What Is Handshake?

The Office of Vocation & Professional Development (VPD) offers a valuable tool called Handshake. This online platform helps university students find jobs. But it goes above and beyond posting job listings. Handshake customizes job listings based on your degree, interests and more.

Customize Your Profile

Handshake will ask you specific questions to help you build a profile.

Here’s what you’ll need for the form:

• Graduation date (month and year)
• Type of job you’re looking for (full time, part time, internship or on campus opportunities)
• Specific roles in which you’re interested
• Cities in which you’d like to work
• Work and volunteer experience (requires names of employers)
• Relevant courses you’ve taken
• Skills you offer employers

My Profile

Once you complete the preliminary questions, you’ll be brought to the home page, which displays job openings based on the job roles you want and jobs that are popular for your major.

Click your name in the top right corner and go to “My Profile” to further customize your job search experience. Here, you can talk about your career goals and add any information you didn’t originally include. You even have the opportunity to add projects and the results.

Upload Your Resume

After you’ve perfected your resume at the VPD center, you can upload it to your profile. This gives potential employers a digital copy of your resume.

Q&A

There’s one part of the platform that is dedicated entirely to questions and answers. You will find interview tips, career advice and company-specific insights.

Learn About Organizations

You can also learn all about organizations. Search the organization’s name, and you will be provided with a full profile of what they do, their website (if available), reviews from former or current employees and insights into specific interview questions.