BEST PRACTICES FOR MBA CAREER SERVICES - GradLeaders€¦ · BEST PRACTICES FOR MBA CAREER SERVICES Tips for connecting your MBAs to Employers GLCC0007. Best Practices for CAREER

BEST PRACTICES FOR MBA CAREER SERVICESTips for connecting your MBAs to Employers

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Best Practices for CAREER SERVICES | 2

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With 20+ years in the industry, GradLeaders is the premier thought leader in recruitment technology and an expert source for knowledge on the subject of MBA career services. More than 75,000 recruiters from over 40,000 companies have used GradLeaders to recruit students and alumni from the world’s top-ranked MBA programs. Through our school partners and corporate client relations, we have created the most advanced network in MBA recruitment.

For decades, our team at GradLeaders has provided partners with our combined recruitment expertise in the form of consulting services. By publishing these proven strategies for attracting employers and promoting your career service portals to candidates, we are offering an additional tool for your career service office to fulfill its needs.

This collection of best practices is designed to help maximize the outreach efforts of your office through the most complete and up-to-date best practices in the industry. We strive to provide relevant information that is both timely and useful. As our network continues to grow, we will share what we’ve learned by continually updating this guide.

This eBook offers ways to:

• Create new connections with recruiters, while maintaining existing employer relations.

• Connect with your MBA students to properly guide their job search.

• Reconnecting with alumni to create a mutually beneficial relationship.

• Connect with our team at GradLeaders for networking opportunities and additional information.

No matter which audience you’re targeting, there is a chapter of this eBook for you and your office’s needs.

IntroductionEverything You Need to Know to Navigate this eBook

Candidate Icon - This icon will appear on the bottom left of a page detailing tips for connecting with candidates.

Employer Icon - This icon will appear on the bottom left of a page detailing tips for connecting with employers.


How to Connect With Candidates ................................................ 5

Early Engagement .............................................................................. 6Email .................................................................................................... 7Website ............................................................................................... 8Social Media ........................................................................................ 9Mobile ................................................................................................ 10Video .................................................................................................. 11Advertise ........................................................................................... 12Big Data ............................................................................................. 13Print ................................................................................................... 14Activities ............................................................................................ 15

How to Connect With Employers ................................................17

Email .................................................................................................. 18Website ............................................................................................. 19Alumni ............................................................................................... 20Social Media ...................................................................................... 21Video .................................................................................................. 22Advertise ........................................................................................... 23UX ....................................................................................................... 24Big Data ............................................................................................. 25Print ................................................................................................... 26Events ................................................................................................ 27

How to Connect with Other Schools ..........................................28How to Connect with the Experts ...............................................29Seasonal Calendar/To Do List .....................................................30Sources ............................................................................................. 31

Table of Contents

Last Updated 1.27.2015


How to Connect with Candidates


GradLeaders recommends the following 10 ways to proactively reach out to both students and alumni:(click to jump to each section)

EARLY ENGAGEMENTEMAILWEBSITESOCIAL MEDIAMOBILEVIDEOADVERTISEBIG DATAPRINTACTIVITIES

Does your career services office proactively drive candidate engagement? Have you employed outreach efforts to maximize the utility of our resources?

MBA students often understand the importance of interacting with their career services office. They have dedicated time and money towards an education that will help them climb the corporate ladder, and they’re interested in your guidance. While most of these students are extremely engaged with career with career services already, it’s still important to reach out to them as much as possible, and in as many ways as possible.

It’s difficult to initiate the same level of communication with alumni, but even after graduation, they are a very important audience to stay in touch with. They are brand ambassadors for your program, representing the quality of your school and its ability to produce well rounded business leaders. Alumni act as an additional resource for students; they are experienced mentors that can provide valuable advice, endorse your students, and establish networking opportunities. John Lippincott, President of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), explains that,

“Graduates are among an institution’s greatest assets and perhaps the only asset guaranteed to grow every year […] They are advisers, advocates, and allies in support of an institutional mission, highly motivated not only by loyalty but also by a vested interest in seeing the equity of their diplomas grow over time […] Institutions should view their relationship with alumni as a lifelong contract that offers mutual benefit.”

As your career services office maintains its relations with both students and alumni, don’t forget that while each has its own set of professional goals and interests, that you can’t have one without the other. Alumni used to be students, students will someday be alumni, and their reputations often mirror one another. Therefore, as John Lippincott states,

“It is extremely difficult to create satisfied alumni out of unsatisfied students. The quality of the student experience will greatly determine the quality of alumni engagement. That’s why some institutions need first to strengthen their student services before trying to build their alumni programs. And an important part of serving students is helping them understand that they are alumni in the making.”

How to Connect with Candidates


Do you have a thorough understanding of who your students are and what direction they’re headed?

The career goals, interests, and backgrounds of your MBA candidates are significant to their b-school experience before they even set foot on campus. By getting your students registered online before school begins, you can be the most equipped for the coming year. The earlier you begin delivering applicable information to your students by understanding their needs, the more effective your coaching will be in the long run. Make sure to ask relevant questions that will garner valuable information about their past, present, and future. Moving forward, continue to track their career services activity and stay updated on any critical changes.

Each student should feel that, with your help, they are continuously developing as MBA students and future business leaders. As stated in Hanover Research’s report, Best Practices in Career Services for Graduating Students, “Studies have shown a clear link between increased job placement rates and CSC utilization. Nonetheless, many students fail to utilize CSC resources. Effectively developing and managing student relationships with CSCs is essential to increasing student utilization and fulfilling CSC missions.”

Every role within your career service center can utilize GradLeaders Career Center to manage those relationships with its students. Whether you are a career coach, peer advisor, or resume reviewer, GradLeaders Career Center can support and assist career service activities from the beginning of your students’ b-school path. GradLeaders Career Center candidate questions are the industry standard for business leadership profile Q&As, to provide you with the information that employers will be looking for. Once your students are registered and have filled out their profiles, you can run detailed reports to acquire data on each class. Moving forward, the candidate tab provides a central location for notes and activity, giving you a full snapshot of each student’s level of engagement. Notes can even be made visible to students directly through GradLeaders Career Center while you’re reviewing resumes, providing more opportunities for larger schools to communicate with their MBAs.

Take advantage of the efficiency that GradLeaders Career Center provides as a one-stop resource for your career services office to understand its students!

Early EngagementBetter Understand Your Students’ Interests & Needs


Direct emails are a quick, easy, and effective way to reach your students and alumni. It’s a proven method for delivering timely information and it provides a solid foundation for your outreach efforts. While other communication channels have gained popularity recently, email remains an important way for your career services to connect with your MBAs.

According to iContact, “56% of businesses say they plan to increase their use of email marketing in 2013; email was second only to social media, which 60 percent of businesses said they plan to increase.”

