CodePath EES2024 BLOOMBERG - How to Net-WORK It

Hello. Hello everybody. I’m Anthony Davis.

I’m the senior manager of employer development and engagement with COPAD and we have an amazing session for you today. Welcome welcome to the networking session hosted by Bloomberg. We are extremely excited to have you all join us today.

I’m going to introduce our speaker briefly but before that I wanted to just share a few reminders. Okay. Let’s try to please please please keep the the chat about the actual discussion at hand.

Okay, we know you all are extremely excited, but we want to make sure the chat stays about the discussion at hand. Okay. So I’ll be monitoring the chat.

If you have any questions, comments, concerns, and things like that, I’ll be monitoring the chat. We will have a Q&A session at the very very end. And we’ll also have a brief survey that we’ll love for you all to fill out toward the end of the actual session.

So, enough with those reminders. I do want to introduce our host today. We have Mr. Justin Hamlet.

He is a technical recruiter at Bloomberg. He has been there for about six years. During his tenure, he has concluded many internship evaluation conversation and has gone out and have given out, excuse me, numerous return offers to both internships and full-time roles.

So, let’s give a round of applause for Justin Hamlet in the chat, guys. Thanks Anthony for that introduction. Hi everyone.

Hope you all are doing well. Again my name is Justin Hamlet and I work on the engineering recruitment team at Bloomberg. In my role as a recruiter I would say that I’m constantly in a state of networking whether it’s at a career fair in the office.

I think it’s pretty important to my job. So, I’m excited to talk to you all today and share with you a couple of like tips and tools that you can use as you go into this career fair. Well, conference.

So, if you could just bring up my slides. Perfect. So, before I get into the networking piece, I do want to take a moment to talk a little bit about Bloomberg.

And I’ll tie it into how it all connects to networking. So, Bloomberg, we are a global financial and technology company. And at our core, what we do is we provide information on the technical side.

We have over 9,000 engineers, developers, and data scientists. And they’re really working on some of the world’s most complex real world problems. When Mike Bloomberg founded the company in 1981 it really started with an initial idea and that was to bring transparency and fairness to the financial markets.

Since then Bloomberg has grown into this massive platform and we provide transparency to the financial markets and we give access to information for our clients. Now how does this connect to networking? The company as a whole didn’t start off the way it is.

It really started with an idea. And as I mentioned, Mike’s idea was to bring transparency and fairness to the markets. How did he get that idea?

When I first started at Bloomberg, I heard this story about how Mike Bloomberg used to buy large amounts of coffee and then he would visit a bunch of financial firms. While he was there, he would hand out coffee to people on the floor. And with that time, he would network.

He would use that time to really just ask the the traders and the analysts questions about their job, questions about the workflow and questions about their needs. And really through those conversations is where the idea for Bloomberg and the the Bloomberg terminal came from. So, as you can see, networking is not only useful to, you know, help you land opportunities, but it’s really helpful to you creating ideas.

It’s a really important part of Bloomberg’s culture here. We say networking is key to success. Because it can really help us be innovative and help us grow as an organization as well as an individual.

So since then Bloomberg has grown massively. Our core product the Bloomberg terminal what that does is it provides real-time financial data to our clients so that they can make financial decisions. And as you can see our clients have grown tremendously.

We have over 350,000 clients globally and they range from investment bankers, hedge funds, wealth management firms, and really anyone who’s in finance has interacted with the terminal in some way, shape or form. And that all started from the initial idea that Mike got from networking. So for today’s session, we are going to dive into everything that is networking.

We’ll talk about the textbook definition. We’ll talk about why people do it. We’ll talk about the benefits of networking and then we’ll talk a little bit about where you can network.

I’m going to start by reading the textbook definition here. So networking is connecting with people to form relationships in the same industry or one of interests. Sometimes networking can simply be a a time or or to sometimes networking can simply be a time to get out and meet others with no ulterior motive.

So why do we do it? Networking can often be mutually beneficial. And these exchanges and experiences can eventually lead to professional growth.

There are more people you know in your field and then there’s more opportunities as a result of the people that you know. So you may be connected to them in work, and you may be connected to them outside of work in your social setting. The people that you meet can really offer you career advice, insight into roles or industries, and often have connections to other employers or employees at at the company that you might be looking to work.

