I'm off to Indiana, trailing my spouse who will be on the Indiana University faculty. And yes, we just hired someone last week. She won't be starting officially until the second week in September. Her name is Alysa Polkes. She is new to the school, but not to MBA recruiting. She used to work at the Wharton career center as an assistant director with international internships development. She's been here for a little more than a year now, however. We hired her as a consultant to run and pinch hit on workshops -- we're really very small staffed -- so we've known her through that kind of connection. What's nice is that she already knows the population and the issues before stepping into my position full time.

Just how many people staff Anderson's CMC? Will your departure force your office to change it's structure at all?

We have four professional staff when we're fully staffed. Right now, however, we have a counselor vacancy. We're almost finished with recruiting for that counselor position. But we've been without one for a couple of months now. The professional staff is the director, one person who manages the campus interview program, and two counselors. During times of crisis when we're doing major projects such as the resume book we're working on right now, we try to have everyone help out. With the resume book, for example, we're trying to have one counselor take the lead on it, with everyone else pitching in. We also have four support staff.

So you're saying that there're only eight people servicing 600 full-time MBAs? How does your office manage to be successful?

We're both good and lucky. The philosophy of this place is that the student is not the primary customer, they are our partners. Our customers are the corporations. That's a [model that's a] little different than other B-schools. That means that when we look at our priorities and marketing, everything goes into our appearance to the corporate world. We partner with the students and tell them we'll run ourselves into the ground partnering with you but we won't "do" for you -- we're just not staffed that way. We count on students to manage the process. Bottom line: It's your career, and you need to manage it. We will, of course, help you through that process, but we won't do it for you.

Because we are so leanly staffed, what we do is work with students in many different ways. For example, l have students volunteer for and assume (after an extensive interview process) mentoring slots. We have 16 second-year career coaching positions and 60 second years who vie for those slots. And they do it for no money, but just to help us out.

In BW's 1996 ranking, companies and graduates gave the highest marks to the placement office, with more than 20% of recruiters rating it second to none [Editor's note: UCLA's placement office repeated as top dog in BW's 1998 rankings]. What has your office done to garner such a high satisfaction rating on the corporate side of the fence?

At that time we didn't pay for recruiters' parking, didn't feed them, or have all of the other amenities that other B-schools have. When we got that accolade, we didn't even have phones for our corporate customers to use! We were able to grab that distinction purely through service. When we run the campus interview program, it's not a scheduling function. We help companies strategize, try to help them find students who match their needs. Knowing the student population and what types of things catch their fancy, we try to communicate that back to our companies.

For example, campus interviewing is not for everybody, and if I know that a company is going to get no response on campus, but may be interesting to a smaller group of students, we will help them tap that smaller subset. We'll suggest that the firm not do any campus interviews, but instead pick and choose qualified students by using the resume book, targeting people specifically by doing things like private dinners as opposed to a big recruiting events. The trick, in that context, is to build your visibility slowly and your position becomes attractive. Because of the clamor for students' attention, some companies and opportunities just won't hit the radar screen. We try very hard to understand that. We don't pitch campus interviews to everybody.

You talk about the service the school provides to recruiters as being a major strength. I noticed, however, that Anderson employs no outreach managers -- people who work specifically with companies, usually by industry, to guide them through recruiting logistics, strategize with them on new marketing techniques, etc...

No, we don't do it, and we don't plan to because I don't see our staff growing. The model you're talking about really requires a lot of staffing. At Anderson, two counselors serve the students, while the campus recruiting person serves the companies -- that's a loose delineation. Then the director helps manage both sides. That brings us back to the versatility of my staff. For example, we all have counseling graduate degrees that we'll put to work during those times of crisis -- regardless of our immediate job responsibilities -- to cope with the extra work brought on by, say, the job offer and negotiation period. There's a lot of versatility that is necessary because we don't have the staff. It's a resource decision, and being a public institution impinges on the resources we have available.

We couldn't do it without the student career coaches. They're required to give us two hours of their time a week counseling first-year students. And in different crunch times, they give us sometimes 5 to 10 hours per week. They have advising appointment times along with the full-time counselors, which, with 16 of them available, adds up to a lot of hours.

