Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 23, 1995 TAG: 9504210070
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: F4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURA GARDNER ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Medium
Job hunters are turning in growing numbers to the Internet, its World Wide Web and subscriber on-line systems for a leg up on the competition. Many of the services offer company profiles, job postings and career counseling.
Some even allow candidates to submit resumes electronically.
``I got a job with a company that never, ever would have put an ad in a newspaper,'' said Bryan Cantrill, a Brown University junior who used the Internet to land a summer spot at QNX Software Systems Ltd. in Ottawa.
``There's no way I would have found this opportunity - or they would have paid any attention to me - through traditional means.''
E-Span Interactive Employment Network, for example, is a free service found on the Internet and accessible through numerous outlets, including CompuServe and America Online. More than 3,500 job postings from 1,700 companies are available at any given time.
Listings are updated daily and turn over every four weeks.
Career Mosaic offers similar services on the World Wide Web. Sun Microsystems Inc., Tandem Computers Inc. and Intuit Inc., among other technology firms, use Career Mosaic to promote themselves and recruit job applicants.
And while computer and high-tech companies predominate, on-line career forums are by no means the sole preserve of technophiles.
Wisconsin, North Carolina and New York are among a growing number of states and cities that advertise civil service jobs on the Internet. There are bulletin boards for virtually every profession, from marketing to music.
The University of Wisconsin at Madison coordinates Project Connect, which helps place school personnel, trained there or at other universities, in new positions.
``Project Connect puts school districts with job openings in direct contact with teachers and administrators looking for positions,'' said Steve Head, who oversees the network. ``All it takes is an Internet address.''
Speed and ease of use inspire many to take their job searches into cyberspace.
Alan Shusterman, a software engineer with Oracle Corp. in Redwood Shores, Calif., relied heavily on e-mail while he was looking for a programmer's position.
``It's so easy,'' he said. ``Click a button and your resume goes out to 30 people - no stamps, no envelopes, no trips to the post office.''
Other successful job seekers rave about the access Internet mail afforded them. With electronic mail, applicants can chat with employees at a company they're targeting to learn what it's like to work there. Assertive candidates can bypass human resources departments and communicate directly with executives responsible for hiring.
Scott Johnston, a junior at Brown and a roommate of Cantrill, won a summer job on a NASA research team after exchanging electronic messages with the project's director.
``E-mail allowed me to contact someone high up at NASA. I felt that calling would be an interruption in his day, but e-mail was OK.''
Employers also boast of on-line recruiting's benefits.
``Overall, it's a more seasoned and more experienced mix of people than I get from a newspaper ad,'' said Dick Dunkin, recruiting manager for Hal Computer Systems, based in Campbell, Calif. Hal Computer already has hired one applicant through Career Mosaic.
Still, even in high-tech fields some are reluctant to embrace a ``paperless'' application process.
Terry Williams, a recruiter for technology companies in the Philadelphia and New York areas, complained that electronic resumes frequently appear unformatted on his computer screen, because fonts and margins can differ based on the computer and software used to create the documents.
``I treat an e-mail resume as a fax,'' he said. "The professional way to do things is to follow up with a hard copy.''
Tom Romano, a software engineer with Dialogic Corp. in Parsippany, N.J., expressed similar sentiments: ``I want a nice, watermarked sheet of paper in front of me.''
It works both ways.
Cantrill - who researched companies, circulated his resume, entertained offers and negotiated his salary entirely via the Internet - conceded, ``There are some things you want on paper.''
Like what?
``Like the final offer,'' he said with a grin.
by CNB