European tools for matching skills and finding talent : What’s in it for job boards?
Date: 2019-03-22
Institutions: Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion
Subjects: EU employment policy, employment service, job mobility, labour market, professional qualifications, recruitment

EUROPEAN TOOLS FOR MATCHING  
SKILLS AND FINDING TALENT
What’s in it for job boards? 
Job  boards  are  key  to  finding  the  right  candidates  for  the  right  roles  across  Europe.  The  European 
Commission  has  always  worked  to  facilitate  mobility  and  employability  in  the  EU  labour  market,  and 
wants to enable the work of recruiters and job platforms with relevant technical solutions and support.  

EUROPASS
A European platform for skills  

ESCO
Improve job search and matching 

Europass 
is  best 
[https://europass.cedefop.europa.eu] 
known for its CV template and receives two million visits 
a  month.  The  Commission  is  currently  working  on  the 
modernisation of Europass, to offer a free e-portfolio tool 
for people to manage their personal information on skills, 
and  access  relevant  information  on  qualifications,  skills 
trends, guidance and education across the EU.

Europass for job boards:

 •

Job boards can become interoperable with Europass:

 •

 •

Users will be able to import their e-portfolio into 
the job board (and vice versa) for job- searching, 
or matching.

Users will also be able to make instant applications 
for jobs on partner websites.

 •

 •

The  new  Europass  platform  will  offer  targeted 
suggestions  for  training  and  skills  development  to 
its  users  in  line  with  their  needs.  The  Commission  is 
working with Member States and stakeholders on how 
to best deliver these suggestions to Europass users.

Europass  will  include  a  technical  framework  for 
issuing  and  verifying  digital  qualifications.  This  will 
enable quick  and easy verification of information on 
candidate’s qualifications, when screening or reviewing 
applications for jobs.

If  you  are  interested  in  discussing  the  possibilities 
of  ESCO  and  the  new  Europass  for  your  job  board,  
please contact us at: EMPL-EUROPASS@ec.europa.eu 

ESCO [http://ec.europa.eu/esco] is a European reference 
ontology  with  3  000  occupations  and  13  500  skills, 
available in 27 languages. Job boards can use ESCO for 
free to improve job searches or matching. 

ESCO for job boards:

 •

 •

ESCO can be used as an ontology for skills-based 
job  searches  and  matching.  Job  boards  can  use 
ESCO  as  their  main  ontology  for  job  matching, 
to  cover  additional  languages  in  their  search,  or 
to  enrich  their  existing  ontologies  with  additional 
terms.

Job  boards  can  also  use  ESCO  as  a  reference 
point  when  exchanging 
(or 
candidate records) with others. All European public  
employment services will use ESCO for exchanging 
information on vacancies and candidates through 
EURES [http://eures.europa.eu] by 2021.

job  vacancies 

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Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2019 
© European Union, 2019
Reuse is authorised provided the source is acknowledged. 
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Digital Labour 
Market