Don’t shy away from emails simply because other outreach methods have gained traction in the corporate world. Email can support your other forms of communication, reinforcing important information and initiating your candidates to utilize all your career services has to offer. The content of your emails should be one step ahead of the recruitment calendar, preparing your MBAs for upcoming activity and important dates for your program.

With the ability to segment your email recipients, you can deliver the most pertinent information to the appropriate audiences. Your career services office can target 1st years vs. 2nd years vs. alumni, or get as specific as emailing 1st year students with an interest in the health care industry about a recent job posting for a summer internship in health care consulting.

Finally, make sure to utilize quick marketing blurbs at the end of your email signatures with a call-to-action for your students to make the most of their career services!

EmailSend Targeted Information


NavigationMake sure that there’s no confusion where to navigate for each major audience your website serves. There should be well-defined sections/pages for prospective students, current students, and alumni. Include recruitment information and provide easy access to career management tools.

“Above the Scroll”Consider this design concept when structuring your program’s webpage layout. Keep important information and links forstudents and alumni near the top of your program’s webpages for convenient access to career management resources.

Your website is most likely one of the first places your candidates think to look for information related to your program. Have you optimized your website to be informative, user-friendly, and up-todate with valuable content for your students and alumni?

Think of your website as the central location for your program’s online presence. By making your career service office’s resources conveniently available in one place, you are assuring that your candidates always have a point of reference, 24/7, as they navigate their career paths. If they have a question about the who, what, where, why, when, or how of your program, there should be a place on your website that either answers their question or directs them to where their question can be answered.

Your website should be an additional means for creating connections with your students, as well as promoting all the ways they can connect with employers, peers, alumni, professors, and administration. Include links to industry news and external resources, along with descriptions on how to best utilize them. Make sure to include links to your Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and blog to encourage connecting through social media. Providing convenient access to relevant and timely information and generating useful content will keep them coming back.

Students will stay engaged and trust that their career services office can be of use in every point of their career paths. Make sure to include a description of GradLeaders so your candidates can better understand the product and our partnership. To create an understanding of our role in the MBA recruiting industry, and to promote registration and usage of the system, we suggest using the following messages when mentioning your resume database and/or MultiPost job board on your website.

WebsiteIncrease Visibility


TwitterIf you haven’t already, create a Twitter account specifically for your MBA program and one specifically for alumni. Tweet at least once a day with something timely and interesting to candidates, such as upcoming OCR dates, reminders about deadlines, industry news, fun facts, and current networking opportunities. With 140 characters, you can keep your Tweets simple and to the point, and insert shortened links for more information.

Facebook, LinkedIn, Google +If you haven’t already, create a Facebook page, a LinkedIn group and a Google+ circle dedicated to your MBA program and onespecifically for alumni. Once a week, post timely information to promote important dates, people, events and opportunities.Your messages can be longer than your tweets, but keep them brief so candidates stay engaged with summarized information.

BloggingIf you haven’t already, create a blog dedicated to your MBA program. Several times a month, create blog posts with more detailed information on recruitment, relevant news, industry trends, program updates, and interesting MBA news. You can link your blog to your website, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+. Candidates interested in learning more about their program, its people and its activities can stay up-to-date with More detailed information than your social media posts, but with more timely information than your website. Unlike your other social media posts, your blog posts can be of any length and take on a more personal spin. Include stories about alumni, stories about your program’s history, highlight student accomplishments, add fun facts, and come up with other clever ideas to post. The more engaging the information, the more likely candidates will feel connected to their program.

Social media is one of the most valuable marketing tools and one of the most effective communication platforms available today. Interconnected webs of people, places, pictures and information produce incredibly valuable advertising opportunities. Today’s growing desire for quick and easy access to relevant information makes social media an increasingly ideal outreach device. As your MBAs are becoming more and more active on social media, it’s important for your career services office to establish itself as an engaged participant.

According to Experian Marketing Services, 27% of the time spent online is on social networking.

Most, if not all, of your MBAs have some sort of presence on social media. This creates an almost endless number of communication channels for your career services office to promote its technology, events, and offerings to your students and alumni.

Different forms of social media facilitate different types of communication, and are meant for specific types of interactions. Some are best designed for sharing small pieces of information often, while some are best designed for detailed information shared on occasion. Come up with a personalized schedule for your career services office to maintain its social media presence, and always be on the lookout for interesting information you can share online with your students and alumni.

Social media is a user-friendly, virtually cost-free, and continuously growing space for your career services to successfully advertise all that your MBA program has to offer to its students and alumni.

Social MediaAdvertise Career Service Resources


The millennial generation will make up 50 percent of U.S. workforce by 2030, and likely represents a large number of your MBA candidates. Technologically savvy and internet dependent, this generation often embraces on-the-go connection points to productively manage their daily activities. Has your career services office promoted mobile career management to its younger students?

The structured timeline of the MBA degree requires candidates to communicate with their career services and employers in an organized and efficient manner. Students are more likely to stay on top of appointments, updates, and deadlines if they can access schedules and contacts on their smartphones. Built into their routine activity, checking one’s smartphone is second nature for many of your students and recent alumni. By promoting mobile career management, you can connect with your younger generation and they can connect with employers by simply utilizing apps designed specifically for that purpose.

Cisco’s survey of college students and workers between the ages of 18 and 30 found that for Gen Y, there is no clear line between the workday and personal time – they both blend and overlap. 60% reported that they find themselves compulsively checking their smartphones for emails, texts, or social media updates.

Encourage your MBAs to add career services to their preexisting list of smartphone uses, and they will be able to stay connected onthe- go. The GradLeaders mobile app for candidates is a convenient and consolidated way for your students and alumni to handle their career management activity, no matter where they are or what time of day. Candidates can update their job search status, check announcements and messages, search companies and their contacts, search jobs postings, view “Hot-Lists” with full functionality, and view appointments on their calendar. With new and improved features, the GradLeaders mobile app is more useful than ever.

MobilePromote On-the-Go Career Management


YouTubeAfter creating videos, upload them to video websites like Vimeo and/or YouTube. Once on YouTube you can:• Select “Share this video” to quickly share the video to

Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Blogger, Reddit, tumblr., Pinterest, and/or LinkedIn. They also provide a shortened URL for simplified sharing.

• Select “Embed” to find html for embedding the video on your website.

• Encourage students to “Subscribe” to your YouTube channel, so they see any newly uploaded videos on their homepage.

PDF GuidesQuickly and easily create your own step-bystep guides in Microsoft Word or PowerPoint, save them as PDFs, and create web files so students can download the PDFs from your website or other online documents.

