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Job seekers are in a fierce fight for store-level roles. We looked at close to 900,000 job seeker profiles on JOBJACK, and 5,087 job seekers told us what it costs them to not only look for work, but also keep the job they have. The report’s findings challenge the assumption that all job seekers want is just a salary. What they tell us is that growth and a chance to make a better life are far more important. This report is vital reading for all employers who hire store-level and front-line workers. It will get you asking how to make job seeking easier, more accessible and less costly.

Resilience is in our DNA! 🇿🇦 Despite the challenges of looking for work, hope remains. 22.3% of unemployed respondents in our recent survey used the word “hopeful” to describe their job seeking journey. Being part of this journey is a privilege I don't take lightly 💚 🔗 Read JOBJACK's latest report, The Cost of Trying, via the link in the comments.

A store-level candidate with work experience is 11x more likely to be hired than someone without it. But experience only shows that the person has done the job before, not whether they did it well. JOBJACK co-founder and CEO Heine Bellingan spoke to Jeremy Maggs from Moneyweb about JOBJACK’s new 2026 Job Seeker Report and the immense hurdles job seekers face just to apply for a job. Heine explains how the current 'way of hiring', such as expecting candidates to drop off physical CVs and attend first interviews in person, forces unemployed candidates to spend money they do not have. He also compares how screening differs between head office and store-level roles, and notes that today’s technology allows for predictable, cost-effective screening at scale. Listen to the full interview in the clip below.

Hope💚 is the most used term to describe the job-seeking journey. Even with high unemployment rates, South Africans are resilient and are determined to find opportunities for future growth. We have HOPE 🇿🇦! We surveyed thousands of job seekers and tapped into the mountain of data we have gathered from helping more than 70k people find jobs to produce the 2026 Cost of Job Seeking Report: ⚫ Job seekers with previous work experience had an 11x higher appointment rate. ⚫ People aren't just looking for work; they're looking for opportunities to grow. 82.4% of unemployed respondents said growth opportunities mattered when choosing a job, compared to 37.2% who selected salary. ⚫78% of candidate interview cancellations were due to an obstacle, not a choice. Link in the comments to the full report. Warm regards

South Africans are looking for more than just a job; they’re looking for growth. But even trying comes at a cost. JOBJACK’s 2026 Job Seeker Report: The cost of trying combines data from 867,706 job seekers with insights from more than 5,000 survey responses to better understand the realities of finding work in South Africa. From the financial barriers people face to the opportunities they aspire to, how circumstance influences decision making and the employer perception challenge us to look beyond applications and outcomes and reconsider how we make employment accessible. Behind every application is a person looking for an opportunity to build a better future. Read the full Report from the link in our comments 🔗

Today we released the first edition of JOBJACK's 2026 Job Seeker Report - The Cost of Trying. It captures what it’s actually like to look for a store-level job in South Africa, and to keep one, as the cost of living keeps climbing. What stays with me isn’t just the financial toll of job seeking: getting to interviews, printing CVs (in today’s world!) and buying data just to find jobs to apply for. It’s the decision so many people have to make between going to that interview and putting food on the table. The tragic result is that these job seekers get labelled unreliable. In reality, 78% of those who cancelled an interview did so because of circumstances they couldn’t avoid, not because they chose to. But in the face of all of this, there’s real resilience. It comes through in the hope job seekers describe in their search, and in their hope for growth and a better future- something more than just a salary. So why release a report like this? It’s simple. We want to show that our job seekers aren’t numbers or a commodity. They’re people with the same hopes and ambitions as the person sitting next to you in the office. And understanding what it took for them to get to work in the morning, or to show up on that first day, helps employers see the person behind the application. Link in the comments