Strategies for job hunting on online job platforms

The project examined how unemployed people search for jobs online. The centrepiece of the project was novel click data that reveals how unemployed people navigate through job vacancies on the online work platform of the Swiss public employment service. In combination with information concerning the jobs and the register data from the social security sector, this novel data offers unique opportunities for the analysis of job-hunting strategies. In addition, the project conducted three field experiments to study how Swiss job seekers react to additional information about jobs and job alternatives. For example, the project examined who uses online job boards, what factors determine job search success, how monetary and non-monetary aspects of the job influence the job search, and how we can optimize the content and design of job boards to promote a more efficient matching of workers to jobs.

Digital technologies have irreversibly changed the way job seekers and companies find each other. Online employment platforms are an important element of this matching process. Thanks to the wealth of information they provide regarding available jobs, these platforms can increase the efficiency of the job search process. But platforms can also have negative consequences. For example, they can put those who don’t use such platforms at a disadvantage.

The goal of the project was to better understand how men and women search for jobs. The findings were used to optimise job platforms and to inform policymakers about the labour market implications of online job search. The project team also developed an interactive online dashboard, www.swissjobtracker.ch, which enables the continuous, real-time monitoring of labour market trends in Switzerland.

The project shows how online data from job platforms can be used by practitioners, to observe the labour market, and by researchers. It demonstrates how public employment services can use the large amounts of data from online platforms to enable effective job searches.

Three Main Messages

1. Our research indicates that the design of job platforms (i.e. default settings, search filters, occupational classifications, the visibility of job characteristics and recommended vacancies) has a strong influence on which jobs workers see and apply to. Systematic scientific evaluations of platform design hold significant and largely untapped potential to make matching workers to jobs more efficient.
2. Swiss employers appear to hold substantial market power, driven by the limited mobility of job seekers across occupations, diverse job-seeker preferences and the limited responsiveness of applications to posted wages. Policymakers in Switzerland should consider implementing pro-competitive measures to curb employer market power. These could include fostering labour market mobility across firms, regions, and occupations or mandating wage disclosure in online job postings, especially in low-wage segments.
3. If public authorities and researchers collaborate to systematically collect, combine, and analyse online click, application, and vacancy data, they enable more effective monitoring of labour market trends, dynamics and mismatches. The weekly time series on www.swissjobtracker.ch illustrate this potential. Collecting and analysing this information also forms the basis for in-depth studies on the characteristics, causes and consequences of job search behaviour.

What Workers Want: Determinants and Implications of Job Search Strategies on an Online Job Platform

• Dr. Michael Siegenthaler, KOF – Konjunkturforschungsstelle, ETH Zürich
• Dr. Matthias Bannert, KOF – Konjunkturforschungsstelle, ETH Zürich
• Prof. Rafael Lalive d'Epinay-Gisin, Faculté des sciences sociales et politiques, Université de Lausanne