PennLink – Penn & Beyond

Announcing Handshake

I am delighted to announce that beginning in June, Penn Career Services will be moving to the Handshake platform for job and internship listings, workshops, career fairs, on-campus recruiting and employer presentations. This platform is used by 170 schools (including many of our Ivy Plus peers) and 120,000 employers; it offers many features that we believe will enhance the student user experience, including the ability to make appointments with career advisors using the online scheduling system. We are excited to launch Handshake at Penn, as it is intuitive, well-designed and cutting edge in its approach. We will keep PennLink, our Symplicity system, live through June 30, 2017. After June 30 you will no longer be able to retrieve any information on past applications and interviews, nor will you be able to access your documents.

We will be following up by email in late May with information on how to join and use Handshake. Since both platforms will be live during June, you can download resumes or cover letters from PennLink and upload them to Handshake if you wish. If, however, you will be busy in June, or traveling without good internet access, you should download your documents now. They will not be available after June 30.

For now, full-time jobs and internships are still being posted on PennLink. Many employers are advertising interesting opportunities, so please continue to check PennLink regularly. And it goes without saying that our office will be open all summer, and we are here to assist you today and in the coming months. Please let us know if you have any questions.

Best wishes for the end of the semester.

Patricia Rose
Director, Career Services

PennLink has a new and improved look!

Mylène Kerschner, Associate Director

If you’ve logged into PennLink in the past couple of weeks, you’ve noticed things look a bit different. Things are cleaner and more easy to navigate now, but we thought you might appreciate a few general pointers regarding the new layout.

What’s the deal with this “Profile __% Complete” alert at the top of my screen?

Previously, employers could only see the documents you submitted directly to them via your applications. Now you have a profile similar to one you might have on LinkedIn. Click into the top part of the page to go into your profile and to edit it in order to increase your percentage complete. Your profile is still private, but you have the option to create a URL that you can opt to share with employers. Currently (as of Summer 2016), this is something that only you can send to employers. Employers cannot find it on their own.

By clicking “publish,” you will be able to click a link to create and share your URL:

One important thing to note here: while you can add a personal statement, update your education and include projects and experiences, you won’t be able to update your GPA on this page. To update your GPA you will need to click on “My Account” from the left toolbar.

Choose “Academic” to get to your Academic profile. Here you will be able to update your GPA.

PennLink will also make smarter recommendations based on your searches:

And it’s even clearer to tell which jobs are OCR and which aren’t:

You can also see the resume submission or job posting date along the right column.

It’s even easier to conduct and then save an advanced search, and now you can save more than twenty searches (the old version maxed out at 10). You can also create search agents which will send you an email when a new opportunity is posted that matches your criteria. Here’s a quick tutorial:

We think you’ll really like the new easy-to-use format of PennLink. If you have any questions at all about the system, about OCR, or really anything related to your summer or post-graduation plans, stop in to meet with a counselor, or schedule a phone or Skype call if you’re not in Philadelphia: http://www.vpul.upenn.edu/careerservices/appointments

We’re looking forward to having you back on campus soon!

Organizing Your Job Search: Search Agents

Carmen Delehanty, Graduate Assistant

Combing through the overwhelming amount of opportunities posted on PennLink can be exhausting and incredibly time consuming. That’s when Search Agents become your best friend! Gone are the days of endlessly clicking through filters every day. After setting up search agents, any new posting that fits your preferences will go directly to your email inbox. Magic!

First, complete a targeted search by clicking Advanced Search and setting your filters.
To save your preferences, click on Saved Searches and name your search. I recommend splitting up your searches either by industry or geographic location. For example, you can save the search “California Internships,” which will include all the different industries you’re interested in, or maybe save “Journalism Internships,” which will include any geographic location you are open to.
Switch “new results only” to YES so that you get the most updated results sent to you. You can chose to have emails sent to you daily, weekly, biweekly, or monthly.
And repeat! You can save all the way up to 10 different search agents.

This technique, and more information on navigating PennLink, can be found in our tutorial here: http://www.vpul.upenn.edu/careerservices/files/Navigating_PennLink/player.html

Now that you don’t need to constantly log into PennLink, you’ll have so more time to polish those cover letters – Enjoy!

Find your perfect match…on PennLink

Valentine’s Day is less than a month away. Perhaps you have found your perfect match. Maybe you are still looking. We have found the best way to find a perfect match is on the internet. What’s the best platform, you ask? Where do individuals find the most results? Pennlink, of course!

We’re talking about internships, fellowships, and full-time opportunities – what were you thinking?

Some people may have difficulty finding their perfect match, and that’s why we are here to help. Going to Advanced Search and selecting items like geographic preference, job function, and class year can help you find that perfect match.

Need some help? Our career advisers are here to support you during walk-ins and appointments. You can also check out our Navigating PennLink tutorial.

Happy Internship-Hunting Season!

With On-Campus Recruiting (OCR) internship season upon us, it’s important that any student participating be on top of all things OCR – that means understanding the process, making sure your PennLink account is working properly and looking for and taking note of who is coming to campus and when. By embracing some of these best practices, you’ll be in your best frame of mind to alleviate stress and cruise through the semester.

The OCR Process
Our website is a great resource to learn more about OCR and how it works. Be sure to check out our robust FAQ section for answers to nearly all questions you may have about the process. We also highly encourage you to attend one of our two OCR Orientation Sessions, which will be held on January 14, 2015 and January 16, 2015. Specific details about time and location can be found on our calendar of events.

PennLink
Each year, we have students who frantically come into our office halfway through the recruiting season (after many deadlines have already passed) saying they just noticed their PennLink account is “missing” the On-Campus Interview tab. This can happen because of a technical glitch (which is too long and involved to explain in this blog post) but can be easily fixed – if you let us know! So, IF you plan to participate in OCR and before the first string of deadlines hits, take a moment to stop, log into PennLink and make sure you see that tab. Here’s what you should see:

If it’s not there, tell us right away because that means you don’t have access to any of the OCR postings and that’s definitely something you’ll want to fixed.

Also, do you currently sync the PennLink calendar with your Google Calendar? If so, read on!

PennLink updated the system on November 17th. In order to CONTINUE SYNCING with your Google Calendar, you must follow these simple steps:

1) Log in to the student interface of CSM
2) Go to the Student Profile, and within that profile, click on the “Privacy” tab.
3) Go to “Sync Events from the system with your Google Calendar”
4) Click the “Authorize” button, and then “Accept” CSM with Google. That’s it!

If you have any questions about PennLink, please email pennlink@pobox.upenn.edu.

We know this time of year can be stressful for students, especially those hoping to land an internship or job for the summer. Please know Career Services is always here to help. While our appointments can often fill up quite quickly each week, please also know that most teams have DAILY walk-ins that are on a first-come, first-served basis. Specific counselors’ walk-in schedules can be found on our website and are updated daily.