Schools give MBA students a boost in their job searches

Many job offers are coming with reduced salaries.
COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) -- Patty Buchek usually works with senior managers in her position with an executive search company. But her recent clients included University of Maryland MBA candidates in need of coaching and some hand-holding as they went off to their first job interviews.
"Get a good night's sleep; have a good breakfast," Buchek told one student anxious about having to make it through three interviews with a pharmaceutical company.
The university's Robert H. Smith School of Business hired Buchek's company, Stanton Chase International, to give its graduates an edge as they compete for positions with top companies. Like other business schools, Smith is resorting to extraordinary measures because of an unrelentingly difficult job market.
Cornell University used four loaned corporate jets to fly recruiters for free this year to its Ithaca, N.Y., campus. Indiana University and Purdue University, traditional intrastate rivals, held a joint job fair in hopes of attracting corporate recruiters who might pass over individual campuses.
"In a market like this, our challenge is to put the product in front of the customer because right now, the customer is not going to come to the product. Whatever spin we can use is critical," said Mel Penn, corporate relations executive at the University of Oklahoma's Price College of Business and president of the MBA Career Services Council, an association of business school counselors.
Current job climate
Counselors say the job market has shriveled since three years ago, when MBAs often left school with multiple offers and seemingly unreal salaries. Many students now find that sectors such as investment banking and high tech have fewer jobs and are highly selective, with much less generous pay packages.
"There are things out there; we are getting interviews," said MBA candidate Brandon Griesell after meeting last week with Buchek and several other Smith students to discuss job hunting. "But people are really slow to pull the trigger."
Statistics suggest the tight market may be driving down salaries offered to MBAs, said Camille Luckenbaugh, employment information manager for the National Association of Colleges and Employers, a nonprofit group that tracks hiring trends for college graduates.
Last year, out of 67 offers to MBA students that NACE surveyed, the average salary was $65,497. This year, the figure fell 12 percent to $57,402 from a sample of 60 offers, Luckenbaugh said.
Sharing tactics
The small group meeting is part of Stanton's approach to job seeking -- getting students together to share tips and experiences and to get advice from the four Stanton staffers working with Smith. The firm also goes to companies, often with r & eacute;sum & eacute;s in hand, to promote students.
The school signed a 120-day contract with Stanton that runs through May. Buchek and two other Stanton employees work full time out of offices on Smith's College Park campus; another in Silicon Valley connects students with tech companies.
About 100 members of this year's MBA class of 220 is taking part at no charge to the students, said Michael E. Agnew, assistant dean of the school. Stanton's fee, which the school did not disclose, is being paid by a private donor.
"For us, it was the right strategy for turbulent times," Agnew said of hiring Stanton.
Advantage for school
The extra steps are not solely taken to help students get jobs, Penn said. The ability of a school to place students in jobs and the average starting salaries are big factors in the competitive business school rankings. Top schools wary of slipping in the rankings work hard to keep their places, while other schools jockey to break into the Top 25.
More important than rankings to Griesell and the other students who met recently with Buchek was getting any kind of job leads they could.
Buchek coached them on how to prepare for a full day of interviews, reminded them to send follow-up notes and talked about the importance of making eye contact during group interviews.
"If companies aren't hiring, they're not hiring," MBA candidate Jay Gelfman said. "But they're [Stanton] doing all they can."