Online job search and job management tools come in many sizes and shapes. Rarely do they warrant much attention – unless your job search management tool is from JibberJobber (http://www.JibberJobber.com).
We caught up with Jason Alba, CEO/Founder, JibberJobber today to learn more about why JibberJobber’s ‘career toolset’ is so very important to job seekers.
What gave you the idea to develop JibberJobber?
I was in my own job search, the first real search I ever had to do, and found it to be a very frustrating process. I think one of the most frustrating things was that I had tools like JibberJobber as a working professional, and I knew that the people I was interviewing with (recruiters, HR, etc.) had sophisticated tools, and wondered why the regular Joe Jobseeker didn’t have anything except a spiral notebook or homemade spreadsheet.
Why is JibberJobber important to job seekers?
Most obvious, it helps job seekers organize and manage all of the information they collect in a job search. But I consider the value to be much greater over the long-term! If you begin to use JibberJobber now, for this job search (or before you even enter a job search), imagine the ability to come back in a year or two when you are looking for a job again and track important information like contacts within a company, your history of what you’ve learned about that company (do they have good benefits, what their next year’s goals are, etc.). JibberJobber is a tool to help manage a career, and the various job searches that you have during a career – these days there are very few jobs that employ you to retirement – and JibberJobber seems to be the only, or at least the best, long-term tool to help you manage all of this. Additionally, it takes counsel from coaches and career experts and allows you to manage your network (complementary to social networking sites like LinkedIn), prepare for an interview and many other things.
How does JibberJobber improve the job search process?
Instead of spending time wondering who you talked to, where you applied and who you need to talk to, JibberJobber helps you organize all of this. Believe it or not, I even missed an important phone meeting that I had set up – what a mistake! So much information can be overwhelming, and trying to keep it all organized can burn time (if you are creating your own little tracking system like I had done). But like I mention above, don’t forget how important it is to understand how to manage these job searches over time, as your network and contacts grow, these will be critical in a future job search.
From your feedback, what are the main tools and features job seekers are looking for when searching for jobs online?
There are lots of things that are requested, like the ability to manage and track all of the different names/passwords of job boards they use. Obviously, keeping track of companies, jobs applied to and network contacts is critical. But the online aspect adds a little more complexity because it is so easy to apply to a bunch of different jobs rather quickly – and keeping track of all that can be a mess. Some sites have a “save job” feature, and allow you to rank or put notes, but that only works for that site. JibberJobber really helps in this regard as it is not site specific, rather it is like a hub to bring all of this information into one place. Additionally, if the job goes away on the job board it won’t automatically go away in your JibberJobber system. You might want to keep that information forever as it may be useful down the road, even when you are employed!
What do you think about job board aggregators/verticals and job boards in general?
I spent all of my time on job boards looking for and applying to jobs. Verticals like Just-Posted.com are great because it pretty much allows me to go to one place to do a job search. I admit that right now I don’t fully understand the differences between SimplyHired.com and Indeed.com, except one seems to get more traffic and one claims to have more jobs (or be the most comprehensive) – something that Joel Cheezman is watching and reporting on his blog. Other tools like RSS and e-mail notifications on my saved preferences are cool. I think that one piece of information that is continually miscommunicated is that job boards are indeed useful! I was using them wrong, or not optimally. To find a listing on Just-Posted.com is great, and its okay to apply to it, but there is also great information such as who is hiring, possibly names of HR or hiring managers, what the company is doing (if they are looking for a new Director or VP, they are likely shaking things up or looking to grow), etc. It definitely is a great tool that could and should be used for what its intended, but there are other ways to get value out of the tool!
JibberJobber brings order to chaos, and gives career minded job seekers the job search management tools to be successful.
