Hartford Business Journal

6 Hartford Business Journal • March 9, 2020 • www.HartfordBusiness.com By Matt Pilon mpilon@hartfordbusiness.com O n a recent weekday afternoon in Febru- ary, graduate students from UConn's busi- ness school met with nearly a dozen major employers at the college's downtown Hartford campus, but there was something unusual about this career fair. Alongside the 50 or so University of Connecticut students milling about the conference room in Con- stitution Plaza were an additional 60-plus pupils, invited by UConn, hailing from competing MBA pro- grams at colleges spanning from New York City to Boston, including Connecticut's own Yale University. In the competitive world of MBA programs, where schools are vying for every student at a time when enrollment for advanced business degrees is on the decline, it may seem odd for UConn to invite other schools to its own job fair. The reality, explained Meg Warren, UConn business school's director of engagement and outreach, is that most MBA programs are too small to draw employer interest in face-to-face events with their students. Combin- ing forces with peer schools — even ones viewed as competitors — result- ed in more companies participating in the newly named Northeast MBA Invi- tational, providing value to employers and students alike. Among the companies that showed up were Amazon, Cigna, CVS Health, Travelers, Virtus Invest- ment Partners and Webster Bank. "Maybe they won't hire a UConn MBA the first time around, but maybe they'll come back again next year and hire one," Warren said. "Do I want UConn MBAs to get hired? Of course I do, but the really important thing is to keep talent here [in the Northeast]." Lucy Gilson, associate dean of fac- ulty and outreach at UConn's business school, had a similar outlook about the event, which could move around to dif- ferent host schools in the years ahead. "It is competitive … but I'm confident our students can match up with students from around the country," Gilson said. "If they can't, we have a bigger problem." She said MBA programs collabo- rate more than one might think, hosting case competitions and other events that draw teams of students from other schools. However, while there are large MBA events hosted by national as- sociations in Chicago, San Francisco and elsewhere — as well as more ex- clusive Ivy League events in places like New York City — UConn's collaborative career fair is unusual in Connecticut and New England, according to Mark Gelinas, one of the event's employer participants. As vice president of talent man- agement for Hartford-based invest- ment manager Virtus, and a previous corporate college recruiter for The Hartford and PwC, Gelinas has a solid handle on recruiting events for MBAs and other types of business students. "I think that model is pretty unique around here," Gelinas said. "And from an employer standpoint, I think it's a great idea." It comes down to being as efficient as possible with his time. "For me to not have to go to half-a- dozen schools and to have access to students from multiple schools, from a logistics standpoint, is great," he said. Craving face time A bigger student pool is good for hiring managers, but at the same time, students who traveled to UConn's event said its relatively small size was a major draw. Abhishek Chittur, 27, an MBA student at Baruch College in New York, said he's attended a large business career event in New York City, where there were an estimated 100 employers. "You just kind of feel lost and con- fused by the end," Chittur said of the larger event. "You didn't have time to forge meaningful relationships with people." By contrast, UConn's event was an intimate setting. "I felt [employers] were more willing to share their insights and engage with me on a human level," he said. Supril Shah is an MBA student at UMass Amherst. He, too, has some experience at a larger, more general career fair, and said he much pre- ferred the UConn model. "One recruiter might talk to a few hundred people in a day," at a larger event, Shah, 26, said, "so it's kind of hard to remember them." "This is smaller-scale," he added. "It gets me more exposure to employers." Immigration headwinds UConn's career fair came as MBA programs across the country are currently facing several headwinds. As is typical during good economic times, which the U.S. has been in for nearly a decade, schools have a harder time attracting students, something UConn and other Con- necticut colleges are facing. An immigration crackdown by the Trump administration over the past four years has been another challenge for MBA programs, which rely heavily on international pupils. At UConn, for example, more than 50% of its Competitive & Collegial With MBA invitational, UConn aims to keep talent in the Northeast Enrollment in CT's 5 largest MBA programs 2018-2019 2017-2018 % change UConn School of Business 1,009 987 2.2% Yale School of Management 723 716 1% University of Hartford Barney School of Business 646 378 70.9% Quinnipiac University 336 222 51.4% Post University 329 477 -31% Source: HBJ Book of Lists TsuHan Lei, 34, an MBA student at Baruch College in New York, is one of the dozens of out-of-state students who were drawn to a recent career fair hosted by UConn School of Business at its downtown Hartford campus. HBJ PHOTO | MATT PILON

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