Today being Sunday and thinking of giving back to the society, I decided to pen down 21 ways to avoid scam jobs based on my wealth of experience in the industry.
A. Before You Start Your Job Search
1. Be focused: Knowing what you want in life may be the first step towards avoiding scam jobs and ultimately nailing a job. Avoid applying randomly to all positions you see. Many job seekers do not read job descriptions anymore. They simply "throw the ball" as soon as they see "Admin", "Customer", "HR", "Intern", among other titles. THe more your random throws, the higher your chances of nailing a fake invite.
B. Before you start applying
2. Do not use general directories. These directories are open to the public and lot's of people advertise different products and services on these platforms. This may not be the best place for your job search. You can message me for names :)
3. Use reliable job boards like this one. Identify job boards with very low Spam rate. Now, I will recommend www.myjobmag.com. We go a long way in verifying our jobs. As a mantra, we rather have a false positive than a false negative.
4. Be careful with job aggregators. These guys do a great job bringing all jobs together from different sources and the process is automated. Hence, they do not confirm the jobs listed. While using job aggregators, watch the websites they redirect to and be sure they are trusted.
C. Research
You do not start researching a company when you get an invite. You should start your research before sending in your application. Serious candidates research companies before applying.
5. Google the company, see what comes up. What can you see about them?
6. Visit Nairaland, search for the company name and read reviews
7. Go to LinkedIn and check them out. Do they have a company page and staff? A company claiming to be in existence for 25 years ought to have a history. There may be few exceptions
8. Google the email address used. This will reveal different places that the email has been used. This may be an eye-opener.
9. If you are not convinced, check if the company is even existing on CAC website. Read how to do this here: https://www.myjobmag.com/square/article/194/how-to-check-if-a-company-is-registered-in-nigeria-with-cac-corporate-affairs-commission
10. Search for a phrase or two in the job description and see if it appears elsewhere. Watch out for the volume of jobs posted unless it is a recruitment firm.
D. During Applications
11. Please please please, do not apply randomly. If you use more than one job website, keep track of all your applications with a diary or notepad. Asides fishing out fake invites, it does not make sense if you are invited and you end up asking your interviewer for the position. I consider this ridiculous.
12. Install Grammarly Chrome extension or simply sign up on Grammarly.com for your English corrections. Pardon me, this has nothing to do with scam jobs, but it will do you lots of good.
13. Watch out for Graduate Trainee Recruitment in unknown organizations. From experience, small Organizations lookout for specialists. Most SMEs do not have the capacity to run massive graduate recruitment schemes. They do not even have the resources to absorb that number. So, before applying to that Graduate Recruitment Program at QtQ, do your research.
14. Watch out for Graduate Trainee Programs with application email. Due to the usual massive response to General Graduate roles, most reasonable companies use portals for easy candidate management.
E. When you receive the invite
15a. Be happy (this is a bonus). Some people are praying to get an invite, even if it is GNLD. This is not a joke!
15b. Check your diary to confirm if you sent in the application. I guess you are safer if you did. Watch out for phrases like: based on recommendation, invitation for chat/training, ref code, etc. in invite text message.
16. Research the company again. Refer to Section C on Research
17. In addition to Section C, check the company's social media activity: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Be smart about this. In another edition, I will write on this.
18. Google the company name, try using the short form if you cannot find good results online.
19. Google the phone number they want you to call. You may even search for the number on Facebook to see if it linked to any company page or person.
20. Google the interview address to see if it exists somewhere and in what context.
21. If the test/interview location is in Lagos, use the Google Instant Street View to see what the area you are going to looks like https://www.instantstreetview.com/
This site is not updated real-time but it gives you an idea.
Ultimately, be wise and seek wise counsel. You can email services@myjobmag.com if you use MyJobMag and you are not sure of a job invite.
Goodluck in your search.
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