Why Enterprise Rent-A-Car is Smarter Than Your Company in Talent….from Fistful of Talent by Kris Dunn
I’m going to describe a service encounter I have frequently when I travel, followed in parentheses by what I experience with the competition:

At the company I’m referencing, the service reps at the counter:

-Smile when I enter (competition - sporadic smiles, with variability to grumpy).

-Are great at stage banter - the art of making small talk while they serve you - meaning you get an emotional connection that’s hard to get elsewhere (competition - rare stage banter, most of the reps are just trying to get the transaction done).

-Are conversational while they try to upsell me, meaning it feels like a conversation - I don’t even mind telling them “no” (competition - sells via a pre-packaged script that they’ve memorized, which is quoted as they sound like a robot).

-Seem genuinely interested in what I do for a living, what I’m in town for, where I’m from. I’ve learned it’s because most of the reps at this company have strong career ambitions of their own, and they’ve learned to ask questions and network (competition - rarely am I asked what I’m doing in town). They’re naturally curious…

Which service encounter would you rather have? The answer is obvious. The company referenced is Enterprise-Rent-A-Car.

The secret sauce for Enterprise? As reported by Fay Hansen in Workforce Recruiting, Enterprise will employ 1,800 interns this summer, most of them rising juniors and seniors. By the time the interns head back to school in September, most of the rising seniors will have received a formal job offer from the company, and by the end of the fall semester, most will have accepted.

Here’s what the article doesn’t tell you. While Enterprise fills their talent pipeline almost exclusively with young college grads, the strategy isn’t about age.

The strategy instead is about opportunity and competition. All the college grads take the job with Enterprise for one big reason - career opportunity. Enterprise actively sells the career dream of being promoted and rising through the ranks. They’ve got thousands of stories related to kids starting with them out of college, then becoming branch, district and regional managers. It’s one of the best cultural plays you’ll find in the area of career opportunity.

Of course, with 80% of their positions in retail-based customer service, they’re perfectly positioned for the model but give them props - the strategy leads to a culture where I’ll actively choose Enterprise as a customer, because I know when I go in that I’ll get the responsiveness that I outlined above.

Enterprise rocks. I’m not getting paid for this post. Try them if you never have and experience what I outlined above, then ask yourself, “Did that feel different”?

I’m betting it will….

This article was copied from Fistful of Talent…find out more here…http://www.fistfuloftalent.com/

NACE Research: Students Who Used Career Center Fare Better in Job Market
What’s the difference between new college graduates who have a job and those who don’t? The “haves” and “have nots” are distinguished in part by their use of their campus career center, according to NACE’s 2009 Student Survey.

Survey results show that students who used career center services extensively fared better in the job market than their peers who didn’t use the career center or used the career center in a limited way.

Overall, just 19.7 percent of 2009 college graduates who applied for a job actually have one, according to NACE’s study. However, 26 percent of those who applied for jobs and made heavy use of career center services have jobs.

Note: The 2009 Student Survey was conducted February 19, 2009, through April 30, 2009. More than 35,000 students representing 840-plus colleges and universities nationwide took part; more than 16,500 of those were graduating seniors. Information in this story are based on data gathered from graduating senior respondents.