Julieta Feltrin ’17 is Senior Vice President, Business Development for Raines International, an executive search and talent advisory firm specializing in senior-level leadership recruitment, executive assessment, and DEI advisory across industries and functions. Julieta offers advice on exploring employers you’re interested in working for and a detailed plan for networking below.
What’s the best approach to learn about a specific organization…and land a job?
The best thing you can do to learn what it’s like to work for a particular organization is to speak to current and/or former employees.
- You should start your fact-finding mission by getting smart about the company through your existing network. This includes friends or classmates who interned there recently or recent grads that are working there now. You can ask them the questions you shouldn’t / wouldn’t be able to ask during an interview about work/life balance and similar topics.
- You should also try getting in front of people who have spent at minimum 2 years at the organization to gain a deeper understanding of what it’s like to work at the company. You should target a broad range of experience levels. For example, folks who have 2-3 years of work experience, 5-7 years, and 10-15 years. Every group will provide different insights that will prove valuable to you.
- I highly encourage you to reach out to people outside of your network as well. These folks will open doors that are not currently available to you.
- Your Dartmouth network can be immensely valuable here. 9 times out of 10 when a Dartmouth alum hears from a student or young alumni they want to help! I’ve seen this first hand in my own experience searching for jobs and even now as a sales executive. We have something special!
Julieta’s plan for networking:
- But before you reach out to anyone…
- Step 1 – Define your goal: Take some time to learn about yourself. The worst thing you can do is rush into an interview or conversation and not make it a valuable experience for you and for the person who’s offering up their time. Take this time to really think about what you want in your next step and develop your personal elevator pitch. Some of the questions that will help you define your goal include:
- What industry / sector are you interested in?
- What types of roles interest you?
- You may know the industry you want to pursue. But do you know what role would best align with your experience and interests?
- For example, you could be interested in working in the food & beverage sector. But are you interested in Brand Management roles? Finance roles? Strategy roles? Supply Chain and Operations? HR? Each of these comes with exciting opportunities and challenges.
- What size / type organization is best for you (i.e. start up, publicly traded company, privately owned)?
- Do you want to live in a specific city?
- What compensation are you targeting?
- Step 2 – Research the organization: Spend a good amount of time on the company website and conducting research online. You should have an in-depth understanding of what the company does and the specific teams that interest you. Apart from the company website, some helpful tools include LinkedIn (company pages), YouTube, Google News, TechCrunch or Builtin.com (for startups).
- On the company website, the “About Page” is a good place to start. It will help answer questions like: What services do they provide? What’s their mission?
- Leadership page. Learn about the leaders of the organization and gain insights into the company structure (i.e. what teams exist?)
- Recent news. What’s going on at the company? What’s top of mind for the leadership team and employees?
- Careers page. What roles are currently open?
- Step 3 – Research the employees. Now that you have a better understanding of the company and it’s structure. Who is the best person to reach out to?
- Dartmouth: Are any of the current employees Dartmouth, Tuck, or Thayer alums?
- Role specific: In whose shoes do you see yourself in 2-3 years? 5 years? 10 years?
- HR/Talent Acquisition: Who runs internal recruitment?
- Hiring managers: If there’s an open role, who are the people hiring for the position?
- Step 4 – Conduct outreach. You understand the organization and the key players. How do you land a meeting with one of them?
- My best advice is to craft a short message about yourself and your reason for reaching out. Keep your message to a max of 5-6 sentences. Don’t spend hours working on lengthy explanations or a cover letter to attach to your outreach. The person you are going to reach out to may not have the time to read a long document. These folks will likely review your LinkedIn profile and scan your resume for relevant experience. You’re better off investing your time sending more emails than perfecting a cover letter! Your outreach should be short and…sent!
- The message should ask for advice, not for a job. Your goal is to land a 30-60 min meeting to better understand the organization and ultimately, build rapport with them! If you can, try to have an in-person meeting vs. a phone conversation.
- My advice is to use LinkedIn, because the person can put a name to the face. Email is also a great tool, although sometimes messages could end up in spam!
- Sample message: Hi Jonathan – I’m a junior at Dartmouth College majoring in Economics. After graduation, I’m interested pursuing a brand management role in a food & beverage company. I was wondering if you’d be open to an introductory call in the next few weeks. I’d love to learn more about Kellanova and your role in the marketing department. Looking forward to hearing from you. Julieta
- Step 5 – Don’t give up. People are busy. Follow up if you don’t hear back!
- Step 6 – Relationship building: Congrats! You landed the meeting! How do you prepare?
- You should start by doing a deep-dive on the person you are speaking with. Check out their LinkedIn, their company bio, if they have any speaking engagements on YouTube, etc.
- The meeting is equally about getting to know the company and getting to know them. They will be more willing to help you find a job in their organization if you establish a relationship. I’ve been on the side of the conversation where students ask me rapid fire questions about my firm but show no interest in getting to know me. Other times, students have taken the time to read up on me and ask tailored questions to my experience. Who am I more likely to help?
- You should also put together a list of 5-10 questions you’d like to ask during your meeting. Make sure these questions meet your goal in this fact-finding mission. Some sample questions include:
- Could you provide some background on your career? Current role?
- What does your team look like? What does your team focus on?
- Why did you decide to join your company?
- What’s the best approach to start a career at the company? Industry?
- How could I best prepare for a role like yours in terms of coursework and work experience?
- What are some things you did not expect in the role?
- What did you feel prepared for? And what are things you learned on the job?
- What motivates you / keeps you motivated?
- What would you do different if you had to start over?
- How do you see your role / industry changing over the next five years or decade?
- What sets this company apart from the competition?
- What are your organizations top goals in the next year?
- What milestones are you working towards? How can someone new to the team contribute to them?
- You should definitely bring up facts you learned through your research about the company to show them you did your homework!
- Questions not to ask: I would suggest staying away from asking questions about work/life balance, remote work, benefits, etc. during this first conversation. You want to put your best foot forward. Every company is focused on generating revenue and you should focus on learning: How do they do it? How can you help advance that mission?
- Step 7 – Follow up.
- After your conversation, send a thank you note to the person you spoke with. This goes a long way!
- A job opportunity may not be immediately available, but having made a valuable connection with an existing employee, you will be top of mind when a need arises.
- Set a reminder to reach out every quarter or so and check in with your new connection. Relationships take work!
- Step 8 – Rinse and Repeat. Set a goal to reach out to a handful of folks every week. Networking is a valuable skill that you will leverage throughout your entire career. The more people on your side, the better!
- Step 1 – Define your goal: Take some time to learn about yourself. The worst thing you can do is rush into an interview or conversation and not make it a valuable experience for you and for the person who’s offering up their time. Take this time to really think about what you want in your next step and develop your personal elevator pitch. Some of the questions that will help you define your goal include:
