Guidelines for attending hiring partner presentations

Hiring partner presentations, for many learners, will be the first opportunity to meet representatives from companies that are looking to hire them. During this event, you should aim to learn as much as you can about:

• The company being presented, in order to better decide if you would eventually like to work there

• General industry practices, in order to get a better understanding of how the work culture looks like in this field

• Requirements for upcoming data scientists, in order to know what you should be focusing on in your studies

While attending the presentation, you need to keep in mind that you will be already representing both yourself and Turing College, in some cases even potentially increasing or decreasing your chances of being hired by that company. In order for you to feel comfortable during these meetings, we have prepared a set of guidelines about do's & don'ts in these meetings:

Do’s

• Be active and ask questions that interest you both about the company, the presenter’s career and data science in general.

• Dress as if you are going to a real event, even if it’s a zoom meeting (smart casual is always a good choice).

• Do a bit of a research about the company in advance. Check if your initial impression of the company will match what the presenter will say. Try to evaluate if you are good at picking up information about companies from public information.

• When asking a question, start with thanking the speaker for their presentation.

• Feel free to network with the person by sending them a LinkedIn connection invite.

• Turn on your camera during the event.

Don’ts

• Don’t try to ‘pitch’ yourself to the company during these events. The events should not turn into a competition about who makes a better introduction of themselves. Also, the meeting is about the company, not about you.

• Don’t make potentially inappropriate jokes. Even if the presenter is very friendly, do not assume that they will necessarily share the same sense of humour, unless they gave a very clear indication that they are fine with a particular kind of communication. In other words - listen to the tone of the presenter and don’t go ‘above it’.

• Do not ask questions that you feel could make the person uncomfortable. E.g. if you have heard negative rumours about a company or even had a personal negative experience with the company, better bring these subjects up in person later on (and in a polite, humble way) if you will be having an interview with that company.

• Try not to ask questions for which you can easily find an answer online. E.g. “what are the currently open positions and what are their pay ranges?”.

• If you have follow-up questions, don’t ask too many in case there are other people who have raised their hand and are waiting for their turn (one follow-up question is OK though).

• When asking questions, structure them so that they don’t have more than 2 sub-questions. Otherwise it might get difficult to answer all of the points. If you have many questions, better add them as a follow-up question or a different question once somebody else has asked theirs.

• Don’t ask for personal contacts during the event. As mentioned before - you can send a LinkedIn invite instead.

• Don’t apply to the company too early - if you’re still learning and have not received the Turing Endorsement yet, by applying on your own you can overestimate your capabilities and reduce your chances later on. If you are interested and confident that you can apply already, reach out to Turing College staff - we might check your individual case and help you with the application if there’s a reasonable chance that you could get accepted.