Making Your Company More Visible at a Job Fair?

moszern asks: "The startup I work for is growing to the point where we are need to do some serious hiring. We are toying with the idea of setting up a booth at a upcoming local college job fair. For the most part it seems these events are all the same with nothing much distinguishing each company from the next. Have you ever been to a job fair where a company had a very unorthodox booth or way of attracting potential employees? What would you want to see at a job fair to grab your attention?"

Comments

Signs.

[Anonymous Coward]

" What would you want to see at a job fair to grab your attention?""

We're hiring!

Make me interested in the job!

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't visited too many job fairs in my life, so feel free to ignore what I say...

Don't let marketing/sales/HR people talk to engineers. Whenever I'm in a conversation where the person is obviously more interested in selling something rather than the work I'd be doing, I mentally check out and back away as soon as possible.

I also assume that they don't want someone whose number one priority is not selling a product. And I know I'll be critized for the last statement, but I'll pre-emptively defend myself by stating that my top priority is quality... Most of the time. (Reading /. may be higher iff my job sucks)

Jobs?

[TERdON]

If you are that clear about who and what you want, make a very obvious sign "This is what we're recruiting right now". List specific positions with job descriptions and all, and put a box beneath it with forms "Contact me about ___ position". And include internships, thesis opportunities as well.

Sadly, many of the companies that go to the job fairs I've been to don't really have a very specific goal of being there, it's more like a public relations thingie. It's almost like using a job fair as an opportunity of recruiting seems like a novel idea...

Worst example I have is Ericsson, who for several years went to the job fair at Chalmers, claiming they had no job openings, no possibilities of thesis writing at the company, and no summer internships.

Re:Jobs?

[spinfire]

Alcatel showed up at one of our college (University of New Hampshire) Job Fairs and they had a huge sign that said they were looking for interns. The conversation went something like this:

spinfire: Hi, I'm a student looking for an internship.
Big Black Dude from Alcatel: Ah, well, you see, we don't actually have any internships.
spinfire: ...
BBDfA: We're only looking for people for full time positions available in Dallas, Texas right now.

Seriously? Then wtf do you have "Internships" as one of the things you have available? The happy ending: I did find a job at the job fair. And I didn't have to relocate to Dallas. Advice for companies that are hiring: Be honest about what you do, and what you are looking for. You don't want your prospective employees thinking you're a bunch of liars.

Re:Buya real booth

[tlhIngan]

Seriously, find a display company who can design a proper trade show booth for you. Think ahead and plan to use it for many functions.

And please, PLEASE, if your company logo embellishes the name in it, please have the company name in regular type elsewhere! Sometimes you see in the "program" interesting companies, but because of the crowds, you can't find their booth (you may be right on top of them) because one can't read the logo. (It may be for a company you haven't heard of, but whose name is interesting enough for a chat to find out if there are any suitable positions. But rather than catch people passing by, those of us who note down who we want to visit would like to make a beeline for said company. So rather than getting passers-by, you get people who are truly interested).