Empowering job seekers with effective self-representation

A significant portion of academic graduates have difficulty finding their first job after graduation. On the one hand, job seekers are often not able to communicate their skills and abilities in a convincing manner. On the other hand, employers are often not able to communicate the job requirements effectively.

In his MSc graduation project, Jeroen ter Haar Romenij (faculty of Industrial Design Engineering) designed a job searching platform that allows job seekers to explore vacancies based on job tasks. This enables them and employers to express their preferences in a uniform language, thereby reducing the communication gap and facilitating better matches.

The way in which job seekers’ preferences are represented by the platform has a direct effect on the vacancies that are presented to them. Therefore, the value of autonomy over self-representation is highly at stake in this context and has been put central in the design of the platform. By directly engaging with job seekers through empirical research, Jeroen explored what autonomy over self-representation means to them in the context of job searching. These insights, together with empirical research conducted with employers, shaped the design of the platform. The final result of this graduation project is a User Interface Design of the task-based vacancy platform.

This work is a practical example of the design approach pursued within AiTech’s Designing for Human Rights in AI project, grounded in proactive consideration of human rights and study of societal context through direct involvement of affected stakeholders.

The graduation project was carried out in collaboration with the start-up HelloCareer and under the supervision of Elisa Giaccardi (AiTech, IDE), Evgeni Aizenberg (AiTech, EEMCS), Alessandro Bozzon (IDE), and Quincy Dalh (HelloCareer).

Jeroen ter Haar Romenij’s thesis is available here.