How to Prepare for a Career Fair

It’s career fair season, and we here at Vault know how overwhelming they can be. But they can also be a great opportunity to find a job or an internship—typically, the companies present at your school’s career fairs have a preexisting relationship with your school. The company’s recruiters know that good candidates come from your school, meaning that you have an advantage over other candidates who apply through a general portal. So let’s go over some ways that you can plan for an upcoming career fair in order to make the most of it.

Find Out Who Will Be There.

The first step to career fair success is figuring out what companies are going to be there and which you want to talk to. There are sure to be all kinds of organizations, from local nonprofits to multinational corporations, and more booths than you could ever reasonably visit. Your best bet is to check out the list of companies that will make an appearance at the fair, and decide on which companies you’re most interested in. Start with your top three to five, but pick a few extra as “second string” options in case your first choices don’t work out for whatever reason. That way, you can research the companies that are most interesting to you and walk around the fair like you know where you’re going—because you know what you’re looking for.

Make a Cheat Sheet.

When on the hunt for a job or an internship, you have to do an awful lot of research into all the various companies that you apply for. At a certain point, all the companies can start to blend and blur together. While it’s a major faux pas to bring notes on the company into a job interview, you can absolutely do this at a job fair. In part because you can review them between booth visits to refresh your memory. I wouldn’t do it while standing in front of any of the booths you’ll be visiting, but it won’t be hard to find a spot a little out of the way to go through your Notes app for bullet points. So when you decide which booths you want to visit, take some time to research what each company does, what positions they’re hiring for, some of the company’s most recent news items, and anything else that you want to remember to keep handy during the career fair.

Quadruple-Check Your Resume and Print Copies.

Chances are, you’ve already got a resume ready. If you don’t, then you’re going to need to do that before the career fair. But let’s proceed as if you do have one: you’re going to want to check it one more time. Then you’ll want to print one. And check it again on the paper—maybe this is just me, but I always spot my error the moment that it’s immortalized in print. Be sure it also has your correct contact info on it. Once you’re sure (?) it’s error-free, print out maybe 10 or 15 copies to hand out at the career fair. Employers will want a record of the people they meet, as well as a way to reach out to them with interview offers or further information. (That’s why it needs your contact info, too.) Think of it like a business card.

Prepare for a Possible On-the-Spot Interview.

It’s not a super common practice, but it definitely happens: sometimes, companies will ask strong candidates to interview with their hiring managers right there at the career fairs. Which means you should come to the career fair as if you’ve come to a job interview, because you may actually have. Luckily, if you’ve got your notes and your resume from the tips above, you’re well on your way. All that’s left is to prepare your answers to a few basic interview questions, like:

• “Tell me about yourself.”
• “What are your strengths and weaknesses?”
• “Why do you think you’re a good fit for our company?”
• “Tell me about a time when you solved a difficult problem.”

Try doing some mock interviews with your friends or the folks at your school’s career center. Pick out a professional outfit, take some deep breaths, and lean on your prep work. You’ve got this!