What began as an email bulletin has grown into one of the most successful job searching websites for those interested in working in the community, or Not For Profit area. Giancarlo Ramaioli created the business in 1999 and even though Giancarlo sadly passed away in 2009 the website is Ireland’s primary website for Not For Profits to advertise for positions and their community to apply to jobs. The website also offers a Community Exchange forum for Not For Profits to share with each other

Ahead runs the The Willing and Able Mentoring (WAM) Programme is designed to give access to the labour markets for graduates with at least a level 8 degree and have a disability. Ahead then works with a range of businesses (some of whom you can see in this image) to provide paid work placements for a minimum of six months for these graduates. Graduates are only allowed 2 placements through the WAM programme. All successful graduates are given a mentor upon starting in the organisation that hires them, to ease their transition into the company and answer any questions the new employee may have. According to their website “the WAM Programme has provided over 550 placements for graduates with disabilities”

For many that can go to college, their college alumni job pages are often a great source of potential positions. Alumni (former students) from the course go back to the careers service or former lecturers. This is because the employers often approach the college, knowing the standards of the course or the college in general and they want those in college or recently graduated to apply to their organisations. It can also work well if the potential applicant has a reference from one of the lecturers in the college.

I previously did a case study on Connect4work which you can view here. CEO – Mary Finn established the organisation to assist people returning to work following an absence due to illness, injury or other reasons such as medical issues in the past.

It was during her time working in a pilot programme and targeting this group of people, that Mary saw the need for greater compassion and better understanding amongst employers in how to assist their employees, while at the same time, boosting employee confidence, self-belief and retention at work.

Connect4Work now runs programmes to support employers and employees on how to plan for a safe, timely

Nearly 90k Family Carers in Ireland receive carers Allowance from the government and with it, a stipulation that they cannot work more than 18.5 hours per week. Family Carers are accountants, teachers, marketing executives, etc who have had to give up full-time employment to care for a sick or ageing loved one at home. They have so many skills and qualifications to use and offer employers but on an 18.5 hour per basis. With even an example of half of 90k Family Carers available for part time work, if employers were open to offering 18.5 hour per week contracts, Family Carers can help towards Ireland’s current recruitment crisis.

As you can imagine from its name, Covid-interns was created out of the Covid-19 pandemic, for students and recent graduates. Covid Interns was started soon after the pandemic began by classmates from Trinity College Dublin. They could see that the internships and entry level positions that would normally be advertised around the March/April period weren’t being promoted and there were recruitment freezes in many of the larger businesses in Ireland.

The pair created Covid Interns. A website where potential interns can upload their CV to land roles focused within SMEs. The businesses that were hiring interns could then upload their internship positions, be matched with an intern, interview them and successfully (remotely) onboard them into the organisation. Since the easing of restrictions, the website has gone from strength to strength, matching over 300 interns to some of the biggest businesses in Ireland. Very recently Covid Interns were purchased by GradGuide – which I have included info on below.

According to their website “We bridge the gaps between refugees and Irish companies and connect refugees’ talent with Irish companies” The website then created a job coaching service for refugees to Ireland (who are legal to work here) and anonymously put their credentials on their site. They then work with employers and put the positions that they are offering on their site,  matching  their potential candidates to the positions on offer. A social enterprise, Employ Refugees is free to use for their users and the employers they work with. They’re job coaches also offer training, identify suitable roles, give interview advice and work with both the user and the employer to ensure a smooth transition to the workplace.

Formally Employamum.ie founder Karen O’Reilly created the business in 2016 to help parents (predominantly mothers) to ease them back into the workforce, by offering flexible work schedules by employers who understood work/life balance and the pressures of being a parent. However, after 3 years they found that 30% of their placements were male and 50% weren’t parents at all, so they decided to rebrand the company and its mission. 

Now EmployFlex works with candidates who wish to have flexibility in their work such as part-time, remote, job sharing or flexible hours to help support their work/life balance. The company has a 93% success rate and now has over 5,000 candidates on their books and has worked with the likes of Bank of Ireland, Ballymaloe Foods and The Republic of Work to name a few.

Grad Guide brands itself as “A free mentorship and events platform to help students and graduates get jobs in the world’s fastest-growing companies”. Their platform allows job seekers (not just graduates) to create a profile and be matched with a mentor a few years ahead of the job seeker. The mentor can then advise about how best to go about applying to certain companies. The service also offers The Grad Guide Academy resources for applying to those companies, open days in some of the companies they work with and a community that offers insights from fellow job seekers. On the other side, the company then recruits the world’s fastest growing companies to the platform, at a tiered pricing range, depending on how they use the site. Once they start advertising the jobs on the website to those job seekers that have a log-in and profile, they can then work with their mentor to apply to positions within those companies.

The company is so successful it was purchased by The Clune Group and the company has gone on to purchase Covid Interns recently.

The premier website in Ireland for any company or employee interested in working remotely. Started in 2019, the company advocates for remote working, by offering training packages to companies interested in onboarding or changing their current work practises to increase the amount of time that employees can work from home. Grow Remote also advocates for employees by offering a community of remote workers to reduce some of the isolation felt by working remotely. They also offer courses on getting started with remote work, a jobs board of organisations who embrace remote working, and a career planning and resources section for the job seeker.

Another company born out of the Covid-19 pandemic, Indielist was created soon after the pandemic began as many freelancers in the advertising, PR and marketing industries struggled to get employment as there was a recruitment freeze on. Una Herlihy and Peter McPartlin came together to create Indielist. According to adworld.ie “There are nearly 3,000 people offering freelance services in Ireland” and this website allows those freelancers to meet with the indielist.ie team, upload their portfolio, and describe their specialist areas. Employers can upload their available projects for freelancers and then they match the correct candidate to the specific position.

According to their website “Search Talent was born from the need in the recruitment industry for a boutique high-end service offering. Search Talent will take the time to understand your recruiting needs and treat every requisition as if it’s an Executive Search. This means high levels of service and attention to detail, no matter what your requirements.” With their team of over 30 highly qualified employees, they are one of the top performing recruitment agencies in Ireland.

Created in 2020, The Open Doors Initiative is an initiative of over 100 of the biggest companies based in Ireland and NGOs, who work with the government to create pathways to employment for marginalised people, nationwide. As part of this The Open Doors Initiative created a jobs page of their website where some of the organisations that they work with post their positions so that they can get more of a diverse range of people applying.

Having spent one too many hours on the M50, CEO Ciara Garvan decided she needed a more flexible approach to work. Long before the Covid-19 pandemic began, Ciara and her growing team of recruiters specialised in “newer” ways to work, i.e. remote working or flexible working in terms of part-time, 3 day weeks and to start and/or finish work at different times of the day.  Having received support from the likes of Enterprise Ireland and having clients such as Dell Technologies amongst their client base. According to their website “At the moment WorkJuggle is focused on IT, Finance, HR, Management, Marketing, Project/Programme Management and Sales roles. We hope you find what you are looking for whether it is a contract position or something more permanent. We are just at the start of our journey. We hope you will join us.”