Earlier this week, I received an email from a job board announcing they had found a “job match” for me. The email profoundly announced that I would be a great fit for a Pharmacy Technician position that recently opened in my local area.
That’s odd. I have no background in pharmacy, I’ve never had an interest in pharmacy, and I really don’t like drug companies. On the spectrum of medical healing options, I lean much more toward natural healing options than supporting traditional drug therapies.
If this were an isolated case, I would brush it off as some kind of anomaly. But, unfortunately, this is becoming quite common. I’ve never received a job match from any service that comes anywhere close to my interests and talents. These companies regularly send me job-match emails that miss the mark completely. 
I’ve often wondered why no one has been able to come up with a viable “eHarmony for jobs”. There has to be some folksy shrink like Dr. Neil Clark Warren out there who could make a go of this business model. Right?
An article I ran across by John Sumser this week makes me think this may never (successfully) happen on a large scale basis. Mr. Sumser wrote the following critique about the marketing propaganda of a new job-matching start-up called eHire that claims to be the “eHarmony for Jobs”:
“Thank goodness, what we’ve been missing is one more eHarmony for Jobs. Here’s the list so far (If you have any additions, I’d love to see them.) Climber, Google, Itzbig, Jiibe, JobFox, Jobster, JobStick, MBAInteract, Optimatch, RealMatch, Trovix, Zumeo..
What’s surprising is that someone would launch a service [eHire] with this sort of branding this late in the game. Although Harry Joiner said it best, there has been an endless supply of articles detailing the problems with matching. To summarize Joiner, there are five reasons that eHarmony won’t work for jobs:
1. Companies often don’t know what they want the new employee to do
2. Many jobs have no defined skill set
3. All candidates are liars
4. People are terrified to specialize
5. Resumes and online 'profiles' aren’t people"
What can we learn from this? If you’re a recruiter or a hiring manager, there is no substitute for getting to know your candidates as human beings. While an assessment or a skills-match can give you some hints as to how a person may fit in a particular role on your team, it cannot replace the need for personal involvement. After all, even eHarmony is designed to get you a first date with someone who is in the ballpark of being compatible with you – The rest is up to you!
If you’re looking for a job or if you are coaching someone who is looking for a job, don’t put too much faith in the role of technology for your job search. Personal connections produce results. Work hard at making personal connections and becoming relevant, helpful, and engaged with the network of people you already know.
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