Simple Instructions1. Visit this link: [insert link]2. Click “Create a New Account”3. Create a username and password4. Fill out your contact information5. Answer profile questions6. Upload an up-to-date resume7. Perform a job search8. Save job search as an email agent

Students and alumni that are unfamiliar with online recruitment practices may need assistance as they register, create their profiles, upload documents and search for job openings. By creating guides that walk them through the process of utilizing GradLeaders’s recruitment technology, you can be sure that they have all the information they need to efficiently search for jobs and connect with employers. Once you’ve created these step-by-step guides, turn them into how-to videos to quickly deliver information and increase viewer retention.

According to Brainshark, the information retained in one minute of online video is equal to about 1.8 million written words.

The videos you create can be simple click through guides, or indepth feature/benefit documentation with voiceovers. Simple screen capture software, such as Camtasia, can be used to record the step-by-step clicks. Video editing software, such as Windows Movie Maker or iMovie, can be used to add pans, zooms, and captions. Assisting your MBAs will ensure that they have a full understanding the technology available to them, and it will demonstrate your ability to help guide their career search.

Once you’ve created instructional guides and videos, you can include the information or links to those external resources when making other outreach efforts.

Generic step-by-step guides and how-to videos made by GradLeaders can be found to the right. Feel free to share these with your students and alumni, or create ones personalized for your school’s MBA program.

VideoProvide Step-by-Step Directions


As part of the GradLeaders network, your students and alumni are now able to search a niche job board specifically for MBAs, with supporting features and continually updated technology.

Candidates are increasingly millennial and tech-savvy, and would be interested in knowing all the benefits that virtual recruitment can provide them. Have you promoted these advanced recruitment tools and their growing ability to support your candidates’ career searches?

According to Bayt International, e-cruitment hiring is on average 70% quicker than traditional hiring methods. Technology creates recruitment opportunities for your MBAs that would otherwise not exist. Candidates are increasingly interested in smaller companies, and not all employers have the time, the team, the budget, or the resources to recruit on-campus. These companies must rely on virtual recruitment to connect and communicate with your candidates. Technology provides the freedom, the ease, and efficiency that will enable employers to not only reach your MBAs, but reach them faster. Inform your candidates of how GradLeaders Career Center can support every aspect of their career management, from OCR to job searches to interview schedules. Encourage your candidates to update their profiles and always be on the look-out for virtual networking opportunities.

Promote technology by informing students and alumni about the connections it provides and the problems it solves. Make sure to advocate for virtual interviewing as a valuable accompaniment that gives candidates more opportunities to connect with employers from afar. With the help of the internet and GradLeaders, distance and time restrictions are no longer a recruitment barrier; that means more job opportunities around the world!

Additionally, keeping the information relevant and updated within the system will create appeal for your students to utilize the job board. Update the student and alumni dashboards with interesting information and career services updates.

Inform your candidates about growing role of technology in recruitment processes and how they can get the most out of it. Facilitate the proper candidate-employer match by promoting this advanced recruitment technology and all of its supporting components.

AdvertiseAdvocate & Update Technology

JobMatchWhen candidates create or update their career profile with new preferences and experiences, the innovative JobMatch technology performs an advanced search of your school’s job board and returns a list of jobs that match your profile criteria. They can immediately view those jobs and/or set up search agents to notify them when new “matching” jobs are posted.

Confidentiality FeatureCurrently employed alumni will be interested in protecting their privacy as they search for a new job. The Alumni Resume Database makes this easy by giving them the choice to not display their resume and contact information to recruiters. When “confidential” candidates show up in an employer’s searchresult, he or she will have the option to send a “blind” email with a description of the opportunity. The candidate can then choose whether or not to respond.


Employer SearchWith both a summary and detailed version of this report, you can see what types of students employers are searching for.

Candidate Usage SummaryUse this report to track how many students are logging into the system, uploading resumes, and applying for jobs in a certain time frame.

Alpha ListThis report prints a list of only active candidates.

Candidate PopulationThis report generates a list of candidates by name with their status, resume submitted, last updated date, page and email.

Candidate ContactThis report prints candidates’ contact records.

Candidate Mailing ListThis report shows the candidates’ e-mail address, program year, and how many offers they have had.

Student InterviewsThis report gives the student’s first and last name, and how many interviews they have had for a certain time frame.

Student BidsThis report lists all student bids by company or student name for the specified round.

Interview ComparisonWith this report, compare yearly interviews with the percent change from year-to-year.

SalaryThis provides a customizable report that displays candidate reported salaries from job reporting.

Job Reporting StatusThis report breaks down the students who have accepted or not accepted jobs. …see Knowledgebase for more info!

One of the biggest benefits that technology provides is its ability to capture big data and break it down into useful information.

With the use of reporting tools, you can gain considerable insight into the demographics of your students, their interests, their experiences and the best ways to serve them.

For example, Target has utilized big data on their customers’ buying behaviors to discover the indicative shopping patterns of pregnant women. A father once complained to the company for sending his high-school daughter coupons for baby products, before learning that his daughter was indeed pregnant. Analyzing customer data enabled Target to determine a girl was pregnant, based off of her purchases, before she had even told her father. That’s a powerful point.

Additionally, a proper campaign built around the results of big data is largely what helped Obama win the 2012 presidential election. Understanding your students’ needs and interests is a great starting place for delivering the most valuable information and providing useful resources. By recognizing the unique qualities of your students and alumni, you can better determine how to move forward as your program evolves to accommodate the MBA industry and the people you’re preparing for it.

The following reports are available at any time through GradLeaders Career Center. Give your students the advantage and let them know how they’re being searched!

Big DataUtilize Student Report Data


AdvertiseAdvertise career services and all the resources available to candidates in the school paper/magazine and school/alumninewsletters. Remind students to register and utilize the system, and remind alumni that their alma mater continues to be an accessible resource for the advancement of their careers. Use the following sample text to increase the number of candidates using your system:

PostersCreate eye-catching posters to distribute at events and have available in your office. Make them useful and creative so candidates hang on to them, share them, and utilizethem throughout the recruitment season. The more visually appealing, the better!

FlyersDistribute the electronic or print version of these PDF flyers to advertise your career services offerings to alumni. You can attach the flyer in emails or use it as a hard copy for events, meetings, conferences, clubs, or physical mailings.

BrochuresIn your career services office, make sure to have a stack of brochures with important information about your program. Distribute brochures with information on how to register and best use the system.

Where technology fails, old-fashioned outreach efforts can more than make up for it. With the proper delivery, face-to-face interactions, printed material, and word-of-mouth have the ability to create the most memorable impressions. Don’t forget that at the end of the day, good business can come down to a handshake and a thank you letter.

Technology provides a cost and time efficient method for communicating information to large groups of people, but there is still value in outreach efforts beyond the realm of the internet. Print material gives people something to walk away with and hold onto, instead of getting lost in the shuffle of online correspondence. Meeting people in-person puts a face to a name, making your career services office more memorable in the long-run. In an increasingly technological and paperless society, personalized messages with some tangible aspect can be extremely effective simply because of its scarcity.

