Easy, accessible, helpful and free are the kind of tools you want when searching for a job or career, right? That’s exactly the kind of online help the U.S. Department of Labor is providing with two new websites: www.myskillsmyfuture.org and www.mynextmove.org.
“We’ve had O*Net — one of the best occupational information search tools online — for a long time but the site was too complicated for many people,” said Jane Oates, assistant secretary of employment and training administration for the U.S. Department of Labor. “The first priority of our Secretary of Labor, Hilda L. Solis, was to get good information out to a broader audience. We wanted to get more user-friendly tools into the hands of job seekers.”
The DOL launched the My Skills My Future website on Labor Day last year. The site was created for people who have work experience, but are looking for a new job or career. It allows users to explore work options based on their experience, strengths and interests.
Here’s how the site works. Users enter a current or former job title and are referred to a list of other occupations that might fit their skills and interests, including descriptions of the work and average salaries. They learn about skills that transfer easily from one job to the next, and what new skills they would need to move into that occupation.
To help job seekers close the skills gap, the site provides information on short-term education and training programs, as well as information on certifications, licenses and apprenticeships. By inputting their ZIP code or state of residence, users can search for nearby jobs from a national database that is updated daily.
“We had heard a lot of complaints about state jobs boards, that jobs were listed more than once or that the information was outdated. We’ve cleaned up the jobs boards and [we] remove jobs as they are filled,” Oates said.
Because not all job seekers are technologically savvy, the site is user-friendly. Oates said that users can’t lose their place and they can customize information and print it. There also are help features on every page.
“During these extraordinarily hard times, people are happy just to have a job, but as we recover, we want to help them find the jobs that best fit their expectations and aspirations,” Oates said.
Since the launch, 445,051 visitors have viewed more than 2,860,760 pages on the site, according to the DOL.
The My Next Move website is aimed at providing students and younger job seekers with information about more than 900 occupations. The site gives profiles of each occupation, including the skills and level of training required, future outlook and local salary information.
A 60-question Interest Profiler helps users find occupations suitable to their interests. They can also search for careers with bright futures, “green” jobs or occupations with registered apprenticeship programs. It also lists job openings.
“Our goal is to get the word out to as many people as possible and to have them use these sites as they plan for their careers,” Oates said.
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