As a freelancer, I’ve got more than a few jobs through Jobserve. In the past, they used to just post email addresses of the agents who were advertising the roles, but recently they’ve got cleverer than that. They now publish an email address that goes to the Jobserve servers before being passed on to the agent. It’s clever, because they now know what sort of jobs you are applying for and can use that knowledge to suggest other similar jobs that you might be interested in.
Except it doesn’t really seem to be working. I’ve recently started getting these recommendations from Jobserve. They actually come from a system called “Jobserve Alchemy”. I got one just now. It says “From the information you have registered with on JobServe and your recent application activity on JobServe you appear to closely match the requirements of the following job”.
They have an interesting definition of “closely”. Here’s the specification.
Type: Contract
Position: GIS Geographic Developer Contract
Skills: GIS, geographical information system, GIS Developer, Contract, Programmer. Fantastic opportunity for an experienced GIS Developer to join a prestigious market leading organisation. Talented GIS Software Developer to join a specialised team working in a fantastic environment Responsible for developing ArcGIS desktop and ArcGIS Server using the MS .NET platform. GIS using the C# .NET platform or VB.NET. Responsibilities also include database integration, developing Web services using SOAP. Technologies: ArcGIS GIS .NET C# Please apply immediate for this GIS Software Development opportunity.
Location: Berkshire
Start Date: ASAP
Duration: 6 months
Those of you who know me will realise how well this matches my skill set.
I have no experience of Geographical Information Systems. I have never used C#.NET or VB.NET. I’m a Unix developer and haven’t developed anything on a Microsoft platform using Microsoft tools for about fifteen years. I have no idea what ArcGIS is. Oh, and I have no interest at all in working in Berkshire. Nothing about this role matches anything that I’ve applied for through Jobserve in the last ten years.
I think that Jobserve Alchemy still has a few bugs in its search algorithms.
It could have been your cover letter. Did you fall in the trap of using contractions? I can see it in my mind:”Come on guv, gis a job! Gis it! Gis it!”