Cold calling for work - experiences?

XX55XX

I am currently a junior majoring in accounting at a major university three miles away from home.

After having failed to land an internship at one of the Big Four accounting firms this summer (had one interview with KPMG, no offers), I have decided to take a more radical path to seeking employment this summer. In the past hour, I have compiled a list of 20 local accounting/tax preparation firms, ranging from one-man operations to slightly bigger operations comprising of a few dozen people. Tomorrow afternoon, when I get home from school, I'll be calling three to four firms for internships and remind the person/partner on the other line that it's tax season, and I will be very happy to work for free.

I've never done this before, but I believe that this is the best way for me to land an internship of some kind this summer so that I am a bit more competitive come full-time recruiting next fall.

Has anyone cold called for work before? Did it work for you?

suicidexcuse

Although I dont have advice on the cold calling, but I will say that do not forget to expand your search outside accounting firms. Right now is the time that some companies in industry start their hiring process for interns. I myself didnt get any offers from the big four so Im trying to find any other accounting job for students. I usually just search through any large companies in my city and see if they are hiring. Any company big enough will be hiring accounting interns and their standards are much lower then the big four.

MagicToaster

I've gotten jobs by making cold calls. In fact, I've gotten jobs by doing walk-ins. If they ask you to email your information or apply on their web page, make sure to take advantage of those valuable minutes of human contact by gathering important information such as "Who should I address this to and what department do they work in".

Make sure to rehearse what you want to say before you call.

Also, don't work for free. These words should never come out of your mouth. When ever you work for free, you cheapen your worth as an employee. Are you worth nothing? Were your years in school worth nothing?

adytum

Personally, I would stop in and introduce yourself rather than making cold calls.

XX55XX

MagicToaster wrote:

I've gotten jobs by making cold calls. In fact, I've gotten jobs by doing walk-ins. If they ask you to email your information or apply on their web page, make sure to take advantage of those valuable minutes of human contact by gathering important information such as "Who should I address this to and what department do they work in".

Make sure to rehearse what you want to say before you call.

Also, don't work for free. These words should never come out of your mouth. When ever you work for free, you cheapen your worth as an employee. Are you worth nothing? Were your years in school worth nothing?

I'm just looking for an internship to bolster my crappy resume. Pay is not terribly important at the moment - I want to set myself up in a better position for Big Four fulltime recruiting in the fall. And I've read that it's not advisable to walk in randomly, unless it's a retail position or something like that.

adytum

Walking in and introducing yourself, talking with someone, and leaving a resume is preferable to cold-calling- I say this as someone on the receiving end of the transaction. Whatever you're going to do, do it now, because it's almost February and within a week or two nobody is going to have the time to talk to you, much less train you.

XX55XX

adytum wrote:

Walking in and introducing yourself, talking with someone, and leaving a resume is preferable to cold-calling- I say this as someone on the receiving end of the transaction. Whatever you're going to do, do it now, because it's almost February and within a week or two nobody is going to have the time to talk to you, much less train you.

Really? I've read websites advising against this...

MagicToaster

XX55XX wrote:

I've read that it's not advisable to walk in randomly, unless it's a retail position or something like that.

Well, if you do anything randomly it will end badly. If you investigate, use proper timing and hit up the right people it won't be a disaster.

When you go hunting, you don't randomly decide to do it while you're driving. You don't suddenly jump out of your car with no rifle and strangle a passing deer to death. This would make you a sociopath and a poor hunter. Similarly, when you're job-hunting, you don't randomly call/walk-in. You prepare all your gear beforehand and stalk your prey until you sense the time is right.

XX55XX

Just made half a dozen calls. No dice. People are saying that they have enough staff already. I timed this terribly - I should have done this last fall.

MagicToaster

What do you have to loose now? Just go in, drop off your resume in person and see if anyone likes you. You'd be surprised at what human contact can do.

Edit:
Wait a minute. You made 6 calls, that leaves 14 firms on your list to go. Are you giving up now?

XX55XX

MagicToaster wrote:

XX55XX wrote:

I've read that it's not advisable to walk in randomly, unless it's a retail position or something like that.

Well, if you do anything randomly it will end badly. If you investigate, use proper timing and hit up the right people it won't be a disaster.

When you go hunting, you don't randomly decide to do it while you're driving. You don't suddenly jump out of your car with no rifle and strangle a passing deer to death. This would make you a sociopath and a poor hunter. Similarly, when you're job-hunting, you don't randomly call/walk-in. You prepare all your gear beforehand and stalk your prey until you sense the time is right.

True. My timing was way off - people already have enough people for tax season. I guess this effort was doomed before it began.

MagicToaster

XX55XX wrote:

I guess this effort was doomed before it began.

You gotta change this attitude. Keep calling. 6 phone calls is hardly a job hunt.

XX55XX

Even though I didn't study finance, I am thinking to extending beyond traditional accounting firms to private equity houses/private wealth management firms looking for an operations guy. Perhaps I might find more luck there...

Heir

Like @MagicToaster said, you can't give up. You only called 6 places...that's nothing. If you want to find something, you have to keep pushing and pushing. Don't give up.

XX55XX

Heir wrote:

Like @MagicToaster said, you can't give up. You only called 6 places...that's nothing. If you want to find something, you have to keep pushing and pushing. Don't give up.

Well, I'm a bit more comfortable with calling random places now. Just called two more one-man operations - both guys adamantly said no.

Heir

Ok now you're up to 8. Congrats...keep going.

XX55XX

Heir wrote:

Ok now you're up to 8. Congrats...keep going.

