The Government Job Bank Postings - Tips

by Kevin T Buckley, CPC

In Canada, there is a useful public job board which is supported by the Human Resources Development Corporation of the Federal Government.
You can find the job postings here at http://jobbank.gc.ca  . There are both English and French portals in this site.

The advantage of this job board is that you can locate job openings across Canada. Jobs in Quebec are posted on another site called
emploiquebec - http://emploiquebec.net/index_en.asp  - . These job boards cover a very broad range of occupations, careers and experience levels.
They identify job openings by province and community and are often a prime resource used by job-seekers. They are an excellent introduction to the job market for students and newcomers as well as people who have experience in industry and commerce.

With the postings on the English job bank however there are defined limits in the information that the job bank will accept. If you are in a specialized field such as Transportation, there are limited options of titles which employers can use and the criteria for hiring is likewise quite generic in nature. You can customize these job descriptions to some degree as an employer/recruiter, but due to these limitations of text and titles that the job bank will accept, you may not get the full job description to evaluate. This is very important to remember when you are assessing what jobs to apply to online.

The job posting may contain a lot of generic duties which need to be checked off as choices available when posting the position; these can apply to almost all occupations and those specific job responsibilities that the employer or recruiter wishes to communicate to prospective candidates may be overshadowed by generic duties such as ""working with computers" or, " using office machines". This results in the job-seeker sometimes only receiving a general idea of what the job may actually entail in the way of responsibilities and expectations. To get this more expanded information may require you to follow up the original employer or recruiter's contact info and check the job description that they post on their own site. The biggest advantage of the job bank to employers and candidates alike is that this is a free service and so employers and recruiters do use the board as an adjunct to their own internal job boards or careers pages, sometimes it is the only resource that they use to post job openings as newspaper advertising even in local or community journals usually requires payment.

To ensure that you receive the fullest information available about a given posting, follow up the original posting company, whether it is a recruiter or a private employer, to establish that there is a basis for your interest. In many cases there will be an internal job posting under "Careers" or "Jobs" or a similar page title in the company's website which provides the full description. The employer or recruiter's name is usually noted somewhere in the contact information of the job bank posting. Just sending your resume without checking to see if the job is what you expect can be counter-productive. Google the company name if there is no link in the job bank posting and see how/if the job differs from the posting on the job bank. Is there more or less information on the originating site? You may find more complete information on the original posting site. The job bank is good for the general job seeker but the built in limitations of what it will accept in terms of text and information may limit the information about the actual scope and duties of the position.

Responding to a job bank ad just by its job number without other identifying information in your email may not yield the results that you expect. Attaching your resume without telling the reader why you are writing - selling your experience - is a task only half-completed. Have a draft email prepared that you can copy/paste as needed and which you can customize in order to connect with the reader or hiring manager. The few seconds it takes to do this can make the difference between whether you make it through the first review or are passed over.

As recruiters, we see countless opportunities for connection under-utilized when people do not bother to indicate why they should be considered for a position. Conversely, those who do take the time to note relevant comments about their experience and the logical basis for their interest always will merit a second look.

Many job advertisements in this marketplace generate hundreds and sometimes thousands of responses. It is easy to get lost in the shuffle when you are part of this volume of responses even if you have the exact qualifications that the job calls for. Anything you can do to capture the attention of the reader and give him/her a reason to stop and read your resume is worth your time and the effort involved.

Check all of your options, it is part of your comprehensive job search, but remember to follow up with the original job posting with the employer or
recruiter who has it on their site to see if this is a job you that makes sense for you to pursue.

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