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Elucidating Skills for Job Seekers: Insights and Critical Concerns from a Field Deployment in Switzerland

Authors:

Mauro Cherubini,

Alex Jiahong Lu,

Joey Chiao-Yin Hsiao,

Anandita Aggarwal,

Tawanna R DillahuntAuthors Info & Claims

DIS '21: Proceedings of the 2021 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference

Pages 449 - 465

https://doi.org/10.1145/3461778.3462049

Published: 28 June 2021 Publication History

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Abstract

This article contributes results of a longitudinal field study of SkillsIdentifier, an employment tool originally designed and assessed in the United States (U.S.), to support “underrepresented” job seekers in identifying and articulating their employment skills. To understand whether the tool could support the needs of job seekers outside the U.S., we assessed it among 16 job seekers with limited education and language resources in Switzerland. While many of our results mirrored those of the U.S., we found that the tool was especially beneficial for non-French speaking immigrants who needed support describing their skills outside of their native language. We also found that listing skills like “active listening” without important context was insufficient and risked hiding key skills and meaning behind those skills to employers. Taking these factors into account, we illustrate the design implications of our findings and directions for practitioners who wish to design employment tools in support of job seekers, especially those who have traditionally been excluded from the labor market. We then provide insight into the potential for unintended consequences as a result of focusing solely on skills in a post-COVID labor market and contribute ways to mitigate them.

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Cited By

Kingsley SSilberman MWang CLambeth RZhi JEslami MLi BBigham J(2024)‘Your Duties Are To Sweep A Floor Remotely’: Low Information Quality in Job Advertisements is a Barrier to Low-Income Job-Seekers’ Successful Use of Digital PlatformsProceedings of the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Symposium on Human-Computer Interaction for Work10.1145/3663384.3663403(1-20)Online publication date: 25-Jun-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3663384.3663403
Lu AGilhool AHsiao JDillahunt T(2022)Emotional Labor in Everyday Resilience: Class-Based Experiences of Navigating Unemployment Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic in the U.S.Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35551136:CSCW2(1-27)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3555113
Dillahunt TSiqueira Rodrigues LChiao-Yin Hsiao JCherubini M(2022)Self-regulation and Autonomy in the Job Search: Key Factors to Support Job Search Among Swiss Job SeekersInteracting with Computers10.1093/iwc/iwac00833:5(537-563)Online publication date: 15-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1093/iwc/iwac008

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Published In

cover image ACM Conferences

DIS '21: Proceedings of the 2021 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference

June 2021

2082 pages

ISBN:9781450384766

DOI:10.1145/3461778

Editors:
Wendy Ju
Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech
,
Lora Oehlberg
University of Calgary
,
Sean Follmer
Stanford University
,
Sarah Fox
Carnegie Mellon University
,
Stacey Kuznetsov
Arizona State University

Copyright © 2021 Owner/Author.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike International 4.0 License.

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Published: 28 June 2021

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National Science Foundation
Swiss National Science Foundation

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DIS '21

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DIS '21: Designing Interactive Systems Conference 2021

June 28 - July 2, 2021

Virtual Event, USA

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Overall Acceptance Rate 1,158 of 4,684 submissions, 25%

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Cited By

Kingsley SSilberman MWang CLambeth RZhi JEslami MLi BBigham J(2024)‘Your Duties Are To Sweep A Floor Remotely’: Low Information Quality in Job Advertisements is a Barrier to Low-Income Job-Seekers’ Successful Use of Digital PlatformsProceedings of the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Symposium on Human-Computer Interaction for Work10.1145/3663384.3663403(1-20)Online publication date: 25-Jun-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3663384.3663403
Lu AGilhool AHsiao JDillahunt T(2022)Emotional Labor in Everyday Resilience: Class-Based Experiences of Navigating Unemployment Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic in the U.S.Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35551136:CSCW2(1-27)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3555113
Dillahunt TSiqueira Rodrigues LChiao-Yin Hsiao JCherubini M(2022)Self-regulation and Autonomy in the Job Search: Key Factors to Support Job Search Among Swiss Job SeekersInteracting with Computers10.1093/iwc/iwac00833:5(537-563)Online publication date: 15-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1093/iwc/iwac008

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