There's More to Recruitment Than Free Water Bottles
As you can see above, recruitment provides a ton of opportunities for free swag at every event and tabling session. (Sorry PwC, I already misplaced your water bottle :/) Obviously recruitment is about more than the water bottles and notebooks, so I'm here to give you some tips for the job hunt as a MAcc student.
Prepare, prepare, prepare.
Recruitment for full time jobs happens right away when classes start in August. It can be pretty stressful to hit the ground running like that, so it's a good idea to know what you're getting into before coming to campus. The Fisher Office of Career Management will hook you up with resume and interview tips over the summer that help a lot. One of the first things a recruiter for a public accounting firm will ask you are your preferred service line (audit, tax, or advisory) and your preferred location. Having ideas about those concepts going in will make your process easier.
Go to EVERYTHING.
There are events all the time, especially early on in the semester. Especially if you aren't 100% sure on the size of firm or service line you want to be in, go to every recruiting event you can find and talk to everyone. This can be a good exploratory stage to learn more about future career options, especially for students like me who didn't get as much exposure to public accounting in undergrad. Be sure to get business cards and use them to send thank you's and follow-up questions.
Don't get frustrated.
For the first few weeks of classes, it felt like I had a networking event practically every night to juggle with my group projects, individual assignments, and settling in to Columbus in general. A lot of my classmates felt the same way, commiserating about our busy schedules. Now that the recruitment season is mostly over, we can all look back and be glad about the work we put in as we have offers to choose from. If you ever feel overwhelmed, just take a breath and remember that if you're a Fisher MAcc student, you are a smart and capable person. It will all work out!