In addition, we have a first-year committee of about 10 students who help us with different career events by doing things like greeting companies that are here doing presentations, bringing a company's material up to the presentation room, helping recruiters set up their PowerPoint presentations... the labor-intensive stuff. And they're doing all that for no money; it's all volunteer work.

What's your philosophy of the most effective way to place the 660 students enrolled at UCLA? How do Anderson MBAs maximize their chances of grabbing that lucrative job?

We certainly encourage students to do the networking. They should definitely work through the alumni (now 11,300-strong) as much as possible and also through their own classmates. In addition, they need to take a step back and look at their own personal network and all of their work relationships. This career center's philosophy is that we will partner with you until we drop dead. Through workshops and individual sessions, we'll coach you to write the resume, do interview advising, go over cover-letter writing and negotiating techniques... the whole gamut. Workshops are the most efficient way to help the greatest number of students, but we do a lot of on-the-fly advising as well. That's allowed through our open-door policy. And despite the moderate full-time MBA population here, we get to know all of the students. In fact we know them all by name -- that's the kind of environment it is.

How many companies could second years choose from in 1998 -- how many recruiters came to Anderson looking to fill their full-time positions? (Editor's note: 1997 brought 191 companies to Anderson)

We had just around 200, a slight increase from last year.

How about for summer internships? (Editor's note: In 1997, 111 companies visited Anderson hoping to fill their internship positions)

For on-campus interviews, it was about 125.

How were you able to increase your recruiter base?

We rely tremendously on alumni. They have wonderful experiences while they are in school. And once they leave, they bring back to us a lot of great opportunities. Also, our students are our best marketing device. For a company that is unsure about Anderson talent, we encourage them to try our students out through a field study experience or summer internship. Almost always, they will be impressed enough that they will come back for the full-time hires.

Do most students get a summer internship?

If they want one, yes. Only maybe 5% to 10% are doing other things in the summer, like taking classes, traveling, etc.

Do you preach the importance of the summer internship in today's marketplace?

Yes, if students want to make a career transition -- and that's probably 80% to 90% of the class -- the summer internship plays a crucial role. It seems to play a particularly important role in investment banking. What the summer internship does if you are a career transitioner is to give you a name and work experience that is different from where you came from. That can help you out during the second year.

Sometimes the summer internship isn't where you want to end up, but because the gap between your career goal and where you are is so great, you need that stepping stone. For instance, let's say there's someone who used to be an engineer in her pre-MBA life who wants to become an investment banker. There's nothing on her resume that says she can be that I-banker, that proves that she knows the industry and has been tested. Chances are she will not get an I-banking internship. What she has to do is get a finance-related internship, sopping up something like a commercial banking or a boutique investment banking experience... something that both demonstrates her commitment to making her transition to investment banking and also exposes her to the world of finance.

How do you counsel students for the internship?

Through workshops that start during orientation and occur throughout the entire year. Also, the second-year class is instrumental in communicating the importance of the summer internship to the first-year class.

We abide by a general plan and then every year we change the speed at which they're offered depending on the particular anxieties of each class. Each class has a personality. For example, sometimes a class will be fairly laid back and won't need a workshop for weeks. Another class might be want one early and often. So we continually refine when we plan to deliver workshops depending on the class's motivations. As I mentioned, the workshops start during orientation, which begins during the last week of September. At that time, we spend a lot of time talking about the broad scope of career interests that might interest the students. We administer some assessment instruments before orientation and students bring their results to orientation and we talk about them. I cannot stress enough the importance of defining who you are first before doing the career search. You have to know who you are and spend some time figuring that out -- that means honestly assessing your interests, values, and aptitudes.

During the orientation self-assessment session we split the class up into two large groups. If the session doesn't suffice and students want to pursue it more, they can come in for individual counseling sessions. The emphasis is that you have to know yourself before you can even start looking at jobs. Every time you struggle with the career development process, it always goes back to who you are. That piece is very important.

What is the school's philosophy for interview schedules -- are most schedules open or closed?

We let the employer decide. That's part of our relationship with them. It usually breaks out 60% closed and 40% open. We do encourage companies to have an open schedules but don't require them to.

Does that tick students off?

