Job Fairs Take the Cost, Work Out of Hiring

Anne Stalker is burned out. After toiling 11 years in the competitive real estate sales business, the Tustin resident says the desire is gone. She is looking for a new line of work to restore her career flame.

The search brought her to the Embassy Suites Hotel here on Tuesday to an all-day sales and management “job fair.” She was among more than 1,100 people, armed with resumes and references, who came shopping for job opportunities offered by 48 companies.

“I’m looking for brighter horizons,” said Stalker, as she filled out a form.

Whether or not she finds new employment, Stalker said the event--sponsored by The Lendman Group, a professional job-fair organizing company--is a big time saver, providing a broad mix of openings from a wide range of companies. There is no need for newspapers or headhunters.

“It’s a great concept,” Stalker said.

And as unemployment in Orange and Los Angeles counties remains at a low level, more and more companies are turning to job fairs to attract new workers--often hoping to lure the best qualified from their competitors.

Karen Vari, chairperson of the Orange County Employment Managers Assn., estimates that nearly 20 job fairs with multiple corporate participants are held each year in or near Orange County. Close to 100 job fairs are scheduled by individual firms.

Tom Hyland, Cerritos branch manger for Metropolitan Life, which is seeking to double its financial services sales force nationwide, said “bottom-line results are better” at job fairs because people who attend are generally serious about gaining new employment.

Hyland and other interviewers at the Embassy Suites fair said that after an initial screening, they decide which applicants would fit into their companies and invite them back for additional interviews and tests. Some companies, however, don’t like the competition of other firms at a job fair and prefer to hold job open houses at their offices or plants to attract applicants. MAI Basic Four, the Santa Ana computer company, held such an event last week in hopes of hiring some software engineers.

Many of the applicants visiting MAI were already employed. They were looking to upgrade their careers or find new employment in the wake or expectation of plant layoffs and closures.

Larry Ball, Orange County regional manager of the Merchants and Manufacturers Assn., said more and more companies are scheduling job fairs on weekday evenings in order to attract competitors’ employees.

With the high cost of housing and other living expenses, many recruiters often find it easier to attract workers already living in Southern California. This saves on relocation expenses and avoids the difficult process of getting a candidate to move from elsewhere.

Dave Fabian, vice president of human resources for MAI, said although that company also participates in professionally organized job fairs, open houses are preferable because “we can control the time we have it, the way we do it, and the interviewing process and we are not competing with 25 or more other companies.” In addition, he said, “it gives the potential candidate an opportunity to see the work environment.”

MAI carefully prepared for last week’s job fair, which cost $10,000. Company managers rehearsed the swift and efficient processing of applicants. On the day of the event, each of 126 applicants who arrived between 4:30 and 8:30 p.m. was whisked through the process in about an hour. While waiting for interviews, they were treated to a buffet and watched videos about the company and its products.

The efficiency was meant to impress. And it did.

“The way they handle this indicates the way they handle their business and their customers,” said Pat Schilling, a software engineer who had been laid off from her job at another company just two days earlier.

Employment specialists say the job-fair circuit tends to heat up in January, following the recruitment and hiring lull that precedes and accompanies the Christmas and New Year’s season.

Among those gearing up its employment efforts now is Century 21. The company this week is conducting open houses in Orange County and throughout the nation to attract fresh blood to its large real estate sales organization.

“People tend to look for career changes at the beginning of the year,” said Tom Motter, director of marketing for Century 21 of the Pacific at the organization’s Southern California regional office in La Palma.

Century 21 officials said that last year, the nationwide series of job fairs attracted 1,500 participants, of which 20% ultimately got their real estate licenses and joined the Century 21 system as sales people.

Nurses are yet another group being zealously wooed at job fairs that hospitals are hosting with greater frequency.

“I think there is a nursing job fair advertised every week or two in Southern California,” said David Langness, vice president of communications for the Hospital Council of Southern California. One result of the competition, Langness said, is that the salaries of nurses have increased 20% to 30% in the past two years.

Susan Walden, employment specialist for Kaiser Permanente in Orange County, said that last April Kaiser’s medical center in Anaheim Hills held a festive job fair in its parking lot--complete with balloons and a popcorn machine. That fair, she said, resulted in the hiring of 13 registered nurses and 23 other health professionals.

This year, Walden said she is hoping to hold yet another fair for other hard-to-fill positions such as receptionists and clerk typists who know medical terminology.

Fluor Corp. last October held a job fair at its Irvine headquarters for secretaries and accounting clerks. Job seekers were able to fill out employment forms, take typing and dictation tests and interview with supervisors--all in a single evening. Of 125 applicants, 12 were hired. The cost of the fair, including advertising, was $5,000.

While some large and better-known companies such as Fluor, MAI and McDonnell Douglas can easily attract job applicants to an open house, employment specialists say there are advantages to job fairs with many corporate participants. They say that for some companies, especially those which are small and lesser known, the fairs are well worth the entry fee of $2,000 to $5,000.

“The drawing power of a job fair is much greater than what any one company could do on their own,” said Ernest M. Lendman, chairman of the Lendman Group, a consulting firm based in Virginia Beach, Va., which produces 120 job fairs nationally each year, including three in Orange County.