So, let’s dive a little bit into some of the benefits of networking. The first one that we have here is job search. So if you have a connection with someone in the company or in an industry that you’re looking to join.

Having someone in your network that’s one step already in the door. So I think it’s really important that you consider this as you are on a job search who is in your network. The next is learning opportunities.

Networking can be a place where you can exchange knowledge with other professionals. And it’s really like an integral part of networking. Like I mentioned in my story before, Mike used his network to really learn about the needs of the clients that he was hoping to build a product for.

So through learning opportunities, you can get firsthand experience and then you can apply that knowledge and also this could be a really good opportunity for you to share your knowledge as well. Next we have career development. And networking with senior people, I would say, within an organization can be really, really important, especially if you want to pursue higher position roles within a company.

You can use this opportunity to get advice and for you to find out about other opportunities within an organization and gain further experience and potentially even land a promotion. Lastly, we have mentorship. Mentors can really help you navigate the career field of your choice.

And often they are really helpful in assisting you to make other professional decisions or make other connections and build your network. So it’s a really, as you can see from these different benefits here, networking is really, really important, especially as you begin your professional career. If you’re looking for ways to network, there are many different arenas that you can go to, start and I would say you can start directly at your school.

Another starting point would say I would say is maybe thinking about the national organizations that are within your school that you should consider joining. You should check with the leadership teams of those national organizations and see if there are even regional chapters. If they do, you should join those as well.

And if they don’t, maybe you should consider starting a regional chapter. I think this is a great way to take initiative and start to build your own community right there on your campus. Another thing that you could do is leverage LinkedIn.

LinkedIn is a platform where you can find people or local groups whose interests align with yours. And once you find those individuals or groups, you can follow them, keep an eye on potential like events that they might be going to. And you can go to those events as well and continue to build and learn from the people that are at these events and ultimately build your network.

And I would say finally, don’t forget to keep an eye out for potential conferences that are out there, similar to right here at CodePath. I think this is a great way for you to get in touch with other peers, but also professionals in the field that you’re looking to join. And then lastly, what we have here is professors, classmates, and your families and friends.

I would say on the families and friends end, this is your personal network. You can use them to kind of really just like share what you’re looking for and get advice. And with professors, they can be really helpful in navigating your career, especially early on.

So, this is just a little bit about networking. So, sometimes folks may not know where to start when it comes to networking or how to think things through in their their plan with colleagues and peers. So we’ve created an acronym for you to remember to highlight a route to networking and that is search.

What does search stand for? So search stands for setting a goal, having an exit strategy, asking questions, recording who you talk to, connect, and then help others. And then in the coming slides, I’ll talk a little bit about what each of these mean a little bit more in depth.

So let’s start with setting a goal. A goal can start really small or maybe it could be like just one little idea that you have. That is completely okay.

I always recommend start small because then you can build from there as you go through your conversations with people and really grow what your goals could be. So starting small could be mean I want to talk to maybe one or two new people or I want to learn about this company. I want to learn about Bloomberg for example.

I think starting there really helps you get comfortable with the idea of networking. And once you accomplish that goal, you can continue to grow and expand and build upon that. In your goal, you want to really understand what is your why.

Why do you want to network? Why do you want to meet new people? Think about the the benefits that I have mentioned before.

This is going to be really helpful with keeping you motivated as you go through say a conference or career fair which can sometimes be tiring. So knowing your why really helps you stay motivated towards achieving your goal of building your network. And I don’t know about you but for me sometimes I get a little bit nervous or I get a little bit shy.

Especially when I was in college I was kind of like afraid to go to my first career fair. What really helped me was bringing someone with me. Maybe it’s a classmate.

That way you can plan and strategize together and keep each other motivated as you begin that networking journey. So always step one, make sure that you set a goal. Make sure you start small, understand your why, and then bring someone with you to share in the joy.

E stands for exit strategy. I think this one can sometimes be a little bit controversial, but I know for me when I get a little bit nervous, especially going into a conversation and it drags on for a little bit of time, I’m always wondering how can I leave this conversation without, you know, sounding rude or leaving a little bit too abruptly. I think there are definitely different ways that you can navigate that.

