"Didn't Your Parents Teach You Manners"
John Flato sees too many companies on campus with bad habits
Cracking the campus nut isn't about sophisticated technology or extensive media plans, according to John Flato, University Recruiting guru at Ernst & Young. It's about the things your parents should have taught you growing up: be kind, be disciplined, and show up.
To get a better read on Flato's laws of campus recruiting, hodes.com reached him from his office in New York.
Q. So, manners matter?
A. Yes. The difference between success and failure on campus boils down to the human touch. And the human touch is about the little things.
Q. Like what?
A. Like sending your best people out to campus. People who are smart and energetic and can engage the students. True story. Big company goes out to Ivy League school and winds up interviewing a dozen students. Of the twelve, eleven refuse offers of employment. Why? One member of the interview committee gave the students bad vibes. Turns out he went to a rival school and didn't like them.
Q. Not so smart.
A. No, not so smart. But easily remedied had the campus team thought about the little things.
Q. So it's not just sending your best people, because presumably this guy was an ace of sorts.
A. You're wooing people. It's no different than a date. Would you go out with someone who gave you the creeps?
Q. So, if we following the dating analogy, be nice…and?
A. Show up. You'd be surprised by how many companies forget to visit the campus regularly. They come one year, then drop out for three years, then show up again. And then they're surprised that they don't get any results. You can't use the campus as K-Mart.
Q. The campus as K-Mart?
A. If you go to K-Mart and buy some socks and don't return for two years, nobody cares. You do that on campus and you're dead. Another true story: one major multinational only hired from campus. No experienced hires, just students that they groomed. They had a bad year and pulled back on spending. Campus was dropped for three, maybe four years. I met the new campus team when they started recruiting again. It was terrible. The process was lost, the history. Worse, they had neglected their relationship with the career services teams.
Q. Why is that a problem?
A. Career Services is like the parents in the dating analogy. They know their kids. They know how to reach them, and what doesn't work for them. And they're the gatekeepers. So you need to work with them.
Q. And, presumably, flatter them.
A. [Laughs] Well, that doesn't hurt. But be sincere. I always remind everyone that honesty is the best policy. The administration needs to know what you want so that they can help you--not stop you. And the students want honesty, too.
Q. With the slick marketing going on for recruits, honesty seems a little thin.
A. It shouldn't. The best thing you can do--and this is proven--is clearly describe your job content. What the job entails, good and bad. If you can describe this to students, the ones who aren't interested will drop out you'll have a better applicants. Which, in turn, reduces the drag on your system.
Q. So, were you a good date when you were a student?
A. Let's just say I learned from the school of hard knocks.
John Flato has run award-winning university relations programs for AlliedSignal (now Honeywell), CIGNA, and Cap Gemini Ernst & Young. He began his career in college administration and has worked in admissions, fund raising, continuing education and alumni affairs.
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