Tangible outreach efforts tend to require more time and may be more costly, but if you create a hierarchy of important contacts, each tier can be approached through sensible methods. Prioritize your outreach efforts, and determine what level of personalization you believe to be appropriate. From general brochures to handwritten letters, make sure it’s useful information to accompany all other outreach efforts. It shouldn’t replace other methods of communication, but should reinforce your connections and deliver updated program information.

PrintCreate and Distribute Print Materials


Career CoachingAssist students through one-on-one career coaching through their entire career management process.

Mock InterviewsGive students the opportunity to participate in realistic mock interviews and provide constructive feedback. Practicing interviews will help your candidates to determine which aspects need improved upon, from their formal attire, to eye contact, to the quality of their answers.

WorkshopsHold workshops about resume writing, cover letter writing, interviewing, elevator pitches, networking, the application process, negotiations, accepting offers and declining offers. Encourage student groups to coproduce your workshops.

Guest SpeakersProvide additional perspectives by bringing in experts and other experienced professionals with specialized knowledge on different topics and industries. Invite alumni to visit campus and discuss their experiences and answer

Career ExplorationEncourage students to consider their options as they explore industries, occupations, and potential career paths. Conduct one-on-one assessments and administer career aptitude tests to help your candidates determine where their strengths and interests overlap.

Alumni ConnectionsInvite alumni back to campus for panels, coffee hours, presentations, etc. to establish connections with current students. Students can ask alumni questions and learn moreabout potential career paths.

Online ResourcesProvide students and alumni with access to resources through your website, such as sample resumes, sample cover letters,interview prep checklists, employer information, etc.

Career services should offer a wide array of resources for students and alumni to further develop their professionalism. Each candidate should feel as though they’ve been assessed, prepared, and practiced for every step of the formal recruitment process.

The education your students receive in the classroom becomes infinitely more valuable when accompanied by a tailored career search that is supported by soft skills, self-understanding, and an effective delivery.

While much of the coaching and guidance you should be providing is based off of proven strategies from years passed, make sure to incorporate timely and economy specific advice, giving your candidates a well-rounded understanding of the current job market and its demands. As stated in Critical Skills Needs and Resources for the Changing Workforce by SHRM, “Although it is difficult to predict the exact skills that workers will need in the future, it is certain that skills requirements will continue to evolve as the workplace changes and adapts to market innovations, new technologies and the globalization of business and labor.” The diverse skills your students and alumni display as they interact with employers will demonstrate the types of skills they can utilize on the job.

Modernized career coaching will give your candidates an advantage as they strategize their job search and adapt to the ever-changing economic environment. As your students explore their options and refine their professional skills, ensure that you are continually adapting your methods to best serve the individual at hand. Pioneering efforts to expose new opportunities, trends and industry opinions will make career management exciting, personalized, and one-step ahead of the competition.

Refining your candidates’ professional skills will not only help them to begin their career, but to begin the right career.

ActivitiesRefine Professional Skills


How to Connect with Employers


GradLeaders recommends the following 10 ways to proactively reach out to employers:(click to jump to each section)EMAILWEBSITEALUMNISOCIAL MEDIAVIDEOADVERTISEUXBIG DATAPRINT MATERIALEVENTS

Looking for ways to properly maintain and grow your current recruiter network?

By systematically keeping your school’s MBA program top of mind for employers, you can sustain and expand the source of opportunities for your students. Consistently communicate the quality of your MBA program by promoting your candidates, alumni, and faculty. Your school is a valuable brand and it deserves to be displayed and advertised accordingly. With the help of social media, email, technology and promotions, you can market your school to thousands of recruiters by completing simple outreach tasks. As recruiters work to fill positions with quality hires, these activities will help to keep your MBAs front of mind as valuable leadership candidates.

Because your students and alumni have worked to set themselves apart as business leaders, it’s worth noting the positive outlook for their future recruitment. Drawing responses from more than 900 employers in 50 countries around the world, the Graduate Management Admission Council reported that 75% of companies planned to hire MBAs in 2013, up from 71 % in 2012.

As the generally accepted gateway between your MBA students and recruiters, it is crucial for your career services office to institute habitual outreach activities. The following suggestions are simple tasks that could initiate long-term affiliations with new and existing partners.

How to Connect with Employers


Direct emails are a quick, easy, and effective way to reach employers around the world. It’s a proven method for delivering timely information, and it provides a solid foundation for your primary outreach efforts. While other communication channels have gained popularity recently, email remains an important way for your career services to connect with businesses.

According to iContact, “56% of businesses say they plan to increase their use of email marketing in 2013; email was second only to social media, which 60 percent of businesses said they plan to increase.”

Don’t shy away from emails simply because other outreach methods have gained traction in the corporate world. In our Digital Recruitment Survey in late 2012, email was still the number 1 task performed by recruiters (both on mobile devices and computers).

Email can support your other forms of communication, and vice versa, reinforcing important information from multiple angles and initiating hiring managers to take action and connect with candidates. The content of your emails should be one step ahead of the recruitment calendar, preparing employers for upcoming activity and important dates for your MBA program. Additionally, emails should inform employers about recent activity, in case they missed the latest announcement, the last career fair, a resume book release date, etc.

With the ability to segment your email recipients, you can deliver the most pertinent information to the most appropriate audiences. Your career services office can broadly target large groups, such as current vs. prospective recruiters. Then, you can narrow these targets further by dividing them by industry or location, so you can send them relevant information about your students’ experience and preferences.

Finally, don’t just think of email as a mass marketing opportunity. Each individual you send an email to via Outlook or from your phone can also help connect your candidates to employers. So make sure to utilize quick marketing blurbs at the end of your email signatures with a call-to-action to virtually recruit your candidates.

EmailSend Targeted Information


NavigationMake sure that there’s no confusion where to navigate for each major audience your website serves. There should be a welldefined employer page that outlines the different ways to recruit your candidates.

“Above the Scroll”Consider this design concept when structuring your program’s webpage layout. Keep important information and links forrecruiters near the top of your program’s webpages for convenient access to your candidates.

Search Engine OptimizationMake sure your website is optimized for search engines by including META tags* and titles for “MBA recruiting”, “MBA students” and “MBA resume books”. If you’re not sure if your website is optimized, ask your webmaster or contact us with any questions. *A META tag is an HTML coding statement that describes the content of a website, so that search engines know what a searchshould display based on the information websites contain

Search Engine MarketingAdvertising with Google Adwords, Yahoo! Search Marketing, and Microsoft Adcenter can drive thousands of potential employersthat are searching for “MBAs”, “MBA recruiting”, etc. to your webpage. Search engine marketing can be very inexpensive forthe amount of recruiting traffic it generates.Examples of how other programs advertise:From TheWeatherChannel.comFrom Pandora.comFrom Thesaurus.com

Have you maximized the visibility of your students to employers? National recruiting events, meet & greets, coffee hours and OCR events are all great ways to introduce students to employers, but they don’t extend your reach to the hiring majority. With a limitless reach and round-the-clock access, the internet is still the most efficient way to connect your MBAs with companies around the world.

