There's a Job for That - presentation
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In July 2014 we met at a White House Data Jam โ a workshop that brought together a large group of people to explore how government data could be used to help Americans find jobs: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2014/07/11/vice-president-biden-use-open-data-and-innovation-help-americans-find-jobs Unlike many of the teams, we did not know each other before that day, but we were all interested enough to put together a demo. We got to give a demo of our work to Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez, and CTO Megan Smith on October 21, 2014 https://twitter.com/VP/status/524696725131235328 Aliya Rahman and Bobby Joe Smith of Code for Progress did the front end coding. Jike Chong from Simply Hired did the data analysis and API. Whitney Quesenbery, Center for Civic Design worked on the semantic analysis and plain language. Logan Powell from the US Census Bureau helped with contacts and project management.
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There's a Job for That - presentation
- 1. There's a Job for That A simple way to find jobs that match your skills Demo for V.P. Biden, Secretary of Labor Perez, and CTO Smith October 21, 2014 The Job-for-That team Aliya Rahman, Code for Progress Bobby Joe Smith, Code for Progress Jike Chong, SimplyHired Logan Powell, U.S Census Bureau Whitney Quesenbery, Center for Civic Design Download the file to read the demo script in the notes pages
- 2. If you are looking for work... ... you may struggle to find the jobs that match your skills.
- 3. There's a Job for That starts fast. No login. Low bandwidth. Simple interface.
- 4. One simple question in each step.
- 5. Questions quickly narrow down the app to the right type of work
- 6. Plain language is critical to help job seekers find a good match.
- 7. Skills have been "translated" into simple, everyday questions
- 8. The questions include qualifications plus skills and preferences.
- 9. There's a Job for That can be a front end for more formal jobs profiling tools like ONet.
- 10. The questions come from an analysis of millions of job listings
- 11. The changes in color signal the section of the app.
- 12. The app returns a mix of jobs...showing the kind of work available in the area.
- 13. Job descriptions links lead to the host jobs site.. in this case, Simply Hired
- 14. What's under the covers? ๏ง Requirements extracted from real job listings. ๏ง Analysis to curate and group. ๏ง Plain language questions for ๏ง Qualifications ๏ง Knowledge ๏ง Skills ๏ง A smart algorithm that stays up to date to show the most desired skills for jobs right now There's a Job for That!
- 15. Making jobs information easy ๏ง A simple site ๏ง Works on a mobile device ๏ง Written in plain language ๏ง Matching people's skills to the jobs available today. There's a Job for That!
- 16. Next steps ๏ง Test the concept in job centers ๏ง This will take partnerships There's a Job for That! ๏ง A team to continue the work ๏ง Access to staff and job seekers ๏ง User research to fill out and refine the plain langauge questions
- 17. There's a Job for That! A simple way to find jobs that match your skills. Try it: http://theres-a-job-for-that.herokuapp.com
- 18. Thank you. ๏ง Aliya Rahman & Bobby Joe Smith, Code for Progress aliya@codeforprogress.org ๏ง Jike Chong, SimplyHired jike@simplyhired.com ๏ง Logan Powell, U.S Census Bureau loganpowell@gmail.com ๏ง Whitney Quesenbery, Center for Civic Design whitneyq@civicdesign.org There's a Job for That!
Editor's Notes
- This team met in July 2014 at a White House Data Jam โ a workshop that brought together a large group of people to explore how government data could be used to help Americans find jobs. http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2014/07/11/vice-president-biden-use-open-data-and-innovation-help-americans-find-jobs Unlike many of the teams, we did not know each other before that day, but we were all interested enough to put together a demo. We got to give a demo of our work to Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez, and CTO Megan Smith https://twitter.com/VP/status/524696725131235328 Aliya and Bobby Joe did the front end coding Jike did the data analysis and API Whitney worked on the semantic analysis and plain language. Logan helped with contacts and project management
- If you are looking for work, you may not know what skills are in demand. Or who employers in your area want to hire for jobs...RIGHT NOW. And you may not know how to use existing job search tools if you don't own a computer or know how to write a resume. The result: you struggle to find the jobs that match your skills.
- Our goal is to bridge that gap with a mobile "helper" app we call There's a Job for That. There's no login, No complicated interace, And it's fast Just a few yes-or-no questions, and in about 20 seconds, There's a Job for That can show you options that are right for you. That's fast enough to use while you're in line to see a career counselor or to help you get started on a job bank. Let's show you how it works.
- My uncle โ let's call him Francisco - used to work in a factory, until he hurt his back and was laid up for a few months. Now, he wants a job again. There's nothing for him where he used to work, and he's not sure where to start. My cousin lent him an old hand-me-down phone, so he can make calls. The career center office sent him a link to There's a Job for That and he decides to try it out. He enters his name, and that he's looking for work in Buffalo, NY.
- The first question is "Are you open to retail sales jobs?" That doesn't sound like him โ he doesn't want to be trapped at a cash register all day. Ditto the idea of working as a caregiver.
- But warehouse worker.. that sounds just like him, so he taps YES
- Once he's said yes to a type of job, the questions change. Here's the first question: Can you unload trucks? Well, with his bad back, he can't deal with that kind of work, so he says, "no"
- He's worried that answering "no" will put him out of the running for any of these jobs, but the next one isn't too bad, and he answers yes.
- This question doesn't sound promising either.. Can you stand for long period of time, and lift up to 50 pounds. He's a little worried, but he says no here, too.
- Then, it asks about his driver's license and safe driving record.. he starts to think, maybe there's a driving job. He can do that.
- The next screen seems good: it found 10 jobs. Some of them don't seem perfect...like Assistant Store Manager. But others look like something he could do.
- He sees a number of jobs for a driver, but also finds one, for a detailer. That gives him some options to think about.
- There's a Job for That is a helper app. Once Francisco chooses a job description, he is taken to the site where that job is listed.
- First, we analyzed jobs listings and jobs categories to extract requirements. Of course, they were all worded differently, so we aggregated them and then looked for groupings. For this demo, we included jobs in retail sales, warehouse workers, caregivers, and data entry. Then, for each group we wrote a simple, clear question that summed up what a job seeker would need to have (like a qualification), know (like how to run a cash register) or be able to do (like lifting heavy boxes). Finally, we put all that into an algorithm that runs the back end. The system is โsmartโ in being able to scan job listings for the most desired skills - right now. Because we see this as a helper app, we connected it to the SimplyHired database of job listings, to show how it could replace a more conventional search.
- Thereโs a Job for That addresses three problems that make it hard to read job listings: 1. Your typical job site is pretty complicated, and you have to know a lot about what kind of job you are looking for to get started. 2. Many Americans have low digital literacy, but do have mobile devices that could give them access to powerful tools. 3. Job listings and skills profilers simply arenโt written in plain language, making it hard to know what they are really saying. Our team combined front end app development with a back end API and some plain language work to show what could be done to solve these problems and help the 100M working age Americans without college degrees get to work.
- We can see a lot of ways this would be helpful to people looking for work. We would like to pilot this in a few job centers. It will take both a team and access to staff and job seekers to refine this app into an amazing and useful tool. Is there a group like Code for America (Jennifer Pahlka) or an agency like Career OneStop that we could partner with to make this app a reality?