No, not really. I don't think I've ever had a student couch it that way. If there was a complaint concerning a closed-scheduling conflict, my response would be: Let's talk about ways to get you on the schedule. One option would be to talk to the company and simply inform them of your interest: "My name isn't on your interview list, but I'm really interested in your company and have attended all of your presentations. I'd like the opportunity to talk to your recruiters for 5 to 10 minutes." We coach students to approach recruiters either early, before the interviewing starts, or late, after the recruiter has finished his or her interviewing, to grab a couple of minutes of their time and showcase themselves.

You have to do whatever it takes. Because we're on the West Coast, many times our East Coast recruiters have to [stay] overnight because of their flight schedules. We coach students to meet them the night before and take them out for a few cocktails, for example. We coach students to think "out of the box." You have two choices, one is to think of ways to get yourself in front of a recruiter by thinking outside of the box, and the other is to be unhappy and accept not being able to get on a closed schedule. Again, we will strategize ways to do that for the student but will never pick up the phone to tell companies that they've missed a great student. The reason? Because great student X can do that for himself!

Does the school use an online placement system to manage the interview process?

Yes, we use an online interview-scheduling system. We're starting a new one this year called .EDU Link. It's a Web-based product developed by the Darden School (University of Virginia's business school). Until now, students had to come here to my office to sign on to the central CPU through the computers at school. Now they can do it from the comfort of their own home. This is an exciting new product and puts much more responsibility back on the students' plate. Now they have 24/7 access to information. From what I've read -- I've actually never stepped through the process -- the new system will manage all of the interview scheduling, which means it can handle both open bidding (when students bid "points" on interview slots, with the higher bidders securing spots) and invite-only slots, arrange company-event information where students can sign up to attend specific events ahead of time (receptions, corporate presentations, etc.), and also manage the ever important salary survey piece we produce at the end of the year. With respect to the campus interview program, .EDU Link will also maintain an audit trail of what students do throughout their on-campus interviews. So, if a student requested an interview, then changed his mind and wanted to forgo his appointment, it will keep a record of that decision on record.

Is .EDU Link part of Anderson's push to automate what it does?

Yes, and not just on the career services front, but for the entire school. Last year, separate and apart from the Darden system, we put our student resumes up on an open (non-password protected) part of our Web site. Of course, we removed students' addresses and phone numbers.

How many interviews occurred on campus this past year? (Editor's note: In 1997, there were 4,500 on-campus job interviews)

This past year, there was an estimated total of about 7,600 on-campus interviews -- that's combined for first and second years. Just for the second years, we had about 5,000.

What about for those students who decide not to interview on campus? How many MBAs opted for the independent route? Does the entrepreneurship center play a vital role in helping students make their decision independent of your office?

Yes, very much so. We have a very strong entrepreneurship program headed by Professors Osborne and Cockrum. And I'd say that on average maybe 20% of the incoming class is interested in pursuing a startup when they initially get here. But reality does start to set in while they're here. It's still an ultimate goal, but because of the debt load behind earning an MBA and the realization while they're here that they don't know much about running a business, many decide to take the intermediary step of working for a small company that gives them exposure to the financing, marketing, and production behind running a young company. So that initial 20% who were actually committed to starting their own company, bypassing the lucrative opportunities to make the entrepreneurial thing happen, drops to 15%, and then to 10% as the year progresses.

I'd say that easily 50% of the student body goes off-campus to interview throughout the course of their career search. To help those who are going about their job searches independently, we run what are called Success Now groups. They start in January for both first and second years, are comprised of about 10 to 20 people each (there are 5 to 10 groups), and basically serve as support venues for people to share their experiences, specific job-search plans, and get feedback. Students are responsible for running these groups with a counselor in attendance. It's an attempt to put structure into the self-directed students' search. One of the most phenomenal things I've seen happen as a result of these groups is that participants will share their leads. If a student is applying for a job, he or she will share that job lead with his classmates. The Success Now groups have been around for probably 6 to 10 years, and they culminate at graduation with about a 95% placement rate.

Does your office administer more individualized professional counseling for the self-directed students or is that left to the entrepreneurship center?

