iSchool-sponsored career events and on-campus interviews are privileges that carry certain expectations for your conduct. To reinforce appropriate use of iSchool and Career & Internship Center on-campus recruiting opportunities, we have adopted protocols to better serve you and the employers visiting campus. Please familiarize yourself with these standards of appropriate behavior before participating in any on-campus recruiting events.

In your best interest, the iSchool has also defined a Recruiting Policy for Employers to ensure recruiting entities work within a framework of professionally accepted recruiting, interviewing and selection techniques as stipulated in the NACE Principles for Professional Conduct.

Please note that violating these policies may results in consequences such as having your iCareers or UW Handshake accounts blocked. If you have questions or concerns regarding your interactions with employers, please contact an iSchool career services advisor.

Cancellations and No-Shows

Failure to appear for scheduled interviews prevents other students from using your time slot and wastes the recruiter's time. Such behavior reflects poorly on your professionalism, could jeopardize the iSchool’s relationship with the employer regarding research and related activities, and could ultimately cause employers to suspend recruiting at our school. Therefore, it is important to follow through on all interview appointments. If you cannot make your scheduled interview, be sure to take the appropriate steps well in advance.

Cancelling Interviews

Recruiters, hiring managers, and technical interviewers take time to prepare for and conduct your interview. Cancelling within 48 hours for reasons other than withdrawing from the process due to another job offer, an illness, or an emergency is not acceptable and will jeopardize your recruiting success. It is unacceptable to accept an interview without doing company research and having intent to possibly join the company if presented with an offer. If you must change or cancel an interview, call the recruiter to inform them, and email both the recruiter and the interviewer (if you have the interviewer's email address). You should apologize for the inconvenience the cancellation causes them and reiterate your interest in their company and the position for which you are being considered. Ask if it would be possible to reschedule, but understand that such a favor is at their discretion.

No-Shows

If you miss an interview for any unexplained reason, contact your recruiter to apologize and explain your reason for missing the interview. It is important to understand that a no-show for either a phone screen or in-person interview is looked at very negatively. It could remove you from consideration for the position.

Ethics of Negotiating

It is assumed that you will negotiate in good faith with employers. This means you should negotiate with an employer only if you plan to accept the employer’s offer if the negotiation goes well. It is unethical to negotiate with an employer whose offer you have no intention of accepting.

It is appropriate to politely refuse to provide an employer with specific information about any job offers you may have received from other employers. If asked, you can affirm if you have other offers pending. You do not have to name the organizations that have made offers to you, nor are you obliged to provide specific information about the salaries, perks, or other forms of compensation involved. Instead, broad responses to these questions that include salary ranges (rather than specific dollar amounts) are perfectly acceptable.

Evaluating Offers

When you receive a job offer, you will likely feel elated and probably a little anxious. Consequently, you may be tempted to rush into accepting the offer immediately. Try to evaluate all aspects of the job offer and think objectively about your choices before responding to an offer.

There is no standard amount of time that an organization is legally required to give you to make a decision. The iSchool details the expectations and timelines that employers must follow in our Recruiting Policy for Employers, and we ask that all iAffiliate companies abide by it when recruiting our students through on-campus and departmental channels (which includes participation in career fairs, tech talks, on-campus interviews, iCareers postings, etc.). If you need more time to accept an offer, it is expected that you tell the employer about these policies and timelines at the start of your negotiations. If you have a question on how to address this, please consult with an iSchool career services advisor.

Delaying a Response

You may find that you need more time than an employer initially extends to make a decision on a job offer, especially if you have other employment opportunities pending. There are appropriate ways to approach this matter that minimize any negative impact on the employer, your reputation, the iSchool, or other students who might be interested in pursuing an opportunity with this employer. Please consult with an iSchool career services advisor on ways to address such a situation.

Accepting an Offer

Once you have accepted a job offer, it is important to terminate all other job-search activity. Failure to do so could deprive another student of those opportunities. Notify all other employers that you are no longer available for employment and cancel any interviews you have scheduled.

Declining an Offer

If you are declining an offer, do so with sensitivity to the employer's needs. Inform the recruiter verbally as soon as your decision has been made and follow your conversation with a thank-you letter. Do not delay contacting the employer: while making that phone call may be difficult, it is bad news does not get better with time. Employers need to know you are declining their offer as quickly as possible so they can adjust their plans accordingly. Waiting until the last moment to contact them could force them into a situation they cannot remedy.

Reneging on Offers

Accepting an offer is a commitment to the employer who made you one. Once you have accepted a job or internship offer, it is important to terminate all other job search activity at this point. This means ending any current interviews you may have going on with other organizations and not moving forward if you receive new interview requests for positions you had applied to in the past (see example email). Reneging on an offer could be seen as an ethical and possibly legal violation of your commitment. Besides negatively affecting your reputation and the iSchool’s, reneging could also taint the reputation of future graduates of our department.

Professional communities are never as large as they seem. Recruiters share information and change companies throughout their careers. They might share information about someone who reneged with other recruiters, or they may move to another recruiting position at a different company, which could cost you future interviews and job offers. If you are not ready to make that commitment, do not accept the job offer.

The iSchool spends considerable time and effort on your behalf to cultivate strong, positive relationships with employers. We consider reneges undertaken in any but the most dire circumstances a serious ethical breach. Doing so may result in the forfeiture of your right to participate in future departmental recruiting activities.

The iSchool Student Recruiting Policy was adapted from the policies in place at UW’s Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) Department and the MIT Career Office.