I [@strebel] am having a bit of an idea shortage at the moment so I am turning to you intelligent people for ideas for a solution to a challenge.
Mission: Create an not-for-profit online property to assist people in finding jobs, careers, training, and freelance work in the Tech/Web industry and ensure that this entity drives demand for these services in the future, beyond the economic downturn.
Something non-traditional, I dont think we need another job board site.. even though that may be a component of the solution. How can we leverage existing data and information?
What is missing in the market right now? What can be improved? How can we better connect government resources, employers, and skilled labor?
If money was not an object, and you had a room full of the best web developers and designers to build your creation. What would it do/be to solve the challenge?
One idea would be to have an anonymous auction website. Candidates would put their information online but no bio or contact information.
Employers would have to say they would like to talk to the person, and then list a price range for the position.
Candidate could accept, decline or request more information.
Theoretically there could be a bidding war for top-talent.
Data could be mined and you could figure out what skills are most in demand and what certifications the marketplace was willing to pay for.
Bernie
People need connectors, a way for all involved to have conversations, share stories, talk about gigs and vent.
Job boards don’t work, because there’s no interaction. Social networks don’t work, because there aren’t any job boards. Blogs don’t work, because, well…no one maintains them.
Perhaps that’s it. Blog-type sites that aggregate comments, convos and job postings about any particular topic, interest, location or specialty.
Good question…
As a previous manager I hated sorting through hundreds of resumes only to take a gamble on who would be the right fit for my team. I would love to see a site where employers and employees could be matched against a series of criteria that is more in depth than the typical “copy and paste resume”
Employer: Creates a profile, and for each position they have to fill, creates a position profile. In addition to skills, software knowledge, and previous experience required, they can also add facts like shifts available, company culture, advancement opportunity, and the other not-so-obvious factors that make up the work environment and its people… for example I would have had “ninjas” listed under my team traits because it was something we used in the workplace but not really something I would use on a job posting…
Job Seeker: Fills out their own profile which has the standard skills, education and experience, but also has personality type tests/ questionnaires, and surveys about what they like or don’t like in the workplace (free bagels yay, cubical farms boo). Also, whether they are looking for full-time, part time, salary, gig, contract, etc.
The web app would then compare seekers to positions and display something like an interactive heat map with the hottest part of the map highlighting the position and profile that matches the best. Below the map could be an ordered list by match percentage of the top 10 or so results.
You could expand the idea out to educational facilities matching seekers’ interests, VC’s matching entrepreneurial ideas, or whatever else you have in mind, but the idea is to get not only the right talent, but the right personalities and mutual goals connected.
And if anyone is already doing this and I’m just not in the know, please point me to them!
~Shauna~
Interesting. For boulder.me we have a jobs@boulder.me email that has a curated list of companies around the city that welcome people looking to move to Boulder, and help them find work. People send email to the list, I write them back, and then pass it on to 35 companies.
An interesting approach, wonder what more we can do?