We share the responsibility. The entrepreneurship center is much more about connecting individual students to individual job opportunities while our office's role is a bit broader. The philosophy around here is: This isn't going to be your last job search, the workplace being what it is today. You're going to do this again and again and again in your work life. Placing you in a job doesn't give you that skill set.

Just how well did students make out on the job front? How many offers did they average for 1998?

We don't keep a tally but rely on students to give us that information. We are in the midst of tallying it, but I would say that it's coming out at (for those looking for a job with a company) about 3.5 offers. If you lump them all together, I would say that the students who never set foot in this office over the course of their two-year stay averaged about two job offers apiece.

Is that average falling because of this increased focus and flexibility MBA's are now being taught?

Actually, it's increasing for those who are actively doing the searching. But one of the strategies companies are employing in this very hot market is to convert their summer-intern pool into career hires as soon as possible. That has a lowering effect on the average number of job offers students receive... If you were a summer intern who had a great internship experience and got an offer, most likely you'll pull yourself out of the active job-search pool once you come back to school.

Are companies throwing more bait out to their summer interns as a way to bring them into their ranks full time?

I'm seeing companies offer higher signing bonuses to their summer interns who agree to be their second-year hires, over those students who are coming out of their second year.

Let's talk about the internship arena in general. Are companies now dangling more impressive incentives to students just to get them into their internship slots?

Oh, there are signing bonus that range anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000 for the summer, and that's on top of a sizable range in salary. I don't remember the bonuses being as sizable as they are today. Other than the signing bonuses everything else has pretty much stayed the same: Assistance with housing, sometimes a car loaner, etc.

Where are Anderson grads being placed by industry?

The big places are consulting and banking -- those account for roughly 60% of the student body. Then 10% go into hi-tech (a combination of hi-tech services and well as production). Then there's another 8% who go into food and consumer products in manufacturing. And then there's a string of small "others," including telecom, entertainment, real estate, utilities, oil and gas, and pharmaceuticals.

In the '96 rating, corporate recruiters put UCLA grads in the top 10 for marketing and operations skills [Editor's note: Recruiters, in BW's 1998 rankings report, put UCLA grads in the top 10 for marketing only]. Is that where most Anderson students are going off to after graduation?

With the growth in consulting, that marketing/operations pool got and is getting smaller. That's because the group who used to go into that when consulting wasn't that hot now go into consulting.

Among the big pluses of going to Anderson are, of course, the warm climate, but also the preponderance of local jobs. Are most MBAs settling in California after graduation or dispersing throughout the world?

It looks like they prefer California. But we hope they go back to the East Coast and places like New York City if we've recruited them from there because we want to grow our East Coast alumni. In fact, it's not unusual for me to have a conversation with an East Coast candidate that goes something like, "I really like this school, but my biggest fear is that I won't be able to go back east after it's all over." Overall, about 70% of the student body stays in California after graduation, and that's roughly a 60-40 split between Los Angeles and San Francisco. What happens is, in their second year, students can apply for residency status so that they get a lower tuition rate. That creates a big conversion right there.

Name the top 10 companies that hired the most Anderson graduates in 1998, along with number of hires [Anderson's Top 10 in 1997 include: AT Kearney (12); Clorox (5); Coopers & Lybrand (5); Deloitte & Touche (5); Andersen Consulting (4); Intel (4); McKinsey & Co. (4); Nestle (4); Pittiglio, Rabin, Todd & McGrath (4)].

The order of our top 10 for 1998 is: Deloitte & Touche (13 full-time hires), Hewlett Packard (10), AT Kearney (6), Intel (6), Merrill Lynch (5), Procter & Gamble (5), Citibank/Citicorp (4), Coopers & Lybrand (4), Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (4), and Goldman Sachs (4)

It appears that there's been some fluctuation in that elite grouping.

That's the nice thing about our school. When I talk about each class having a personality... it runs through everthing. Our office recruits a diversity of students, and because of that there is fluctuation. There are few companies who consistently do well. Because of the way admissions recruits people, the repetition in top recruiters is different because the class is different. That's reflected in the career choices students make when they leave.

In 1997, Anderson grads grabbed an average base salary of $75,300. What do the average salary and total compensation that grads are taking home look like for 1998?

