Virtual Career Fair How-To: OPEF Professional Educators Fair Video Interviewing Recap

At the recent Oregon Professional Educator Fair (OPEF), presented by the Oregon School Personnel Association (OSPA), interviewstream was asked if we could help to provide the interviewing technology used during the fair. And we were excited to do so! In fact, if you have an upcoming virtual career fair, and would like some help with interviewing software, please reach out to marketing@interviewstream.com today.

interview on demand and interview connect were used in booths during the fair to help facilitate the interview process between Oregon school districts and prospective educators. In this blog recap, we’ll walk you through how the virtual career fair worked, how you can facilitate a similar fair, and some do’s and don’t to consider at your next virtual career fair.

How do virtual career fairs work?

To kick things off, let’s define what a virtual career fair is and how it differs from an in-person career fair. An in-person career fair takes place at a specific time and place, like a convention center, exhibit hall, school or university, etc. Potential employers set up branded booths where they meet prospective candidates, review their resumes, and potentially offer them the chance to interview for an open position.

Similar to in-person job fairs, virtual career fairs offer the same opportunities to employers and candidates, only they’re conducted using virtual event technology, and in our case, in concert with video interviewing solutions.

The OPEF educators fair was conducted using Virtual Event Place. Candidates registered for the fair and were able to easily navigate between the Exhibit Hall, Auditorium, and Interview Rooms using the event technology.

Each registered district at the fair was assigned a booth in alphabetical order in the Exhibit Hall, and premium booths were available for more visible locations in the exhibit list.

At each district-branded booth, candidates were greeted by reps from the district who would engage with the prospective educators using the booth’s chat feature, or over video at the booth, and could invite the candidate to interview using the different interview options available.

Along with booth customization, OPEF also included a webitorium that allowed candidates to view presentations during the fair.

How does interviewing technology fit into a virtual career fair?

As the interview technology partner at OPEF, all districts were offered access to one-way video interviews. The booths were equipped with a button that would allow candidates to immediately gain access to a pre-recorded interview.

interviewstream also worked directly with districts before the fair to help set up interviews unique to their position’s requirements. These positions do not have any limitation- and can include everything from a teacher role to a principle or even an HR pro or a marketer. 

After a candidate clicked the access button to participate in the interview, the candidate was redirected to the interviewstream interview where they could complete the screening on their own time.

Once the interviewees completed, the candidate’s profile was available for each district to access privately to review the candidate’s responses, evaluate the candidate, or share the video interview with other district recruiters for their feedback.

Premium booths had access to interviewstream connect interviews along with on demand interviews, allowing district reps to also invite candidates to connect in real time over video. Booths were set up with a schedule of time blocks and virtual interview rooms that would allow candidates to sign up for specific times where they would be able to participate in a live interview with district recruiters.

Along with allowing the recruiter and candidate to connect “face-to-face”, interview connect allowed districts to record interviews, evaluate, and share records after the interview for additional feedback from HR teams and District administrators.

How can you make virtual career fairs work for you?

While I’m sharing a specific example we were involved in this year, this model can work for any hiring team looking to join a virtual job or career fair, regardless of the industry or location.

Even if there isn’t an interview technology sponsor for the event, the model of inviting a candidate to complete an on demand or live interview after you’ve connected with them will work for anyone.

If you’re interested in using the on demand method, simply set up a short pre-recorded interview before the fair, jot down the invitation link and pass it to your candidates after connecting with them. After you’ve finished with the show you’ll have a virtual list of candidates you can refer back to.

Check out what Harford County Public Schools had to say about their experience using interview on demand and how it helped them expand the capacity of their team and connect with candidates who could have been missed or overlooked in an in-person interview.

And if you’re interested in using interview connect, set up a calendar of times using a scheduling tool or spreadsheet and have candidates sign up for an interview time when you meet them at the booth. Once they’ve agreed, send the candidate a link to the live room and meet up with them for a live interview at the agreed upon time.

Video tools at virtual events can take your booth experience to the next level. They provide a better experience for your candidates and allow you to passively interview candidates while expanding your candidate pool without sacrificing time to greet candidates as they enter your booth.

Virtual Career Fair Do’s and Don’ts

To cap things off, check out our quick list of virtual career fair do’s and don’ts:

Do:

1. Prepare your booth ahead of time with high-quality graphics and PDFs. This improves your candidate and brand experience, which is a win for you any way you spin it.
2. Similar to your booth, sell your organization and open positions in the interview welcome messages or landing areas. Keep things warm, upbeat, and mention how excited you are to connect with candidates.
3. Make sure you register all of your booth reps ahead of the fair so that they have time to receive access to the booth, familiarize themselves with the tools available, and have time to prepare.
4. Use video technology if you have the option. Tools like on demand allow you to self-pace your interviews and gather candidates while focusing on other tasks.
5. If you’re using on demand or pre-recorded interviews, give your candidates a retry during the interview, but not too many, we recommend two.

Don’t:

1. Don’t wait until the last minute to prepare. Giving yourself enough time allows for a stress free environment, and for a confident and positive interaction between you and your candidates.
2. Don’t have too many internal users in your booth at one time. Pace out the number of people occupying your booth throughout the day if you’d like to have more people involved in the process.
3. Don’t make your written material too long, keep things short and sweet. Candidates are meeting with a lot of organizations so you want to make it easy for them to connect with you.
4. Don’t make your on demand or pre-recorded interviews too long, you want the barrier to entry to be low so that you’re encouraging as many candidates as possible to complete the interview. We recommend keeping your number of questions to three or less, with a two minute answer time limit, and prep time of one minute.
5. Don’t ask interview questions that prompt one word or binary answers, like “yes” or “no”. Keep your questions open ended to give yourself an opportunity to learn more about the candidate. Here’s a great example question: “Is there anything you want to tell me about yourself or your qualifications that I couldn’t glean from your resume?”

In the end, we think virtual career fairs are pretty great and may even offer you more flexibility and hiring opportunities than in-person job fairs.

Click here if you’d like to know more about how you can use video interview tools to make your virtual career fairs even better. We’d also like to give a special thank you to OPEF and OSPA for allowing us to help Oregon educators hire the best.

About The Author

Joey is a Client Success Account Manager at interviewstream. Before joining our team, he worked for Baylor Football and the Dallas Cowboys, solidifying his love for sports. When not watching a big game, Joey spends his time adventuring outdoors with his friends and family.