When large companies start to "compete" for college students, do they rely on training or just letting them grow?

This article focuses on the peak of autumn recruitment for Internet companies and analyzes the selection strategies for campus recruitment. It provides valuable guidance for fresh graduates and is recommended for all job seekers.

In August, campus recruitment for major Internet companies entered its peak period.

According to incomplete statistics, there are currently more than 500 companies that have started autumn recruitment. Many major Internet companies including Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, Douyin, JD.com, Meituan, Pinduoduo, etc. have launched campus recruitment for 2024, which means that a large amount of fresh blood will walk out of the ivory tower and enter major Internet companies.

Campus recruitment is of great significance to both companies and recent graduates.

For companies, campus recruitment has become an important way for them to build a future-oriented talent team and can help them acquire fresh blood.

For recent graduates, how to choose a good company and successfully get an offer determines the future career development direction in a sense.

As more and more post-2000s enter the workplace, campus recruitment trends are gradually changing.

For example, this year's "2023 Spring Campus Recruitment White Paper" pointed out that in addition to paying attention to immediate salary and benefits when choosing a job, students have also begun to consider longer-term factors, such as the company's development prospects and their own career development.

More importantly, how should we choose among the same large companies? We suggest that we give priority to Internet companies with "strong momentum".

Let’s first take stock of the campus recruitments that have already started at several major companies, and then we will tell you why you should choose companies that are close to the hot spots.

1. Autumn recruitment of major Internet companies has reached its peak

"The students of the 23rd class have not yet received their graduation certificates, but the 24th fall recruitment has already begun." For most graduates, this is the biggest feeling of this year's fall recruitment.

Compared with previous years, the pace of this year's autumn recruitment has been significantly accelerated.

Some netizens found when sorting out the autumn recruitment information that the autumn recruitment suddenly accelerated after entering August, with dozens of online applications opened a day. So far, nearly 200 autumn recruitment online applications have been opened in August alone.

"I feel that the overall pace of this year's autumn recruitment has accelerated a lot, and the peak period of autumn recruitment has arrived," the netizen said.

On social platforms, many recent graduates are seeking recruitment information, organizing recruitment positions and asking about autumn recruitment matters online. A series of topics related to autumn recruitment, such as how to prepare for autumn recruitment, autumn recruitment information, and autumn recruitment assessments, have attracted much attention.

There is a reason why fresh graduates attach great importance to the autumn recruitment.

A former campus recruit who currently works in a large company said that generally speaking, there are more job openings and larger companies in the fall recruitment industry. More importantly, campus recruitment generally has lower thresholds and requirements than social recruitment, and is more friendly to college students.

In addition, he believes that campus recruitment is also a good opportunity for most fresh graduates to work in large Internet companies.

Although many new graduates are now expanding the scope of their intended companies and are not limited to just the size of the company, it is undeniable that large companies have advantages over small companies in terms of salary and benefits, rules and regulations, and training systems.

Previously, there have been many cases online where new graduates have shared stories of being cheated by companies. For example, one student shared that they encountered situations in their first job where their salary was arbitrarily deducted, there was no training system for new graduates, and the management system was chaotic. However, their classmates who joined large companies at the same time were still receiving paid training.

On social platforms, the dynamics of large factory campus recruitments have also become a focus of attention for recent graduates. Posts under topics such as large factory campus recruitment time, large factory campus recruitment salaries, and large factory campus recruitment schools have all received a lot of likes.

It is understood that many large companies including Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan, Baidu, Douyin, JD.com, and Xiaohongshu have started campus recruitment.

Let’s focus on the campus recruitment situation of the first-tier Internet giants known in the industry as “ATMD” (Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan and Douyin).

1. Alibaba campus recruitment

More than 7 types of positions are open to recent graduates from home and abroad, including R&D categories including JAVA, C/C++, and algorithm categories including machine learning, algorithm engineering, in addition to data, security, design, etc.

2. Tencent campus recruitment

Campus recruitment has been launched in August, and Tencent's supplementary recruitment of interns is ongoing. This time, 130 positions are released, covering software development-backend development, software development-backend development, etc.

3. Meituan campus recruitment

This autumn recruitment is expected to recruit 6,000 people, covering 10 major categories and more than 100 positions, including technology, products, business analysis, operations, finance, supply chain, functions, marketing, design, sales, customer service and support.

In addition, the "Beidou Project", a recruitment project for cutting-edge campus science and technology talents, was also launched simultaneously. The positions involved include large-scale algorithms, large-model machine learning and other popular fields.

In addition to traditional methods such as "going to campus to conduct presentations" for campus recruitment this year, Meituan also applied digital methods to recruitment. For example, Meituan organized job experts, senior HR, interviewers, etc. to answer students' questions and provide employment-related consulting services through live broadcasts, mock interviews, and dialogues with industry experts.

In terms of the training system, Meituan has set up a "Budding Campus Recruitment Growth Plan", which offers more than 30,000 courses, provides exclusive workplace mentors for new graduates, provides special promotion channels and practical experience opportunities, and helps campus recruits grow through mechanisms such as fresh water and rotation.