This year our official guaranteed base salary figure will be around $78,000. The signing bonuses are going to come in at an average of $18,700. We keep those two figures very separate from what we do. So total compensation will be around $96,700. But we really have a problem accurately reporting the total compensation figure. Stock options, for example, are huge this year, but we don't know how to put the cash value on them. And in the interest of accuracy, we do not estimate their value and don't include them in the placement report. Total compensation includes only base salary and signing bonus (Editor's note: Anderson does not include year-end bonus, relocation costs, stock options, or tuition reimbursement in its total compensation figure).

Amy, we were talking earlier about some of the things recruiters are doing to up their chances of bagging a summer intern. What types of novel incentives are firms using to lure MBAs into a full-time job?

Hmmm. I heard of one firm that is paying the spouse of a consultant a small amount of money for every night that the consultant is away from home. That's unusual. I've also heard of several companies paying the closing costs on a house, if you buy the house within a certain time period. Of course, stock options are huge, and more and more firms are using them. They're increasingly becoming parts of everyone's packet. In earlier years, before the market was so hot, stock options were something you could look forward to after working for, say, five years. Now they're part of the starting package.

Do you feel that because of Anderson's location -- a couple of hours' drive south of Silicon Valley -- that there is a greater amount of students receiving stock options?

The hi-tech industry tends to give the stock options, yes, and because a lot of our students choose that for a career, they do tend to receive them. Small, startup manufacturing firms are apt to give stock options as well, however. And, like I said, they're being used by more and more companies across the board. I even recall a sports marketing firm in Los Angeles that was a small startup and couldn't pay a starting MBA wage. Instead, it gave stock options as the incentive to get one of our students to sign on.

How do you explain the rush of perks that MBAs are now pocketing? Is it partially the result of your office placing more emphasis on certain types of workshops or counseling that help students negotiate these incredibly rich packages?

It seems to be a function of the marketplace. Every year companies try to find new ways to attract students. At some point, you top out on a salary. But every year, I'm surprised by how much more [employers] can find to add to the salary. For example, per diem for the spouse has become one of the little hooks. Companies have a whole internal compression issue, so structurally they just cannot have an entry level MBA earning more than their last year's hires, and that's where I think they start going to the more creative incentive packages that are a one time offering and don't show up internally. But it's definitely driven by the marketplace.

We don't run separate workshops on how to get the most out of a negotiation. We run basic negotiations workshops which stress looking at what's important to you in the work environment and who your managers or mentors are. It focuses much more on making sure that the job is a fit with your personality, and that the work and projects you might be getting are stimulating. The negotiation workshops focus on what your talents are in the marketplace.

When do the workshops occur?

We offer them during the fall and winter quarters for both first and second years if they want. And the negotiation workshops focus totally on offer negotiation. Interviewing is offered in separate workshops.

Let's talk a little bit about these high pay packages MBAs are garnering. Are the only people that get six-figure checks the ones that worked previously as, say, analysts in Wall Street and come from Ivy-League colleges? Or can it work for other people as well?

I think it can work for other people as well. Work experience is definitely important. I don't know if quantity of years is as important as the quality of years. I don't think you can get that quality in a two-year window. I think four to five years of previous work history is a good timeframe for a real go-getter to get very significant, quality work experience. Work experience has to show leadership. You can't go in as an accountant and five years later come out as an accountant. Those five years should show progression.

So the students who graduate with six-figure salaries are those who worked on real meaty projects in their pre-MBA life, and who made some significant contributions to their companies... anything that demonstrates that they left their company in a better place than when they started, regardless of what industry that they're in. From a company's point of view, these days if you have technical pre-MBA experience, and you managed or led projects, that seems to play well into the process.

In which industries do those higher pay packages predominate?

Probably consulting and investment banking. Last year, our grads who went into industries that make a product (manufacturers) earned an average salary of about $72,000. That's a little less than our overall guaranteed salary average. And then their signing bonuses averaged about $10,000, as compared to the $18,000 overall average. That's one reason a lot of our students tend to go into nonmanufacturing industries like telecommunications, hi-tech services, multimedia, entertainment, consulting, and investment banking.

