I noticed Mr Visible’s thread about having gotten laid off today – and it’s only one of a fair number of posts about people looking for work over the past year or so. In Mr Visible’s thread someone mentioned that the company he was working for was looking for an IT guy and he’d be willing to send Mr V the info. It reminded me of the time when Tygr lost his job and it just so happened that the firm I was working for was looking for someone with his skills. I had him e-mail me a résumé and turned it in to the woman doing the hiring, and he became the successful one of two qualified candidates.
He’s still there; I’m not. There’s something ironic in that.
But what provokes me to post in ATMB is to ask what board management would think of a thread or threads where people out of work could describe who they are and what their skills are, and other dopers – HR people and folks who know what the companies they work for are looking for – could read and perhaps help make linkups of the sort I was able to do for Tygr.
Does this sound acceptable? If so, what forum? MPSIMS?
I suppose there are privacy issues here, but if things are done in they way you described with Tygr - sounds like a good idea to me. This is such a helpful community - if we can send baby clothes to one another, and white elephants, why not resumes?
IANAMod or Admin, but I can’t see the harm… If a job seeker voluntarily posts that s/he is looking for work and wants to see if anyone can help them, why not?
I once asked a fellow Doper for a resume when I found out that the Doper became unemployed due to a layoff. While I was unable to get the Doper a job, at least I was able to give it a chance…
What sort of issues, mnemosyne? We’re assuming that people will be voluntarily posting their personal information. I can’t be much worse than what I do when I post personal information (with my real name, to boot)…
I could have sworn I read somewhere that stuff like that - classified ad-like stuff, I guess - was verboten. I’m probably wrong, though, but it’s sticking in my craw nevertheless.
I think, dan, that there’s a clear difference between what Polycarp’s proposing and a classified-ad-type thread, even though they’re both selling something, as it were.
My own opinion (for discussion purposes only, not for official policy use, do not operate heavy machinery after reading) is that a selling-it type thread ought to be acceptable if it’s both personal and notable. So, for instance:
Hey! I just wrote a book and it’s out for sale! should be acceptable, because it’s a notable achievement by a specific Doper.
Hey! I’m looking for a job in engineering! should be acceptable, since changing jobs (IMHO) is a notable event in one’s life, and obviously it concerns one specific Doper.
Hey! I’m selling my '76 Chevy van! should NOT be acceptable because that’s not a particularly notable event.
Hey! my company is hiring folks for 10 IT positions! should NOT be acceptable (except in response to a request like the one above) because it’s not really a particular Doper asking.
And, of course, spam fails both the “personal” test and the “notable” test.
Since, by definition, there aren’t a whole lot of notable events in one’s life, and many of those can’t really be construed as “selling it” I don’t think such a policy would increase thread traffic much at all.
Oh, no argument here at all, zut. Just saying I coulda sworn I’d seen a “ruling” on this before.
A job bank, as it were, sounds good to me - with 25,000 members and countless unregistered lurkers, it only stands to reason that people could benefit, for the reasons you’ve mentioned.
I would guess that an objection to the idea would be a server-space issue; if “I lost my job, anyone hiring” threads are not discouraged, it could open up the field for a plethora of job-hunting threads. (After all, while losing one’s job is a notable event, it’s not as if it’s a rare occurrence - I would bet that nearly everyone switches jobs at least once in their lives.)
(1) Would there be a demand for it? How many unemployed (or otherwise considering a move) Dopers are there? How many would want to look for work on these boards (and for the latter category, how many would want details of their searching recorded for public view)?
(2) Would there be a supply for it? How many Dopers are in a position to offer jobs or otherwise help? Also, would there be enough of a spread of job types and locations to make any kind of help worthwhile (e.g. I wouldn’t look for jobs here, since there aren’t enough London-area Dopers in my line of work to make it useful to me).
(3) Given (1) and (2) would the additional demand for resources be worthwhile - I’m thinking in terms of memory, storage space and time (e.g. technical support and moderator time). That’s not really my area of expertise, to be honest (Anthracite?)
It might be a good idea, but I doubt it’ll ever get off the ground unless the board administration believe that (1) and (2) outweigh (3).
Of course, if I’d read Polycarp’s post in less than three seconds I’ve might have paid more attention to his idea that it would be a thread rather than a new forum.
We’ve always been open to the idea of Dopers helping one another out and never more than in these hard times.
At the same time, we also feel that these situations are generally handled best on a case by case basis. Because of that, we’ve always asked that if you had a job gone begging or you were looking for work that you clear such a posting with us first. In most circumstance we have no problems with it but we would prefer to judge for ourselves first.
But yeah, bring it on, let’s see what we can do here.
