Job portals, headhunters try new tricks to boost business

With firms turning choosy both on hiring and spending, recruitment agencies and Internet job portals are trying out innovative techniques amid an economic downturn, Himani Chandna Gurtoo reports.

With firms turning choosy both on hiring and spending, recruitment agencies and Internet job portals are trying out innovative techniques amid an economic downturn.

Their new tricks include making a candidate's resume visually attractive, career-coaching services including personality trait tests, psychometric tests and other value-added services to garner revenue because old fashioned job postings are fewer.

Job portal Naukri.com, owned by Info Edge, for instance is offering to build resumes with visual support. "We dig out stuff like testimonials, promotional letters and merit certificates to highlight candidature and arrange it in a visually impressive manner,' said Payal Dhar, associate vice-president, resume writing at Naukri.com.

Some headhunters have introduced career guidance tools including services that aim to understand flaws in job seekers that they can reficty. These include tests to identify personality traits and mind-mapping techniques like psychometric tests for senior-level professionals aspiring for management positions.

For relatively new job seekers, paid resume and career-coaching services that cost anything between ₹ 500 to ₹ 65,000 are gaining popularity. "Such services contribute upto 20% to the company's total revenue," said Uday Sodhi, chief executive officer of Headhoncos.com.

"To escape the bad economy, we are trying to pump in more innovations," said Dhar, whose agency has sold visual resume to over 2,500 candidates in the last one month. The company is targetting 100,000 candidates by the year end.