Teen Jobs comes to Hawke’s Bay
The launch of a new website in Hawke’s Bay may be the answer to many parents, and their teenagers’ prayers. And the answer has come from a 15-yearold.
Josh Callander first launched Teen Jobs in his hometown of Tauranga in November last year and has since expanded to five other New Zealand cities.
“I started the website as a school project for the Tauranga Young Innovator Awards and came third place and was encouraged to follow through and develop the idea into a fully functional website,” Josh says.
Teen Jobs is currently live in Tauranga, Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Christchurch, with more than 2900 teenagers registered and many job offers each week. Josh says Teen Jobs is now the leading way for teenagers to find jobs in New Zealand.
“We have been popular because we are innovative. We don’t list jobs. Instead of listing a job, paying and waiting, we simply list the teenagers with a CV-like profile which employers and households can browse and make contact.”
Josh says Teen Jobs is completely free for users — and now it’s Hawke’s Bay’s turn.
“We are launching in Napier and Hastings because the objective of the website is to help teenagers to gain essential employment related skills, including responsibility, work ethic, time management and overall to reduce New Zealand’s youth unemployment rate which is three times the adult Josh Callander
rate. The more teenagers we can help to gain these skills, the better and more helpful we will be.”
Josh initially came up with the idea when he was looking for part-time work in the school holidays.
“I looked on job websites such as Trade Me Jobs and Seek, however, I found that there was nothing specifically aimed at teenagers. I knew there must have been a better alternative and this is when the Teen Jobs idea was born.”
Teen Jobs currently has around 3000 teenagers’ profiles listed on the site. Josh says it flips the traditional way where the employer lists a job and people apply.
“Teenagers just select their job categories, suburbs and days available and employers search under the same criteria to find teenagers who match what they need.”
He says this is faster and cheaper than listing jobs, and works well for part-time or unskilled roles, which suits students and teenagers.
He says keeping the teenagers safe has been a priority.
“We have added many features to keep teenagers safe online, including those under 16 must confirm they have their parents’ permission and are being overseen by their parents before they can sign up.
“There are no personal details displayed on the website and there are no feedback features or way to comment on teenagers profiles.”
Josh says this means teenagers can’t be ‘trolled’.
“We have filters for contacting teenagers to filter out inappropriate messages.
“Contact can only be made through the website — we keep a copy of all contact details.”
He says when a job connection is made a workplace address must be given — which is recorded — and the teenager is told to only meet there.
“There are numerous cybersafety messages to teenagers on the website, including with the contact message from the employer to the teenager which comes with a message around involving your parents in meeting the employer.”
He says teenagers can enter as much or as little information as they feel comfortable with.
“Teenagers are blocked from some job categories based on age.
“For example, under 14-yearolds cannot babysit.”
Although he is unsure how many teenagers have found work since the website started, Teen Jobs has enabled “hundreds” of job contacts every month.
Josh says there is a real variety of job types. The most common are household work including gardening, babysitting and lawn mowing.
“Then we have also had businesses mainly offering retail jobs such as shop, cafes, etc.”
Helpful tips for teenagers trying to create their profile can be found in a section on the website www.teenjobs.co.nz/ marketing
The long-term goal is to decrease the youth unemployment rate in New Zealand and Teen Jobs may be already doing just that.
“The response from teenagers has been phenomenal — there has been no easy way for teenagers to find work in the past and we have had an amazing response.
“We have even had teenagers from Napier asking when we were coming here.
“We have had teenagers contacting us telling us that we have been a real help and allowed them to find work that they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to get.”
Josh says parents have also been very supportive.
“The whole community really backs the website and we have had an amazing response from community groups, as well as not-for-profit charities looking for volunteers.”
■ For more information visit www.teenjobs.co.nz