I think the biggest thing is one being mindful of the time being mindful of the employer’s time, but also the other people that are waiting to have a conversation with that employer. So you can always start by saying, "Oh, I want to be mindful of your time. I’d love to connect with you later." and then let them have conversations with other people.

Or if you’re bringing someone else with you, you can use that as an opportunity to introduce them to someone else that’s in your network. Or maybe you have class or a meeting and you have to get to it. I would say having some sort of exit strategy just makes it really efficient for you to get through say a conference experience and be able to to move on and continue to talk to other people and build your network.

Next you want to do the next thing that you want to do is ask questions. I highly encourage that you think of questions ahead of time. That way you’re kind of not stuck there in front of someone thinking like hm you know you want to be able to have things in the back of your head that you can pull from that are going to be really really important to helping you understand like maybe how you can potentially join a company.

So having questions prepared really just makes the conversation flow a lot easier. And when you have those questions prepared, the next thing that you want to do is make sure that you are altering those questions to the company or the position that you want to apply to. That way it seems a little bit more genuine and more connected to the company.

I think this really goes a long way when you’re trying to leave an impression on the employer. Many times when I’m at career fairs, when someone comes with questions not only about what I do, but also about like the company at large, maybe they did some research beforehand, that really stays in my head. That means that you’re really motivated and you’re really driven to get an opportunity within the organization that I work.

So, make sure that you are altering those questions and keeping it in line with the companies that you are applying to. Questions can also be a great way for you to get to to know someone. Maybe this is in more of like a social setting once you’re in a company and you’re having like coffee for example.

Use this as an opportunity not only to see what you can benefit from the conversation, but also use that as an opportunity to to get to know the person. You might find out that you are connected in more ways than one and it can help really build the relationship that you have with the other person. And that ties into my my next part.

Don’t focus solely on yourself. You want to use this as a time to think about maybe how could you potentially help them? What benefit can you bring to the organization or what benefit can you bring to the other person?

So that like we said in the beginning, networking can be a mutually beneficial relationship. Okay. So now we have asking questions.

I talked about this briefly. It’s important to have questions when you’re going into a conversation. There are really two types of conversations that you can have.

The first one is informal. This is your get to know you type of conversations. So asking them a little bit more personal questions about maybe where they grew up, what are some of their hobbies, maybe what movies are they watching currently.

If you’re in student organizations, you can ask them about maybe what they’re studying in school. How did they get involved in the group? This is a really good way for you to like introduce yourself without necessarily diving into the the nitty-gritty.

Really starting off soft and getting to build that camaraderie or relationship with the other person. On the other side is the more formal conversations. And this is probably you’ll use this a lot more when you go into career fairs, into interviews, conferences, maybe even just meetings to gather information or just networking opportunities.

So you can ask them about the the company, maybe what team they’re on. Are asking them a little bit about how they what their experience has been at that company. Do they like it there?

Do they not like it there? What are the things that maybe could be improved about the company? Especially in a career fair or an interviewing setting, this is an opportunity for you to gather information about the company so you can make an informed decision yourself to see if that’s even something that you want to pursue.

Other questions that you could potentially ask the company is learning about like internal mobility or career growth at that company. This can really help you see if you want to be at that company for a long time or can even build a career at that company. Once you have gotten a little bit of information and built some camaraderie, you can ask them about what is the referral process like at that company.

Will it help you land a potential interview? I think this is good information to have just so you you know like after what are the next steps that you can take in order to potentially land a role at that company. In these formal conversations, I think it’s really important as well to learn about the interview process of the company.

Because it’s going to help you plan out what it’s going to be like for you to interview and you can prepare ahead of time right off the bat from that conversation. It’s important to note that it doesn’t have to be very rigid. Either you’re having an informal conversation or a formal conversations.

Honestly, oftent times more than not, especially in these settings, it’s going to be a blend of the two. I would say the best type of networking conversations have often felt a little bit natural and easy and it really blends into to the the two experiences. So, it’s going to be on you to figure out what exactly is that balance in order to make sure that you are making the most of that conversation if that makes sense.

So, as a reminder again, informal conversations, this is where you get to know someone and then formal conversations, this is where you can get information, also share a little bit about your professional experiences. And together I would say blending them together is really really helpful in making the conversation feel natural and easy and easy flowing. So I encourage you to to think about this as you go throughout the rest of the rest of the week at the emerging engineer summit.

