Job seekers will from today have free use of an advanced
specialised web search engine to look for jobs near where they
live.
Zubed Jobs is a
location-aware search engine that can identify jobs advertised on
company websites and match them to the job seeker's location,
presenting them on an online map for ease and speed of use.
"It's about finding local jobs for local people," said CEO Ian
Haynes.
The site will be launched at the Conservatives Party's Social
Action Conference tomorrow. Party leader David Cameron will say how
happy the party is "to champion this use of location intelligence",
and say it could make a real difference to many businesses and job
seekers.
The system was developed from an internal talent management
system written by Zubed, a division of Triad, a listed computer
services firm that specialises in geospatial information and
mapping applications.
The talent management system is presently used by a global PC
maker to manage its internal consultants, as well as other firms to
add mapping to customer relationship management, sales prospecting
and talent management.
Haynes said that before the credit crunch the problem was to
manage one's skills pool effectively. But when the jobs dried up,
they re-engineered the program so that it became a job finder
rather than a skills finder.
The system uses semantics and artificial intelligence technology
to "disambiguate" or clarify the true meaning of the information
contained in CVs and job descriptions and allow the job seeker to
match them.
Zubed Jobs is currently finding over 110,000 UK jobs, Haynes
said. Some might also be listed with recruitment agencies, but the
primary data sources were company websites, he said.
Haynes said the system is a pure search engine, but it will
search only firms that it knows exist. In addition, no personal
data is exchanged unless the job seeker sends it, thus preserving
the privacy and security of their information.