In 2006 I was laid off. A few months later we rolled out this site called JibberJobber, which allowed you to organize and track your job search. I have described it a thousand times this way:
“A replacement for the job search spreadsheet.”
Every job seeker knows what a job search spreadsheet is. A place to track who you have talked to, where you have applied, and when and how you should follow-up. Here’s a quick intro video:
I used a job search spreadsheet in my job search, and it worked great for about two weeks. But then it got to be a mess. I would add a column here, a sheet there. Soon, maintaining the spreadsheet took too much time. I have heard from career coaches who work with engineers that this is a problem… they’d rather tweak their spreadsheet design than actually do job search stuff.
The big problem, though, was that I was missing follow-ups I had scheduled. I got mixed up between a different calendar and a note to follow-up on my spreadsheet, and ultimately missed an opportunity to talk with a hiring manager. I was so frustrated at my “system!” It just wasn’t working.
I wondered why job seekers, who felt like we were third class citizens, didn’t have real systems at our fingertips. Recruiters and HR had systems, why did we have to do what felt like write phone numbers on our hand, like we were in 6th grade?
And so JibberJobber was built. I modeled it after CRM software that sales professionals used to organize and manage their sales prospects. Really, what we as job seekers do is very similar to what sales professionals do.
JibberJobber was born in May 0f 2006. We were the first such site to launch. Over the last 14+ years we have undergone continual changes and enhancements. We mostly focus on functionality… that is, we want to work well. Every once in a while we try to give JibberJobber a facelift, so it doesn’t look like it was created by engineers (I know, we have a lot of work to do here :p).
We’ve also seen about 20 competitors pop up. Some are still around, many have gone away. This isn’t the most lucrative business, really. It makes more sense to make a niche job board and charge companies hundreds of dollars per posting than to try to find a job seeker who will part with $60 (more or less, prices have changed over the years). It’s a weird business, for sure.
But there are people who need our services. We hope to provide HOPE. We want to provide the quality and functionality of tools you have been used to at work and home, and not resort to a messy spreadsheet or spiral notebook.
And so here we are, 14 years later. We continue to work on JibberJobber. We just launched a bunch of enhancements Sunday, and have a huge facelift we are working on. We have a list of suggestions by users, and continue to invest in JibberJobber.
JibberJobber is simply a job search CRM. Still, a replacement to the job search spreadsheet. Ideal for you, if you are in a job search and feeling disorganized.
I should say, some of my favorite users are those who have already landed but continue to use JibberJobber because they know networking is what we do now, for the rest of our careers.