Candidate Preparation

EmployPrep is always on the look out for exciting new employment technologies.  In today’s post, we feature Mextr, a new job search technology that is sure to make a significant impact on the employment search industry. Mextr combines an intelligent job search engine technology along with intuitive job matching capability.  The result is an easy to use job search website that effortlessly connects an employer, recruiter and staffing agency with qualified candidates.

We had the pleasure to speak with Neeraj, one of the founders of Mextr recently to learn more about this fascinating technology.  Below is an excerpt of our interview.

EmployPrep:  What is Mextr?

Neeraj:  Launched in 2009, Mextr is the fastest growing personalize job search site on the Internet.

EmployPrep:  How did Mextr begin?

Neeraj: Back in 2007, we set out to improve upon the frustrating hit or miss process of finding a job on the traditional job sites. Despite the significant changes caused by the Internet in recruiting markets, most of the career sites still require time-consuming keyword searches and produce hundreds of marginal results. Keyword searching techniques are inefficient and time consuming, making it all too easy to miss the right opportunity. We knew there had to be a better way.

Mextr saw an enormous opportunity to impact the recruiting market through its unique matching technology, and the crawling engine to bring an elegant and efficient solution for career aspirants.

EmployPrep:  Tell me more about your job search and job match technology?

Neeraj:

We developed our unique matching engine (MatchPro™) to enable us to closely match the wants and needs of job seekers with those of the employer. Through this system, we learn each individual’s unique skills, experience and then present only the jobs that are the right fit.

Our proprietary crawling technology (Mexbo™), crawls the Internet to find job listings from corporate web sites, job boards, recruitment agencies, newspapers, classifieds and numerous other sources, providing job seekers with free and instant access to tens of thousands of jobs from companies and job boards at one place, alleviating the painful and time consuming process of searching jobs on the net.

EmployPrep: What makes Mextr different from it’s competitors?

Neeraj: The Traditional job sites - with their countless keyword searches, hundreds of marginal results, and minimal privacy - don’t work for today’s job seekers.

Mextr’s unique matching engine (MatchPro™) delivers highly accurate results for candidates. MatchPro™ consider every dimension of a career aspirant – their unique skills, education, experiences, and preferences – against detailed job profiles and return only the best matches. Mextr, eliminate the clutter and delivers personalize results.

EmployPrep: What benefits are enjoyed by job seekers, employers, recruiters who use Mextr?

Neeraj: With its beta release, Mextr introduced a Job seeker application module, which provides personalize job matching and crawling features. We also provide free access to resource center that provides valuable content library for job seeker to aid in their job hunt.

Employer and recruiter modules are at present targeted for 2010 summer release.

EmployPrep: What has been the response so far? Any important milestones or achievements?

Neeraj: Yes, there a few achievements that we are very proud about.

• Crossed 1000+ user registration mark in two months into beta
• Have 200k+ job listings from all leading job boards in India, all of these listings are validated, refresh, and checked for duplicity several times during a day

EmployPrep: What exciting things can we expect from Mextr in the near future?

Neeraj: Our priority by year end is to refine the job search site.  The immedidate priorities are as follows:

• Create a much improved User interface due to release by end of 2009.
• Greater coverage on job listing, and will include jobs directly from leading employers career site
• Niche services for job seekers to improve their chances of landing a job by April 2010

Jake Stupak, otherwise known as the ATS Guy, is well known for his reviews and experiences working with various software for the staffing industry. He recently reviewed the candidate preparation software, EmployPrep.   EmployPrep is white-label career portal and resource center, value-added software add-on for staffing companies, applicant tracking systems, job boards, and job search engines.

In this article, the ATS guy reviews EmployPrep, and provides his thought and recommendations on this employment software.

