Look who’s getting into the job matching game.
Popular algorithmic dating site eHarmony went mainstream last week that they have their eye on the job search marketplace.
“It seems like there’s a social problem here that needs fixing, much in the same that when we started with relationship matching, there just seemed to be a problem,” said Grant Langston, eHarmony’s vice president of customer experience.
In theory, this seems like a match (pun intended) made in heaven, but I’ll go ahead and predict disaster.
Here are three reasons eHarmony-for-jobs will flop.
1. It’s never worked before. We’ve been down this road before. The story doesn’t end well. Remember itzbig, Climber, Jobfox and Trovix? They’re all gone as matching solutions and only Trovix, a Monster acquisition, cashed out … nevermind the eventual product, 6sense, failed to round the bases.
Langston said, “We don’t see a company in the jobs market that is providing an ‘eHarmony-like’ matching service.” There’s a reason. Google it.
2. No core competency. Big companies with lots of traffic have tried to made inroads into employment for years. Remember eBay’s Kijiji or MySpace jobs? They didn’t make a dent in Craigslist.
The hubris of company’s with eyeballs and brand who think they can make a splash in recruiting never ends well. And, by the way, it reeks of desperation.
3. Recruiting isn’t dating. Motivation to fill out a 29-point questionnaire works if you’re hoping to find true love. It doesn’t work so well with employment. In order for matching to truly work, but parties – in this case, job seeker and employer – must fill out a lengthy dataset. Successful matching doesn’t occur magically, no matter what computer scientists tell you.
Only the most desperate job seekers will do it and employers don’t want to compete lengthy forms to access these candidates.
The guys at Yahoo! Finance were equally skeptical.
They’re right. Stick to the love connections and leave the employment stuff to the professionals.
