Online Recruitment Feature
Responses below are from our MD, Julian Felstead and others at 1Job.co.uk:
1) In the light of the Monster ‘hacking’ how safe is online recruitment and why should recruiters have no concerns about using sites?
“1Job’s job search engine business is about sending candidates to vacancies shown on job sites on the internet. We don’t store CV’s on our site so this issue does not affect us directly. The effect of the Monster ‘hacking’ vulnerability affects all of us involved in online recruitment.
“Details of how Monster’s site was hacked are not known or clear, but it’s likely that other job boards with searchable CV databases could be vulnerable.
“One useful way of countering such attacks would be for Monster to reveal to other Job Boards in the industry, details of how the attack was made. A joint working group could then be set up to improve job board database security.
“This is a problem as CV database’s need to be searchable by recruiters. In many cases hacking can be down to how usernames and passwords are handled, not only by sites but by the users of the databases.
“Restrictions and limitations on CV download volumes over a time period is critical, as a security feature.
“Of prime importance too is to remind candidates not to include unnecessary personal details like date of birth, place of birth, national insurance numbers etc. that could be used for any aspect in financial fraud.”
2) In a massively candidate driven market what value does the online industry give to a recruiter?
“The primary value of 1Job’s service is different to that offered by job boards. As a job search engine we take candidates directly to the job boards or recruiter’s job adverts. We provide the job title and a summary details of the jobs The job hunter can then choose to click through to the site hosting the full job advert descriptions.
“Our job aggregator model enables candidates to find the jobs they’re looking for on the job board, or recruiters site – from over 300,000 fresh jobs each day. Job search engines and job boards make job hunting fast and efficient and they enable recruiters to receive applications and find candidates very quickly. There is no comparison in this respect between online job advertising and any other offline job advertising media.”
3) Are social networks still the biggest threat to traditional Job Boards?
“Social networks are social networks. And as people tend to separate social activities to work and career activities job specific websites, and job search engines like 1Job, will always be the first choice for any serious job hunter. They are designed specifically for purpose.
“Unless a social networking site focuses on jobs and careers then they will always be third rate at best. But … professional and business networks like Linkedin are a different matter and these are useful for recruitment. Most of these types of sites are aimed at senior office and management people and these are the ones that use them.
“At 1Job, what we do think though, is that niche business sector sites will become adapted and used for carrying more vacancy advertising and career information.”
4) How will online technology evolve to benefit the relationship with recruiters?
“Remember we are still at the dawn of the internet age … the areas that will evolve to substantially help recruiters; and employers, job boards and job search engines; will be technologies that enable each party to ‘find-and-share’ candidates and job opportunities.
“Technologies similar to those we use in 1Job’s search engine algorithms to help enable candidates to find those “needle-in-the-haystack” opportunities will help.
“Fundamentally the technology firstly requires standardization of information exchange, such as those currently being proposed by the for HR-XML consortium. And secondly there needs to be significant improvements in Natural Language Processing technology.
“Using these two technologies together will enable both job descriptions and CV’s to be accurately machine read, understood, categorised, filed and retrieved correctly and meaningfully. This will then enable a true ‘find-and-share’ methodology that will revolutionise the industry. There are strong signs that this approach is already starting to happen.”
5) Are there too many Job Boards and how do you differentiate your site?
“Yes, there are definitely too many job boards, but the problem isn’t just the number of boards a job hunter needs to look at. There are thousands of other website that are all potentially relevant to a candidates job search. Sites provided by recruitment agencies and employers.
“Our site 1Job.co.uk is a job search engine designed to help the job hunter find the job ads they’re looking for. We differentiate ourselves by trying to provide a comprehensive list of the entire jobs advertised online in the UK. We then direct candidates directly to the job adverts on job boards and other sites in the UK and Ireland.
“The UK has approximately 1000 job boards, 25,000 recruiters and 2.5m employers. 1Job positions itself at the top of what might be visualised as a ‘job-content-pyramid’. Our mission is to help job hunters ‘drill-down’ into the pyramid to find the type of job that’s right for them, in the location they want to work.”
In an ideal world, there would only be one job board, where all candidates could search and apply for every advertised vacancy. Back in the real world, we know that this is an extremely competitive, where job seekers, recruiters and employers need to decide which job board best meets their needs. Dedicated Job Search Engines, like 1Job, can help candidates search many sites at once. Advert distribution services like Broadbean can greatly reduce the effort involved in posting job adverts. However, the best bet for disintermediation in this sector, lies with the expected mergers and acquisitions that will surely take place this year, as some companies struggle to stay afloat in a tightening market. In our sector, 1Job.co.uk differentiates itself by keeping it simple and delivering on our commitment to clients.
Julian Felstead – 1Job.co.uk
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