How to Follow-Up After a Career Fair

Megan Riksen (00:19):

Hello and welcome to the Work like Laker podcast. I'm Megan Riksen. And today I'm joined by Grace Pushman. Hi Grace.

Grace Pushman (00:27):

Hi, how are you today? Hi, I'm good. How are you?

Megan Riksen (00:30):

I'm doing well. Great. So today we have a fun topic. We're going to be talking about how to follow up after a career fair or really any sort of networking interaction that you have with an employer. So Grace and I have our top four tips to share with you today. And the good news is that we've consulted some additional experts on these topics as well. So three of our employer partners were kind enough to share their insights with us. So throughout this episode, you'll be hearing us read some tips and advice from Rachel van den Broek who's a recruiter for graduate programs here at GVSU Jamie Kleinheksel who's the university recruiting manager at Gentex and Liana Periard who's an organizational development consultant at Emergent Holdings. So yeah, why don't we just jump right in to these tips? I'll hand it off to you, grace.

Grace Pushman (01:21):

All right. Sounds great. So the first type is to connect quickly. Rachel says that you want to try to follow up within 24 hours of meeting with someone. Liana mentioned that if you get a business card, you can use that to follow up and make sure you do it because a lot of students don't and it can really help set you apart. And then finally, one thing to include with your follow-up that Jamie mentions is your resume. So even though you probably gave them one, when you first met them, it is really helpful and convenient for them to have an attached resume when you email them, because then they don't have to go through their stacks of papers. And they're more likely to actually look it over and give you a response. So, you know, follow up within 24 hours, use their business card and include your resume.

Megan Riksen (02:05):

Awesome. Yeah, I really like those tips and especially the resume one you may think it's redundant because, Oh, I just provided that in the career fair, but I think what a nice reminder, they might even remember you better based on that, you know, visual learners and the way I remember information, at least I think that's helpful.

Grace Pushman (02:26):

And a small tip for resumes when you include it, upload it as a PDF. That way when they open it, it will look nice and clean and how you want it to look.

Megan Riksen (02:34):

Yep, absolutely. Awesome. So tip number two is keep it simple. This follow-up doesn't have to be anything over the top. It doesn't have to take up a ton of your time. So if you're feeling overwhelmed, like you're kidding me. I'm going to talk to 20 people at the career fair and spend a ton of time following up with each one. No, keep it, keep it simple. So Rachel says that just a simple, thank you that expresses both your gratitude and then a desire to connect down the line is, is really all that's needed. And she also said that if you can refer back to something that was talked about when you met either in person or virtually that could have been a common hobby, something that you discussed a vacation, you just went on, whatever it was. That's a really good thing to speak about in that follow up email to kind of remind the recruiter of that initial encounter. And Rachel says she loves when they connect, when students connect on a personal level. And then also from Liana, she said something similar. So write something memorable from your conversation, but she also gave the advice to articulate a call to action. So that's essentially saying, you know, here's who I am, you know, you're maybe attaching your resume. You're saying something memorable, memorable from the conversation, but then maybe you have a question you still want to get answered. So that's kind of the call to action of something that's going to prompt the person you're writing to, to maybe respond back or maybe you'd ask for a connection to someone else at their organization. But just something something quick, but some sort of little call to action that will, that will prompt a response from that employer.

Grace Pushman (04:19):

Yeah. That's a great tip because I think some feedback that I hear from students is that they follow up with someone and then don't hear back. And.

Megan Riksen (04:26):

I think that part of the reason is because the recruiter might not know how to follow up because they don't know what you're looking for. So that call to action, I think would be very important. Yeah. You're really just helping them out more than anything. Exactly. Yeah. Cool. All right. So let's take a quick break now for our best and worst segment.

