Companies increasingly targeting minorities

In the often cruel world of big business, some minority students are finding that getting a job is not so scary after all.

In increasing numbers, many businesses are finding their way to Penn's campus to recruit minority students and help calm their job-hunting fears.

Companies across the board "have seen a big push for diversity recruiting," said Gloria Odogbili, a diversity recruiter for the financial-services firm UBS.

And minority recruitment encompasses much more now than it did just a few years ago. Many companies have created departments devoted entirely to recruiting minority students, and career fairs for minorities abound.

In fact, so many companies are eager to come and speak with students that "we actually don't have enough room on our calendar and had to turn some down," said Stephen Campagna, president of Out for Business, Wharton's club for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students.

With the development of Out for Business' job-outreach program, students are finding that "many firms are very supportive," said Campagna, a Wharton MBA student.

"Until recently, many LGBT students would shy away from the more conservative industries like consulting," Campagna said. "There was this idea that you have to fit a certain mold" in order to succeed in such companies.

But firms' friendly initiatives to reach out to all types of students are helping to dispel those myths, Campagna added.

Like Out for Business, other minority groups are also welcoming corporations to come speak to their members.

The Wharton Latino Club holds a conference every September that over 20 companies attend, Wharton senior Ivan Chavez said.

According to Chavez, who is the club's president, the conference draws "the top banks on Wall Street" and other important companies every year. Recent participants include Morgan Stanley, Johnson & Johnson, L'Oreal, Lehman Brothers, and the Boston Consulting Group.

In addition to holding their own events, Penn's minority groups also collaborate with larger organizations aimed at helping minority students, such as Sponsors for Educational Opportunity.

"SEO is a great training program that gives you a lot of exposure" to opportunities minority students might not otherwise have, said Kary Orlandini, who serves as one of Penn's campus liaisons for the organization.

Last year, SEO helped about 400 minority students find internships. With 31 students participating, Penn contributed the greatest number of students from all the colleges that participated, Orlandini said.

UBS, one of the companies that collaborated with SEO this summer, has about six other programs designed specifically for minority recruitment, according to Odogbili, the UBS recruiter.

"It's important to make sure that minority students have the same opportunities as everyone else," Odogbili said.

She believes that some minority students don't have the same advantages as other students because they "don't come from typical backgrounds, and most don't have parents or friends in the financial-services industry."

In addition, there are cultural differences that might make minority students less likely to "speak their minds and go out of their way to network with people," Odogbili said.

Chavez, who is from Mexico, realized these differences the hard way.

"The first recruiting event that I went to, I cracked jokes and tried to socialize with company representatives. I didn't realize it was supposed to be so formal," Chavez said.

Bringing companies to campus has helped Chavez understand the "politics involved" with finding a job, he said.

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