HOME UK Top 30 UK career websites (PDF)
Top 30 ranked companies in Europe (PDF)
Like most people, I suppose, I visit company websites when I need information. Nine times out of 10 I'm looking for something straightforward, such as the address of headquarters, a telephone number, or the name of the boss.
By almost the same ratio, what I find first is a selling operation or career-focused messages telling me what a wonderful employer this is. Too often the address or contact numbers are in the small print.
For this reason I don't view corporate websites as welcome mats but as fortresses. Like fortresses they are imposing, intimidating and controlling. They stand in my way, preventing me from reaching the people inside. They might dazzle me with the brand, almost as a castle will brandish its coat of arms, but they have intricate defences that appear designed to repel boarders. Either that, or they are protected by a labyrinth of confusing information with long, winding passages and dead ends. Is this deliberate? In most cases I don't think it is.
The real problem, I suspect, is too many companies place responsibility for websites with designers and coders - not professional communicators.
Thus, when a website fails to deliver the right kind of traffic, the instinct of company bosses is to demand a redesign because they are dazzled by appearance rather than function. They continue to make the same mistakes because their web designers are unwilling to point out their own limitations.
Instead, technology-focused designers will try to seize on the latest idea, be it podcasts, videos, film clips, flashy graphics - you name it - without examining the rationale for their use.
But things are changing. In its latest rankings of company websites for their career offerings, Potentialpark Communications,* a Swedish market research and communications company, has congratulated the way some businesses are making their web-based career propositions clearer, simpler and effective.
The research, which consulted 7,605 students and recent graduates across Europe, concluded that increasing numbers of job applicants apply online. This is why the fortress mentality must be replaced by something more like a showroom with friendly advice and a positive experience for applicants, whether or not they are successful.
I note that some of the most popular sites among graduates seem to have simplified their web presentations. Deloitte, the most highly-rated career site in the UK from this study, is notable for its clarity. Gone is the temptation to have lots of illustrations or moving images. Instead there are clear questions and answers and a logical sequence of links to the relevant information.
The web is rediscovering the utility of the list. Possibly this has something to do with the phenomenal success of sites such as Craigslist. Whatever, the reason, employers do seem to be waking up to the need for functionality.
While Accenture remains wedded to the power of the image - just now a picture of Tiger Woods is on the front of the site - once again, when you click on careers, the pages are clean and logical.
It may be significant that each of the big four accountancy firms is in the top 10 on the Potentialpark UK rankings, as in its European rankings. The leading accountants are big recruiters. Preparing clear information is fundamental to the profession, so they, of all employers, should be capable of giving graduates precise information about career opportunities.
Across Europe, the leading careers section was that of Deutsche Post World Net, the post and parcel group, where the company appears to have established a strong offering, underpinning its career information with a powerful message on sustainability and social responsibility.
PwC has gone even further in this respect with its Ulysses leadership programme, which sends employees on eight-week socially-oriented projects in developing companies.
Sustainability issues register strongly among graduates. Employers that ignore such issues, therefore, are going to be at a disadvantage. But the overriding message from the research is that career sites must be honest, succinct, intuitive and relevant. "What's the point of having a graphically stunning website if you can't find the information you need?" said one of the students in the study.
Other students complained that the material on some sites read like propaganda. "They all say the same things about themselves," said one graduate, "Perhaps they actually are all the same."
There is a barely-concealed cynicism about some of these comments. No wonder some graduates are turning their backs on big companies, preferring instead to work for small start-ups or launching their own small businesses.
Torgil Lenning, senior consultant at Potentialpark, says: "Career websites have an important dual nature. They have become the root systems of all other recruitment efforts and they are undoubtedly the main door to a company; and, therefore, if this door is bad, blocked or locked, top talents will go elsewhere."
