Location Based Job Boards

One of the most frustrating things I find about hearing about possible web development jobs on certain sites is the sheer amount of them which are simply unviable due to my UK location. Previously I decided to post all those jobs I could find to my own webtyrant site and the recent job and profile sites in the django communities has got me thinking about how these two pieces of information on locality could be aggregated together (I don’t have time myself to do this though unfortunately – perhaps someone might like to chat about collaborating). What I’ve concluded is that being aware of those jobs within a certain area might be quite useful – and simple to implement. What you’d basically end up with is a situation where you could subscribe to updates on jobs in a particular field within a certain area (think – “tell me about all dev jobs within 50 miles”). Whilst this feature may exist on some other sites (though I’m unaware of it) my experience tells me that it probably isn’t executed particularly well.

This entry was posted in Computers and Internet, Geek and tagged , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

4 Responses to Location Based Job Boards

  1. Neil says:

    As far as I’m aware, most job sites do allow you to search within localities and specify distances from a given postcode. However, like you say, they’re not usually executed very well and perhaps commuting time is a more realistic parameter to include. I assume they often use “as the crow flies” measurements. Lots of Bristol jobs often show up in “20 miles from Cardiff” searches. And it is only 20 miles away – across the water….

  2. Ian says:

    I think I more mean specific web dev or creative sites job boards, say the Krop or the 37Signals boards. Where the more interesting jobs might appear. “As the crow flies” would be fine by me, as usually a large chunk of the jobs are work at home efforts anyway. I’m not sure that google’s efforts to give an inkling to duration are anything to go by in the main.

  3. Jonathan Roberts says:

    You are very correct in saying that it is not executed very well, take me for instance. I live in Swansea….on the coast. If I apply for jobs with a 50 mile radius I get jobs come back that are in Ilfracombe which is the other side of the Bristol Channel and is infact 174 miles by road which can take upto 3 hours to get to. No use to me.

  4. I run a start up job site called Jobsplay at http://www.jobsplay.com one of the features we have is the ability to display the jobs matching your search criteria on a map. This allows you to see immediately how far the position is from your location. The problem is that some recruitment agencies are unwilling to give the exact location of roles as it is easy then for you to find out the company name and approach them yourselves.
    You will get a good idea of position from the site though.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong> <pre lang="" line="" escaped="">