How to Best Utilize CS Career Fairs for New Grads / Interns
Article about what to do at a career fair - and not just hand them your resume
Overview
I’m not a big fan of career fairs personally, but sometimes for some people, I’ve seen it work out. So these are my tips for people who do attend career fair in terms of what you should get out of it, rather than just handing them your resume.
Ask them for their Email
“Hey, just wanted to introduce myself, I’m Justin a full stack web developer at NYU, here is my resume. I just wanted to ask, are you in charge of the student recruiting process? If so, could I get your email or an email of someone who is? I would love to be able to just follow up after this career fair. Is there maybe also like a generic team email that I could email cause I am in the process of actively interviewing right now.”
(What is the goal? Get someone’s email, so you can apply the cold emailing template:
[Hopefully you get an email]
Additional contact info:
“Just wondering, is there any other way best to reach out to you, since I do want to try to align my interview processes best I can? I hope is okay to confirm that email is the best way, or if some other way like Linkedin etc is better?”
[Goal is just to double confirm and fish out any more information]
Confirm Timeline
“Thank you so much, last question, could I also just ask, are you guys already in the process of actively interviewing? Or will that take time? I know some companies are already doing so, but some are just processing resumes and still figuring out schedules”
[What is the goal here? Figuring out the timeline.]
Everything else
Obviously, if you have time, introduce yourself, talk about the company, your own skills, but I usually find career fairs very fast moving, tons of people, so the goal is, get an email, be able to follow up, and go from there.
(Also why I hate career fairs, cause it just a swarm of people).
Note:
This is just all my personal opinion, maybe people have better tips about what to do at career fairs, but I always found it exhausting for myself and never ended up panning out for me. But again, others have had better experiences.