There’s going to be a lot of roundts at different companies. So try this out as you go into those conversations and see if it feels different for you than the methods that you’ve been trying in the past. So the next piece here is record who you talk to.

In some settings such as like conferences, it’s going to be really important that you take notes of who you talk to. You’ll be meeting a lot of people. So, I say having notes is going to be really helpful after the career fair or or an event when you’re trying to figure out what were these conversations that I had, who am I going to be reaching out to and developing that plan.

I think recording who you talk to is going to be really helpful. You can do this by collecting email addresses. You can do this by collecting business cards, LinkedIn, or maybe other social medias, maybe like a GitHub link.

But what you want to really make sure that you’re doing once you have this information is trying to jot down some facts or recapping the conversation that you had with this person. This is going to be really really essential as you go into the followup because when you contact someone and follow up with someone, what you really want to do is make sure that that outreach is personal. And recapping the conversation is an easy way to to make that happen.

And also it’s a easy way for the person that you’re talking to to remember who you are. You’re you’re remember they’re you’re not the only ones that’s talking to a lot of people. The employers are also talking to a lot of people.

So, recapping the conversation really makes it easy for you to remember who you’re you’re talking to. And then once you have this contact information, I would say add them on LinkedIn. Keep in touch with the network.

Because there could be other events that you could potentially go to that’s going to be really really helpful for you to one get an understanding of the company. But two, just understand who that person is a little bit more. You can learn that through their posts, the events that they go to, and really just what they they they share in general.

Another thing that you want to keep in mind as you have these follow-up conversations is what is the ask? What are you going to ask from them? Do you want to set up a coffee chat conversation and continue to learn more about them?

Do you are you going to ask them for a referral? This is kind of really what you’re going to have to think about and you want to make sure that you include that in your follow-up email email or message at the end. That way it’s it’s very very clear.

They remember who you are. You can have an ask and see where the conversation leads. So, just to recap this slide, record who you talked to, recap the conversations, and then connect and follow up.

And then once you have done that, it’s your turn to help others. It’s really important that you make sure that you are paying it forward to other people in your network. If people are reaching out to you on LinkedIn, maybe they saw that you landed an internship and they’re excited to potentially get their first internship.

Make sure that you’re having those conversations with them as well, similar to how people have had conversations with you. This could be mutually beneficial to you because you never know where they might end up in their career. So I would say make sure that you’re paying it forward because you’re going to want to be treated the same way.

Okay. So, we’ve talked a little bit about networking in a very brief format. Now, I’m going to dive a little bit deeper into how you can define your networking plan.

This is kind of sort of an activity but this is an activity that I encourage you to do in your free time when you get home or a little bit later after the the conference is over. I’ll start with the first slide which is talking about defining your network. So the first thing that I would recommend all of you do is make a list of the people who have taken an interest in your career by assisting you with your per personal or professional development.

Really think about who that can be. And you want to think really broadly about that. You may know these people from previous work experiences.

Maybe they were your team lead or your mentor. They could be from your university. Maybe it’s a professor or a teaching assistant that you’ve communicated with a lot over office hours.

Or they can be from your community. These could be leaders that you look up to, role models, family members, maybe people at your church. When you have those people listed down from there you want to briefly describe who they are and in what social arena do you interact with them most frequently.

In this section I would say write down as much as you can just so you have a holistic view of your relationship with that person. Does that make sense? Great.

All righty. So once you have your your list already created, the next step is to really analyze your your network. And the way that you can do this is assess them in four specific qualities.

So diversity you can think about how similar or different are you to these people. You can think about it as as granular as like gender, ethnicity, function, experience, where they’re located. And you want to try to be very in-depth with these as well.

And really think about like do you you have a lot in common with each other or do you not have a lot in common with each other? I think this is really helpful as you think about that. The next quality which is relationship strength.

And this is where you really think about like the the depth of your connection to this person. Are you close to them or are they acquaintances? From here you can really determine who do you want to get closer to?

How can I continue to strengthen this relationship? And what can I offer to this person as well to make sure that it is mutually beneficial. The next one that we have is interconnectivity.

And this is how close is your development network? Maybe you might find out that a lot of people in your network know each other. Is there some redundancy in these relationships?

