The popular Myjobseye website is very convenient for Kenyan employers. Put yourself in an employer’s position, they usually want to fill a position quickly with minimal disruption to the day to day running of the organization. Put an ad in` the daily papers these days and whatever you do, your resources will be stretched to the limit for days.
Smaller businesses that ask people to call will have their lines jammed and paying customers will not be able to get through. If you use the mail (snail mail), you’ll receive a sack-full of applications that will take hours to sort out. Even if you use email, the same problem of going through all the applications will be prove to be cumbersome.
How about going straight to an existing data base of job seekers and short-listing a few names? You can do it one slow afternoon, call a few names for an interview using the mobile telephone numbers and have the position filled the next day.
The strange thing about hiring online in Kenya is that a vast majority of the applicants you will end up with are female. In a way that partly explains the rapidly rising percentage of women in offices and in all sorts of jobs across the city of Nairobi. I know because I have hired through Myjobseye.com several times. When over 70 per cent of the names you’re handling are female, chances are much higher that you’ll settle on a lady for the position. They’re capable and they’ve shown the initiative to pay attention to what’s going on online, why would anybody want to risk the position with a sleepy guy whose missed it all. The same ignorance is bound to extend to their work performance.
Visit any cyber café in Nairobi and chances are high that you’ll find the men on either an Arsenal Football Club website but more likely on some porn site. The ladies will be reading and answering email. The same men idling away at cyber cafes are fond of complaining about women being favored or securing all the plum jobs in exchange for certain favors that only a woman can give.
Wake up from your slumber, guys.
Next Thursday: Experiences with leading recruitment companies in Kenya.
==================
STOP PRESS… opps I mean STOP POST
Don’t miss these special features, only in this Blog On Tuesday…
What Kenyan Companies Are Doing To Survive These Hard Times
The deadly link between crime, bad governance and the 500,000 jobs a year that never came
The shocking reason why crime is so low in neighboring countries and so high In Kenya.
==================
I think it also depends on the job. If you are looking for secretaries or receptionists, then you will probably get females. I have used www.myjobseye.com to hire for 7 positions - 2 sales reps, 1 accountant, an accounts assistant, 1 IT manager, a driver, and an operations manager. Only 3 of the 7 are females.
ReplyDeletePerhaps someone form myjobseye.com can comment?
ReplyDeleteThanx for your insightful comments, John. I've contacted somebody at Myjobseye to give us some feedback incase they all missed this post.
ReplyDeleteStill, the jobs on your list have all been traditionally in the male domain so 3 out of 7 is not bad. Our ladies have sure come a long way and deserve all the encouragement we can give them.
They are also more honest. I would certainly feel more comfortable with a lady heading my cash office or entire accounts department.
OK. Here are the official stats. There are 24,933 female, and 32,583 male job seekers registered on www.myJobsEye.com.
ReplyDeleteNeil Ribeiro
General Manager
myJobsEye.com
My apologies. I seem to have been wrong.
ReplyDeleteYet I distinctly remember doing the interviews personally over a period of six months (2 years ago) and the results were always frustratingly the same - many more females than males). There were 30 positions to be filled for technical sales representatives for the leading solar and alternative energy company In East And Central Africa.
Have things changed so much or can somebody explain this mystery to me?
BTW Myjobseye are giving us an interview which will hopefully be published here, Next week.
I graduated form USIU in 2002. In 2003 I got my 1st job with ICEA as a mangement trainee through myjobseye.com. I have recently gotten my second job through the site too. In fact, for my 2nd job I only used the site and within a month of updating my CV and applying, I was interviewing!
ReplyDeleteDon't stop posting such articles. I like to read articles like this. BTW add more pics :)
ReplyDelete