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Finding opportunities

Two distinct types of item appear in the list: matches, which are computed, and suggestions, which are sent by another member. Both require Solo plan.

The opportunities marketplaceOpen /a/opportunities in the app
The opportunities marketplaceThe opportunities marketplace

Opportunity matching requires Solo plan and uses the same engine as member matching, with the same 60/30/10 weighting of shared terms, meaning and distance. What differs is the comparison: an opportunity’s tags against your interests and match tags, its country against your location, and its text against yours.

The consequence is that the profile is the input in both cases. A thin match list is addressed by completing the profile rather than by adjusting the search.

Weak matches are excluded rather than ranked low. Items below the relevance threshold do not appear, so a short list indicates that few met the threshold.

A flagged opportunity is scored at half weight for all members, in both directions. See verification.

Completed connections raise match scores with a member, but the bonus applies only in the member → opportunity direction. It does not affect the direction that determines whose list your own opportunity appears in, so connection activity does not raise the ranking of your listings for other members.

Suggestions are Solo plan.

Separately, a member can send an opportunity directly. It appears under Suggested with any accompanying message, and is unrelated to scoring.

Who Any member, to up to five people at once
Message Optional, up to 500 characters
Clearing Suggestions can be dismissed; they do not expire automatically

Suggestion is the less-used of the two mechanisms. Matching identifies what fits a profile, whereas a colleague can identify what fits a member including factors the profile does not record. Up to five recipients can be selected at once, with an optional note.

Opportunities with a start date: reminders and your calendar

Section titled “Opportunities with a start date: reminders and your calendar”

Some opportunities are not just a deadline to apply but a date something happens — a residency, a conference, a course. For those, two things help you not miss it.

Save it, and you are reminded. Save for Later on an opportunity that has a start date also subscribes you to reminders, with no second setting to switch on:

When How you are told
A week before it starts In the app
The day before In the app and by email
On the day In the app and by email

Two things explain what you will and will not get:

  • Reminders speak in dates, not hours. They go out at a fixed time of day rather than at a time chosen for your time zone, so “starts tomorrow” means tomorrow by the calendar.
  • They stop when the opportunity closes. A residency’s start date is often months after its applications shut, so an opportunity that is no longer open is not reminded about. Saving something already closed will not produce reminders.

They follow your Opportunity alerts setting: turn that off and the reminders stop with the rest. See Notifications.

Put it in your calendar. An opportunity with a start date shows a Remind me · Add to calendar menu, and event pages carry the same one. It offers Google Calendar, Outlook.com (personal), Outlook (work or school), Yahoo Calendar, and Download .ics for Apple Calendar and Outlook on the desktop.

Both Outlook entries are there on purpose. Personal Microsoft accounts and work or school accounts sign in at different addresses, and choosing the wrong one lands you on a sign-in for an account you may not have. Pick the one that matches how you sign in to Outlook.

The Add to calendar menu on an event pageOpen /events in the app
The Add to calendar menu on an event pageThe Add to calendar menu on an event page

The menu, shown here on an event page — an opportunity’s is the same. The downloaded file is the only route that can carry a reminder alarm with the entry; the four web calendars add the event itself. An opportunity has no end time recorded, so it appears as a one-hour block starting at the start date.

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