Welcome back to Moving from College to Career! In this space, we share practical insights to help you explore career paths and prepare for recruiting.
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Career Spotlight: The Business of Hiring
When students think about working at Fortune 500 companies, they often picture roles in marketing, finance, or product.
But organizations of that scale rely on many functions students rarely hear about, including the teams responsible for identifying and hiring the next generation of talent.
Recently, Introships students heard from a recruiting leader at a Fortune 500 consumer brand about how recruiting works inside large organizations and how professionals often find their way into the field.
There’s no single path into recruiting
Unlike many careers students plan for in advance, recruiting is a field people often enter from completely different starting points.
The professional who spoke with our students began her career in an administrative role at a global consulting firm.
In that environment, she developed skills that translate directly into recruiting: building relationships, earning trust, and anticipating what people need in order to do their best work.
Her move into recruiting began with something simple — a LinkedIn message from a recruiter at another consulting firm who believed her skill set could translate well into the role.
It’s a good reminder that early careers are rarely linear. Skills developed in one role often open doors to opportunities in entirely different functions.
Industry and function are separate dimensions of a career
After several years recruiting for consulting roles, she realized she still loved the work itself but was ready to experience a different type of organization.
Rather than leaving recruiting entirely, she made a move that many early professionals overlook: keeping the same function while changing industry.
That shift ultimately took her from consulting into recruiting for a Fortune 500 consumer brand, where she worked on early-career hiring.
It highlights an important idea for students exploring careers: industry and function are two separate dimensions of a career. Sometimes the most interesting moves happen when you keep one constant while changing the other.
Why conversations like this matter
One of the biggest challenges students face when exploring careers is simply not knowing what roles exist.
Through Introships, students hear directly from professionals across industries, ask questions, and start to understand how careers actually develop over time.
If you’re a college student looking for structured guidance, real conversations with professionals, and a clearer path to internships, that’s exactly what Introships is designed to provide.
Alumni Spotlight: Why Introships Beat Doing Research Alone
Payton Cottingham (University of Richmond '25) participated in Introships to explore different career paths and hear directly from professionals across a range of industries. Through those conversations, he found the experience far more helpful than simply researching careers on his own.
In his words: “It’s not the same as just doing research on your own because you’re having conversations face to face with people where you can understand their day-to-day, understand what they’re doing and what goes into their work, and understand the culture of the companies they’re working at. That value add was huge.”
We hope you found this helpful. Feel free to reply with questions or feedback, and stay tuned for more from Introships on LinkedIn and Instagram!
Joe Fiveash & Sean Wetmore
