Job Match Quality Optimization
RCTReview
Information frictions prevent employers from matching specific job requirements with job-seekers' unobserved capabilities. Poor match quality leads to high worker turnover, reduced job tenure, and stagnant wage growth.
Picture this
Multi-dimensional skill certificates provide detailed performance data across cognitive, mathematical, linguistic, and practical work tasks. This operates like a detailed specification sheet for complex machinery, allowing employers to place workers in roles where their exact abilities are utilized.
What the evidence says
Providing verified skill certificates increased the longest job spell duration by 10% (1.2 months over an 11.8-month control mean, p < 0.10), raised skill utilization on the job by 8.2 percentage points (p < 0.05), and increased conditional earnings by 15% (370.4 ETB, p < 0.05).
- Who was studied
- N = 3,052 young job-seekers aged 18–29 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
- How
- Randomized controlled trial with longitudinal endline surveys at 8 months and 4 years.
What to do
Assess candidates using multi-dimensional work-sample tests covering cognitive and practical tasks to optimize job placement and tenure.
From the source
"We find that the duration of this work spell significantly increases by about 10 percent when young people are offered the job application workshop... Second, we find that treated workers are 8 percentage points more likely to work in jobs where they employ their skills."
Anonymity_or_Distance_Job_Search_and_Labour_Market_Exclusion_in.pdf