I was so excited and anxious that I couldn’t sleep. I had 2 job fairs the next night and I couldn’t wait to go hand out resumes and try to get some kind of connection to the companies I thought were a fit.

I had done my homework and already looked up what companies were going to be at the 2 fairs and then researched them so I would be able to talk with the recruiter about their company and then applied to all the jobs both through FoxNet but also through their respective company websites.

First up was the Entrepreneurship Job Fair. It was one of the first of it’s kind apparently because of how it focused on those going for a major, minor or certification in Entrepreneurship. So all the companies at the job fair were small and some even pre-revenue startups.

I had already reviewed the employers at this job fair and knew I had 6 specific companies I was interested in giving my resume too and that I have 3 in particular which were especially intriguing. They were all small tech companies from around Philadelphia and one just outside of the North East.

The conversations went well and I gave them all my “Entrepreneurship” resume which accented my entrepreneurial activities more than my “Finance” resume which was designed to get me a job with a Finance firm.

I was a little surprised by how interested people were in my blog and other websites that I have. I hadn’t even written it on my resumes yet it was the most interesting piece of my resume to some. I started jotting down my blog URL on the bottom of resumes as I spoke with the potential employers.

This carried over to the 2nd Job fair of the day - Spring Connection. At this job fair my major didn’t seem as highly respected. Everyone wanted accounting or finance majors. I applied to several finance firms, some marketing firms, and to some banks. Most companies smiled while we spoke but then would softly tell me how competitive it is for a sophomore to get one of their internships. It’s frustrating at times, you want to say “Either let me apply and give me a chance, or tell me not to even apply because you don’t give it to sophomores”.

Also, I’d like to take this opportunity to say how unimpressed I was with one massive financial company - who shall remain nameless (hint: they use more nautical terminology than a 35 year old basement dwelling Pirates of the Carri bean fan). They came and presented to my HR class and I liked them then. Especially their in-company “university” - I love that kind of limit less opportunity for growth aspect. However, at Spring Connection they botched their banked goodwill by treating me, a sophomore, like a second class recruit. I won’t be dignifying them with an application next year.

I’ll admit that in retrospect I realize how unhappy I most likely would have been had I ended up getting a job with one of these massive corporate firms. The kind of culture I am looking for at the moment just doesn’t match most of these like I had convinced myself it did. I knew that a normal corporate internship wasn’t what I wanted to use my summer for. If I was going to stay here and work instead of going abroad somewhere then I wanted to make sure that I had a job that was going to challenge me and provide the opportunity for growth as well as educate on the startup environment in Philadelphia.

In my next article I’ll tell you all about how I followed up and got a job!

This entry was posted on Monday, May 5th, 2008 at 7:56 am and is filed under Job Search, Joseph Norton. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.