Now Hiring College Students and Recent Grads Revisited Vol I

“We’re going to have the best-educated American people in the world.” – Dan Quayle

Whether you’ve just started college or you graduated last year (or anywhere between the two), it’s never too early or too late to create or update your Job Marketing Toolkit. Just about everything you’ve done can be leveraged in your search for a job. That being said, it is worth spending a little time thinking about your “digital life”. My general rule of thumb is, if you would not embarrassed by your mother knowing some fact about you (or seeing something about you on the Internet), then it is probably a safe topic for a potential employer.

Career planning during college is very important and most colleges and universities have Career Offices to help in planning and in job search. This resource is usually open to alumni as well as existing students (check it out if you haven’t already). Another very important activity during your college years is internships. To be useful they should have some alignment to your major. Of course any internship is better than none and there is an expectation from employers that you’ve done something useful during your summers.

Internships, Career Fairs & Entry Level Jobs:

Monstertrak.com – This site, which is a job search site, focuses on internships and entry level jobs. The site allows posting of resumes, saved searches, cover letters, internship advice, salary advice and much more.
Careercruising.com – This site provides interactive career exploration and analysis (it’s never too late to review your career choices). This is a “pay” site, but they provide a 30 day trial (you must get this through your college or university), but the site offers some information about their services which should help you decide if this is worth the $.
Careerfairs – BusinessWeek – BusinessWeek published this article about Career Fairs. These are no longer geared towards the younger crowd. According to the article (worth a read), career fairs are drawing older crowds. Consider the article and consider career fairs in your job search.
Wikijobs – Internships – Wikijobs also has a very good article on Internships. This is definitely worth a read as the article describes the Internship process. There are also some useful links at the end of the article.
Collegecentral.com – This site offers quite a few options. You can click on “student central” – which focuses on entry level jobs, “alumni central” – which focuses jobs for recent grads and “Career Services Central” – which allows you to connect with mentors. The site also has a job search kit, which provides resources on resumes, cover letters and interviews. There are also a very wide range of articles on the first page.
Aftercollege.com – Aftercollege offers searches for internships and entry level jobs. You can register or just search. You can search by job categories and there are a number of job tools on the main page. This site also has “endorsements” which are similar to recommendations on LinkedIn, which allows professors, managers or anyone you want to put in the good word for you.

Job Career Advice & Resource Sites:

Collegegrad.com – Due to the broad range of information available on this site, I would classify it as a Job Career Site which also includes job search. This site also allows search and post your resume. There is a wealth of information on this site including Preparation (explore careers, resumes, cover letters and interview prep). There are featured articles as well as a section on offer negotiation.
Quintcareers.com – College Grad – A job search site, this section of the site focuses on college students and recent grads career and job resources. The site includes articles, searches and links to other related sites. There are quite a few additional resources (too many to list here). Definitely worth a look.
Careersearch.net – This site offers a broad based research tool for corporations, industries and individuals at companies (by title). This site requires a code (which can be obtained from your college). This is an amazing research tool in your job search.
Jobseeker – Specific Career and Job Sites – Quintcareers.com offers an excellent page of resources for teenagers, college grads, temporary workers, executives and much more. This should definitely be on your list of “to do’s” in your job search.
Top 10 College Career Services Blogs – As the title indicates, this site lists the top college career blogs. Too much information to cover here, but you should definitely look at the blogs as they offer some good information. Additionally, there are some good links on the right-hand side of the site.
VisualCV – VisualCV is a new way to build your resume (your marketing tool for your job search) using online tools. It not only allows your to keep your resume current (since all viewers will see the same resume, no need to “resend” when there are changes), but it allows you to embed video, audio and work samples. Additionally, you can control who can see your “visual” resume. A very innovative way to approach your resume/CV and job search.
Gradgrad.com – This site focuses on recruiting for college grads. It appears to work like most job search sites – sign up (add your resume), employers search for you and then, according to the site “add you to their list”. You can do a job search by several different criteria.

Company Career Sites:

Apple.com – New Grad – A company site, Apple has a career section that is dedicated to college grads. The site is geared to students about to graduate, new graduates and those who graduated in the last year. There is also a section on campus events.
Google Jobs – This Google career/job search site is focused on student opportunities at Google. The site is organized by geographic region and offers background on Google, life and Google and “getting into Google”.

Good luck in your search.