SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA JOB MARKET : REPORTS FORM THE FIELD : Job Fair: When Dreams Collide With Reality
Los Angeles Police Sgt. Joseph Peyton was looking for a few good rookies. So on a San Mateo recruiting drive, he tried to lure new officers with the rewards of police work: the chance to perform a vital public service, the excitement of apprehending criminals.
But Peyton was outgunned by a rival who drew bigger crowds. “The (Drug Enforcement Administration) had this gimmick--a robot-like Ninja warrior moving up and down,” he recalled laughingly. “All we had were four officers.”
Welcome to the job fair, the awkward ritual where prospective employers and employees get acquainted, usually on college campuses. Both sides say the encounter is revealing, if not a downright collision of expectations. Recruiters say many students want more money at the entry level than employers are willing to pay. And students say they sometimes find the demands of would-be employers to be a little, well, unrealistic.
On a recent blustery day at USC, about 3,000 students visited representatives of 135 fields, including high technology, entertainment, financial services, retailing and law enforcement.
Charles M. Hedgepeth, 23, a USC senior majoring in public administration, discovered that the hard realities of the working world were somewhat different from what he’d hoped.
“Nordstrom is entry-level only,” complained Hedgepeth, who spent $700 for his job interview wardrobe. “And May Co.? They want a 3.0 grade average. . . . It’s ridiculous.”
What sort of money should college graduates expect for their first professional job? Depending on the field, holders of bachelor’s degrees generally start out at $20,000 up to the low $30,000s, according to national surveys by the College Placement Council, an association of employers and colleges.
Petroleum and chemical engineers, for instance, start out at an average of $33,000, whereas health care workers typically start at $20,000 to $25,000. (Salaries in high-cost regions, such as Southern California, may be higher.)
Highest starting pay outside technical fields goes to students entering the investment banking field, with offers typically in the mid-$20,000s or higher, the placement council reports.
Not surprising, “financial services have continued to be a pretty big draw (for students) as well as communications, tech-oriented companies and, of course, the more glamorous ones, entertainment,” said Stephen Cheney-Rice, assistant director of USC’s Career Development Center.
Asked for popular career choices among UCLA undergraduates, Joyce Haraughty, a career development employee there, cited advertising, accounting, management, real estate and government.
While some fields are perennially popular, other aspects of the career search are changing. Consider preparation: Increasingly at local universities, preparing for the job hunt is serious business. At UCLA, counselors are available to help students prepare their resumes and fine-tune their job interview techniques, Haraughty said.
Such practice can help, counselors say. During a typical two-hour mock interview at USC’s career development center, counselors pretend they are employers; the episode is videotaped to help improve the student’s performance.
One tape revealed that a “young lady’s leg would accelerate--jumping up and down out of nervousness--whenever she had to answer a question,” Cheney-Rice recalled. “ . . . a mile a minute that leg was going. That’s the kind of thing that can be found by video playback.”
All the preparing, it seems, can create student-experts in workplace issues--even among students who have little firsthand knowledge of the working world.
“They want to know about retirement, pension benefits, opportunities,” said LAPD’s Peyton. “They are going to grill you, and you’d better be prepared.”
Jerry Houser, who directs the USC career center, agrees: “Students say, ‘I’m going to check out a company and if they don’t come through with their promises, I’m going to get out of here.’ That’s a big switch from the early ‘70s.”
Tim Briggs, a recruiter for the Broadway department store chain, noted another aspect of the tough attitude among students he has met lately: They state exactly what they want the company to do for them.
“No long-term commitment,” he said. “Students tell us that they are looking to get a job, get experience and move on to other companies. Students are more up front about their wants, to work and move on.”
Listen to Gunner Chapman, 23, a public administration major and one of the thousands of USC students at the career fair: “Ideally I’d like to start with big companies for training and experience and then go off on my own or a smaller company. Larger companies tend to stifle growth. Atmosphere is very important. I don’t want it too rigid, like engineers, or too loose like sales-oriented jobs.
Are such expectations excessive? Not at all, declared Sally Peinado, 21, a USC communications major.
Peinado said she wants to know about a firm’s training programs, its recruitment policies and, “How do they assess my wants as well as theirs. . . . You have every right asking the company what they can offer you. I’m not afraid. I want to know what they have to offer me.”
STARTING SALARIES
Average salary offers to bachelor’s degree candidates in January, 1990
FINANCE Public accounting: $26,293 Commercial Banking: $18,983 Insurance Underwriting: $21,843 Investment Banking (Corporate Finance): $25,040
COMMUNICATIONS Design/Graphic Arts: $17,630 Public Relations: $19,995 Writing/Editing: $19,275
MARKETING Advertising: $16,750 Product Management: $23,869
ENGINEERING Manufacturing: $31,622 Software Design: $30,734
HEALTH CARE Administration: $19,575 Nursing: $24,114 Occupational Therapy: $25,346
SOCIAL SERVICES Counseling: $15,053
COMPUTER SCIENCE Programming: $26,730 Systems Analysis: $28,505
OTHER Architecture: $18,130 Consulting: $26,161 Paralegal: $19,000 Research (Technical): $24,024 Teaching: $18,627
Source: College Placement Council