This could be really good opportunities to figure out who you can group together. Maybe it’s a a social that you’re putting together. It’s a great way for you to figure out how you can network with multiple people.

In one similar setting. And that could be really, really helpful as you go through your networking journey. And then the last one that we have here is power and influence.

And I think this one is incredibly important in helping you move forward in your career. So once you’ve categorized the other four qualities, the next is to look at power and influence. You want to look at the people in your network and understand like who is influential.

What can they what can how can they help you with their influence to get to the next level in your career or in your your journey. Those are people that you’re going to want to really focus in on and get to know a little bit better and then really focus on building that relationship strength with them. And then from there you can understand their network and get connected to other people.

So as you can see these qualities are kind of interconnected within each other. And they can be used in different ways to really help you elevate yourself. And then the last one that I have here is focusing on developing your action plan.

Once you’ve gone through the list of people, you want to make sure that you are thinking about what are the opportunities that are are available or maybe what are the challenges that you’re you’re looking to to solve. This doesn’t have to, you know, be like looking for a new job or a position. It could be, like I said, taking on a new challenge.

Maybe it’s changing scope of what you’re currently doing. Maybe it’s as simple as improving your your leadership skills or maybe achieving more balance in your life. And that first step, this is going to be really important because it it ties back into your your why.

What is it that you are looking for from this networking experience? Once you have that, the next thing that you can do is really think about how will your current network help you achieve this goal or is there even anyone that can help? And looking at the qualities that we’ve talked about in the previous slide and looking at the people who are influential, those could be really two things that help you figure out how are you going to achieve this goal.

From there, you can think about, is there any type of help that you’re missing from your current network? I think this one’s also really important because it could also guide you to new people that you might not have considered before. That could be helpful in building a full and complete networking group.

And then f after that you want to think about how can you leverage the current set of relationships that you have to meet new people that could be helpful to you. So really this one is about expanding your your network growing. And then finally, the last thing that we have here is really just listing two to three specific actions you could take to initiate contact with new people and enhance your current relationships.

So in this step you want to make sure that again it’s very very specific that you connect it to your why that you take these actions and then finally put them into action using the steps that I had mentioned in the beginning of the the presentation. So, I encourage you all to to take some time hopefully at the end of this presentation or at the end of the day today to think about the the networks that you have and think about the employers that are here at the Emerging Engineer Summit and really start to develop that action plan and and use that action plan over the course of the week. It’s going to be really really helpful to helping you land opportunities.

And it’s going to be really helpful for you gathering information and thinking about where you want to go in your your career journey. And just as a reminder, this is not something that only has to be used in a career format, a careerfare format. It could also be used in your personal life as well.

It could you be used in your school careers as well. So networking can take many shapes or forms and work in many different settings. And I think once you have a good grasp on how to network effectively, it’s going to really help you boost your career and and well-being as well.

And with that, I leave you with take action. So, I wanted to make sure that there was a lot of time for us to, really I want to make sure I’m answering the questions that you all have for me. So I will pass it back to Anthony to kick off the the Q&A.

Cool beans. Thanks, Justin. That was a lot of helpful information even for, you know, working professionals like like ourselves.

So, I I appreciate that. Justin, you have quite a few questions in the chat. So the feature I’m actually using is called it’s like a upvote feature.

So students are able to ask questions and other students can actually, you know, put emphasis on that particular question. So and it gets placed in a particular order. So the first question they have is does Bloomberg hire new grads outside of internship conversations?

New grads outside of internship conversations. So you mean like outside of like a returning offer? Yep.

Yeah, absolutely. So we do hire new grads. And if that’s for people who have graduated in 2024 or honestly 2023 or earlier or later.

We will be sharing links with folks who fill out the interest form on our booth page. And then we’ll review the that and then reach out to folks with links to apply to the new grad opportunities. Awesome sauce.

We have a really good question. This one says, "How do I prioritize friendships while I’m still asking for professional things? Like, I like to I like a ref a referral at my friend’s company, but I want my friend to know they’re worth they’re worth more than just a referral." That’s that’s a good one.

Yeah. I would say that’s a a really good question. I would say your friends are there to to help you.

