People who want to work for a democratically run business can now search for vacancies on a dedicated jobs and recruitment website.

Launched in April 2019, Democraticjobs.coop advertises jobs at worker co-operatives. The website was developed by Glowbox Design, a worker owned digital agency from London, with funding from the Solidarity Economy Association’s Principle Six Plus Fund.

“The idea came from the realisation that there are lots of people out there dissatisfied with working in traditional business structures,” said Glowbox member Jason Chrysostomou.

While many niche jobs websites already focus on different sectors of the economy, there were no platforms available for those seeking employment in democratic businesses, he added.

“We found that while there is lots of interest in democratically organised workplaces, there wasn’t somewhere to go to find out about job opportunities, which was our motivation for creating DemocraticJobs.coop,” he said.

The website has around 40 jobs listed already, all from English-speaking countries. However, the co-op’s long-term goal is for the platform to list jobs from worker co-ops all over the world, in different languages.

Glowbox is encouraging other worker co-ops to list jobs on the website and help to promote the initiative. Posting a job and uploading a CV is free of charge.

“We wanted to enable people to upload their CVs into a list directory so worker co-ops can search and look for people with different skills and shared values,” added Mr Chrysostomou.

At the moment the website enables users to add jobs, upload CVs and search for jobs. In the future it could have extra features and evolve towards a more interactive platform, says Mr Chrysostomou.

The co-op will be looking for sponsors to be able to continue and sustain the site. Glowbox is a member of the Cooperative Technologists (CoTech), a network of co-operative businesses seeking to build a better technology sector in the UK.