Today Google announced a new job Search experience that aims to help job seekers find employment opportunities. For the first time, when someone uses their phone or computer to search on Google for a job, they will see a streamlined experience letting them explore, research and find relevant, local job postings.
The launch builds on Google’s existing commitment in Sub Saharan Africa to improve economic opportunities for job seekers and employers, demonstrated through Grow with Google initiatives. The Digital Skills for Africa program, Google’s commitment to train 1m African youth between April 2016 and March 2017, was achieved and surpassed. In July 2017, this program was extended to see 10m youth and 100k developers trained across the region by 2022.
“Finding employment is still very difficult for many people,” said Charles Murito Google Kenya country manager. “With Kenya’s high unemployment rate, this new job Search experience will help the millions of Kenyans searching for new opportunities. We believe that the web allows anyone, anywhere, of any age, to grow their business, learn the skills they need to get a job, to grow in their career, become an entrepreneur or developer. This new jobs Search tool will be a key driver for connecting job seekers to open opportunities, helping more people to grow with Google.”
As of today, job seekers will be able to use the new Search experience to help them quickly and easily find opportunities suited to them, through an immersive experience that lets them explore jobs from across the web, and refine their search to meet their specific needs.
Users will be able to view at-a-glance details about postings, such as job title, location, whether it’s full-time, part-time or an internship, as well as detailed information should a job be of interest. Using Google Maps integration, job seekers can search for jobs from any place they can find on the map, and if they’re signed in, they can even see how long it would take to commute to the job from home.
Searching for a new job can take time, so if you step away from your job search, Google has made it easy to pick up where you left off, as well as stay in the loop on opportunities that are right for you. Simply push the “get alerts” button to get email notifications when new jobs matching your search appear.
As this is an open ecosystem, Google is inviting all job sites, platforms and employers — big and small — to integrate with us and make their jobs eligible to display in the new jobs Search experience. With Google’s newly released open documentation, any jobs provider is able to integrate its content through open structured schema.org web markup standards that Google supports.
To optimise the feature and make it more useful, Google is working with a broad and growing cross-section of partners, including BrighterMonday and Fuzu. These collaborations ensure Google is able to present job postings content accurately, as soon as it is posted, to exactly the people that will find it most relevant.
According to Jussi Hinkkanen- Fuzu’s co-founder and CEO-, online jobs search is a key driver for connecting job seekers to open opportunities, which in turn helps local economies grow. “Fuzu (www.fuzu.com) has supported more than 2 million Kenyans in accelerating their careers and hundreds of employers in finding just the right talent for their organizations. The partnership with Google will take our ambitions to next level. Easier access to jobs will empower both job seekers and employers, and accelerate economic growth in Kenya,” said Hinkkanen.
Emmanuel Mutuma, Kenya’s Brighter Monday CEO, is optimistic that the partnership will go a long way in bringing job seekers and employers closer to one another. “We are in a mobile-first world and our focus is to add value to job seekers through a stress-free experience, our partnership with Google is a step towards this,” he concluded.
“This new job Search experience is part of our broader commitment to improve economic opportunities for job seekers and employers through Google technologies in partnership with the broader employment industry. Google is committed to providing useful, accurate and relevant information based on your search queries and helping you connect to your next job. In this way we hope to make a contribution towards matching job seekers with jobs, thereby taking steps to tackle the skills gap,” Murito said.
Google also supports tech startups at various stages of their lifecycle through the Launchpad program. Announced last year, Launchpad Accelerator Africa will provide over $3 million in equity-free funding, mentorship, working space and access to expert advisers to over 60 African startups over 3 years. Intensive 3-month programs, held twice per year, will run out of a new Google Launchpad Space in Lagos – the program’s first location outside of the United States.