I think any friend would want to see you succeed. So, I think you won’t have to worry about feeling used by them as long as like you are maintaining the the friendship. Then, like I said, really making sure that you’re building strong relationships with folks.

And really think about how you can help them as well. I think if you, you know, share that you’re looking for new opportunities, maybe start by asking them or talking about what you’ve learned from them about the company that they they work at. And kind of tying that into the conversation.

So, maybe saying along the lines of like, hey, like you you said that you really love the company that you work at. As you know, I’m looking for new opportunities. You know, I’d love to potentially work with you in the future.

Do you know anything about open roles for software engineering? And see where like the conversation leads. More more times than not you’ll find that your friends are are willing to to help you on your career journey.

Awesome. Totally agree. We have another let’s say relationship question.

I’ve heard that in networking you want your relationships to be deep and mutually beneficial. How do you develop such relationships with more senior individuals and what would be what would I be able to offer them? Yeah.

I think for me senior leaders really care about the company and care about like the company doing well. So if you’re in a current role, I would start off by really one getting to know them a little bit like how how are you doing? Start off kind of small.

And then maybe ask them a little bit about their goals for for the company. I think once you understand their goals, you can kind of tie it into some of the things that you are currently doing. And show how you are helping the company achieve those goals.

And I think that really gets a lot of senior leaders interested. I know for me for example when I’m going to a conference one I try to bring senior leaders with me wherever possible but two after the fact I always come back and I present to the senior leaders about some of the things that we’ve learned the trends takeaways but I also talk about like the things that we have gained in terms of like ROI which really helped drive the the goal and ROI stands for like return on investment for Sure. For sure.

Next one. How do you reconnect with a recruiter after a failed interview? Like in the case of Bloomberg, recruiters offer a reconnection after six months after the interview.

What’s the best way to reach out so that your email doesn’t just stay on delivered? Yeah. So I would say there’s oftent times a lot of events that are being hosted, whether it’s on campus or virtually.

One I would continue to go to events even though you’re in that cool down period. That’s a great way to show initiative and that you’re really interested in the organization. And we’ll see those events in our system too that you’re showing up to that.

So I think starting there giving get putting some time in and getting to build your network with the other engineers and learn more about the company culture. And then just I would say shoot them an email or your recruiting coordinator an email. And then let them know like, hey, I interviewed over six months ago.

Since since my interview, I’ve gained this much like skill or I’ve worked on this project, etc. to really build my my technical toolkit. And I’m really interested in opportunities at Bloomberg. And maybe highlight some things that you’ve learned from the events that you’ve gone to.

I think usually when I see those types of emails, I’m very much more inclined to respond and really get them through the process. Awesome. Love that.

What do you look for when someone reaches out to you on LinkedIn? Any tips for crafting a compelling message? Yeah.

So usually the ones that I avoid are the ones where it’s just like, "Hey, I’m looking for this opportunity. Here’s my resume. And then cuz it’s like not personal in any way.

The ones that I kind of like stand out to me are obviously the ones that I have some sort of degree of connection to. So maybe they attended my event or they heard me speak at a conference. A little bit of flattery goes a long way in there a a little bit, I’d say.

But again, you want to make it personable. So say for example, you’re meeting me at this conference, maybe connecting it to some of the things that you took away from this experience and then throwing in there that you’re looking for opportunities, I would say is like something that’s helpful. So again, connect it a little bit to them.

You want to make it connected to them and highlight what you’ve worked on, but not seem like you’re just asking for something and and going on, you know? That works. Another thing that I would say would work is like maybe starting off small by asking for an opportunity just to connect and have a conversation about like opportunities or just like a coffee chat.

Those are usually like a a easier road in because honestly when people just reach out and send their resumes. It’s like I don’t particularly know like what your skill set is until like I’ve had that conversation or yeah had that conversation whether it’s in person or over coffee chat. Fair.

Fair. That is fair. Now Justin, remember we say that we’re gonna we’re gonna gradually build into the questions and this is a pretty good one.

This one says, "Hi, Justin. Can you please tell us about Bloomberg’s focus on AI and how it is being introduced into existing products? How is AI being targeted and what are the expectations for new grad joining as a software engineer in terms of working with AI?

