<p>My son has been sending off resumes into the resume black hole. </p>
<p>He's about to graduate in June with a degree in mechanical engineering with a emphasis in mechatronics (ie. robotics). He has attended several on campus job fairs, sent out resumes to companies with jobs posted in the area he wants to work. All this and nothing, no replies, nothing. Is this normal? I have heard that a lot of companies don't bother to reply if they are not interested.</p>
<p>He has had his resume reviewed by a friend who is the head of the HR group at a large engineering company (and met with her) and another friend who is in an engineering field. I think his resume looks very good. However, his only work related experience was an unpaid research project last summer and his senior project (a year long effort with an outside company).</p>
<p>Any thoughts, suggestions? As a parent, I would like him to be succesfull and get a job in his choosen field. He isn't as frustrated as I am, but come June and I bet he will be. Just wrapped up in finishing college at this point.</p>
<p>Unfortunately,he is graduating into a terrible market…i agree accessing the career placement/advising office is a great idea,and continue to send out the resumes…best of luck</p>
<p>Yes, it is unfortunately pretty normal in today’s hiring environment. Lots of incoming resumes, and HR offices are short staffed like everyone else.</p>
<p>It may not pay off immediately, but if he is not on LinkedIn yet, have him create an account and link to the following:</p>
<ul>
<li>Anyone he knows from his experience in his year long project at the outside company</li>
<li>Any of his professors who are on LinkedIn</li>
<li>Anyone he met at his unpaid research project</li>
<li>Any older students he might now (a year or two older) who are out working now</li>
<li>Anyone he meets with during his job search process</li>
</ul>
<p>It may not pay off right away, but having a way to connect (and in the future, re-connect) with these people can be very valuable. </p>
<p>Some college students have a hard time with getting on LinkedIn. I think they equate it with Facebook, and feel like it is too “forward” to link with someone (especially who is not in their age group), that it implies a personal relationship of some kind. They don’t really get that it is more of a professional relationship tool. As long as I know who the person is (or have an intro with a good reason for linking with them), I always accept those invitations.</p>
<p>I assume he is working with the career office on campus to try to get interviews with any companies coming to interview on campus. And as mentioned, tap into the alumni network for his school.</p>
<p>Sounds like he is also tracking online job search sites like Monster. An overlooked source of some job listings is the Wall Street Journal, too (even for engineers) – not too many students read it, so unlike online sites, they might not be as overwhelmed with applicants. They don’t do listings every day (one day a week, if I remember right, just not sure which day).</p>
<p>Be sure he knows how to write a good cover letter to highlight the most relevant part of his resume for each job he applies to. It can add some depth/focus to the actual resume.</p>
<p>A year ago, a local company, iRobot was hiring a lot of engineers. I just had a look at their Careers page and there are far fewer openings than I recall from last year. It may help to look for areas of the country where his specialty is in demand. I know the areas where the work in my field is done and it’s mainly concentrated in a few locations and you have to be there to work in the industry (unless you are so experienced that you can work remotely).</p>
<p>When you say “in the area he wants to work” do you mean geographic area or his area of interest? He may need to broaden that, whichever it is, at least to get his foot in the door in the current job market.</p>
<p>Definitely have him go to career services. They sometimes keep lists of alums in various fields who have agreed to be contacted by students. He should find those alums that work as engineers and ask them for an informational interview. This isn’t an interview where he asks for a job, it’s one where he just asks questions about the field. What advice would they give to someone starting out, how did they get into the field, what are some fo the things they enjoy/don’t enjoy the most, would they recommend he go for a higher degree, what kind of experience do they think would be most valuable, etc. He can do it over the phone or by sending questions via email, though in person is better. It’s very useful to get a picture of what the field is like if you’re not having immediate succcess at breaking in. There may be approaches that are not obvious at first that he should try. </p>
<p>Otherwise, don’t be afraid of taking work that’s not in your field while you look for what you want. Lots of good people temp or wait tables or work retail, do other kinds of jobs that are not ideal but pay the rent and provide you with enough of a financial cushion to let you look around. And he shouldn’t be too picky at first. Apply broadly and try for everything. Once you have a job, it’s a lot easier to get another, and slowly he’ll work up to what he wants.</p>
<p>I have a couple Mom friends who have kids who graduated recently in engineering and found the market very tough. After the initial disappointment, one is going to start medical school in the fall, and the other two are in PhD programs, free tuition + living stipends. They all seemed to find pretty good niches back in academics during this difficult economic period. Oh, have heard of another one who went to work at a brokerage.</p>
<p>My dad and uncles are engineers and they all talk about “digging ditches” for a living when they first graduated. It’s a terrific field, no question. But every field gets impacted by recession. Except maybe CPAs . . .</p>
<p>Also I agree 100% with the advice about LinkedIn and informal interviews. When I was just graduating I didn’t take the whole idea of informational interviews very seriously, now that I’m on the other side, I know it can be a good tactic. I think many hiring managers want to help new college grads, even if they don’t have an open position. We know how tough it can be to get your foot in the door (your son’s foot in this case).</p>
<p>It’s a way to make yourself know to people in the industry. They may not be in a position to hire you, but they might know someone who is, or they might know better which companies are doing well and could be hiring.</p>