How many companies do you visit annually to showcase Anderson students?

Actually we don't do on-site visits at all because we are short-staffed. Because we have four staff, we can't afford to have anyone missing from the campus. Every couple of years, though, we'll do a regional visit where we go, for instance, to the Midwest and visit companies in the area. But we don't do that regularly. It's a very large expense for us being out on the West Coast.

Two years ago we started something called an MBA Recruiters Forum where we bring in 60 to 70 high-profile companies (like McKinsey, Anderson Consulting, Goldman Sachs, etc.) -- not necessarily just the ones that recruit us. They pay their own way to listen to our office talk about MBA recruiting trends. We do it in April, at the end of the recruiting year, and it becomes a nice, sharing time for people to talk about trends that they saw and where they see this whole animal going.

The MBA Recruiters Forum is not a direct pitch to companies to take a look at our students, but it does expose them to Anderson. While they're here, they get to see the facilities, get to know our staff, and this gives us good exposure to companies that don't normally recruit here. While that's not our primary aim, we have converted companies that way. While they're here, companies also get to meet other peers in industry and that's a value-added piece for them. The event has been wonderfully successful. We also invite Kellogg, Wharton, and Duke to attend because of our good relationships.

Are there any companies that you are targeting, or that you are passing on to your successor to hone in on and bring to Anderson to recruit students?

We're really targeting the small, hi-tech startups. Venture capital is something our students are getting interested in, but they're very hard to net. A different office in our school runs a Ventures Fellows program where they select a set number of students to work with VC firms over the summer. That's one way for us to expose our students.

Which companies have recently stopped recruiting on campus?

We've lost Kraft. They liked our students and our students liked them, but students just weren't really interested in moving to Chicago (Glenview). We also lost Gallo Winery. That turnover happens just in the campus interview program, however. What that means is that these companies aren't going to fly out here. But if our students want to seek them out, they'll definitely interview them. The companies won't turn the students away. In this case, the effort is just going the other way... the ball is in the students' court.

In many cases, B-schools are able to develop a rapport with companies through their alumni. The Anderson School, founded in 1939 and now with a 13,750-person alumni network, must benefit heavily in that department. Does the school have a close recruiting relationship with its alumni? How much of a part do alumni play in developing recruitment?

I think they play a huge part. We don't have the personnel to do cold-call visits to the companies, so we rely tremendously on the alumni to bring us opportunities. If a student gets hired by a company through a self-directed search, joining the company through his own efforts, often the company will be impressed enough with the quality of the student that they'll contact an alum who will put them in touch with us. I think at least 50% of the class actually get jobs through their self-directed efforts.

Do you feel that the biggest role that alumni play is in influencing their higher-ups to recruit at UCLA?

That's one of them. The other equally important role that they serve is as sources of information to our students. It's part of our coaching strategy in terms of how to get jobs. As part of their career-search process, we tell students to call alumni to learn about the different jobs and industries out there. And that's where our alumni are very important to the recruitment process. This is all captured through an online database of alumni which is sorted by what they do and what industry they work in. Students can sort through the database and find alums to talk to who are working in the fields that they're interested in pursuing for a career. For example, to find out about I-banking, you can sort by geography in New York and you come up with a list with contact info.

Are alumni involved in any on-campus activities?

Often times companies will send their employees who are alums of the school back to Anderson to do presentations and interviews. In addition, the students organize something called an MBA Interchange which happens throughout the year. Essentially students bring in alumni from all different industries for about three nights to share information about their jobs, their companies, their industries, the choices they went through, and why they chose their industry. The interchange is not done in a formal presentation environment; it's more of a huge cocktail hour. Of course, faculty will also bring alums into the classroom to augment learning.

What if any services do you provide for alums?

Career services wise, our information is on the Web. That's how we serve them vs. them coming into the career center. We have job listings up on the Web where they can access the alumni database themselves and network. We don't provide counseling -- that is the one area that we come up short. But we don't charge anything for services because it's all on the Web and alumni have a lifelong E-mail account with us.

How do you define whether a given academic year has been a successful on the placement front?

