MHC job fair offers face-to-face networking opportunity
Online job boards like Indeed.com have become a growing trend among employment seekers providing a convenient place to search and apply for potential opportunities in the area.
However, those same online job boards don’t offer seekers a face-to-face, personal connection, with potential employers to help them find out if they are the right fit for the job.
It’s an opportunity career advisers at Medicine Hat College offer during their annual community job fair, which typically attracts between 700 and 2,000 job seekers and students each year.
“I think it’s very valuable for the students because it gives them that opportunity to go out and actually practise their networking skills and to go out and ask them questions and figure out some other opportunities that maybe they didn’t even know existed before,” said Shelly Drefs, career services assistant with the college.
The job fair attracted more than 50 recruiters from a variety of local companies and organizations who are now hiring permanent, part-time and summer positions as well as offering practicum placements.
Employers were offering a variety of opportunities open in the health-care, manufacturing, retail and environmental sectors throughout southeast Alberta and western Saskatchewan.
“We bring in employers from a different variety of different industries and a lot of them have the direct pathways from our programs into their career,” Drefs said. “So it’s great for them to meet them one on one and learn how to apply and how to stand out from all the other applicants that come in.”
Recruiters from several health-care organizations including CBI Health were on hand looking to speak with nursing students and graduates about health-care aide opportunities.
“It’s been very busy,” Darci Larson with CBI Health said during the event. “We’ve had all walks of life come through with different education and qualifying education as well for us, so that’s great.”
“We are making sure we’re getting the students interested in looking in a field that they might really enjoy,” said Sherry Kuss, Children Family Services.
Hundreds of students who are getting ready to enter the workforce attended the job fair, several with resumes in hand.
Students in attendance told the News the in-person format allows them more opportunities to meet with potential employers and ask questions about the job.
“I feel like this is a good opportunity for us to just kind of, like, chat one on one with them and then if we put in an application with them it’s a little easier for them to recognize it later on,” said Carla Gonzalez.
“It’s better than Indeed and stuff. Because you’re actually like seeing the recruiters,” said Thomas Plunkett.
On the other hand, recruiters say the job fair allowed them to meet with and interview a variety of qualified applicants.
“We’ve heard from most of our employers saying that they’ve had a really good number of good qualified candidates. Lots of resumes that have come in and lots of interviews set up, and they’ve just been really enjoying it,” said Drefs.
The City of Medicine Hat utilized the job fair to hire positions for seasonal, parttime recreation workers.
They conducted several onsite interviews with dozens of applicants during the job fair.