According to Bloomberg Businessweek, a survey of 935 corporate recruiters in 50 countries found that 75 percent of companies are planning on hiring MBAs. Up from 71 percent in 2012, this increase represents a growing demand for MBAs. Seperately, a survey 2 months later reported that nearly half of all business schools surveyed reported that on-campus hiring activity was unchanged or decreased.

Promoting your students begins by simply making their resumes, career profiles, and contact information easily accessible to employers via your online resume databases. GradLeaders recently surveyed 534 corporate recruiters on their digital MBA recruitment practices. According to recruiter responses, over 75% of their resume-reviewing activity occurs on a computer or a mobile device, while less than 25% of recruiters still collect and review resumes with pen and paper.

MBA students are choice job candidates, and by assuring that their resumes are readily available on your career services website, you have already begun to facilitate the hiring process. Recruiters are often bombarded by hundreds of applications, resumes, and cluttered job boards, so it is crucial for your MBAs to stand out as the cream of the crop. First and foremost, your career services website should include a portal specifically for recruiters. Instead of burying it 6 or 7 clicks deep, or “below the scroll”, encourage them to view your MBA resume books by prominently displaying access to the database.

Additionally, search engine optimization, search engine marketing, social networking, and recruiter guides can drive traffic to your students’ resume books. Be sure to include your GradLeaders.com/insertschoolname link in every channel.

WebsiteIncrease Visibility


Your program’s alumni are one of the most powerful tools available for developing employer relations. Many of your alumni are now in the position to hire your current students for summer internships and full time positions. By passing up the opportunity to utilize this resource, you are passing up the opportunity to maximize the value of your school’s MBA degree. Why not take advantage of these loyal connections that exist throughout the corporate world?

As stated in Bloomberg Businessweek, “While applicants have to prove themselves to snag the job, they need to know the right people to get their foot in the door in the first place. Then they need people to advocate for them and eventually mentor them.”

With a long term allegiance that is both supported by the institution and its people, alumni are looking out for the well-being of fellow graduates and their reputations, partly because it’s a direct reflection upon their own education. Devoting the time and resources towards meaningful alumni relations will ultimately create a mutually beneficial relationship between all parties involved.

Your alumni can operate as a direct or indirect support system, from inspiring success stories, to acting as a mentor, to being the future boss of your current MBA students. Plenty of your alumni are already keeping an eye out for MBAs from their alma mater.

Help create an open pathway between these postgrads and your current students by guiding their search and encouraging them to utilize the correct resources. Inspire current students to become future employers of their fellow MBAs by demonstrating the strength of the alumni network from day one.

Your alumni, no matter where they stand along their career path, have the opportunity to be participants and leaders through service, mentorship, recruitment and support. Offer those opportunities in various ways to strengthen alumni ties, and your employer relations will prosper alongside the continued development of alumni loyalty.

AlumniNetwork with Postgrads in the Position to Hire

Utilize Newsletter + EmailInclude a section in your alumni newsletters and emails about recruiting your 1st and 2nd year MBAs, as well as other alumni,with information about OCR, resume books, and Multipost. Include important dates and contact information. Even add class-specific data on the experience, career preferences, and skills that your MBAs have listed in GradLeaders Career Center. For more information on how to acquire data on your candidates, see page 13

Encourage Students to Connect with AlumniThroughout the recruitment process, remind your students of the value of your program’s alumni network. Let them know that the common connections they have with fellow students and alumni will be of value as they continue down their career paths. As they begin their job search, encourage them to reach out to alumni at the companies they are applying.By creating strong ties with your alumni, you are demonstrating the importance and value of that network to your current students. Once those students become working alumni themselves, they’ll remember the usefulness of those connections from the other side of the recruitment process. Build a strong foundation for students to connect withalumni now, and you’ll instill a long-lasting appreciation for your program in future alumni. X number of years down the road, your current students will be more likely to pay it forward to your future students.


TwitterIf you haven’t already, create a Twitter account specifically for your MBA program. Tweet at least once a day with something timely and interesting to employers, promoting your students, alumni, and ways to connect with them. With 140 characters, you can keep your Tweets simple and to the point, and insert shortened links for more information.

Facebook, LinkedIn, Google +If you haven’t already, create a Facebook page, a LinkedIn group and a Google+ circle dedicated to your MBA program. Once aweek, post timely information to promote your students, alumni and ways to connect with them. Your messages can be longer than your tweets, but keep them brief so recruiters stay engaged with summarized information.

BloggingIf you haven’t already, create a blog dedicated to your MBA program. Several times a month, create blog posts with more detailed information on recruitment activity, relevant data on students and alumni, program updates, and interesting news. You can link your blog to your website, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+. Recruiters interested in learning more about your MBA program can stay updated with more detailed information than your social media posts, but with more timely information than your website. Unlike your other social media posts, your blog posts can be of any length and take on a more personal spin. Include stories about alumni, stories about your program’s history, highlight student accomplishments, add fun facts, and come up with other clever ideas to post. The more engaging the information, the more likely recruiters will feel connected to your program and its students.

Social media is one of the most valuable marketing tools and one of the most effective communication platforms available today. Interconnected webs of people, places, pictures and information produce incredibly valuable advertising opportunities. Today’s growing desire for quick and easy access to relevant information makes social media an increasingly ideal outreach device. As employers are becoming more and more active on social media, it’s important for your career services office to establish itself as an engaged participant.

According to Jobvite’s Social Recruiting Survey, 73% of recruiters have successfully hired a candidate who was identified or introduced through a social network or social media. Most employers have some sort of presence on social media. Some companies even have accounts specifically for recruitment purposes. This creates an almost endless number of communication channels for your career services office to promote its MBA program, students, alumni and recruitment tools to employers around the world.

Different forms of social media facilitate different types of communication, and are meant for specific types of interactions. Some are best designed for sharing small pieces of information often, while some are best designed for detailed information shared on occasion. Come up with a personalized schedule for your career services office to maintain its social media presence, and always be on the lookout for interesting information you can share online with recruiters.

Social media is a user-friendly, virtually cost-free, and continuously growing space for your career services to successfully advertise all that your MBA program has to offer employers.

Social MediaAdvertise Your Program


Employers that are unfamiliar with online recruitment practices may need assistance as they search resume books, post job openings, etc. By creating guides that walk them through the process of accessing your candidates and utilizing the recruitment platform, you can be sure that they have all the information they need to efficiently connect with your MBAs. Once you’ve created these step-by-step guides, turn them into how-to videos to quickly deliver information and increase viewer retention.

