BOOLEAN SYNTAX TUTORIAL
OVERVIEW
Not long ago, in a simpler time, there was a single place you could go to find virtually all
employer want ads: the Sunday newspaper. Fast forward to today, however, and there are
now over 50,000 job lead websites, not even counting individual employer sites, themselves!
Luckily, though, you can tame this dizzying array of sites with a little practice. Savvy job
hunters who learn the basic rules of “Boolean syntax” are able to set up a series of automatic
alerts on a few key job boards that will help them easily stay abreast of virtually any published
job that might fit them on the Internet. Let’s walk through this process together…
BOOLEAN SYNTAX: A QUICK TUTORIAL
AND: Adding the word AND between any two search terms will ensure that your search only
returns results where all of your targeted words show up
e.g. golf AND accounting
OR: Adding the word OR between any two search terms will ensure that your search returns
results where any of your targeted words show up
e.g. mathematics OR algebra OR numbers OR statistics
QUOTATION MARKS: Any time you’re searching using two words or more, you’ll likely
want to enclose the words in quotation marks to keep them together as a unified phrase
e.g. "financial analysis" OR "human resources" OR "business development"
NOT: Adding the word NOT before any search term or quote-surrounded phrase will
eliminate any results containing that particular language
e.g. sales NOT "100% commission"
PARENTHESES: When writing complex searches that mix AND/OR statements together,
you’ll often need to group “ buckets” of clues together with parentheses to avoid confusion
e.g. (sports OR athletics OR fitness) AND (sales OR marketing)
TITLE: While the “title:” syntax option isn’t supported by all websites, you can use this search
prefix on most job lead sites (e.g. Simplyhired) to ONLY search the job title, not the body text
e.g. title:sales OR title:("business development" OR "account management")
JOB LEAD ALERT #1: INDEED.COM
If you haven't yet discovered it, Indeed.com is generally regarded as the most effective job site
in the market today—since it’s essentially a “job board search engine” that collects listings from
thousands of other job sites, in addition to thousands of individual company career pages.
As a first step in your job hunt, therefore, you’ll want to set up a targeted search on this site
using the Boolean syntax rules discussed above. Better yet, once you run your search, you can
hit the “create e-mail alert” button in the top right corner of the screen to automate the
process―and have a new e-mail sent to yourself every 24 hours containing any fresh leads!
Career Horizons, LLC

(425) 450-4960

14205 SE 36th Street, Suite 100

Bellevue, WA 98006

www.career-horizons.com
Example: Search for Administrative Assistant Jobs
title:(executive OR administrative OR admin OR personal) AND title:assistant
Example: Search for Mid-Level Corporate Communications Jobs
title:(specialist OR coordinator OR representative OR consultant) AND title:(communications
OR relations) AND ("internal communications" OR "corporate communications")
Example: Search for Financial Management Positions
title:(CFO OR controller) OR (title:(finance OR financial OR accounting) AND title:(VP OR
title:SVP OR title:chief OR title:president OR title:director OR title:manager OR
title:management OR title:executive OR title: consultant)) NOT title:assistant
Example: Search for Operations Management Jobs Involving International Trade
title:(manager OR director OR VP OR SVP OR vice OR president OR chief) AND
title:(operations OR "supply chain" OR logistics OR distribution OR import OR export) AND
(import OR export OR trade overseas OR EMEA OR "pacific rim" OR africa OR europe OR
australia OR "south america" OR "latin america")
JOB LEAD ALERT #2: SIMPLYHIRED.COM
The second site we'd encourage you to check for leads is Simplyhired.com, which works almost
identically to the Indeed.com site, above. So if you've already created a Boolean search phrase
for Indeed, you can use the exact same one for Simplyhired. While you'll see a fair amount of
overlap in terms of the leads posted on these two "aggregator" sites, it's still worth checking
both, to be thorough—and setting up a daily e-mail alert, just as we recommended on Indeed.
JOB LEAD ALERT #3: LINKEDIN "JOBS" PAGE
The next site you'll want to program to automatically send you job leads is LinkedIn. While
not nearly as big as the previous two sites, LinkedIn’s “Jobs” page is attracting more and more
openings from employers—and doesn't allow sites like Indeed and Simplyhired to pick up and
redistribute their leads. So you'll tend to find fresh jobs on this site you won't see elsewhere.
In general, you won't need to use any Boolean syntax when searching LinkedIn. Just go to the
"Jobs" tab, drill down to the "advanced search" page, and use the drop-down menus to set your
search parameters. Then, once you run the search and see the results, you can hit the “save
search” button at the top right of the page to set up a daily or weekly automatic alert.
JOB LEAD ALERT #4: CRAIGSLIST
Beyond the three sites above, the final place we'd recommend you check for published leads is
Craigslist.com, which features tons of openings at non-profits and startup organizations—and
which has never allowed other sites (like Indeed or Simplyhired) to pick up and redistribute its
listings. The syntax for searching on Craigslist is different from standard Boolean, however.
Instead of an "OR" term, you use a vertical pipe character "|" and instead of a NOT command,
you use a minus sign. Also, instead of adding in a Title prefix directly within your search, you
check a box called "Search Titles Only" on the search page to achieve the same functionality.
Example: (manager | director | VP | vice) AND (sales | "business development")
Craigslist recently added a "Set Alert" option, too—so make sure to use it to set up a daily feed!
Career Horizons, LLC

(425) 450-4960

14205 SE 36th Street, Suite 100

Bellevue, WA 98006

www.career-horizons.com