Binayak Mishra '08 was discouraged about job hunting at first. Citigroup denied him a job, noting that they were hiring fewer employees. At a career fair, JP Morgan's recruiters told him they weren't looking to hire.
"It seemed like it was harder this year to get a job," Mishra said. "I feel like at first Brown didn't come across as strong because we tended to not have specific, marketable skills. But we do well on personality, and it seems like everyone did OK in the end."
Don't worry: Mishra will start a job soon with Credit Suisse. But his initial experience is not unique. For this year's job hunters, a slumping economy coping with the subprime mortgage crisis and the ensuing credit crunch is making a stressful journey even more hectic.
Labor economist Rachel Friedberg, senior lecturer in economics, said seniors looking for jobs are most exposed to corporate cutbacks. "When firms cut back, they usually start by limiting new hires instead of laying people off," she said. And while hiring cutbacks may have already begun, it "looks like they're going to get worse" in the future, she added.
In Rhode Island, the unemployment rate has reached 5.7 percent, its highest number in more than a decade. And, according to a survey released yesterday of more than 3,100 recruiters by employment Web site CareerBuilder.com, 58 percent of employers want to hire recent college graduates. That figure stood at 79 percent a year ago .
Emily Polivy '08 said she is in a class of 20 incoming analysts to Oppenheimer Funds, down from 35 last year. Speaking with friends and classmates, she said she has seen more competition for fewer openings in the financial services industry.
Paul Mithun '08 and Rafael Rincon '08, who are both working for consulting firms next year, each said they faced more competition than students had in the past. Consulting and financial services firms have similar applicant pools, they said, so with a decrease in financial sector jobs available, there were more people applying for consulting positions.
On the other end of the hiring process is Bethany Gerstein '07, who works in Google's human resources department. While she would not speak on behalf of the company, she said - based on her own experiences and those of her friends - it was "unquestionably harder to find a job this year."
She also estimated that when she was at Brown, about three-quarters of her friends had jobs by spring break.
Though the Career Development Center could not provide statistics on how many students have accepted jobs, most seniors interviewed by The Herald said they do not know what they are doing next year. Elizabeth Inglese '08 said she is taking a year off before starting graduate school and that she would have found a job if she had thought there were more opportunities available.
But Brown students may be in a better position than many other graduating seniors. If hiring goes down and the job market becomes more competitive, students from Brown and other prestigious schools will fare better than others, Friedberg said.
Brown's many and well-employed alumni are also an asset that other job hunters don't have. "In a tough economy, expect to be working much more closely with alumni," said Barbara Peoples, the CDC's senior associate director.
So far, the CDC has not seen any significant change in employers' recruiting, Peoples said. The CDC had its "strongest recruiting in five years," in terms of the number of firms that came to campus, the number of interviews conducted and student participation rates, she said.
Beverly Erhrich, CDC's associate director, said students she's spoken with who are conducting their own job searches aren't experiencing "anything unusual or different," either.
But it's unclear whether the CDC's recruitment numbers represent last year's economy or the current one. Employers registered for this year's recruitment program last May, Peoples said, so this year's large recruiting effort may not accurately reflect those firms' current hiring.
"We anticipate we may see something next year," Peoples said. "It's going to be interesting how (the economic slump) affects the college market."
Not all students reported problems. Gerstein, of Google, said the technology industry is "pretty booming, especially for engineers."
For non-profit organizations, it's a mixed bag. Nathan Wyeth '08, who served on the board of directors of the Sierra Club, said "baseline funding for a lot of nonprofits drops during a recession" as small donors cut back on contributions to conserve more essential purchases. But nonprofits pursuing political agendas operate based on the political schedule, Wyeth said, so they may actually be "ramping up hires" in preparation for November's presidential election.
Wyeth said clean energy and clean technology firms are doing well. They are driven by government policy and venture capital, Wyeth said, not consumer spending. Nat Manning '08 agreed, saying there is "plenty of work in green consulting," and that "new companies seem to be sprouting up" despite a feeble economy.
So what should jobless seniors do in the face of a lackluster job market?
"Don't change career plans based on this year's economy," Friedberg said. "Continue to look for what you want to be doing in five years. Try to ride it out."
"It's not about you," she said. "It's about the economy."
