Have Guardian jobs 'crossed a moral line'?

Posted by: James Wylie, Account Director 4 Jun 09 - 1:06PM  | Recruitment |  World Wide Web

An interesting story has come to light regarding the use of candidate CV's by jobs boards.  

John Reilly MD of Reilly People has stated that Guardian jobs is "having its cake and eating it" by using its candidate CV database to "effectively operate as a recruitment agency itself".

Adam Freeman, Commercial Director for Guardian News and Media has outlined their position.

"Our business model is based on taking some of the best, or most marketable candidates to organisations that they have positively agreed to be introduced to. We are only working with job seekers who have actively signed up for the service and I must emphasise that we are not actively 'chasing roles' as this would be counter productive and would be acting against our advertisers' interests. This is significantly different to companies who are able to take all candidates to all advertisers on their own database."

This is certainly a hot topic that could set a precedent for how job boards operate.  We'd like to hear your views.

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I think the issue seems to be from most of the commentors on that page that the Guardian didn't report they were doing this. So is the problem the business practice or the communication exactly?
Posted by: Nate Wood, Date 04 June 2009, 01:59PM
I think telling customers their plans would have eased the issue that has been raised with this move, however I think some customers would have taken their business elsewheer once told. Is this why they were not told?
Posted by: Kieron Mayers, Date 05 June 2009, 01:00PM
I think it's possible to run a job ad service as well as a recruitment arm, but I think there needs to be awareness. If the CVs gathered by an advertiser were not shared then I see no conflict at all. And if they are shared, then that needs to be known, otherwise you get the lashback as Guardian have seen. I don't think the Guardian deliberately misled anyone. Mistake perhaps, poor forward thinking maybe, but no deliberate malice.
Posted by: Nate Wood, Date 05 June 2009, 02:03PM

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