Learn to Impress the Robots?

I read on the BBC news a couple of days ago that The Chemistry Group has designed an on-line 'game' designed to analyse potential job candidates.

 The Chemistry Group describes itself as a 'talent consultancy' and its web site states that it is expert "at using predictive assessment to define what great people look like for your business and building highly accurate recruitment processes".

 The 'highly accurate recruitment process' is designed to save employers the trouble of reading through large numbers of CVs by subjecting job applicants to an on-line 'game' that (supposedly!) separates the wheat from the chaff. The Chemistry Group is not alone in producing this sort of software - and I suppose we should all have expected that somebody would - but I can't help wishing that nobody had.

 It is certainly true that eventually, at some point, any employer deciding to use this software would have to meet his 'wheat' face-to-face and come to a reasonable decision about which ear of it might fit his own particular sheaf, but it is equally true that the cleverest software is not as discriminating as an experienced human being.

Of course job hunters should make themselves aware of this technology and learn how to use it to their own best advantage - but employers should be aware that their own inbuilt software is (as yet!) a far superior product.

 Geoffrey

Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com - Yet Again

I originally wrote about this very strange organisation as long ago as the 24th of August last year, and comments are still trickling in because - alas - Get Hired Boot Camp is still in business, still preying on the unwary, and still making money out of the misfortunes of other people.

Chinese people would call the times we are living in 'interesting'. Less philosophical people would call them 'hard'.

Having lived though a whole series of 'hard' times, I know that there will always be people who try to profit from them - and that there will always be people desperate enough to help them to do it.

If you are looking for work, do be careful about the on-line company you keep. Organisations like Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com charge for the sort of advice you can get free, on-line, from hundreds of other honest, reliable sources who are truly interested in helping you, rather than helping themselves.

Geoffrey