E-Verify and Other Recruiting Tidbits

This is a very important insider story on how recruiters are looking at you on the web. - Dan.

From ERE Exchange by John Zappe Aug 21, 2009, 5:21 am ET

In no particular order, here are some bits and bytes of recruiting news that made it to our inbox this week.

First, the headlines:

• A publicist for business law firm Proskauer Rose LLP reminds us
  that Sept. 8th is the deadline for federal contractors to sign up and
  use E-Verify, if they want to continue being federal contractors;


• CareerBuilder lit a match to BrightFuse,
  the business community site it launched 18 months ago, issuing a press
  release officially announcing it. At the same time, CareerBuilder
  released a survey saying 45 percent of employers have used social
  networking sites to research job candidates.


• Australia's leading high-salary job board - www.sixfigures.com.au
  - introduces a new look and expanded career content today for its dues
  paying, high earning members. It's also putting more news and content
  on the outside of the login wall.

E-Verify

This
is the electronic employment verification program the U.S. Department
of Homeland Security operates. If you haven't used it, chances are you
eventually will, since the government is slowly expanding its mandatory
use and has made its voluntary use very attractive to employers.

The program is free and (mostly) insulates employers from legal
sanctions for hiring undocumented workers if they have verified I-9
information through E-Verify.

Come Sept. 8th, federal contractors will be required
to use E-Verify if their contracts exceed $100,000. Their subs, if they
earn more than $3,000, will also have to use E-Verify. President George
Bush first ordered the program in 2008, but between presidential
extensions and a lawsuit, the implementation deadline kept getting
pushed until Sept. 8th, a date expected to actually stick this time.

BrightFuse

This
is CareerBuilder's version of Facebook for business. Instead of content
a job seeker may come to regret, BrightFuse offers a place for your
face in a pantsuit. It's a professional profile that can be used in
place of a standard resume. Recruiters will like it since the data is
neatly structured, making it conveniently available for digital capture.

It clearly shows a LinkedIn influence, what with the section for
contacts and another for recommendations and the ability to create and
join interest groups. It also has taken some cues from Facebook,
allowing user to add Twitter feeds and RSS feeds to blogs. There's also
a tab for a portfolio to showcase work and a way to export elements of
a BrightFuse profile to Facebook. Though with the CareerBuilder survey
showing just how fast employers have embraced online backgrounding for
candidates, some job seekers may want to keep their BrightFuse profile
separate.

SixFigures

I
can't tell you much about this relaunch, except to report what was in
the press release I got the other day. Here's what it says about the
site that may already be live when you read this:

"Due to growing
demand by high salary earners for more specific career and industry
related content, Six Figures is meeting demand by catering for
additional aspects of a professional's career, with career development,
directorships, education and industry news forming a part of its
extended offering. "

According to the PR, SixFigures has about 25,000 members, a seemingly small number until you consider that the entire labor force in Australia is only 11.2 million. How many of them pay the AU$66 a year wasn't disclosed.

Incidentally, since the press release came from Australia, which is
on the other side of the International Date Line, it wasn't clear until
today whether the new site's launch date was Aug. 21 in Australia or in
the U.S. It's today, using the North and South American time zones.