7.1.1 Source of job post or vacancy

There are several ways you can verify that the organisation or company posting the job exists and is real.

This section will discuss two ways of doing so:

a. Organisation details and website

b. Account verification

a. Organisation details and website

The first step and the most reliable is to go straight to the source of the job post or vacancy.

This means you go straight to the company or organisation website and search their job vacancies (as detailed in section 4.3.4 of Module 4Link opens in a new window), and if you find the same job posted on their website that is your confirmation that this is a real job.

Some recruitment and job websites like LinkedIn post the job on their website, and then when it comes to applying once you click the ‘Apply’ button it takes you directly to the company or organisation website where you have to fill their specific job application form (discussed in Module 10).

b. Account verification

The second step of verifying if the source of the job posts is reliable, is through account verification.

According to Wikipedia:

Account verification is the process of verifying and confirming that the account is used and owned by a specific real individual or organisation.

This is also another advantage of using well-known global, regional and local recruitment and job websites to find jobs. Because many of these websites require employers or companies to verify their organisation and company accounts.

Many social media platforms allow account verification as well, which is usually indicated with a tick (correct sign) next to the account name (as shown below in yellow).

On LinkedIn once a company or organisation creates a profile, they have the option to verify their account, this also applies to individual accounts on LinkedIn (discussed in section 7.2)Link opens in a new window

Examples of verified organisation accounts on LinkedIn

Although not recommended as a source to search for jobs online as mentioned in Module 4, sometimes if you see a job you are interested in on other non-professional or non-job specific social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and so on, you should be very careful (section 4.3Link opens in a new window). You should do the following:

1- First, try to search for it online (for example on google) to see if you can find the same job either posted directly on the employer website or on a well-known recruitment or job portal, to make sure that the job vacancy is real.

2- If you could not find the job anywhere else but on the social media platforms (i.e. not on professional or job-specific platform), then you should try to search and apply only to jobs that are posted by organisation pages or groups that have verified accounts on these platforms.

3- Another way to see if the employer organisation or company account is reliable on non-professional social media platforms, is by going to their website and checking the social media links found on the company or organisation website

Verified accounts on Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp would have the tick with blue next to their name.