4. Douyin campus recruitment

There are more than 750 job openings available on the official website, covering R&D, operations, functions/support, products, etc. Kuaishou offers 11 major categories including algorithms, engineering, and products.

Similar to Meituan, Douyin also adopted the form of offline campus lectures + online live broadcasts to provide employment support for the majority of recent graduates.

In terms of employee training programs, according to the CSR report previously released by Douyin Group, the company mainly provides learning resources for employees through the "Byte Learning" platform. At the same time, employees will also spontaneously organize thousands of interest groups to exchange experiences.

2. How to choose: ATMD is recommended

Faced with so much campus recruitment information from large Internet companies, I believe many graduates are already dazzled. How to choose from the large companies' campus recruitments and which one is more suitable for them has become a headache.

A comparison chart of the echelons of major manufacturers that has been circulating online recently looks not only clear but also very interesting.

Netizens use the strength of universities to compare the rankings of Internet giants. For example, the first-tier ATMD, namely Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan, and Douyin, are compared to Tsinghua University and Peking University; JD.com, Pinduoduo, Ant, and Baidu are compared to C9; Kuaishou, Didi, Xiaomi, and NetEase are compared to 985, etc.

There is a reason for this division. First of all, in terms of salary, which most people pay attention to, the four major companies ATMD have a great advantage.

Recruitment platforms show that the salaries for campus recruitment positions released by Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan, and Douyin are generally quite generous. Among them, Alibaba's JAVA and data research and development positions start at 10,000 yuan and can be as high as 25,000 yuan; Tencent's front-end development, product development and other positions are also generally between 10,000 and 26,000 yuan; Meituan's campus recruitment product manager salary range is between 15,000 and 25,000 yuan, which is not a low salary level for fresh graduates.

For recent graduates, salary is only one aspect. Development prospects, company benefits, and matching with personal career plans are even more important. The relevant learning and training, as well as future career planning provided by major Internet companies are obviously more comprehensive.

If you are good enough, you should definitely choose big Internet companies such as ATMD.

Compared with traditional enterprises, Internet enterprises have a broader strategic layout, and currently they basically develop through the integration of "online and offline".

Moreover, most importantly, you can compete and learn from outstanding predecessors and young people in large companies. If a person wants to go far, it is particularly important to have like-minded people around him and people with the same thinking dimension. Only when your thinking and vision surpass those in other industries can you always stay ahead.

I believe that many Internet practitioners have this experience when they go home. They find that they are not in the same logical thinking system as their former classmates. At the class reunion, they can only agree on food and drink, but can no longer reach a consensus on key views on some things. This is the difference created by the environment.

For non-related practitioners, the Internet is just a gadget for reading gossip after dinner. But for Internet practitioners, they deal with the Internet every day. It's all-in. So, who do you think will have more choices in 10 years?

it goes without saying.

One day online, three years offline.

You taste it, you taste it carefully, you taste it carefully.

Therefore, we recommend that the graduates of 2024 must give priority to large Internet companies such as ATMD. From the first step of career choice, you will be at the forefront and ahead of more people.

3. How to choose ATMD: both “firepower” and “matching” are required

Some outstanding students may ask, ATMD both look good, and they are all Internet companies that you described, and they all integrate online and offline development, so how should we choose?

On this issue, we believe that both ATMD are good, and if you can get into any of them, you will be extremely outstanding.

But if you get offers from four companies at the same time, how do you choose?

Based on the principle of helping people to the end, our answer is to give priority to going to places where there is artillery fire.

Which big companies in ATMD are the ones that have the gunfire?

Based on our experience as a technology website with 17 years of experience in Internet observation, we believe that Alibaba and Tencent can be defined as stable areas in the Internet field. After more than 20 years of development, these two Internet giants have formed their own mountains, and their layout of land, sea and air has been very complete.

For example, Alibaba is called the e-commerce empire and Tencent is called the social empire. Both sides are fighting small-scale local battles around their main battlefields, making repairs and patches, but it is difficult to open up a huge new battlefield.

We give some examples to help you understand the wars and the places where there were artillery fire in the past 10 years.

For example, Alibaba wants Alipay to do social networking and entertainment videos, but it is obvious that Alipay’s social dream has long been shattered, and the Youku section of its entertainment business is currently no match for Tencent Video and iQiyi.

For example, Tencent also wanted to attack Alibaba's e-commerce heartland and do e-commerce. At first, it had Paipai, which was similar to Taobao, but then it found that it could not do it, so it changed its strategy. If it couldn't do it itself, it would look for new forces to do it. It successively invested in e-commerce platforms such as JD.com and Pinduoduo, which to a certain extent tore open a hole in Alibaba's e-commerce empire. However, with Tencent giving JD.com shares, Tencent's e-commerce dream has basically come to an end.

Both companies have fought these battles. What we should envy are the predecessors who participated in the battles of the last decade. After the baptism of war, they have grown rapidly and have long become the backbone of major Internet companies.

Alibaba and Tencent have discovered that e-commerce is the foundation of Alibaba and social networking is the lifeblood of Tencent. The development of both parties is relatively stable, and there are few large-scale battles.

