20% of online job listings are misleading or never result in employment

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Editor’s take: Conventional wisdom suggests that a tool as powerful as the Internet should make finding employment exponentially easier for job seekers. Yet, unsurprisingly, humanity has managed to complicate it.

According to data from hiring platform Greenhouse, roughly one in five jobs posted online either are not real or were never intended to be filled. Both scenarios sound equally unbelievable but critics make some compelling arguments for why it is likely true.

Some suggest “ghost job” postings are actually a corporate strategy used to make onlookers believe their business is growing or actively hiring when in reality, that is simply not the case. The practice could also help executives reach quarterly goals without the backlash of removing jobs from career sites.

There are plenty of other reasons that come to mind as to why a job listing might not be what it seems on the surface. For example, it is entirely possible that a company wants to make a hire… eventually… but doesn’t have the resources or ability to do it right away.

As Stack Overflow highlights, some companies are always on the lookout for new candidates – but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are actively hiring. Others may have simply “forgot” to take down a listing after making a recent hiring, or want to keep attracting new candidates following a hire in case their first pick does not work out for whatever reason. Worse yet, some companies post ghost jobs to make existing employees feel “replaceable” or so they believe additional help is on the way to alleviate their workload.

If you are in the job market and not making much headway, consider alternative routes. Word of mouth is still incredibly powerful; reaching out to contacts you have made over the years through networking could lead to opportunities you might not have otherwise even known about. And if you’re feeling overly ambitious, now might be the perfect time to branch out and start your own business.

Image credit: Tahir Osman, Getty Images