By Thunderbird Career Management Center
Each year one of the most important campaigns for the Career Management Center staff is to push graduating students to report their employment status and job offers with the MBA Career Services Council. This past year, 77% of 2011 MBA graduates reported they were seeking offers, the number of students offered a job within 90 days of graduation increased by 26 points over last year, and the average salary increased by 3 points! In a challenging global environment, these numbers are welcome news for Thunderbirds worldwide.
To what do we owe these increases? As with most findings, there is rarely one specific factor. Rather, change is a byproduct of multiple forces working from all sides. For one, the administration invested more in the CMC and within the last year, the number of CMC staff literally doubled. This not only allowed for more advisors to meet with students, but for more employer relations directors to manage relationships with recruiters. In fact, this year was the first time the CMC went on a business development trip to Asia!
As a result of increased business development and staff attendance at national career conferences such as NSHMBA, the school was able to attract the attention of Fortune 500 companies with rotational development programs including DaVita, L’Oreal and Liberty Mutual. Not only will all three of these companies have visited campus by the end of the month, but in our first year of relationship with them, Fortune 500 manufacturing company Air Liquide made time to attend our annual Career Fair, part of October’s Professional Development Week, which logged over 350 students and 240 interviews.
Additionally, the CMC has completely reorganized and refined our communications strategy, relying heavily on social media and other digital communications to reach out to students and employers alike. For instance, over 500 companies were emailed this fall with an invitation to the Career Fair and an e-copy of our 2011 Guide to Recruiting. Students are also more apprised of opportunities including employers visiting campus, job openings, and general career search news. Take this as proof: On average, 300 students are reading our weekly newsletter. Twitter followers are up by over 200 since last October, and nearly 450 people have liked our Facebook page since its creation in January.
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Note: As a student or recent grad, anytime you receive an offer, please log in to GlobalConnect and click the Reporting tab to enter your information as we can only report employment numbers if we get at least 85% of the class to report. The statistics compiled will help recruiters and prospective students to understand where Thunderbirds go after graduation, into what functions and industries, and what kind of salary they expect.