The Muse

The Muse is a New York City-based online career platform that combines career advice content, company profiles and job listings. The site lets job seekers explore employers before applying, presenting behind-the-scenes material about offices, teams and culture alongside open roles, with the stated aim of helping candidates match on people, perks and values. Its editorial arm, The Daily Muse, publishes practical guidance on job searching, interviewing, career paths and workplace issues.

For employers, The Muse sells branded company profiles and targeted job postings intended to build candidate pipelines and strengthen employer brand through employee storytelling, and it runs an annual VIBE Awards program recognizing company perks and benefits. Additional services have included Coach Connect, a network of career coaches launched in November 2016 offering resume review, career Q&As, personalized job search and networking plans, and coaching in interviewing, negotiation and leadership. The company operates two consumer platforms, The Muse and Fairygodboss, the latter a career community for women acquired in 2022.

The Muse's own profile lists its industry as technology and its locations as flexible/remote and Northville, Michigan.

Founding story

The company was founded in 2011 by Kathryn Minshew, Alexandra Cavoulacos and Melissa McCreery, and launched as The Daily Muse on September 6, 2011 in Brooklyn with eight editors and eleven columnists. Minshew had previously worked at McKinsey & Company and on vaccine introduction in Rwanda and Malawi with the Clinton Health Access Initiative, and earlier co-founded PYP Media, a community platform for career-focused women that dissolved after founder disagreements; Cavoulacos was also a PYP founder. Minshew has said the idea grew from her interest in how the internet could democratize access to career information and from her own early-career experiences, such as an unsuccessful salary negotiation. Reader feedback on The Daily Muse indicated that job seekers found searching frustrating, often discovering only after multiple interview rounds that a company was a poor fit, and that never hearing back from employers was their leading annoyance, prompting the founders to build a different kind of job site.

Business model

The Muse operates a two-sided platform: free career content, company research and job search for individuals, and paid employer-facing products including featured company profiles, employer branding content and targeted job postings. It has also offered paid career coaching through Coach Connect.

Revenue is associated with employer-side offerings — featured brand placement, company profiles and job postings on the platform — and with career coaching services sold to individual users.

Traction

Reported reach has grown from 20,000 users in the first month and 70,000 within three months to over 50 million people helped find jobs and companies as of 2018, and more than 70 million annual users across The Muse and Fairygodboss, which itself serves over 10 million women and hosts more than 50,000 employee reviews on gender equity. Featured employers on the platform include Charles Schwab, Zoom, TJX, Navy Federal Credit Union, PNC, Sandia National Laboratories, Hitachi Energy and Fannie Mae.

Latest developments

In 2022 the company acquired Fairygodboss.com, the largest online career community for women, and now operates it as a second platform alongside The Muse. Kathryn Minshew stepped back from the CEO role after leading the business from 2011 to 2023. The site continues to publish career advice and employer content and to feature hiring companies.