Smart setup lets everyone know where they stand

With fewer job openings, employers are being swamped with applications when they decide to post a job, says QJumpers' sales and marketing manager, Simon Oldham.

"If someone does have a job vacancy, it's a lot tougher to manage the process now because of the huge volume of applicants. If you have a job vacancy it is a lot of work nowadays and it's really hard," Oldham says.

QJumpers offers applicant sourcing and filtering services to employers for a fee.

"The biggest need in this market is finding a way to help employers cut down on administration time with all those applicants," he says.

QJumpers started in May 2006 as a way for small to medium businesses to source talent without paying for the services of a major recruitment company. Recruiters generally charge a commission of around 15 per cent of the employees' salary.

"We've broken down the recruitment process into its various stages and called them products. An employer can buy as much help as they need depending on their circumstances," says Oldham.

Employers can post jobs online and track the responses of applicants using QJumper's website for $249, plus GST per job.

Additional services such as filtering and short-listing can also be bought. It's a scaled-down version of a full recruitment company service.

QJumpers can also offer a full service which includes interviewing candidates and providing the three top choices to the employer.

"We don't say that we know that person will fit into your company culture because we don't know your company culture. But we say, 'This is this person. This is what they're like. This is how they like to be managed. These are the kinds of environments they would fit well into'."

QJumpers relies on the online job-seeker market and posts jobs on the top existing jobsites as well as its own.

"By using the top three jobsites, you get to about 95 per cent of all people looking online and around about 80 per cent of all jobseekers in New Zealand," Oldham says.

All candidates receive confirmation emails once they apply for a position and are kept informed as to how their application is progressing.

When shortlisted or rejected, candidates are notified immediately by email.

Employers receive an online account where they can manage applicants. They can click to reject or shortlist an applicant. They are also given an option to customise email responses sent to candidates. Oldham says the system is not just a way for employers to wade through CVs.

"From a job seeker's point of view, we get a lot of comments that they love the fact that they know where they stand.

"Even people who have been dismissed after a week say that it's been fantastic; 'I know that it wasn't successful and I can move on to the next one'."

Oldham says that they are the only company in New Zealand that has a free applicant tracking system linked to all the top job sites.

He says their software also offers candidates help in shaping their applications into a format which makes them easier to digest. Oldham says their locally developed application software is designed around what New Zealand employers want to know about applicants.

"If candidates follow our online process and enter our talent pool, what they then have is a CV that the New Zealand employer finds useful."

It's possible an employer can chuck out a promising CV just because the key information does not jump out at them.

"If employers can't find that information very quickly and easily, often that will rule them out of the process."

Candidates can submit themselves for inclusion in various talent pools before a job is posted online.

"If you want to keep your information on file, we have an automatic matching process."

If an employer and a candidate check the same boxes then they are linked together in searches. If candidates want to be at the top of an employer's search results, they can pay to have their information pre-screened and verified.

"What we'll do is meet with them, we'll cite their certificates, we'll call their former employers, we'll check to see that the skills they say they can do, they can actually do."

The process is a lot more involved than simply clicking the "apply" button on the job advert. But spamming out CVs is not an effective way of locating a job.

"A lot of applicants just attach their CV and that's it. They may write a covering letter.

"But when an employer goes filtering these hundreds of CVs, whether on their desk or in their inbox, they're just searching for a couple of pieces of information."

To interview and screen candidates, QJumpers has a large pool of contract HR people to call upon.

Oldham makes a clear distinction between his company and a large recruitment company.

"There is a key philosophical difference between what we do and what a full recruitment company does. A full recruitment company has to know their client inside and out and know their culture and know what kind of person would fit that role."

QJumpers focuses on providing information about their candidates in their job pool. They will conduct interviews, check references and do psychometric testing. But QJumpers leaves the election of candidates up to the employer.

"The whole idea of a recruitment company is that they're providing three people who they think would be perfect for that role and that company. That's why they earn the extra money."

Contact David Maida at: www.DavidMaida.com