Whether you’ve been unceremoniously dumped by your employer or are looking to climb the employment ladder, there’s never been a tougher time to get an Irish job. But with dozens of Irish job sites to help you on your way though, surely it can’t be as tough as it sounds?
Ironically, the explosion of job websites in recent years can often be a further hindrance to your situation, with multiple websites offering identical roles, or these same identical roles worded differently from site to site – not to mention the collection of phantom jobs being plugged by recruitment agencies.
They say getting a job is a full-time job in itself, now more than ever, so you’ll need to do your research to swathe through the mountain of employment sites to find the job of your dreams. Some of us at JOE have been there before, so here are some helpful hints.
Choose the right websites
There are far, far too many Irish job websites for us to mention in this article, but suffice to say, you won’t find your dream job by typing “jobs” into Google. These days the majority of Irish jobseekers tend to congregate on the most popular employment sites, Jobs.ie and Irishjobs.ie, instead. However, who’s to say your ideal job isn’t resting on a low-key, recently-launched website or even the company website alone? And if so, how can you find it?
The quickest, most incisive way to identify your suited roles is to use an employment search engine such as Careerjet.ie or Indeed.ie. Both websites scour the web for newly-posted positions from job sites, newspapers, company websites and classified advertisements – you simply fill in your search criteria and/or location and you’ll have instantly nullified the need to scour a plethora of job-related sites first. Instead, potential jobs come to you.
Is this you? Why is your phone so crap?
It’s worth looking at both Careerjet and Indeed as neither has identical results to the other, and each contain worthwhile functions. Careerjet’s result pages allow you to save results, and to to choose specific salary and date ranges, whilst allowing you explore worldwide Careerjet results for your chosen search.
Indeed has similar options but also allows you to add your email address after your search, for live updates when new roles are created. Either way, both search engines are enormous time savers and should be your first port of call once your CV is fully prepared. Also for part-time or once-off jobs, don’t overlook classified websites such as Gumtree.ie.
Another very simple but effective tip actually does involve Google – go to Google.ie and search your job title or location, or both, and click “show options” on the result page. On the left-hand side you can then break down the results to include only those posted over the past 24 hours or past week.
For quickly-filled roles that require jobseekers to be on their toes, these kind of daily searches will keep your ear to the ground and grant you a fighting advantage over your rivals. Fine, I’ll admit it – I used this exact tip and the query “Journalism job” to get my writing role at JOE.ie – and I cant evn spel 2 gudd.
Cut out the middle man
A common problem people have with job websites is that the number of roles advertised are being artificially inflated through agencies. Months ago, while looking for a role in the glamorous world of telesales, I experienced the validity of these claims first-hand.
After finally giving in to my long-held hatred toward recruitment agencies, I sent off a couple of CVs indiscriminately, some directly to employers, and some to agencies. A few days later, I got a call about a sales role at an insurance company near Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin. The lady at the agency (where I had sent a completely different application) was very excited about the position advertised and gradually I came to see the potential too.
By the end of the week, however, three more agencies I had sent applications to began to call me, one by one, telling me about the Christchurch role, even though I had never actually applied for it. I quickly realised the paucity of roles being provided by Irish agencies in the current environment and the potential challenges to even securing an interview against the likely hundreds of rivals. Although my first-hand experience was limited to sales, I would still encourage any jobseekers to exclude agencies wherever possible.
Even today, the Irish Independent’s Loadzajobs.ie website is advertising 1194 IT roles – an impressive figure, until you read the fine print. Of the 1194 positions, 1175 are being advertising through recruitment agencies, with just 19 roles coming straight from the company itself. If you don’t want to be hounded for weeks on end, stick with the 19 company adverts for now.
Personalise your application
Finally, once you’re C.V is set-up and ready to go (if you need any help there we provided expert tips a couple of weeks back), you shouldn’t just trot out identikit application and cover notes – as this is what exactly what the majority of your rivals for the job will do.
You never want to look sloppy, or that you don’t value the offered role, so simple tips such as taking note of the contact name included in the advertisement and adjusting your cover letter accordingly will really make you stand out.
Likewise, if your past experience mean that you’re qualified to apply for positions in distinctly different spheres, save separate template CVs that promote the skills you have that match each job type.
Finally, once you’ve sent out your application, always save the webpage advert as a web browser favourite – if you can make it over to the computer once you get a call-back, you’ll manage to sound wonderfully knowledgeable about the company’s beloved role.
LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Aideen McQueen – Faith healers, Coolock craic and Gigging as Gaeilge