According to Brainshark, the information retained in one minute of online video is equal to about 1.8 million written words. The videos you create can be simple click through guides, or indepth feature/benefit documentation with voiceovers. Simple screen capture software, such as Camtasia, can be used to record the step-by-step clicks. Video editing software, such as Windows Movie Maker or iMovie, can be used to add pans, zooms, and captions. Assisting employers will ensure that they have a full understanding the technology available to them, and it will demonstrate your appreciation for their time and effort as they navigate new recruitment territory.

Once you’ve created instructional guides and videos, you can include the information or links to those external resources when making other outreach efforts.

Generic step-by-step guides and how-to videos made by GradLeaders can be found to the right. Feel free to share these with employers, or create ones personalized for your school’s MBA program.

VideoCreate Step-by-Step Instructions

YouTubeAfter creating videos, upload them to video websites like Vimeo and/or YouTube. Once on YouTube you can:• Select “Share this video” to quickly share the video to

Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Blogger, Reddit, tumblr., Pinterest, and/or LinkedIn. They also provide a shortened URL for simplified sharing.

• Select “Embed” to find html for embedding the video on your website.

• Encourage students to “Subscribe” to your YouTube channel, so they see any newly uploaded videos on their homepage.

PDF GuidesQuickly and easily create your own step-bystep guides in Microsoft Word or PowerPoint, save them as PDFs, and create web files so students can download the PDFs from your website or other online documents.

Simple Instructions1. Visit this link: [insert link]2. Click “Create a New Account”3. Create a username and password4. Fill out your contact information5. Answer profile questions6. Upload an up-to-date resume7. Perform a job search8. Save job search as an email agent


Career services often act as the home-base for student-employer interactions, but it’s increasingly important to be the facilitator of a technology-based recruitment system. More and more, virtual recruitment is becoming the norm, as tech-savvy candidates are entering the workforce and hiring managers are adapting to the changing landscape.

As stated by Kevin Wheeler, the President and Founder of Global Learning Resources, Inc., “We assume hiring managers will oppose a virtual process, but most of them are unaware of how a candidate was sourced or screened. They are also more than likely open to video chats and other virtual ways of communicating with candidates as many hiring managers are traveling, busy or have difficulty finding quality time for a face-to-face engagement. We assume senior level candidates, especially, want an in-person discussion or interview, yet there is no objective evidence to support this. In my conversations with senior executives, most say they would welcome a faster and more useful recruiting experience.”

Encourage use of the technology you’ve made available to employers to connect with your candidates. Advertise the benefits of the efficient and user-friendly products designed to quickly fill their talent pipelines with your MBAs. Developing a solid recruitment process through GradLeaders Recruiting and the available tools within the system will help create the most connections for your candidates. Once employers become comfortable with the technology and discover the many advantages of virtual recruitment, they can begin to initiate their own hiring efforts, while continuing to use your career services to maximize those efforts. Make it easy for employers to learn about and access your candidates through GradLeaders Recruiting, MultiPost, and Resume Books, and advocate the use of Virtual Interviewing to assist the process.

AdvertiseGuide Employers to Technology

Resume BooksResume books give employers the ability to pinpoint the right MBA candidates fast. Each Resume Book is an extensive database of profiles and resumes submitted by the top MBA talent at your school that employers can search by experience, certification, keywords, and more.

GradLeaders Recruiting GradLeaders Recruiting moves employers beyond their static recruiting network, expanding their reach to over 75 top-ranked b-schools from around the world. Our resume databases, MultiPost andJobMatch technology are available to all of our GradLeaders Recruiting clients, so that they can efficiently fill their talent pipelines with your students! Share information about GradLeaders Recruiting with recruiters and your working alumni to create more corporate connections for your program. JobMatchJobMatch is an automatic way for employers and candidates to find each other. After an employer posts a job with MultiPost, the JobMatch technology performs an advanced search of the comprehensive database and returns a list of candidate profiles and resumes that match the job description.

MultiPostMultiPost is an exclusive tool that allows employers to post job opportunities to our school partners – including yours! Promoting this tool to recruiters will increase the number of jobs available to your candidates.


Update Employer DashboardBy using our standard modules and creating our own custom widgets, you can provide valuable information, relevant news, useful links, and promote recruiting tools to the employers visiting your site.

Update Candidate StatusesSimply tag job-seeking candidates as “active” or tag hired candidates as “position accepted”.

Check on New OrdersEmployers ordering your Resume Books through GradLeaders.com are told that it can take up to 48 hours to receive approval from the school. Ensure that employers get access to your job-seeking candidates promptly by making it a daily task to approve new orders.

Although virtual recruitment allows for a more independent method of hiring, career services still plays an important role in updating school-specific content within the system. Without a wellmaintained system, your candidates could be bypassed by an ideal opportunity, simply because their status wasn’t up-to-date, or a resume book order took too long to be approved.

In this instance, you can think of your MBAs as products, and employers as customers. Once they’ve arrived at the store and they’re browsing the shelves, what purchase will they make and why? How have the products been presented? Are they clearly visible and displayed appropriately? Has the manufacturer presented the most updated product and accommodated the customers’ needs?

Considering that e-cruitment hiring is on average 70% quicker than traditional hiring methods, these questions need answered 70%+ quicker than ever before. As the recruitment landscape changes, and in this case speeds up, students and career services must proactively parallel the new MBA recruitment industry. As Dr. John Sullivan, the internationally known HR though-leader from Silicon Valley, states, “interrelated processes that are dependent on each other must be either coordinated or completely integrated if speed goals are to be achieved. This integration is necessary to ensure smooth and fast handoffs between functions and to ensure that roadblocks to speed are quickly identified and eliminated.” In other words, the recruitment process is speeding up, and career services must follow suite in order to properly match your MBAs with employers.

Candidate statuses must be updated regularly, resume book orders should be approved as soon as possible, and the employer dashboard should never contain out-of-date information, but rather, recent news, important dates, and program updates. Play your part, because time is of the essence!

UXOptimize the E-cruitment Experience


Candidate DemographicsThis report generates a list of questions/ answers and the number of times candidates have answered each answer.

Employer UsageThis report generates a list of users who have logged into the system, including their email addresses, usage dates, and total number of logins.

Company ActivityThis report generates a list of activities performed by that particular company.

Organization ContactsThis report generates a list of contact information for that particular company.

Organization Contact LabelsThis creates company contact labels for mailings.

Primary Organization Contacts with VisitsExport of primary contacts for companies with OCR visits in the date range.

Major EmployerThis gives the name of the organizations that have offered positions and if they were accepted or not.

Jobs and OCR DetailsThis provides a report of all jobs and OCR events with the information from the posting such as company, contact, title, job type, job function and industry.

