What Job-Hunting Help Does Tahatū Career Navigator Offer?

Tahatū Career Navigator (the site formerly known as Careers New Zealand) offers free, self-service job-hunting help in four main areas: a Job Hunters' Workbook of practical tips and activities, CV templates and job videos, interview tips, and guides for planning your next steps when you're looking for work. It suits anyone job-hunting in New Zealand who wants structured, do-it-yourself guidance rather than one-on-one coaching. The site doesn't state that you need an account to browse, but it also doesn't say the tools are downloadable without one — check each page as you go.

Job Hunters' Workbook: your starting point

The Job Hunters' Workbook (He Puka Rapu Mahi) is the site's main practical tool for people actively looking for work. According to Tahatū, it contains "practical tips and activities that will help you figure out your next steps when looking for a job."

How to use it:

1. Open the Job Hunters' Workbook from the "Top tools and topics" section of the homepage.
2. Work through the activities in order — they're designed to move you from "what do I want?" to "what do I do next?"
3. Treat it as a working document: complete the activities with your own details rather than just reading them.

Expected result: a clearer picture of the roles to target and the concrete next steps to take. The site doesn't specify a page count or format, so check the page itself for what you'll actually get.

CV templates and job videos

The site's own description lists "CV templates, job videos" among its resources, and the homepage links to a Video Library (Puna ataata). The video library sits alongside the career-ideas section, so it's most useful for seeing what a role actually involves before you apply — for example, watching a job video for a trade or service role before writing a CV tailored to it.

The site doesn't publish details of how many CV templates exist or what formats they come in. If you need a specific format (for example, a New Zealand-style CV), check the templates page directly before relying on it.

Interview tips

Tahatū has a dedicated "Tips for interviews" (He kupu āwhina mō ngā uiui) page, linked from the homepage's popular content. It's a guide rather than a mock-interview tool — expect advice you read and apply yourself, not practice sessions or feedback.

A practical way to use it: read the tips, then prepare answers to the questions you're most likely to face, using the site's career-idea pages to check what skills and entry requirements matter for the role you're interviewing for.

Planning your next steps when you're looking for work

Beyond the workbook, the site's "Get advice" section includes a guide called "Discovering who you are" (Te tūhura haere i a koe anō), which helps you explore your skills and values. That's useful when you're job-hunting but unsure what to aim for: identifying your skills and values first makes it easier to decide which jobs to apply for and how to present yourself.

The Interest Quiz (Kairoro Kaingākau) is another option at this stage — it surfaces your top interests and suggests career ideas, which can widen or narrow your job search.

What the site doesn't cover

Tahatū is a government career-information site, not a recruitment service. Based on the site's own description, it doesn't list job vacancies, and there's no indication of personalised coaching or CV feedback. For those, you'd need a different service. What it does well is give you structure and information to work through on your own.

A simple plan to follow

Start with step 1 if you don't know what you're aiming for; skip straight to steps 3–5 if you already have a target role and are ready to apply.