1 - Primer
2 - Gateways

3 - Supersites
4 - Job Search Engines

One of the best Gateways, run by Susan Joyce. Here you will find a wealth of information on job hunting, using the Internet effectively, and current articles about the world of work. In addition, there are many links to job search resources and industry journals, organized by field, location, etc. The site is extremely well organized; I find that the look of a web site is crucial to using that site well, and finding the information that it has to offer. I really like the look of Job-Hunt.

Originally a California site — and still somewhat CA-centric — Jobstar also has a national presence, with lots of good information for the job-hunter. Run by Mary-Ellen Mort (who goes by the pseudonym “Electra” on the site), JobStar is particularly good when looking for information on salaries and the Hidden Job Market. (If you don’t know what I mean by that, you have obviously not read What Color Is Your Parachute?, and shame on you.) Since the site’s funding is from the California State Library, there are links to actual job postings in that state, and specific Jobstar sites for Los Angeles, San Diego, Sacramento, and San Francisco; this also explains why there are not specific sites for areas outside of California. But she does have links to help you find work regardless of location, and most of the site’s information is relevant no matter where you live.

An extremely comprehensive site. What you get here is a manageable index of job-hunting resources on the Internet, well-organized, plus a lot of extras, like a summary of resume databases and job-search guides. In addition to informative (and timely) articles, there are many links to job listings by industry and profession, from "Academic Librarians" to "Zoo and Aquarium". You should know that there is a lot of information here, and it may take you a little while to become familiar enough with the site to find exactly what you want. But this is a minor complaint; all things being equal, The Riley Guide is one of the best places for your job hunt.

They bill themselves as "The #1 Entry Level Job Site". Believe it. Every time I go on this site, I find something else to pleasantly surprise me. Among the site's features is a large database of employers who are looking for grads and entry-level personnel; also, author Brian Krueger's book, College Grad Job Hunter, is on the site, complete, well translated to Web (hyperlinked) format, and free. Part of the secret to the site's excellence is that the people here see their mission as a limited one: helping to find employment for college students and recent graduates only. But many of the site's resources are useful to all, and you should have the site in your Favorites (Bookmark) folder for sure.

There is a lot of stuff here — over 2,000 pages, much of it quite good. Besides all of the stuff you would expect on a Gateway site, like articles on job-hunting, resumes, testing and career assessment, there is data on making a career change, colleges, what are the top companies to work for (grouped in categories like private companies, public companies, multi-cultural, which companies are best for the older worker, etc.), links to resources for teens, for the working college student… lots of stuff. Also, the site has many links to colleges and education resources. The interface is good, the pages well set up, and the site is logical and, for the most part, easy to use. Not that the site is perfect. Many of the articles lack depth, though you can usually find links to more data when that’s required. Also, if you use Netscape as your browser, some parts of the site will not work properly; you should use Microsoft Internet Explorer. Although they have a job listing database, I found this part of the site to be slow when it worked, and sometimes didn’t work at all. For this reason and others, I recommend that you use the site as a resource for finding information, but if you are looking to use a job-hunting database, there are better ones available.