With fall sports upon us – Hooray! – I have decided to throw my commentary hat into the LeBron James discussion ring. Drama aside, I see an opportunity here to touch upon a few important points for college athletes embarking upon their senior year and their first official job search.
I highly doubt that many of us will be able to schedule a 60 minute television event to announce what job offer we will be accepting, and I certainly wouldn’t recommend this approach to notify employers of your decisions. My thought on the LeBron situation is that he demonstrated a professional immaturity and lack of respect to the teams (aka “employers”) that had expressed interest in hiring him.
First-time job seekers have been known to struggle while navigating the employment waters. With that in mind, here are three common errors that graduating seniors have made and some recommendations to avoid those mistakes.
1. Applying to any job regardless of interest
Was LeBron really interested in all of the teams he courted?
All too often, and especially in down economies, we see graduating seniors throwing their resumes into application pools like they were playing disc golf. This lack of focus doesn’t benefit either the candidate or the employer.
Recommendation:
Be selective about what you are pursuing. Don’t apply to something just because you have a resume and can hit the “apply” button. It ends up wasting both your and the recruiter’s time. It is critical to be selective and research the positions and the companies before you submit your materials.
2. Interviewing with a company you would never work for
We may never know the full truth as to how ‘The Decision” really played out, but if James, Wade & Bosh really began planning this years ago, the question becomes: “Did LeBron lead the other teams on?”
Sometimes students think it is ok to interview with a company for “practice” when the recruiter is on campus. I wholeheartedly disagree with this strategy. Significant time, energy, and financial resources are committed to these campus visits – making these interviews more important than if you had a first round in the employer’s office. This behavior could tarnish your career center and your college’s reputation and possibly even result in the employer deciding it isn’t worth the investment to return to your school.
Recommendation:
Make sure you have done appropriate company research before applying and then even more research prior to accepting any interview. If you want interview practice, schedule a mock interview with your career center. When you interview for a position you are not interested in, you are stealing an opportunity away from your classmates. Imagine if the shoe was on the other foot and the employer was interviewing YOU for practice?
3. Collecting job offers like setting up your “Starting 5”
We saw that LeBron had collected multiple offers in addition to staying in Cleveland. The bigger issue here is that he kept everyone, including his current employer, in the dark until the entire country learned which team would be welcoming James to their city.
Multiple job offers could come to very desirable candidates, and managing this process in a professional manner is critical.
Recommendation:
It is important to take your time when considering offers in order to make the best decision. It is also important to have open and honest communication throughout the process, keeping all parties informed. If you have other final round interviews scheduled and an offer comes in, great. You can then say something like, “Thank you so much for this opportunity. I need to let you know, however, that I have another final round interview already scheduled and fulfilling my obligations is important to me. May I have until “x-date” to make my decision?”
The lesson to understand with these examples is the importance of communication and respect. If you keep this in mind when you are going through the application process, you will not go wrong as you “bring your talents” to your next city.