Part 3: Find a Foot in the Door
This is Part 3 of a 5-part series on Interviewing. You can start from the beginning here.
Picture yourself out of town at a party. Would you rather walk up to a new person, or be introduced by a mutual friend? The extroverts among us may enjoy jumping into a conversation with a complete stranger. Even still, Extroverts must recognize that being introduced is invaluable for a multitude of reasons. The friend is able to speak on your background, qualities, and give you insight on the person they are introducing you to. This helps to set everyone at ease, more so than if you approached them as a stranger.
This is the same ethos businesses hold when choosing which candidates to evaluate. Having a foot in the door can make all the difference in getting to the first stage of interviews, or just being another resume in the pile.
The following are avenues we all have access to for finding a foot in the door of our dream company.
Friends and Family
The best feet in the door are the individuals in your immediate network with whom you have a personal relationship with. Their direct relationship with you gives them a unique perspective on who you are as a potential candidate for the company.
If you don’t have any friends or family directly connected with companies, ask if they know anyone at these companies and request an introduction. This is called networking, and learning this skill will help you throughout your career.
Organizations & Conferences
Every industry offers opportunities for you to make personal connections. For Engineering students — you have organizations, such as NSBE, SHPE, ACM, and Code2040, which create opportunities for students to network with other student engineers and industry professionals, and even help you get into the industry. Some organizations even have partnerships where companies review the organization’s members before other candidates.
There are also conferences, such as the Grace Hopper Celebration or South By Southwest that offer the opportunity to rub shoulders with representatives from tech’s best and brightest companies. Get involved in your industry, and brush shoulders with as many people as possible. You never know where they’ll be five years from now.
If you’re first starting off your career, or changing industries, you may not have the network depth to have a personal foot in the door, which is totally fine. At this day and age, everything you need is at the tip of your fingers. There are many social media platforms which give you access to people from around the world at all different walks of life.
The following steps will help you make a good online impression with the companies you’re interested in:
Search and find members of the company
LinkedIn has very powerful search which makes it easy to find people who work at companies. Simply search “Recruiter at X” or “Product Manager at X” and open all the resulting people in new tabs. The best connections are those you have a similar background with, whether that be hometown, alma mater, etc.
Craft a LinkedIn connect message
A LinkedIn connect message is only 300 characters long, so you want it to be direct, straightforward, and help you stand out from the crowd.
An example message would be:
“Hi (name)! I’m Marc Brown, a Computer Engineering student at the University of Michigan interested in SE positions at x. Would you be open for a call sometime next week?”
This gives connections a lot of information in a little bit of time, and upon them accepting your connection, will automatically open up a chat window with them.
If you connect with members of the company that aren’t recruiters, you can send them the same message, and ask which recruiter would be best to speak with regarding the role you’re interested in.
Next you want to build social capital. Where possible, find the connections Twitter profile and follow them. Next, create private lists for each of your five companies, and add as many employee and company accounts as you can find. Next, begin liking and retweeting their tweets. Since all your names and photos are the same on your social media profiles, they’ll see you in their notifications on one platform, and immediately recognize you on the other.
Repeat
Submit your application / resume
Lastly, you’ll want to find the online portal where your company accepts applications, and submit yours. When you connect with recruiters, they’ll most likely ask you to do this, so this will put you ahead of the game.
Once you’ve crafted meaningful relationships and opened doors for yourself, you’ll have to start getting ready for the interview.
