2009-2010 e-Career Awards
Promoting career information excellence on organisations’ websites
Read the report analysing nine government Career Websites to see how Victoria, followed by Queensland, Western Australia and Northern Territory, present a quality Career Website. Look at what the Department of Innovation and DEEWR have done to improve their Career Websites.
2008 e-Career Awards Results
Read the report and find out what makes a quality Career Website and what questions you can be asking to review your Career Website.
About the Awards
The e-Career Awards promote career information excellence on organisations’ websites.
Why e-Career Awards?
- We are repeatedly told that there is a skills shortage.
- We are also told that younger employees are attracted to organisations that offer career and professional development opportunities.
- Applicants continue to find applying for public service jobs arduous and confusing.
A survey by Mental Nutrition of over 30 government agency websites shows that “..very few use the employment section of their website to full advantage.” A scan of some state and overseas government websites shows a similar result.
How organisations make sense of themselves to job applicants makes a difference as to whether they apply. If the process is too complicated or doesn’t make sense; if there is little indication of career paths, if it’s too hard to find essential information, then people simply won’t bother.
The ANAO Performance Audit Report No 31, Management of Recruitment in the Australian Public Service notes that agencies need to be more creative and innovative in their attraction and recruitment strategies. (p. 61-62) The report emphasises the need to base attraction and employer branding strategies on sound research. The APSC State of the Service Employer Survey 2006-07 identified a range of attributes that attracted employees to their current job. These factors included:
- Future career opportunities in the agency
- Desire to gain experience or greater experience in the APS
- Ability to contribute to making a difference to the lives of Australians
- Agency’s reputation for good work-life balance practices
- Developmental/educational opportunities in the agency
- Opportunity to work on innovative or ‘leading edge’ projects.
Websites are one avenue to provide information about these factors and how they apply to a specific agency.
The awards process
The awards focused on government websites in the Commonwealth and ACT Governments.
A range of websites were assessed using criteria that examined:
- Homepage
- Career page and information
- Job vacancy information
- Corporate information
- Clarity and access.
You can read the details of these criteria.
A 4-point scale was used for each of the criteria.
- 0 Means there is nothing to match this criterion
- 1 Means there is minor coverage of this criterion
- 2 Means this criterion is mostly covered
- 3 Means there is full, comprehensive, high-quality coverage of this criterion
Websites were judged as follows:
- Gold Means a score of 13 – 15
- Silver Means a score of 9 – 12
- Bronze Means a score of less than 9
Categories of Awards:
- Commonwealth departments
- Commonwealth agencies
- ACT Government departments
Special categories of Awards:
- Excellence in information for applicants
- Excellence in career path information