Therefore, we believe that in relatively stable Internet companies, it is not that there is no fighting, but the intensity and scale of the battles will be relatively small. For young people who are just entering the workplace, they may feel like "retirement".

This state may not be a good choice for young people. It may be better to go to a place closer to the gunfire. The logic is simple. In the early stage of entering the workplace, young people need opportunities to exercise. Only with sufficient opportunities can they grow rapidly and have the possibility of "enjoying stability" in the middle and late stages of their careers. And where there is gunfire, there will be enough opportunities.

Meituan’s goal is no longer just to deliver food, but to vigorously develop “retail + technology”, while increasing investment in local life live broadcasts, using its advantages such as high write-off rate and stronger basic service capabilities for local life to help merchants reduce costs, increase conversion rates and write-off rates, and bring some new changes to the entire local life live broadcast field. Douyin’s ambition is no longer just short videos, but also has its eyes on the local life cake. The businesses of these two major companies are still in competition and iteration, which also means that young people have more opportunities to grow.

In addition to measuring job search choices from the dimension of "firepower intensity", several major ATMD companies have different training strategies and employment preferences for campus recruits. It is necessary for everyone to understand these differences and make a more suitable choice based on their own situation.

There is a lot of discussion among professionals in the workplace. Although large companies in a relatively stable period have made considerable efforts in campus recruitment, they are more inclined to use mature social recruits for key personnel, preferring "plug and play". In layman's terms, it means "using experienced people" rather than "using new people". This is not good or bad, but a choice made by mature large companies.

Companies that are closer to the battle lines naturally have a greater demand for young people because of their business growth and rapid development. They are also more willing to give opportunities and hope that young people can bring new ideas.

For example, Meituan has been vigorously developing "retail + technology" in recent years, releasing many positions related to new businesses and new tracks, and its graduate recruitment scale is also increasing. In the past three years, Meituan has recruited more than 5,000 graduates annually, and the scale of campus recruitment for the class of 2024 exceeds the average level of the past three years. In addition, because its business and workplace are spread across the country, it provides positions in dozens of cities across the country, including Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, etc., which can provide flexible choices for graduates from all over the country.

Judging from campus recruitment information, except for large companies such as Alibaba and Tencent, which are in a relatively stable period, the positions and cities provided by other large companies, as well as the broad prospects of their business, will not be very different. Judging from the campus recruitment circle and industry discussions, the core difference between these large companies in recruiting campus students lies in their employment philosophy. In short, some focus more on "cultivation" while others prefer "free range".

As far as we know, Meituan has always attached great importance to the recruitment and training of campus graduates. It started recruiting campus graduates at the beginning of its establishment, and now has established a guidance of attaching importance to the recruitment and training of campus graduates from the top management level.

Don’t forget that Wang Xing and Wang Huiwen, the two founders of Meituan, started their business as students, and the earliest users of Xiaonei.com were all college students. You can see that the relationship between Meituan and college students is even deeper.

Wang Huiwen mentioned in a sharing session that since 2019, the management of Meituan has discussed the idea of ​​talent training and introduction, and decided to gradually increase the proportion of talents recruited from campuses to become the main source of talent supply. Meituan s-team members have also mentioned in many internal and external sharing sessions that they want to make campus recruits the main source of talent supply, and use a systematic training mechanism to allow campus recruits and the company to grow together in a longer-term and better way.

In order to help campus recruits adapt and grow quickly, Meituan's new employee training mechanism places more emphasis on long-term and systematized development. For example, it will launch a variety of learning products. After joining the company, campus recruits will participate in the budding campus recruit growth plan, be equipped with exclusive career mentors, and provide special promotion channels and practical experience opportunities. Through the fresh water and rotation mechanism, campus recruits will be helped to complete the transition of workplace roles.

Some other large companies have a different approach, preferring the latter approach over "cultivation". For a campus recruit who is internally identified as having high potential and strong ability, they do not spend too much energy on cultivation, but directly give him a key position and key tasks.

The benefit of this "free-range" approach is, of course, that young people may be promoted "rapidly." But for relatively inexperienced young people, the pressure is also obvious - when they first arrive in an environment that is "intensively bombarded," rapidly iterating, and full of pressure, getting started directly and "catching it" will give their careers a good start, but the risk of "not being able to catch it" is also great, and there will be many pitfalls. For those campus recruits who hope to have a smooth transition and be able to smoothly integrate into the workplace when they first enter, Meituan's "heavy training" approach may be a safer choice. The same is true in reverse.

In short, the selection of campus recruits is not as simple as one or two dimensions. Large companies like ATMD are good choices, but if you want to be more selective, there are many indicators that need to be measured. Business prospects, competitive landscape, number of opportunities, the perfection of the training system, and the employment orientation of campus recruits all require young people to consider their own actual situation. "Matching" may be the most important.

I hope that job-seeking fresh graduates can seize the autumn recruitment opportunities, find companies that match their personal development, and successfully get their dream offers.

Author: Whip Bull

Source: Bianews (ID: bianews8); accurate, fast and in-depth technology media