Landing graduate and professional students to higher paying employment.
Tips for other Career Fair Styles
Reverse (Industry) Career Fair: A Way for Graduate and Professional Students to Find Industry Internships and Industry Employment
The Graduate School hosted as part of their spring “A2i Job Search Strategies” workshop series an opportunity for graduate and professional students to engage in a Reverse (Industry) Career Fair.
During the traditional Career Fairs employers provide information about their industry internship and job opportunities and their company. The Employer's stationery often displays their company’s materials and student lineup, to meet with the company representative (generally a recruiter) often for just a few minutes handing out their resume, giving an elevator pitch and perhaps their business card. It is generally a very repetitive process for employers and graduate and professional students, with little opportunity to see what makes a student a good fit/good hire for the company. It also provides little opportunity for students to showcase their experience, skills and accomplishments.
During the Reverse Career Fair, the student is stationary and recruiters seek out graduate and professional students. Recruiters will have already reviewed the students’ resumes and selected which students they want to talk to. The graduate/professional student will have developed a poster ahead of time, in person event - tabletop trifold or other display of a printed version; remote event - PowerPoint, highlighting their experience, qualifications, and accomplishments to potential future employers. It facilitates a much more genuine interaction between the recruiter and the graduate/professional student.
IMPORTANT: Future employers’ benefit from getting a resume from all the candidates ahead of time, so that they can strategically seek out students they want to connect with. This approach in combination with the student’s poster leads to targeted and unique first contacts and conversations, between graduate/professional students and recruiters as they are looking for their future workforce.
Graduate/Professional Student Preparation
Graduate/professional students need to prepare for the Reverse (Industry) Career Fair in four ways:
- Self-reflection—students should explore:
- What are they looking for in their future employer? Do they want to work for a start-up company or a more established local, regional, or international company?
- What is the mission, vision, and value (such as commitment to DEIJ) of the company?
- What internship and employment opportunities exist in this company?
- Is this company “employee-first” focused or is it downsizing?
- Which transferrable skills will you bring to the new job and which transferrable skills do you hope to develop more,
- What hard skills will you bring to a new job?
- Do you hope to advance, or would you prefer to work in a lab?
- How important is ethics?
- How do you plan to achieve work/home balance?
- Research industry companies that will attend the Reverse (industry) Career Fair:
- Go to their website and look beyond the first page to learn more about the company. What is their mission and vision statement? What values are reflected on the website?
- Check out the company’s social media. Are there customer comments?
- Check out LinkedIn.
- Do a news search. Is there a story about layoffs or some new technology, vaccine, etc. that this company is involved with?
- Finally sign up with the Ohio State University’s Alumni Associations AlumniFire- osu.alumnifire.com (it is free to graduate/professional students and alumni). AlumniFire is a great way to connect with Buckeyes who might presently work at the company you might be interested in and (a) can provide more insight, and (b) might even advocate for you.
- Develop your resume (it should not exceed two pages). Remember it will be given to recruiters prior to the Reverse (Industry) Career Fair.
- Your poster should contain this information:
- Your name and credential
- Major and degree
- Expected graduation date
- Work experience (include internship experiences; work that prior work experience, etc.) make sure that you relate this experience to working in industry.
- Your skills (transferable/soft skills such as leadership, project management, etc. as well as hard skills, such as language skills, computer skills, etc.)
- Accomplishments
Like a research poster, it should look professional. There is freedom in the layout and design
IMPORTANT: In preparation for the Reverse (Industry) Career Fair today’s graduate/professional students need to move beyond the traditional elevator pitch and learn how to: develop their Speed Sell to engage in Speed Networking and be a competitive candidate.
Industry Preparation
Industry/Companies are encouraged to register for the (virtual or in person) Reverse Career Fair ahead of time.
Companies who register early will be given access ahead of the event to the graduate/professional student’s resume for their early review to strategically select students with the experience, skills, and accomplishments that they are looking for in their future workforce.
For industry companies interested in being part of next year’s workshop series and Reverse Industry Career Fair, please contact Karin Jordan, PhD, Assistant Dean, Graduate Development, and Engagement at jordan.1193@osu.edu. This event occurs annually early Spring term.