Recruitment After Graduation

Dig deeper into my experience of job hunting after graduation, the takeaways, and my vision for recruitment.

In my previous blog post, I wrote about my personal experience with COVID-19 and the lessons I learned while being furloughed and sheltered-in-place since mid March. At the end of May, I packed up and moved back home to Tokyo, officially ending my furlough and being unemployed. And so began my job search.

I quickly realized that the job search was vastly different from the search I did when I was a senior at Cornell. There was more guidance, support, and resources to help me find my full-time position after graduation. I remember the career fairs, the exclusive job search portal, and, most importantly, the university’s Career Management team that shared years of advice and knowledge with me.

As I was familiar with LinkedIn, I decided to scan the platform for open opportunities. Unsurprisingly, almost all of the opportunities listed were from industries outside of hospitality. I knew that COVID-19 had hit hospitality the hardest, and I wasn’t expecting any open positions. However, I was surprised to see that most full-time, entry level positions had listed requirements that were more than I anticipated. Even though I could have leveraged my hospitality and operations skills, I was bogged down by not having 6+ years of work history, an MBA, or a corporate-office environment experience. And yes, these were a few required items for an entry position! It was truly disappointing to see such high barriers of entry.

Feeling defeated by the lack of opportunities on LinkedIn, I decided to look at other mediums. I was recommended to get in touch with recruiters as they may know of opportunities that I could pursue. I set up an online account, spent hours perfecting my profile, and applied to positions. Within a day, I was getting emails from recruiters, all sharing opportunities and leads. A few even requested a phone call interview to “assist me further”. I was encouraged to receive such response (who wouldn’t?) and proceeded to block out my entire week with virtual meetings. 

However, with every interaction with recruiters, I realized that these recruiters didn’t care to understand my background, experiences, or skillsets. They didn’t even attempt to understand what my career goals were. I was receiving opportunities that were very opposite of my background and postings that I know I was vastly under or over qualified for.  With the economic downturn, I couldn’t be picky, but I had to be mindful of how this next job impacts and fits into my greater career path. 

With the impersonal interactions I had with recruiters, I decided to focus purely on LinkedIn and other job posting boards. Instead of mass sending resumes to random positions, I strategically looked at how my own skills and experiences could be used in a job opening. I wrote multiple cover letters, tailored my resumes, and networked with other professionals to better prepare for interviews. 

In the end, hard work, patience, and dedication pay off and I am so excited for my new position! Funny enough, I will be working for TEKsystems, a subsidiary of Allegis Group, in the recruitment industry as Candidate Manager. I was hesitant at first, due to my bitter experience working with recruiters, but I realized that Allegis Group was pursuing recruitment with a different mission and vision. I am excited to bring my hospitality into the firm and its practices and contribute to growing its two-year-old branch in Tokyo.

I spent a total of two months in the search and I’m glad that it is over. The journey was definitely a rollercoaster, filled with highs and lows, but I am so grateful to have gone through this at a very early stage of my career. Now that I am in touch with the reality of job search, I feel better equipped for future job searches. 

A major takeaway I got from the job search was how the recruitment industry has a lot of opportunities to grow. Job search is a sensitive and personal journey and it is stressful and scary. Especially with the heightened sense of insecurity and volatility today, job search can be even more overwhelming. As job seekers navigate with little to no support from others, recruiters can play a big role by guiding and helping seekers find opportunities that are aligned with the their skills, experiences, and career goals.

Granted, recruiters make sales commission through each job opening that gets filled so some say it isn’t worth investing time in the “hand holding”. But I challenge recruiters to not just look at the commission, but the greater purpose of job search and employment. I envision recruiters fusing hospitality into their practices and focusing on personal, interactive, and ongoing relationship building in junction with the job search. That way, we can make job hunting a little less scary.