Mail and Guardian reporter
The Mail & Guardian has opened South Africa’s first recruitment service on the Internet.
Called work@za, the service is housed at the World Wide Web site of the Electronic Mail & Guardian. It lists a variety of current jobs available in South Africa, and on-line users can apply for many of the the posts directly via the Internet.
work@za also offers a free resume service, enabling Internet users to pro-actively market their skills.
The M&G has entered into an arrangement with the Right Agency, one of the country’s premier recruitment advertising and personnel selection specialists, which will integrate the database into its client service programme.
“We are initially concentrating on posts in the academic and public service/development and IT sectors,” says M&G director Bruce Cohen, “as these are key communities on the Net”.
“The Mail & Guardian is the country’s premier recruitment medium for posts in the educational and development sectors, and our on-line service will be used to strengthen our positioning.
“Non-governmental organisations and universities worldwide constitute a major user group of the information highway. By publishing these posts in both the “hard” and “soft” editions of the Mail & Guardian,, we are able to broaden the reach, quality and response rate of our recruitment advertising.”
work@a will also help speed up and streamline the recruitment process through the use of standardised on-line and off-line application forms. Says Cohen: “We will soon be be storing standard public service application forms on our Web site so applicants will no longer have to fetch or wait for a copy to be mailed to them before they can apply for a post. They need simply print it out or complete the on-line version.” .
Right Agency MD Jack Bensch says: “work@za will enhance the synergies between ourselves and the Mail & Guardian, and offer our clients a powerful value-added service in this recruitment medium of the future.” Adds Bensch: “In key sectors of our society there are serious skills shortages, and work@za will enable organisations and companies to extend their recruitment net at low cost to a global marketplace.”
work@za will soon be linking up with a similar service from The Guardian in London. “The Guardian is the UK’s market-leader in a variety of professional appointment areas, especially education,” says Cohen, “and our collaboration with our parent company will create an unsurpassed recruitment marketplace.” work@za can be found at the Electronic Mail & Guardian WWW site: