Boolean search language1/10/2024 ![]() How can you expect to get good answers (results/people) when you don’t know how to ask the right questions (construct effective queries)? #2 Boolean logic is the easy part of search stringsĪs I a fond of telling folks, my daughter learned Boolean logic in kindergarten – public school, no less! I do not believe sourcers and recruiters need to become masters of “Boolean search” – I believe they need to develop a mastery of information retrieval, which involves knowing how to use sites and systems to find people who are highly likely to be excellent matches for a company’s talent needs, as well as people who are highly likely to know and can recommend/refer people from the target talent pool – regardless of the search interface, syntax or solution. If you haven’t already read my Search: Beyond Boolean article, I strongly advise you to do so. If you’re not writing queries with the specific intent to predictively control the probability of match beyond keywords, I’d argue you’re not approaching talent sourcing from the right perspective, which will drastically affect the efficacy of your searches. So, without further ado: #1 Searching for anything (people, information, etc.) isn’t about Boolean strings – it’s about information retrievalīoolean logic just happens to be the easiest way to construct a query, which, when it comes to sourcing talent, is essentially asking a system to return results of people who have a high probability of being qualified for and interested in your current and/or future opportunities, regardless of job seeking status. I’m going to take the opportunity to address the points Matt raised – not because I am trying to stay “relevant,” as some might suggest (my blog is a not-for-profit personal passion and I don’t consult/train for a fee), and also not because I have a vested interest in “keeping Boolean search alive” (because I really don’t) – rather, because I am still amazed that a fundamental lack of understanding of search and information retrieval – both “manual” Boolean search and “automated” taxonomy driven and/or AI-powered semantic search – and I am constantly trying to help people not only understand both, but also appreciate their intrinsic limitations, as well as separate reality from hype. ![]() I enjoyed Matt’s post and his approach, but I did not find his arguments to be thoroughly sound – although I suspect he wasn’t trying to make them so (after all, his blog is titled “Snark Attack”). You can read the snippet regarding Boolean Strings below – click the image to be taken to the entire post, in which Matt addresses mobile recruiting and employer branding. An entertaining blog post by Matt Charney was recently brought to my attention in which he tells the world to shut up and stop talking about Boolean strings – he argues that Boolean search is a dying art and that “investing time or energy into becoming a master at Boolean is a lot like learning the fine art of calligraphy or opening a Delorean dealership.”
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