H that is a a good question. So right now I know that AI is being used in a sense to like extract information from like documents and also from like what’s it called quarterly like calls or or things like that. And it’s using basically taking those that information and providing it to like our users to be like right in front of them if they ask a question.

I’m not super tuned in to like the AI space at Bloomberg. It’s really more so of like a senior role at Bloomberg. So it’s a little bit out of my scope, but I do have a link that I can share with you all that could be really really helpful.

I’ll find it and I’ll throw it into throw it into the chat in in just a little bit. Think that works. Amy, I’m going to do a little jumping around here, so it may not be in order anymore.

Justin, I have a really good one I went and found. It says, "Hi, Justin. Networking is of course a social game.

What would be your advice for less social sociable people when more introverted who are more introverted in nature? Are there different strategies that are like networking online? This was a good one.

H so yeah I would say like in a in a space like for example this virtual career fair virtual conference is definitely a good first step for those who are a little bit more introverted especially because like inerson conferences and stuff can feel very overwhelming even for like me as a recruiter. So starting off in like a virtual setting, I would say maybe like sticking to the the questions that are really important to you can really help you help motivate you to have that conversation. So if you are say looking for an opportunity, you’re going to want to really make sure that you learn about the company and understand like the the values and see if it aligns with yours.

So, I would recommend just like going into the conversation really curious. And I think that really helps build the conversation. So I would say you can ask about like the person’s like experience at the company.

So, what are they what team are they on? What are they working on? The tech the technical stack that they have that they use.

You can ask them about like the organ the clubs or groups that are at the company especially as it pertains to like DNI. And then I think from the things that they say if there’s something that really excites you or connects to what you’re currently doing I think that’s a good spot for you to kind of like interject and say like oh that’s really interesting. I am currently working on a project that is very similar.

Do you mind if I talk to you a little bit about that project? So I think it helps the nerves a little bit when you start with the questions about them and then get into the question the the projects and stuff that you’ve worked on. Because most people are nervous to like you know share about themselves but it’s probably easier if you just start with the questions.

Does that make sense? For sure. Absolutely.

And we’re going to do maybe two more. One, says, "When will the Bloomberg accelerator program be available for summer 2025?" for summer 2025, I’m not sure about summer 2025, but right now it is available for folks to sign up for. I will put a link at our booth to make sure that it is there for folks who want to sign up.

But yeah, I would say the accelerator program is something that’s run consistently throughout the year. So, I’m not sure about 2025, but for now it’s like available for the fall. Gotcha.

Gotcha. Fair. Someone asked, "How can we make a more natural connection to make a stronger bond essentially for a longer term without making it like they’re solely reaching out just for let’s say opportunity, a work opportunity?

Yeah, I think this goes back into the informal side of the conversations of getting to know them. I’m always going to go back to like the careerfare example and people are asking me like questions. Not only do you want to know about like the company, but think about things like the the location.

Like if it’s in New York and you’re not from New York, you could be like, "Oh, can you tell me a little bit about New York? Like what’s that like? Do you enjoy it there?

Or what are your hobbies? Is there opportunities for like someone like me? I have this hobby.

Do you do you know if like I’ll be able to find that in in New York? I think connecting it to the not only the company, but also like the culture of the location that it’s in, I think could be a really good way for you to kind of like ease into more of like the natural conversation and getting to to know them a little bit better. Yeah.

Awesome. Awesome. Well, Justin, we really really appreciate you for coming.

We appreciate you appreciate you for answering all of their questions. Again, we thank you so much. And unfortunately, we’re coming to the end of this particular session.

So, if you all can please show Justin gratitude, appreciation, things like that within the chat. We really, really appreciate it. Okay.

And also what we’re going to do again, make sure you drop your appreciation in the chat and then please take a moment to fill out the survey. The survey should be linked here in the chat. Okay.

We also encourage you all to go to all of the the presenters in the networking lounge. Stop by there, please. The virtual booths will be open later on today as well.

But I am going to throw it back over to Bobby. Here’s a brief video from Bobby. Next up, we have network breaks.

And remember, here’s a nuggets. Your network is your net worth. So hopefully you hear that, Jim.

But here’s some information I want you all to remember. You can access the network lounge or visit the company’s booths during this break. This is a great time to connect with companies and each other.

So, we encourage you to go visit the spaces and build connections.