My views on job fairs

Job fairs are mostly organized by recruitment consultancies were many people don't do a genuine job. A great amount of money and publicity is involved in the business. The advertisements of the job fair usually lists many companies that may really won't turn up during the recruitment event. But for mere publicity companies leave them unnoticed. Job fairs collect registration fees from the candidates. Easily if a job fair is organized, candidates turn up in bulk. So even a small amount collected will fetch them a great money in total.

Apart from such issues, a few firms do fair job fairs. For candidates, they should analyze the job fair event when published if they are going to attend the interview. The companies that are featured should be checked thoroughly whether its fake or not. Before paying amount in any point of time candidates should question about the interview process for the various listed companies and whether jobs are offered in the event itself or not. Candidates should also clarify about the companies that are actually present at the day of event. If the queries are not given satisfied answers then it is better not attend the job fair.

Since my work is in recruitment field and my company's testing solution for screening the candidates in job fairs made my presence in job fairs. I am able to see the game played by the consultants in those job fairs. Before going to those job fairs i too thought that recruiting people were doing a great job there. But it didn't satisfy my expectations that i had on those job fairs as thinking in the perspective of candidates in many ways. I like to share the experience in two of the job fairs that took place in and around of Bangalore.


The consultant firm requested our company for scoring purpose some one week before the  job fair and booked their slot for continuous two days. The job fair was advertised by big brands and the company listing crossed over 100. But it was all small to mid sized companies. In a business thinking it was also a big advertisement for our start up to accompany the recruitment process. The event took place in vast ground and not in any college premises. On the day of event we were surprised to see only few companies came and the organizers of the event hided the information from the candidates.

They collected the money and allowed to see the companies. This was one of the mistake done by them. However the crowd didn't mind about the money and eagerly waiting for the interview process. Then they were conducting screening exams and asked candidates to attend the interviews for the companies present and for the absent ones they told they will send the resume and screened scores. This was funny. Candidates are unaware of the tricks played by the consultants.  On the end of the first day many candidates realized that they are getting cheated and got the funds back.

The biggest mistake of the job fair was it took place on the next day also. The greediness of the consulting firm made them to fall in trap. There was only two to four small companies participated. The candidates grew more fierce and started querying about the condition. The consultants couldn't answer and finally steps were taken under the grounds of law. The job fair was a total damage. As our company handled only the scoring of answer sheets our name didn't get damage. In this case many candidates realized that they are being cheated.

The next job fair was a little brainy attempt that because it took place in a college and the companies that are said to participate had both IT's and BPO's. But on the day of event many IT companies that are advertised that they will come didn't participate. They managed with the BPO's and with some non IT companies. The companies list that the job fair forecasted was also funny. It had our companies client names and the company people were not even aware of the consultancy and the event. The crowd as usual had tough time in participating the event.

We are about to do only the automated scoring part but the consultant firm tried to portray ourselves as recruiting company. It was a horrible experience that we escaped from the situation. Great money came in hands of the consultant firms and the pathetic candidates left the place with frustration and dissatisfaction. Actually our company had an idea of organizing such a job fair but thinking of the present hurdles and past experience halted the thinking of doing such stuffs.

So as an advice to the candidates who wish to participate in job fairs, they should be more cautious before and after the participation. Before going to the job fair candidates should collect data's of the organizers, company attending. After attending the interview if they get selected to any company and if they claim for money to join then think twice before paying the money.