Recently AIM Group published an article entitled Job Boards for Women: Aiding Skills Shortages While Bridging the Gender Gap.
The article discusses the rise of female-focused job boards and their impact on addressing skills shortages while narrowing the gender gap in the job market. These specialised job boards tailor their offerings to the needs of women, fostering a supportive community, and curating job listings that emphasize diversity and work-life balance.
Some of the key points the article covered include:
∙ Emergence of Female-Focused Job Boards: Job boards targeting women, such as WomenForHire, WomensJobList, and TheMomProject in the U.S., along with sites like The Female Factor and Investing in Women in Europe, are becoming more prevalent. These platforms create an environment where women can explore opportunities in male-dominated industries.
∙ Driving Factors: These specialised job boards aim to stimulate areas of the economy facing skills shortages by encouraging female participation. They provide tailored conditions for female candidates and promote relevant job listings.
∙ Importance of Gender-Neutral Job Postings: Creating gender-neutral job descriptions is crucial to attracting more women to roles. Avoiding terms that may deter women and focusing on critical skills over an extensive list of requirements can encourage female applicants.
It contains quotes from some fabulous women in the job boards space – including ones from our partners at Jobiqo.
“In my experience, it starts with a gender-neutral job description and a bias-free selection,” Ling Wu, head of sales at Austria-based Jobiqo, told the AIM Group. Jobiqo is a provider of job board software and AI-enabled search-and-match technology.
Jobiqo is currently working on a machine learning project, together with the Johannes Kepler university, that uses AI to mitigate gender bias in job recommendation systems. The project aims to identify gender-discriminatory wording in job descriptions, map the legal framework for online job advertisements, and create a content-based job recommendation algorithm that mitigates gender bias.
If successful, Jobiqo will then be able to distribute the software among its clients to quickly locate and amend discriminatory job listings, which are usually non-intentional.