That's a hard one for me to answer. Philosophically, I think we're successful. On a deep level, it's not a numbers thing. Students give up a lot of income, stepping out of their work life for two years. To help and coach them through the placement process to get them what they really want requires wearing a lot of different hats. I think our job is to help students keep focusing and refocusing on what they are here to do. And I think we're successful in doing that. It's just hard to quantify that. We're successful if we've helped students reach their goal regardless of whether that makes it into the placement report. Placement reports seem to be driven by placement numbers at graduation, and part of the world evaluates you on those numbers. But you don't want the career center to start making that a priority. The goal is get students the jobs that they really want.

How big a role do students play in the recruitment process? You mentioned earlier how their participation helps your office cope with its small size...

They are the key to our success. Our students do many of the things that at other schools the career-service offices do. Our career nights, for example, are all organized by the students. There are seven of them throughout the year, and each focuses on different industries (I-banking, entertainment, consulting, marketing, hi-tech/operations, real estate, small business, corporate finance, and international business). The students are entirely responsible for bringing 40 to 50 companies for each of these nights and organizing each one from start to finish.

The student clubs also play a tremendous role. In addition, second-year students often set up mock interviewing sessions for first years on top of our workshops, and one-on-one counseling. Our career center also has 16 second-year students who volunteer to be career coaches. So student participation is very extensive.

About 27% of the Anderson student body is female. Is it harder for that class contingent to grab jobs? Or is the MBA degree the great equalizer in pay packages among the genders?

Not noticeably so, but that has less to do with negotiating abilities by gender. I think it's more the companies wanting to offer standard packages. Investment banking, for instance, is generally known to offer nonnegotiable compensation packages. It has nothing to do with a woman's ability to negotiate, it's just the companies setting the standard. Consulting companies are moving toward that too; they want people to come in at a street salary. Overall though, there doesn't appear to be gaps in compensation by gender.

What, if any, special services does your school provide for female students -- be they salary negotiation techniques, offer assessment, etc.?

My office does not provide any gender-specific programming, and that has not been suggested by students. Students do have a Women in Business club that does a lot of events for its membership. They, for example, bring in alumni for breakfasts to talk about gender issues and coach. That's another example of the students' involvement.

Roughly 23% of Anderson's students are international -- that's about 165 students. Do they face more challenges doing the job search than their U.S. counterparts?

Not if they want to go back home to work. But many foreign nationals want to stay here. Certainly the work authorization is an issue, but I think companies are able to make a case for unique sets of skills if the international student brings to the table specific skills that the company is looking for. We do spend a lot of time coaching the international students about the way business is done in the U.S., talking about things like networking. We don't run anything separately for international students though.

There is an international business student club which does do programming. We spend our efforts on more of the broader picture: This is how you should do this, contact alumni, go to these events, try not to stand in the back of the room, try to get up to meet people. We spend time coaching both our domestic and foreign students on schmoozing and how to be assertive. That's different from saying here's a list of every U.S. company that will hire a foreign national -- we're helping them build a skill set.

Anderson also has quite a sizable part-time population -- approximately 550 students. How does your office help part-time students with their job search? Is you part-time placement agenda done separately from your full-time one?

We counsel with them and do workshops for them on the evening and weekends. But it's not done separately from our full-time agenda. Because most of our part-time students also work part of the time, we provide workshops on Saturdays because that's the easiest time for them. If a full-timer wants to attend them, he's more than welcome. Part-timers also share classes with the full-time students.

Amy, let's finish up on a lighthearted note. I expect that you've been working in the placement arena long enough to have experienced some bizarre moments. What's the wackiest gimmick you've ever seen a student use to try and net a job offer?

Well, I had a student several years ago who got a rejection letter form a very high-profile consulting firm -- one of the top three. He couldn't imagine that he could be rejected, and because the reject letter had some typographical errors in it, he thought it was a test. So he went through and the edited letter, and sent it back to the partner who wrote it. Let's just say that it wasn't a test.

We had a little conversation with him afterwards about bouncing ideas with my office first before doing something like that. We coached him that any time something seems like it's out of the normal placement process, he should to touch base with us, asking us what we think. The firm was not impressed by the letter, and it certainly didn't sway their decision. It probably confirmed it.

Thanks, Amy, for filling me in on Anderson's placement process.