It’s a common sight at conferences whether it’s ERE, ASA, local staffing conferences or job fairs - droves of people with “bags of swag“.  Along with this phenomena, comes the related “swag swap” where you get together with colleagues and make strategic trades of promotional products for their most important clients (translation get the stuffed toy for their son, daughter, nephew or niece).  There is nothing like watching staffing professionals in tense negotiations, “I will give you 5 calendars for the stuffed toy from Monster” or “If you give me that job shark, I will give you twenty Careerbuilder pens”.  And if you are one of the strong and make it to the last day of the conference, then you might just witness a “swag feeding frenzy“.  This is when the booth exhibitors try to give away their remaining swag before the conference closes and staffing professionals swarm in for the kill (something more extraordinary than the mass migration of caribou).

In the midst of this do you ever stop to wonder if there is any proof that giving staffing swag is beneficial?  How do you know promotional products branded with your staffing company’s logo will actually help you get more job orders, attract more candidates, and close more deals?

Well I have done some research and I think I have gained some insight on staffing swag…..the “swag feeding frenzy” is topic I will save for another day.  Well I am going to jot down notes for my next post…..now where did I put that Indeed pen and Careerbuilder day planner (…hey I never said, I am above it all, besides admitting it is the first step isn’t it?).

In this tough employment market, the ratio of applicant to job opportunities is greater than ever.  As a professional recruiter, what can you do to increase your chances?  Ensure your candidate’s resume is up to date and prepare your candidates before sending them out.  A good candidate preparation can help ensure your candidate gets a fair chance to showcase his/her skills.

“All things being equal, the technical skills are the same — it’s usually the person with more forthright personality”

“Someone who convinces the employer they can do they job is going to be hired.”

Henry Goldbeck, President, Goldbeck Recruiting

The quote above is from one of our corporate clients, Henry Goldbeck from Goldbeck Recruiting. Henry, is the president of Goldbeck recruiting, a Certified Personnel Consultant (CPC) with over 20 years in recruiting experience and believes that with all things being equal it’s the connection your candidate’s make in an interview that determines success.  As a proud partner of Goldbeck recruiting, EmployPrep enables Goldbeck to prepare their candidates and build their staffing brand.

Click here for for the news article

For news clip:

Candidate Prep Helps in Tough Market

Why spend our hours searching for the best candidate, only to send them to clients unprepared. Learn how EmployPrep software can help you prepare your candidates and build your brand.

EmployPrep - Prepare Your Candidates, Build Your Brand

Those that have not had to hire for a living may not be aware of some of the weird and funny ways in which people respond to interview questions. While I have heard many funny job interview stories, this one is likely one of the very best, so I hope you enjoy.

A well-respected staffing company sent a candidate to a high profile IT company. The candidate did as he was coached and arrived early and waited in the parking lot of this secure building. Like many candidates, I suppose he felt nervous and a lot of pressure waiting for his job interview. The candidate has an emergency, well he needs to use the bathroom. What happens next is well, where it gets interesting.

Instead of getting access into the building and using the toilet located inside, the candidate decided to take it “back to nature”. Within minutes, a security guard notices this unusual activity in the parking lot and confronts the candidate.

Needless to say he didn’t get the job. It was an embarrassing situation not only for the candidate but for the staffing company since their candidate represents them to the employer. When telling this story, I only wish I had been the one conducting that interview. In my professional opinion, some appropriate questions would include “Describe a situation when you had to make a decision under pressure?” or “Give me an example of when you had to take urgent action to meet a deadline?” While these two questions would be good (correction, would be great), ultimately the question that would be most fitting in this case would be “Tell me about a time when you made a mistake and how did you handle it?”

If you want to hear more interesting job interview stories just take our your local recruiter or HR professional out for a drink (or two) and I am sure the stories will ensue. I will wind this up and while I cannot promise any more stories quite as memorable as this, I do nevertheless promise more job interview stories to come. In the meantime, here is a newspaper article with some more funny interview responses.

Got any funny job interview stories? Feel free to share…
Why spend our hours searching for the best candidate, only to send them to clients unprepared. Learn how EmployPrep software can help you prepare your candidates and build your brand.

EmployPrep - Prepare Your Candidates, Build Your Brand