Called another firm. They asked me for a cover letter and a resume. Well, my resume might shit, but I think I can still do a pretty decent cover letter.

Feral

BTW, you said you're willing to work for free.

Consider also volunteer work. Nonprofits often need accountants & bookkeepers - try looking on www.volunteermatch.org for keywords like "accounting" and "bookkeeping" and "financial."

Artereis

You may also want to look into the companies that make the software the Big 4 use.

Eat it You Nasty Pig.

My experience cold calling/walking into places wasn't negative really, but it wasn't incredibly productive. The most I got out of it in terms of direct job prospects was put on a couple internal-ish email lists of open positions. Which was nice, don't get me wrong, but not incredibly helpful.

What was somewhat more helpful was asking, rather than about jobs, just to interview established people about how to find jobs/interview/etc. People are more willing to talk to you because it doesn't seem as much like you're asking for something (even though you are) and you can do some networking. Plus if it does so happen that the person's company is hiring, chances are they'll mention it to you.

XX55XX

Eat it You Nasty Pig. wrote:

My experience cold calling/walking into places wasn't negative really, but it wasn't incredibly productive. The most I got out of it in terms of direct job prospects was put on a couple internal-ish email lists of open positions. Which was nice, don't get me wrong, but not incredibly helpful.

What was somewhat more helpful was asking, rather than about jobs, just to interview established people about how to find jobs/interview/etc. People are more willing to talk to you because it doesn't seem as much like you're asking for something (even though you are) and you can do some networking. Plus if it does so happen that the person's company is hiring, chances are they'll mention it to you.

What do you mean, by "established people"? I get a feeling that this is better if you are already employed and are networking internally or via professional groups. I am only a mere student. I've reached out to professors (and one of them indicated that he was willing to help me out).

spool32

XX55XX wrote:

Eat it You Nasty Pig. wrote:

My experience cold calling/walking into places wasn't negative really, but it wasn't incredibly productive. The most I got out of it in terms of direct job prospects was put on a couple internal-ish email lists of open positions. Which was nice, don't get me wrong, but not incredibly helpful.

What was somewhat more helpful was asking, rather than about jobs, just to interview established people about how to find jobs/interview/etc. People are more willing to talk to you because it doesn't seem as much like you're asking for something (even though you are) and you can do some networking. Plus if it does so happen that the person's company is hiring, chances are they'll mention it to you.

What do you mean, by "established people"? I get a feeling that this is better if you are already employed and are networking internally or via professional groups. I am only a mere student. I've reached out to professors (and one of them indicated that he was willing to help me out).

"Hi, I'm writing an article on what sorts of things employers are looking for in an accounting intern. Would you mind scheduling 15 or 20 minutes with me to give your thoughts?"

Eat it You Nasty Pig.

You're trying to work in some kind of financial planning or such, right?

So rather than calling firms and being all 'so, you guys hiring? No? Okay then,' figure out who at the company is doing the job you want. Then call them up, and say hey, I'm so and so and I'm trying to break into the industry, and I was wondering if I could come in and talk to you for 15 or 20 minutes about [blah blah blah].'

Some people will still refuse/blow you off, but most like to talk about themselves, so they'll agree at least to meet you over coffee or something. And you have a much better shot at having a good conversation and getting a line on an actual opening this way than you do by walking into an office and talking to whoever the front-end HR person is (their job, basically, is to get rid of you.)

ed: then having gotten an interview, come prepared with 20-30 minutes of questions and stuff to actually talk about. The goal is to impress this person, after all.

MagicToaster

That's a fantastic idea!

ihmmy

Eat it You Nasty Pig. wrote:

You're trying to work in some kind of financial planning or such, right?

So rather than calling firms and being all 'so, you guys hiring? No? Okay then,' figure out who at the company is doing the job you want. Then call them up, and say hey, I'm so and so and I'm trying to break into the industry, and I was wondering if I could come in and talk to you for 15 or 20 minutes about [blah blah blah].'

Some people will still refuse/blow you off, but most like to talk about themselves, so they'll agree at least to meet you over coffee or something. And you have a much better shot at having a good conversation and getting a line on an actual opening this way than you do by walking into an office and talking to whoever the front-end HR person is (their job, basically, is to get rid of you.)

ed: then having gotten an interview, come prepared with 20-30 minutes of questions and stuff to actually talk about. The goal is to impress this person, after all.

I second this approach, especially in regards to letting them talk about themselves some. As someone who works with a fair number of one-man and small accounting operations, they love talking, and talking about themselves is only one-upped by talking about accounting

Deebaser

XX55XX wrote:

Even though I didn't study finance, I am thinking to extending beyond traditional accounting firms to private equity houses/private wealth management firms looking for an operations guy. Perhaps I might find more luck there...

Are you looking for an internship or a summer job? If you just want the cash money, temp.

XX55XX

Deebaser wrote:

XX55XX wrote:

Even though I didn't study finance, I am thinking to extending beyond traditional accounting firms to private equity houses/private wealth management firms looking for an operations guy. Perhaps I might find more luck there...

Are you looking for an internship or a summer job? If you just want the cash money, temp.

Internship.

wonkainc

Have you tried asking all of your parents, relatives, and family friends if they know anyone who works in an accounting firm? Surely one of them knows someone who might know someone. Then you wouldn't being cold calling people.

XX55XX

This cold calling is going nowhere. Today, I went to see a professor I was pretty chummy with (had several classes with him and knew him outside of class) and asked for help. He said he can't guarantee anything, but he promised to circulate my resume among people that he knew who might be useful.