<p>^^Marian I was waiting for someone to say that. 80-100 resumes should yield something (seriously). Also totally agree about Linkedin. He needs to put his status so that it is clear he is looking for a job and should put his unpaid “jobs” and research into it as well as any paying jobs he’s had since leaving for college even if they aren’t career related. Most employers, especially for entry level are looking for related colleg experieince either an internships/research/etc. as well as “some job” that shows the student knows how to work in a work environment. </p>
<p>You cannot underestimate an informational interview. He should target some companies, find an alum or a contact and invite them for coffee or ask for an appointment. Most jobs are found through networking.</p>
<p>Finally he might have to move to a different geographic area if he’s combed his area. If he’s dead set on staying in the area he could perhaps find a job to pay the rent so to speak.</p>
<p>It’s tough, mine is deep into the resumes etc and just lined up a “summer” job to tide him over financially.</p>
<p>Same situation here. S is an Economics major, International Gov minor with a 3.8 GPA, Phi Beta Kappa, Spanish Honor Society. Working through Career Planning and on his own, is on LinkedIn. Has given resumes to many relatives. Had one interview last fall, didn’t pan out.</p>
<p>His weak spot is that he never got a summer internship. He looked, but nothing panned out (it didn’t help that he was in Europe the spring of his junior year, he did email resumes and even did a phone interview but didn’t put as much effort as he would have if he were on campus). </p>
<p>I really think he’s going to need to go to grad school. He’s not opposed, but says he’s not sure what he wants to do so he doesn’t want to spend the money on grad school until he figures that out. He wants something with an international element.</p>
<p>My daughter graduated May 2010. Very few of her entire group of friends, apart from those who went onto grad school immediately are employed in the area that they studied in. Most have jobs in which they are underemployed, almost none have jobs that provide any benefits, some only have part-time jobs. My older daughter graduated in 2007…she has completed grad school and has two part-time jobs in her field, both with prestigious institutions in her field. Neither job offers any benefits. Many of her friends other than those still in grad school or in finance have jobs in their fields. Many are underemployed,several working in family businesses that they have no interest in and so on.</p>
<p>Like others, I would like to know (if you’re willing to post) what the GPA is and whether “in the area he wants to work” is geographically limiting.</p>
<p>My S graduated in EE into just about the worst job market (2009) and had two offers.</p>
<p>Some factors to consider:</p>
<p><em>he made zero geographic limits in his search
*he applied (and networked) not only in his preferred segment of the industry, but also in other segments (his job offers were *not</em> in his preferred segment, but he is certainly happy now 2 years later)</p>
<p>Two friends in the field reviewed your S’ resume. That is good, but I wonder if they were too diplomatic or not critical enough in their review. I would suggest review by Career Services (they suggested changes to DS’ resume). Also agree on informational interviews, and choose one or more of those to ask for a critique of his resume if appropriate.</p>
<p>DS did have prior experience (two summer jobs in a tech field, although not his particular field) and several non-career related jobs. Does your S have non-career related work experience? People like to see that (eg, summer landscape work; summer retail work, whatever).</p>
<p>Does his resume specify that the research project last summer was unpaid? It does not need to do that. It is possible that this job description could be beefed up. </p>
<p>It’s April now. Can he line up any kind of job (paid or unpaid) with a prof in his field? Job-shadowing? DS had two short job-shadows on his resume, which sparked interest by interviewers.</p>
<p>It is a very tough market for engineers. We have family friends whose daughter graduated from a public ivy with highest honors and it took her fifty resumes (reviewed by her career center and family friends in the industry), a willingness to work anywhere in the country, using every contact she had and some luck to land a position. She is working as an engineer but not in the area she studied. </p>
<p>As others have suggested, the career center is the place to start and I know it’s hard but your son should not take this personally. It truly is a historically bad time to be entering the job market.</p>
<p>jmmom mentions 2009 as being the worst job market and it was tough but not sure things now are not as tough or tougher so don’t give up. 09 engineer son had 2 great offers but was in the midst of still interviewing for more opportunities when the tide really started to turn. Recruiters who had been wining and dining him were saying things like -we really like you but we have to cut back,etc. He was lucky to have already had 2 solid offers that came from fall 08 recruiting(0ne of which he was worried would pull the offer when he had trouble getting in touch with the recruiter -the recruiter was just on vacation but it was at the time when jobs in general were disappearing so he was very anxious). Engineering is still a great field so I’ll bet things will turn around. The intelligence,analytical skills, critical thinking skills,etc. in engineering are attractive to many employers.Don’t give up on engineering. We need engineers. All the best and good luck to your son with the job search!</p>
<p>Another thought: DS not only did his own networking (alums etc), we did appropriate networking. EG, my alumni data base is sortable by job function, industry, job title etc. Then you can dig deeper for details. I emailed about half-dozen people (whom I didn’t know and most of whom had not been in my own class) with a title something like “Job contact for 19xx alumna son.” I described in just a couple of sentences his degree, interest in their company and asked if they could recommend an appropriate contact within their firm.</p>
<p>To my surprise, every single one replied with some form of assistance. I bowed out, he forwarded his resume and went from there. </p>
<p>None of these turned into job offers for him. But I know one of hs friends who had no job a couple months into the summer after graduating college 2009 who did, in fact, land a job where the initial networking was through the dad.</p>
<p>All avenues for networking are certainly fair game.</p>
<p>Others have offered some very solid advice that I hope will pay off for your DS. Unfortunately, this is such a tough time for engineering students to be entering the job market. My dad was a guest lecturer last week in a required class for senior year civil engineering students at a state university. When he asked how many had jobs lined up, the dismal response was three.</p>