Company Event ExportThis provides an export in a CSV file of all of the company events for the date range searched.

Primary Organization Contacts with VisitsThis is an export of primary contacts for companies with OCR visits in the date range. …see KnowledgeBase for more info!

One of the biggest benefits that technology provides is its ability to capture big data and break it down into useful information. When your focus is narrowed, the decisions and actions of individual recruiters may not seem of much value; take a step back, and you can gain considerable insight into the key trends of your target audience and the reasoning behind them.

For example, Target has utilized big data on their customers’ buying behaviors to discover the indicative shopping patterns of pregnant women. A father once complained to the company for sending his high-school daughter coupons for baby products, before learning that his daughter was indeed pregnant. Analyzing customer data enabled Target to determine a girl was pregnant, based off of her purchases, before she had even told her father. That’s a powerful point.

Additionally, a proper campaign built around the results of big data is largely what helped Obama win the 2012 presidential election.

Understanding what recruiters are looking for will help provide your office and your candidates with insight into growing industries, employer priorities, recruitment trends, and talent vacancies. As your MBAs look to differentiate themselves from the crowd, share the information you have readily available on what employers are looking for. That way they can better customize their cover letters, resumes, capabilities, and interview processes for a tailored approach to the application process.

The following reports are available at any time through GradLeaders Career Center. Give your students the advantage and let them know how they’re being searched!

Big DataUtilize Employer Report Data


MailDiscover your key employer contacts and send hand-written letters, both inviting them to OCR events and thanking themfor attending. For all other employer contacts, accompany each major email push containing important recruitment information with a personalized letter in the mail.

Flyers + PostersCreate eye-catching flyers and posters to include in promotional packages, to distribute at events, include in mailings, and have available in your office. Make them useful and creative so employers hang on to them, share them, and utilize themthroughout the recruitment season. The more visually appealing, the better!

BrochuresIn your career services office and at every event, make sure to have a stack of brochures with important information about your program. Distribute compact brochures with an outline of your program and what makes it unique, key contact information, a calendar with important dates, fun facts about your school, instructions on how to connect with your candidates, program statistics and achievements, etc.

Where technology fails, old-fashioned outreach efforts can more than make up for it. With the proper format and delivery, printed material, word-of-mouth, and face-to-face interactions have the ability to create the most memorable impressions. Utilizing several mediums for outreach efforts will ensure you’re catering to the preferences of every employer, of every age, with varying ideas of how to conduct professional correspondences. Don’t forget that the end of the day, good business can come down to a handshake and a thank you letter.

Technology provides a cost and time efficient method for communicating information to large groups of people, but there is still value in outreach efforts beyond the realm of the internet. Print material gives people something to walk away with and hold onto, instead of getting lost in the shuffle of online communications. Meeting people in-person puts a face to a name, making your career services office more memorable in the long-run. In an increasingly technological and paperless society, personalized messages with some tangible aspect can be extremely effective, simply because of its scarcity.

Tangible outreach efforts tend to require more time and may be more costly, but if you create a hierarchy of important contacts, each tier can be approached through sensible methods. Prioritize your outreach efforts, and determine what level of personalization you believe to be appropriate. From general brochures to handwritten letters, make sure it’s useful information to accompany other outreach efforts. Tangibles shouldn’t replace other methods of communication, but should reinforce your connections and deliver the most updated program information.

PrintCreate and Distribute Print Materials


Has your career service office created opportunities for employers to establish a presence on campus? Face-to-face networking allows for a personalized approach to working partnerships, in order to build and enhance communication between students and employers. This gives your candidates the chance to further develop professional relationships and create stronger connections with recruiters.

Forbes contributor Glenn Llopis explains, “Your audience will serve to help you connect the dots of opportunity and potentially act as an enabler for you. […] Networking is both an art and a science. But in the end – networking should be fun, exciting and a rewarding approach to advancement.”

Networking events have a unique and lasting value for many reasons. Not only does it get your candidates in front of employers, but they give students the chance to ask questions, motivate them to be proactive in their job search, teach students how to market themselves as choice candidates, and give those students with limited professional experience the opportunity to prepare and practice for corporate communication. Each event gives your MBAs the chance to demonstrate their soft skills and utilize the career coaching they’ve received.

Alongside standard career fairs, hold and host a diverse number of events for the different segments you’re serving, giving employers the ability to pursue a narrow scope for their particular recruitment objectives. Students and employers will have preestablished mutual interests, segmenting your program for a more personal form of networking.

Additionally, make sure to host both formal and informal events for students and employers to connect. While informal events shouldn’t be too casual, they allow for a different type of interaction to help students get a feel for the companies they’re interested in.

EventsHost and Attend GradLeadersed Events

Face-to-FaceEveryone knows that putting a face to a name will help to personalize relationships. When companies visit campus, make sure your program’s key contacts meet face to face with key recruiters. Employers will value the time and effort you take to reach out to them and make their campus visits personalized.

On-Campus-RecruitingHosting employers for on-campus-recruiting is a great way for your MBAs to explore opportunities and learn about the companies interested in hiring them. Make sure students are able to connect with recruiters from a wide array of industries, sizes and locations. Career FairsEncourage your students to attend regional and national career fairs. See page 28 with a list of events for MBAs.

Coffee HoursCoffee hours give employers and your candidates the chance to connect in a more casual setting.

Student Club EventsConnect your student clubs with employers interested in hiring diverse individuals.

Information TablesInvite employers to have information tables at your business school. This gives your candidates a chance to ask questions in a more causal setting and gives employers another chance to connect with current students.

Advice + InspirationSee page 28-29 for information on how to connect with GradLeaders and our other partner schools. Seek out advice and inspiration for your program’s events by learning how other programs operate.


As part of our exclusive network, GradLeaders invites you to attend our annual Connections Conference, and User Conference, as well as our industry specific Focus Forums. These events are specifically designed to share and encourage best practices, debate issues and facilitate networking between our partners and other industry leaders. With the common goal to effectively match top MBA talent with employers around the world, our team and attendees provide unique and valuable insight into current and future recruitment practices.

Our Connections Conference continues to be the premier event for thought leadership in MBA recruitment. There is always something new to learn, and we appreciate the ideas, comments, and willingness to share year after year. The rich and open dialogue that takes place at this one-of-a-kind event helps us to understand our partners’ needs so we can best accommodate them in the future. Whether you have attended one of our Connections Conferences in the past or not, we guarantee you will profit from the collaboration between the industry’s key players.

Our User Conference is an event specifically for career management office professionals from the world’s leading business schools. This technology focused event gives attendees the opportunity to share ideas for product and process improvements, so that we can enhance our software and increase productivity. Additionally, we explore best practices, problemsolve and discuss industry standards. We encourage your career services office to attend our User Conference, where your input will help us continue to develop the most advanced MBA recruitment software.

