New E-Mail Effort to Help Inform, Educate Customers

CHICAGO – E-mails will be sent to more than 800,000 business leaders and workers to highlight information and services available at the Illinois Department of Employment Security (IDES), officials announced today.

“This is an employment office. The e-mail blast is another tool to share that message,” IDES Director Jay Rowell said. “We offer job training and career counseling. We can work with companies to help them hire, set wages and build a business plan. The ultimate goal is to put people back to work as quickly as possible. Doing so is best for our businesses, our workers, and our economy.”

The e-mails will be sent to business leaders and individuals who have shared their addresses with the IDES. The initiative builds off previous successful e-mail blasts, such as those that informed Veterans of job fairs.

The e-mails will not seek personal or banking information. There will not be a reply feature. If an individual receives an e-mail claiming to be from IDES that seeks such information and encourages a reply, it should be viewed suspiciously. The e-mails will include links to IDES content, and that content will be clearly labeled.

The e-mails will not replace official correspondence between IDES, employers and workers at this time.

An example of potential e-mail content is Illinoisjoblink.com. There are 120,000 help-wanted ads on Illinoisjoblink.com, the IDES employment website that links job seekers with employers. This no-cost, career resource allows individuals to create multiple resumes that emphasize different talents and allows businesses to search for specific skills. The keyword matching technology increases the likelihood of a successful new hire. Illinois JobLink emphasizes Illinois jobs, scrapes other commercial job boards, and compares favorably to private efforts that cost hundreds of dollars for a single advertisement.

Business leaders can access IDES’ no-cost HR recruitment services at www.ides.illinois.gov or by calling (877) 342-7533. The businesses-services team can assist employers with hiring individuals and evaluating what tax incentives might be available, such as the $5,000 state tax credit for hiring qualified Veterans.

Appointed by Gov. Quinn and confirmed last summer by the Illinois Senate with strong bi-partisan support, Rowell was entrusted with three goals: turn the IDES into the state’s employment office; assist families facing economic hardship; and advocate for taxpayers by correcting waste, fraud and abuse.