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I think that a much simpler solution is to charge people to apply for jobs. That's what colleges do. There are certainly some complications that would come alo

by WillyF 16y ago

I think that a much simpler solution is to charge people to apply for jobs. That's what colleges do. There are certainly some complications that would come along with this, but there would be far fewer than with keeping a database of everyone who has ever applied for any job. I don't love the idea, and I know quite a few people have tried making it work unsuccessfully, but I still think it's far more realistic.

raganwald 16y ago
Clearly that has worked about as well as micro payments for email ;-) But seriously, there is an equivalent strategy, and that is putting up a small road block such as writing a test application. The problem is that many qualified people won't do it. Those who are currently employed are the least motivated to pay in time or money to submit an application.
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  Last I checked, theladders.com is still fairly successful (business model: pay $35/month for your job search).
cj 16y ago
Colleges charge fees more to make money than to screen candidates. We don't want to have the job market profiting from the unemployed. Stanford University, for example: $90 fee X 20,000 applicants = $1,800,000
- pwim 16y ago
  The first goal of universities charging to cover their costs. Stanford isn't pocketing that 1.8 million.
  - cj 16y ago
    Maybe my opinions are a bit baised as a student who spent over $400 in fees applying to colleges. I would have assumed that my universities' costs would be offset by the $40,000 I'm paying every year for the next four years, rather than erroneous fees that aren't tallied in the advertised total cost of attendance.
    - irrelative 16y ago
      The point of the fee isn't to make money. Imagine how many people would have applied if it were free? They still need employees to read all of those applications and they need to keep the quality of student up as high as possible (so they can't just outsource it, or use a lottery). Basically, your tuition could be even higher if they dropped the fee to apply.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
pbiggar 16y ago
This is an excellent idea, though obviously needs some tweaks: Perhaps you get a refund if you get past some simple metric like being able to do a FizzBuzz test? Or get partial money back for each step in the hiring process you get through (30% for FizzBuzz, 30% for phone screen, 40% for being good in person). Either way, if you're trying to reduce the number of spam applications, this is certainly a great way of doing it, and it's much much simpler than building a massive database.
pbiggar 16y ago
Perhaps this could be a two way process. Both the employer and employee give $100 to an escrow company, created explicitly for this purpose. If they waste your time (fake postings, no-one hired, etc) you get the $200 back. If you waste their time (you're bad at what you do), they get the $200. That said, it might be hard to figure out when hiring company has failed the applicant.

by WillyF 16y ago

raganwald 16y ago

Clearly that has worked about as well as micro payments for email ;-) But seriously, there is an equivalent strategy, and that is putting up a small road block such as writing a test application. The problem is that many qualified people won't do it. Those who are currently employed are the least motivated to pay in time or money to submit an application.

yummyfajitas 16y ago
Last I checked, theladders.com is still fairly successful (business model: pay $35/month for your job search).

cj 16y ago

Colleges charge fees more to make money than to screen candidates. We don't want to have the job market profiting from the unemployed. Stanford University, for example: $90 fee X 20,000 applicants = $1,800,000

pwim 16y ago
The first goal of universities charging to cover their costs. Stanford isn't pocketing that 1.8 million.
- cj 16y ago
  Maybe my opinions are a bit baised as a student who spent over $400 in fees applying to colleges. I would have assumed that my universities' costs would be offset by the $40,000 I'm paying every year for the next four years, rather than erroneous fees that aren't tallied in the advertised total cost of attendance.
  - irrelative 16y ago
    The point of the fee isn't to make money. Imagine how many people would have applied if it were free? They still need employees to read all of those applications and they need to keep the quality of student up as high as possible (so they can't just outsource it, or use a lottery). Basically, your tuition could be even higher if they dropped the fee to apply.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

pbiggar 16y ago

This is an excellent idea, though obviously needs some tweaks: Perhaps you get a refund if you get past some simple metric like being able to do a FizzBuzz test? Or get partial money back for each step in the hiring process you get through (30% for FizzBuzz, 30% for phone screen, 40% for being good in person). Either way, if you're trying to reduce the number of spam applications, this is certainly a great way of doing it, and it's much much simpler than building a massive database.

pbiggar 16y ago

Perhaps this could be a two way process. Both the employer and employee give $100 to an escrow company, created explicitly for this purpose. If they waste your time (fake postings, no-one hired, etc) you get the $200 back. If you waste their time (you're bad at what you do), they get the $200. That said, it might be hard to figure out when hiring company has failed the applicant.