Digital shorts

Simply Jobs Group unveils new Middle Eastern partnership

Niche job-board specialist Simply Jobs Group has agreed a strategic partnership with E-waseet.com, the Middle East's leading classified ad web portal.  The deal will enable UK businesses and recruitment agencies to recruit for jobs in the Middle East at a time when many world-leading organisations are establishing offices in the United Arab Emirates.  The group has built, and will manage, a job-board facility (based on its market-leading niche site design) for ewaseetjobs.com, and the intention is that this will establish itself as one of the region's premier online recruitment resources by mid-2010.  All UAE-based jobs advertised on Simply Jobs Group sites will be distributed through the new site.  MD Ian Partington says "Increasing numbers of UK-based workers want to experience working in a different country - and the UAE is usually top of the list, because of the quality of jobs it has on offer.  Although sceptics have said that the Middle Eastern economy is slowing down, it is still growing at around 5% per annum as opposed to the 3% decrease in the UK.  Due to the continuing development in the region, there is also a big requirement in the Middle East for skilled professionals from the UK.  By partnering with E-waseet.com, we can provide job-seekers and recruiters with a solution to their recruitment needs."

UK interviewers least likely to check social networking sites

New research from talent management specialists DDI suggests that UK interviewers are the least likely to check out candidates' social networking pages.  Only 12% of UK interviewers claimed to do so, whereas a quarter of interviewers worldwide use sites such as Facebook and MySpace to verify information - and over half (52%) of these say they've used the information to influence hiring decisions.  The Germans are the most enthusiastic on this score - 46% use the technique, almost twice as many as recruiters form any other country.  Europe V-P Steve Newhall reckons job-seekers are "quite naïve about how personal information on social networking sites is used."  (According to the research, fewer than a third (32%) of candidates think that what they post on social networking sites will affect their chances of getting a job - and even fewer (less than one in four) in the UK.)  "Interviewers should also realise that much of what is put there is for fun, and is unlikely to reflect a candidate's on-the-job demeanour or performance," adds Newhall.  But others take a different view.  "Look at what many employers are missing," said a spokesperson for Click-a-Job.  "With its highly personal focus, social networking is particularly useful in assessing likely motivation and people fit.  If interviewers pass up the chance to see inside applicants' heads, they should not be surprised if their candidate choices are second best."

TwitterJobSearch goes live

TwitterJobSearch.com went live on Wednesday 18^th March - and is already generating traffic from some 80 countries around the world.  The launch means that anyone online can now access the job opportunities posted on Twitter, whether or not they are a member.  While over 1.3bn messages had previously been posted on Twitter (according to the GigaTweet counter), they were only searchable via keywords, trend or popularity.  TwitterJobSearch assesses every post to identify the real job vacancies, conducts various checks and queries, and then visits the destination website to assess each opportunity fully, adding in extra context to ensure the vacancy appears in all relevant job searches - thus making a big difference to its level of exposure.  The new service has been developed by job search engine Workhound, whose director William Fischer says "140 characters, the maximum length of each post, often just isn't enough space to provide all the important information, and as a result many jobs can be overlooked because they don't have a particular job-title or location included.  TwitterJobSearch supports employers and recruiters by adding a vital layer of context to the message, making it easier for their job to be found by job-seekers."  The new service will apparently be joined by a whole suite of smart, semantic recruitment search services in other social media channels in the coming months.  ● A separate survey from O2 reveals that over 700 businesses are saving on marketing, networking and recruitment costs by using Twitter.  Around one in six (17%) of SMEs use the free site to send some three million ‘tweets' a day.

UK's first career site comparison & search site launches

On Thursday 19^th March, CareerSiteAdvisor.com launched as "the UK's first Web 2.0 career site comparison index."  Founded by Keith Robinson, the new site lists thousands of commercial job-boards and corporate career sites, featuring jobs that often can't be found on any other job-boards.  The web-based service also compares reviews by job-seekers and recruitment professionals, and acts as "a one-stop shop aggregating relevant online job-seeker and career advice information."  Job-seekers search for positions by occupation, industry and location, and the site then lists all relevant job-boards and corporate careers sites.  Searches can also be further refined in terms of specific employers, consultancies, jobsites, professional associations etc.  Careers sites can add their listings for free, while those already listed can add to and enhance their listings for "a small annual fee."

Creativepool launches new showreel website

On Tuesday 11^th March, Creativepool.co.uk launched a new version of its specialist creative recruitment site, which will enable its 46,000 registered design professionals to post their showreels online "as part of their job-seeking profile."  Launched back in 2005, the site helps design, advertising and new media candidates to showcase their best work to prospective employers via the internet.

Personneltoday.com sees uplift in HR jobs

Despite the downturn, HR site Personneltoday.com has reported a 12% increase in the number of HR jobs being posted on it.  Its jobs site has experienced a record month (as have other RBI sites such as New Scientists Jobs and Flightglobal Jobs, incidentally).  The latest figures reveal that Personnel Today Jobs has 1,770 jobs on its site, compared to just 444 on People Management's.