Beginning Thursday morning at 8:00 a.m., you will be able to apply (or “bid”) on Symplicity for employers who are participating in Fall OCI 2012—including the employers who are participating in the Las Vegas Interview Day on September 22. There are employers coming for both 2Ls & 3Ls.
Right now, you can see who is coming and on what date by logging onto Symplicity and searching under the OCI tab. You will only be able to see who will be conducting interviews for your class year.
You will have until Thursday, July 26, at 5:00 p.m. to bid/apply. Do not wait until the last minute to get your bids in—something will invariably go wrong (i.e. your computer will crash). This is a very, very firm deadline. At the same time, please take your time to make sure employer names and addresses are correct before you submit your applications. After the July 26th application deadline, employers will select the students whom they wish to interview. Do not ignore the employers who are simply doing resume collections—these employers specifically want to see applications from our students, and last year several of these employers interviewed our students!
If you apply for OCI jobs, please plan to be at your computer on the morning of Saturday, August 11, at 8 am. Those students who have been “preselected” by employers for interviews will be able to see that they have been preselected at that time, and can (very quickly) pick the most convenient time slot on the day that the employer is coming to campus. When you check, please have your class schedule readily available to minimize potential scheduling conflicts. Should you be so lucky to have multiple interviews, attempt not to miss the same class repeatedly. DO NOT enter your class schedule into Symplicity—if you have done this, undo it now—it will prevent you from taking interview slots that are even close to your class time. (Keep in mind, 99% of slots will be filled by 8:02 a.m. Please keep this in mind as well—if you don’t get interviews, you are in good company, and it wasn’t a waste of time—if you are a 2L, you will apply to the same folks in the future (whether through OCI or directly), and showing your interest is very helpful.
Well before July 26, you should finish researching employers & begin the task of drafting employer-specific cover letters to them. Finalize your resume, prepare any writing samples, transcripts and referenced which employers may require. Make sure you upload those documents into Symplicity & apply to complete the application process. For more detailed instructions, including OCI pitfalls to avoid, click on the following link, or review the information in your PDO Handbook:
Advice for how to select which employers to apply (“bid”) to: Apply to any firm which, if it were your only offer, you would take the job.
We have compiled a spreadsheet of all of the employers who will participate in Fall OCI, which Jaclyn will email to you. The spreadsheet includes the individuals (and their titles) to whom you should address your cover letters, the class years being interviewed by the firm/agency, their interview dates (if they plan to come to campus) and any special hiring criteria they have included in their schedule requests. Please note that a portion of them will be accepting resumes through the “resume collect” option, in which you will bid as you would for employers coming to campus to interview, and at least three have chosen to accept resumes through the “direct send” option. For these employers, please thoroughly review the employer schedule and apply accordingly. Please recognize that this information is subject to change. However, PDO will notify you should changes to the spreadsheet arise.
If you would like your resume/cover letters (or any other documents) reviewed by PDO, please contact either Megan, Anneliese or Jaclyn immediately. Anneliese will be out Thursday and Friday at the Utah Bar Convention.