Weekend Thinking: The Pitfalls of the Online Job Market
Getting a job used to be easy.
At least, that’s what the baby boomers tell us.
We’ve all heard the tales. You walked out of high school with your diploma and went down the street to the nearest business. There you were given a job you would stay in until retirement. Oh, you lost your job for some reason? No worries. Just walk down the street a little farther to the next business and get another one.
I don’t know what messed up parallel universe you old people were living in, but I do know that it’s long gone.
Today all job postings are listed online. Unless you haven’t looked for a job since 2002, you’ve definitely spent some time on Monster, Workopolis and, of course, the government job bank. Some companies are even using big data to source suitable candidates.
At face value, applying for jobs online seems like a godsend. Who has time to dress up nice and go to the place in person anyway?
But as Leah Eichler explains in this Globe and Mail article, the online job market is causing all sorts of problems for job seekers:
“On the job search front, technology acts more like a gatekeeper than a door opener. Before human eyes view your painstakingly written résumé, it will likely be screened by a software application that can easily spit you out for a host of unforeseen reasons. Nowadays, sending in a résumé can feel like dispatching it to a black hole that swallows your dreams and ambitions. Welcome to the job search apocalypse.”
Sounds about right.
The article goes on to quote Adrienne Tom, a résumé writer, interview coach and employment strategist. Tom says today’s résumés are “branded, targeted, results-focused marketing tools that are commonly scanned by a computer before they are read by a person,” and job seekers need to learn to how to make their applications stand out in the pile.
Eichler continues:
“To ensure your résumé gets read by a human, Ms. Tom says you should use Word documents instead of PDFs, avoid complex formatting, including graphs and charts, and ensure that contact information is kept out of the header.
Above all, she said, job seekers should customize their applications by using the key words emphasized in the job ad – and repeating them several times.
These key words must also be matched with supporting evidence. For example, the term “leadership,” may be an important key word but it should be accompanied with a well-matched description, such as, ‘Directed a team of 26 through the creation and execution of a $16-million marketing strategy in collaboration with four external partners,’ Ms. Tom said.”
So there’s definitely an art to it. But even if you’ve mastered it, there is no guarantee you’ll get a call. Unless you have connections to leverage, on top of using the follow-up email/call where appropriate, it almost seems like the luck of the draw.
Yet within this struggle are business opportunities. Companies and startups have emerged to help make navigating the digital job market easier.
For instance Indiana-based WorkHere aims to make it easier for jobseekers to find the job they want, where they want and when they want.
RecTech Media did a podcast recently with the company’s co-founder and COO Mike Seidle.
Listen below:
Then there are companies like Mentat that are taking things as step further. As Fitz Tepper from TechCrunch writes, the company specializes in helping those who want a new job, but haven’t had enough time to get things in order to take “the leap.”
“To these people, Mentat will take over and optimize their LinkedIn and Resume, the Literally write cover letters and have one their advisors apply to job for you, by hand,” Tepper writes.
“The company also pairs you with a dedicated, real-life advisor to talk via phone, chat and email as much as you want during the process. The company has about 50 advisors on staff who have expertise in tons of different industries, so they can give you the best advice for the specific industry you want to work in.”
You literally don’t have to do anything.
But it’s not just job seekers who are having issues with navigating the online job market, employers are too. With so many online platforms to post to, some employers are having a hard time finding quality candidates in the slew of applications. New Brunswick startup Qimple has designed a platform that helps employers connect with the right candidates who apply through their job board postings.
Like most things that appear to become “better” with the help of the internet, online job seeking/hiring has a new set of issues and problems. It’s cool to see startups emerging to try and solve these problems, but there are still some questions we could ask about the online job market:
-What are other ways besides the traditional job boards that companies can use to post available positions?
-Are they affective?
-If so, to whom?
-What role does face-to-face, human interaction play in the online job market?
– Who is getting left behind when it comes to the online job market?
– Do those people matter?