May 26, 2020
Blog post by Ambassador Katie LaDuke
When I began my freshman year of college, I knew the day would come where I would have to spread my wings and finally put all my knowledge to work to find a big kid job after graduation. Little did I know I was going to be entering the workforce during an economic crisis amid a global pandemic.
No one could have prepared for this. Many corporate jobs still have employees working from home, making office life and recruiting remote. With the shutdown, it’s understandable for hesitation to fill positions without proper interview spaces, orientation, and normal routines.
However, from my experience of searching for work, companies are still posting open positions but are waiting to contact applicants until stay-at-home restrictions ease. Some companies are developing and reconfiguring remote interview processes to monitor applications and keep in touch with applicants.
For me, I have been lucky to be in contact with a few companies, but the experience of interviewing has been interesting. Most first-round interviews take place over the phone and then move to Zoom or another video communication platform. While the questions are the same, a big challenge comes when your internet isn’t stable enough to handle a video call. When that happens, the video freezes or the audio cuts out, which leads to information getting missed and having to repeat yourself.
Having these video calls is one of the best solutions to keeping interview processes on schedule. There will be challenges and technical difficulties, but we all must work through it together.
There have also been different resources I have relied on to stay in the loop and have conversations with others. These are a few I use frequently:
This platform is a great way to connect with former employers, other graduates and students, industry professionals, and interesting individuals. I was never a frequent poster to the site, but now I have found an appreciation for checking my main feed and posting about my professional accomplishments. There are also a variety of jobs posted daily to the LinkedIn job board.
This website has been the main job site I’ve used regularly. Positions are updated when needed and new jobs are added every day. It’s convenient to be able to search based on location with many responsive employers.
Like Indeed, schools typically have their own job board where positions are added for all majors. There’s usually a mix of big corporations and smaller businesses. Handshake, the one Oakland University uses, keeps track of an application process if it was reviewed, pending, or declined.
These are resources I didn’t even think of until I was added to one. Groups like these are populated with professionals working in your field and those that are trying to get into that field. I’ve seen professionals offer to answer questions and do videos to offer tips when looking for jobs. Your school might also have Facebook pages dedicated to specific departments and majors where open jobs will be posted.
The wait to hear back from employers can be frustrating, but everyone is under stress and challenging obstacles. Keep applying and work on yourself in this down time. Good things are on the way.
