DePaul Computer Science x iManage Workshop
Learning how to navigate the career space as a college student can feel like an uphill battle full of problems you don’t have the answers for, but events like these really open things up and provide those exact answers. DePaul has so many connections with companies in Chicago, and events like these happen year-round for every single major and field of study.
iManage is a company centered around a primary product: a software for businesses, primarily in legal spaces, to organize emails, files, and other communications. They have experienced significant growth in recent years, and have expanded from their Chicago headquarters to offices in multiple cities in the U.S., Europe, and even Australia. They still maintain a strong relationship with Chicago, and have hired many of their employees from DePaul and other Chicago schools. Two of the presenters were actually DePaul students who had transitioned from interns to full-time employees with iManage after graduating. The event was hosted by the DePaul Computer Science Society, so naturally both were computer science majors at DePaul and work in software engineering at iManage. They were also both alumni of the computer science society, and it was very gratifying for us as members of the society to see people who were in our exact situation end up finding success. The third presenter was a recruiter, and she primarily handles early career opportunities at the company.
This event was a career information and preparedness workshop. I really enjoyed the way that the iManage employees chose to set up the event. The recruiter gave the main presentation on a handful of topics, and the two DePaul alumni chimed in occasionally with relevant information or comments. Then, there was an open question and answer session with all three, and I think the biggest takeaways came during that portion. The presentation first focused on iManage specifically and then expanded to careers in general. There was a ton of valuable information on how their company functions and what roles for us as computer science students typically look like. There was also some very useful information regarding resumes, interviews, and how to land an internship and/or full-time job. The event was open to all students so there was a varying degree of experience in the audience. However, they recognized this and managed to give both introductory information for those who knew little as well as more in-depth and specific tips for people who were more experienced.
As I mentioned, the presentation offered a ton of useful information on the entire career process, but the Q&A really provided some great insight, especially from the DePaul alumni. The job market for all fields is in a rough spot right now, and computer science has experienced a huge growth in graduates the past couple years making things even tougher. There are not too many times where you can have open access to ask a recruiter and two recent graduates about the internship and job search process, so this event was very valuable for everyone in attendance. We all have to deal with this search, so the answer given to each question was valuable for every person even if they didn’t have that specific question in mind. Most of us were curious about what the interview process is like for the technical roles we are hoping to get, and what we should know going in. A lot of other questions dealt with things like what is good to include on a resume and how to answer questions in interviews to stand out amongst many candidates. The recruiter is a person who reviews resumes and conducts interviews regularly and the two alumni are both in positions that we are all hoping to be in very soon, so this event provided a perfect time to get our curiosities addressed and learn a ton.
I am going to conclude by reiterating that this event was very valuable to me and everyone else in terms of building career knowledge, but is not a unique occurrence at DePaul. I see these types of events advertised very frequently, and you can find them for practically every major that is offered at the university. Even if you are not at DePaul, connecting with student clubs centered around your major or the field you want to pursue is a great way to build your career skills and learn about opportunities like this that can help you land your first job!
~Jeff