Connect with Other Schools

GradLeaders EventsConnections ConferenceUser Conference

Additional EventsThe Consortium General ConferenceHCI Strategic Talent Acquisition ConferenceForte MBA Women’s Leadership ConferenceMBA CSEA Global ConferenceNBMBAA Conference & ExpositionNSHMBA Conference & Career ExpoReaching Out LGBT MBA ConferenceAsia MBA Leadership Conference & Career ExpositionMLT Ambassador Networking Events

Save the DateCheck the GradLeaders.com Events Page for more information, dates, and locations.


Corporate TeamTodd Erdy Vice President, Customer Success – Corporate [email protected]

Amy King Director, Customer Success – [email protected]

School TeamHeather Krumpak, Vice President, Customer Success – Higher [email protected]

Dave HoyVice President, Products & Customer [email protected]

Jessica FertelSenior Customer Relationship [email protected]

Amy JonesSenior Customer Relationship [email protected]

Ellie RinglerCustomer Relationship [email protected]

Rob HagemanCustomer Relationship [email protected]

Meghan Swonger Manager, Customer Success – Higher [email protected]

Marketing TeamRyan Pratt, Marketing [email protected]

In partnership with the world’s top-ranked graduate business schools, GradLeaders has created the most comprehensive recruiting network available. For more than two decades, these school partners—and the companies that employ their students and alumni—look to us for advanced recruiting technology solutions, best practices, and innovation.

Today we are proud to bring an ever-expanding range of opportunities to MBA talent in North America, Europe, and Asia through:

Exclusive School Partnerships — are comprised of the world’s top MBA programs including their students and alumni. These schools count on us for their online resume books, job boards and office automation needs in order to increase the visibility of their candidates and provide their students with more diverse and quality career opportunities.

Corporate Recruiters and Employers — gain access to our school network in order to quickly and cost-effectively identify and attract top MBA talent. Our advanced recruitment technology solutions mean better control of the recruiting process and ensure that corporate recruiters never again miss high-potential and high-performing talent.

For 20+ years, the team at GradLeaders has worked to provide our school partners and corporate clients with premium recruitment technology, innovative strategies, and superior service. Always up to date on industry best practices, our partners look to us for relevant information and insight. As an extension of your career services office, we are happy to answer your questions, address your concerns, and respond to your input. If you did not find the information you were looking for in this guide, we invite you to contact any one of our team members.

Connect with the Experts

GradLeaders


Designed to coincide with the recruitment calendars of our partner schools and corporate clients, GradLeaders maintains a year-round outreach schedule. This calendar serves as a guide for what activities each audience is engaged in throughout the academic year. It not only helps to outline our schedule each year, but should also aid our partners in planning timely outreach.

The best time to start building relationships with employers, students and alumni is right now. By merely aligning your outreach and response periods. Plan ahead and build relationships with recruiters, employers, and your MBAs throughout the entire year to create a steady and balanced approach to career management.

Use our calendar of recurring activities to build your own MBA career service calendar.

Download Seasonal MBA Recruiting Calendar (PDF)

In order to keep our outreach activities organized and itemized, GradLeaders maintains a detailed to-do list. By outlining our daily, weekly, monthly and annual strategies, we can be sure that we are staying on schedule by consistently moving forward with our long and short term promotional objectives.

monthly and annual to-do list as well. Mapping out your recurring tasks will create a straightforward system of your outreach of consistency and your MBAs in the know will maximize the Use our to-do list as a rough outline of standard upkeep activities to include in your own schedule.

Today, 87% of the inbound traffic from employers to our partner schools’ virtual recruitment products is generated by the sales and marketing efforts of GradLeaders. Our network is continuously expanding as we reacou out ot recruiters through emails, phone calls, social networking, events, and more.

View our outreach efforts (PDF)

Seasonal Calendar

To-Do List

Did You Know?

DailySocial Media Tweet relevant news and information for both candidates and

employersGradLeaders Career Center Approve/decline resume book orders Approve/decline job postings

WeeklySocial Media Facebook + LinkedIn + Blog - Post relevant news and

information on your program’s page/group and reply to employers and students that have interacted with you.

MonthlyEmail Recruiters – important dates, program information and

promote your candidates Registered Candidates – important dates, program

information, and GradLeaders Career Center information Un-registered students and alumni – promote GradLeaders

Career Center registrationGradLeaders Career Center Update dashboard Export employer activity reportsNewsletter Send program information, industry news, campus news,

important dates and ablurb about GradLeaders Career Center to candidates; create a section for alumni, or send them their own newsletter

AnnuallyWebsite Update website with resume book release dates and updated

program informationSocial Media Announce resume book release datesEmail Announce resume book release dates Promote just-in-time hiring to recruiters Communicate your program’s important dates with

GradLeadersGradLeaders Career Center Export resume book order report Export job postings Update candidate statuses as actively seeking or inactive


1. http://www.bayt.com/en/career-article-1121/

2. http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-08-30/mba-job-hunt-networking#r=lr-sr

3. http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-05-21/mba-hiring-about-to-go-into-overdrive

4. http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-07-23/mba-recruiting-is-down-again

5. https://www.case.org/Publications_and_Products/2011/MayJune_2011/Presidents_Perspective_Overcoming_the_Undervaluing_of_Alumni_Relations.html

6. http://www.cisco.com/en/US/solutions/ns341/ns525/ns537/ns705/ns1120/2012-CCWTR-Chapter1- Global-Results.pdf

7. http://www.ere.net/2013/11/12/never-look-a-candidate-in-the-eye/

8. http://www.ere.net/2013/11/11/speed-doesnt-kill-slow-kills-organizations/

9. http://www.forbes.com/sites/glennllopis/2012/05/29/7-reasons-networking-can-be-a-professionaldevelopment- boot-camp/

10. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-waspregnant- before-her-father-did/

11. http://www.gmac.com/~/media/Files/gmac/Research/Employment%20Outlook/crs-2013-hiringreport- 01.pdf

12. http://www.hanoverresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Best-Practices-in-Career-Services-for- Graduating-Students-Membership.pdf

13. http://www.icontact.com/blog/eight-email-marketing-facts-for-small-and-mid-sized-businesses/

14. http://web.jobvite.com/rs/jobvite/images/Jobvite_2012_Social_Recruiting_Survey.pdf

15. http://press.experian.com/United-States/Press-Release/experian-marketing-services-reveals-27- percent-of-time-spent-online-is-on-social-networking.aspx

16. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/11/prweb11317999.htm

17. http://www.shrm.org/research/surveyfindings/articles/documents/critical%20skills%20needs%20 and%20resources%20for%20the%20changing%20workforce%20survey%20report.pdf

18. http://www.brainshark.com/ideas-blog/2013/june/improve-training-retention-elearning.aspx

Sources

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