Dive Brief:

• Employers looking to attract top talent among college grads often do the wrong thing, according to CareerBuilder. Specifically, the article lays out seven mistakes recruiters make when sourcing potential new hires from colleges across the country, both off and on campus.
• The major mistakes range from misunderstanding the college recruiting cycle to ignoring faculty when developing and maintaining campus relationships, and from treating seniors as a monolithic group to not communicating enough during the process.
• With Baby Boomers retiring, employers can ill afford to make these mistakes, the article says, and offers several ideas on how to avoid these missteps.

Dive Insight:

So what can an employer do? For one thing, the article suggests teaming up an inexperienced recruiter with a veteran when hitting college job fairs. Apart from a great chance at mentoring the fresh recruiter, the target audience – college students – will see a more well-rounded view of the employer.

The article concludes by pointing out that competition for college talent will only get sharper in the near term, so avoiding these kinds of mistakes can be the difference between landing top talent or settling for second-best.