Liana Periard (04:48):

Hi Lakers. My name is Liana Periard and I graduated from GVSU in 2016. My worst career fair interaction is one that always cracks me up a few years ago. I managed college recruiting at Nissan while standing at our career for a booth. I asked a student, so what interests you in working for Nissan? The student responded well, I drive a Toyota and isn't that like the same thing. I promise you. They're very different brands and it's not the same thing. That was pretty cringe-worthy. And needless to say, we didn't end up working with that student on the flip side, my favorite career fair interaction, or a student approached us with a GPA that was much lower than what we typically accept for our internship positions. Immediately after the career fair, we were conducting on campus interviews and because of his GPA, we didn't select him to meet with us. He came up to my booth and said, I noticed you didn't schedule me for an interview. Any chance you have some open slots on that schedule. I was really impressed with his bravery, gave him an interview. The panel was so blown away with his communication skills, his entrepreneurship, and his extracurricular activities that we ended up offering him the position. And he turned out to be one of the highest performing students I ever hired. Good luck, Lakers and happy networking.

Grace Pushman (06:16):

We are back with tip number three. And with tip number three, you want to establish a connection on LinkedIn. So Liana mentions that you should add her on LinkedIn right away, and this allows you to stay connected. You can like their content, so a lot of people will post some LinkedIn articles. You can comment on what they say. Similarly, Rachel mentions to be active, not passive. So again, you're just wanting to make sure that you add them, but then also be active on there. So like their stuff, congratulate them. If they have a milestone coming up, it will remind you on LinkedIn if someone's been at an employer for a certain number of time, like a year, so you can send them a little congratulatory notes, you can post stuff that you think would be relevant for them that they might want to interact with. You can check in with them periodically. So definitely, you know, use LinkedIn, actively add people. And if that can be really helpful way to just keep the connection going for a longer period of time.

Megan Riksen (07:12):

Absolutely. I completely agree. And then our final tip is pretty, pretty related to that, but it's just find ways to stay connected. So you've sent the follow-up. Maybe you've had a little bit of back and forth over email. You've established that connection on LinkedIn. You're engaging with that person via LinkedIn. But maybe there are some ways that you can even get a little bit more creative, right. And ways to stay connected beyond kind of that first week after your interaction. So emails are great, right? Of course, we've already talked about that. That's kind of the mandatory component. But then Jamie, she mentioned that she really likes when students follow up down the road and say, Hey, can I bring in my student organization to your company for a company tour? Now she does say that probably would be a virtual tour right now, but either way, you know, you're going to be interfacing again with that employer. And she says, you're going to be meeting with not only her, but likely get to meet a bunch of her colleagues as well. So you're establishing connections with other people at the organization, so that that really does become a win win because that organization then gets to meet a bunch of the students as well, who are a part of that student organization. So I thought that was, that was some great advice. And then Leanna says that, you know, you've connected via email, you've connected on LinkedIn but then continue to stay connected via those platforms. So if you read a great article that you think she would enjoy, if you think of additional questions, ask those, she says, tag me in posts that you think might interest me, it shows that you're thinking, putting effort into staying connected. So you really want to just ask yourself the question, what can I do to show my sustained interest in this company, in the rules I'm considering there and just to continue developing and building the relationship that you might have established through a career fair or some sort of networking event.

Grace Pushman (09:18):

Networking and building connections takes time. And it does take thought like you do have to put some thought into, okay, did I send the followup? Do they add them on LinkedIn? Am I continuing to engage with them? And it is an effort, but that's really the best way to get jobs to build your career is to make these connections and to grow hopefully authentic relationships from them.

Megan Riksen (09:40):

Yeah, absolutely. That authenticity, I think in all of this is a pretty key component. You don't want to just be doing it that you're kind of using the person, right? Like you want it to feel like a mutually beneficial, actual relationship with some back and forth. Right. All right. So that was our quick top four tips. Hopefully we've inspired you in some way to follow up after you've met with people and as always, you know, the Career Center is here to help. We can help you brainstorm some of these ideas for staying connected. Talk about some ways that you could get connected to specific companies. You know, there's tons of information sessions in handshake. Handshake is also a spot where you can use the community feature to talk to other students who may have worked at these organizations where you've now established some sort of a connection. You can read reviews about companies. You can find new events that these organizations might be attending. So be sure to utilize these resources as well, to kind of help you in your pursuit of staying connected. Is there anything else for the, for the good of the pod?

Grace Pushman (10:56):

I think we covered quite a bit. I think I'm good.

Megan Riksen (10:59):

Awesome. I do too. All right. Well thank you everyone. And we'll see you next time.