Students on Handshake can submit reviews for the jobs and internships they have participated in. Additionally, after a job or internship review is submitted, students may choose to share their thoughts on the interview process as well.
These reviews can offer other students a perspective on the job or internship experience and offer employers valuable feedback.
While sites like Glassdoor are already popular with students, career centers get no insight into this data. Handshake bridges this gap, and in so doing brings tremendous value to both career centers and students!
Approved reviews are visible on the company's profile to students, which helps in multiple ways:
- More informed career exploration and decision-making
- Specific advice regarding the company and its roles
- Insight into a company's culture, mentorship, learning, etc.
Reviews also benefit career centers by:
- Getting comprehensive data on internship and co-op outcomes, enhancing student lifecycle reporting
- Building relationships with new employers that your students love
- Enhancing your career counseling efforts by referencing tangible stories of student experiences
Note: career services users must have the Manage Student Profiles role to access the Reviews tab in Handshake. To learn more about user roles and permissions, refer to School Settings: Career Services Staff Roles and Permissions.
How do we collect reviews?
There are three different ways students can submit reviews for employers in Handshake.
1. Handshake's email campaign
Handshake sends an annual email campaign in the fall to activated students encouraging them to submit a review.
This survey starts by asking students, “What did you do this past summer?” and allows students to select non-work experiences like “Research” and “Taking Time Off”. If a student indicates they participated in an internship, they have the option to leave a review.
Here's an example of what this email may entail:
Subject line |
{{First Name}}, a chance to win $100 for sharing your summer experience |
Header |
Share your experience for a chance to win. |
Body copy |
Hi {{First Name}}, We want to hear about your summer internship experience. Take a 5 minute survey today and have a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card. Your review will help other students on Handshake find the right internship. And when you complete your review by November 5th, you'll be entered to win! Simply respond by clicking the button below. [Share My Experience] Thank you, |
2. Directly from their Handshake account
Students can submit a review directly from their account.
If the student has already written a review, their reviews are listed on this page.
For more information about the student's process of submitting a review, refer to Reviews in Handshake.
3. The company's profile in Handshake
Students can submit a review directly from the employer's company profile. They'll click the Reviews tab, then the blue button Write a review.
For more information on the student's process of submitting a review in Handshake, refer to Reviews in Handshake.
Accessing reviews as a career services user
Click Reviews from the left navigation bar - all Job Reviews will automatically load on the page. Use the filters on the left side of the page to narrow your results or find a particular review.
Click Interview Reviews to access all reviews related to interviews.
Content moderation
All reviews submitted in Handshake undergo a two-step moderation. To learn more about this process, refer to About Handshake Reviews Moderation Process.
Review Status
There are 4 statuses in which a review can be in Handshake:
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Pending
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Reviews that have been submitted, but have yet to be moderated by Handshake. This is the default status for all Reviews (that are not marked as private or not connected to a Handshake employer) until they have been through our moderation process.
- Note: only Handshake moderators have the ability to change the status of a review, and it may take around 3 - 4 days for the review to be changed to “approved” or “declined.”
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Reviews that have been submitted, but have yet to be moderated by Handshake. This is the default status for all Reviews (that are not marked as private or not connected to a Handshake employer) until they have been through our moderation process.
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Unpublished
- Reviews that have been marked as private, or isn't connected to a Handshake company.
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Approved
- Reviews that have passed the moderation process.
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Declined
- Reviews that did not pass the moderation process.
To access reviews by their status, use the Status filter on the upper-middle section of the Reviews page.
Employer attributes and ratings
Students are asked to select attributes they feel best describe the employer in the reviews survey. These attributes were generated after extensive feedback from students about what they value in potential employers. If enough students select an attribute for an employer, that attribute is shown in the “Highlights” section of the reviews tab on the employer page. Many students have shared feedback that these attribute highlights are very helpful for them to get a quick understanding of what differentiates this employer from others
Star ratings are not shown to students, and only viewable to career services users. In our pilot, we found them to be unhelpful to students, as originally constructed on a one-to-five-star scale. Ratings in the pilot were overwhelmingly positive - the average rating was 4.5 out of 5. They therefore provided very little signal to differentiate employers and provide value to students. We will instead show employer attributes (as described above), that provide a more nuanced and helpful signal about what makes an employer special.
FAQ's
Career Services Reviews Functionality
Can I report on the Summer Experience survey questions? (Example: students who were doing research, volunteering, taking classes, studying abroad, taking time off or other).
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- At this time you can't report on this question in the application, but you can reach out to our support team and request a report with this information!
Can staff receive alerts when reviews are flagged?
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- We do not currently have this functionality, but will circle back with our plans in this regard.
For multi-office campuses, can we get the ability to filter by schools?
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- We do not currently have this functionality, but will circle back with our plans in this regard.
Is there a way to view the Q&A’s posted by our students?
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- Yes! You can pull these from the Q&A Insights Explore here. This view shows all questions and answers on Handshake, and you can filter by “Answerer School” or “Asker School” to get to your students’ questions and answers. If the school is listed as null, the student chose to be anonymous.
What are some useful reports from the Analytics tool on Reviews?
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- Majors of students submitting the most Reviews report here
- Distribution of privacy submission status (students submitting public or private Reviews) report here
- Full list of employers that your students submitted Reviews for report here
Employers
Where can employers access their reviews in Handshake?
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- Employers can access their reviews on their company pages, exactly as students can view them. They will also be able to flag and reply to reviews on that same page.
Will all contacts at an employer be notified when they get a new review, or just one point of contact?
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- By default, all recruiters for a given employer will receive in-app (not email) notifications every time a new review is published.
- They will have the option to opt-in to email notifications on an individual basis if they so choose. We will make this clear to them in our communications to employers and Help Center resources.
What if reviews are left for employers not currently on Handshake?
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- If reviews are left for employers without a Handshake account, we currently have no way of displaying that review in product.
- However, with 650k+ employers currently on Handshake, the majority of reviews are attached to Handshake employers.
What if reviews upset an employer?
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- We’ve found most submitted reviews to be thoughtful, constructive and high-quality. None of the employers we’ve spoken to have raised issues with example approved reviews we’ve shown them. On the contrary, they’re excited about the ability to engage with students in new ways.
- If an employer believes a review does not meet our Content Guidelines, they are able to flag that review for secondary moderation. Employers also have the ability to reply to reviews, a great opportunity to proactively address feedback and show students they are engaged and listening.
Students
How will reviews be presented to students?
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- Reviews will be shown on an employer’s job profile and employer profile.
Is there any way for a student to write an anonymous review?
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- Yes, students are able to select how they would like their review to be shown in Handshake:
- Fully visible: Display full name, photo, school, school year and major
- Semi-anonymous: Hide full name + photo, but display school, school year and major
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Anonymous: keep it private to only their career center
- After talking to students, the overwhelming feedback was that totally anonymous reviews were significantly less valuable. This is because some context around the reviewer is important for understanding if a review is relevant to a student. For example, an English major at a small liberal arts college may find a review from an engineering student at a large state school interesting, but less relevant to them personally.
- Yes, students are able to select how they would like their review to be shown in Handshake:
Can students make their reviews visible only to other students and not employers
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- We are making it clear to students that if they choose to share their reviews publicly, they should expect that employers will be able to see it. Because even if Handshake limited access to “just students,” employers could well still see their review (for example, by asking one of their interns to show them reviews via the intern’s student account). We are optimizing for ensuring we do not create a false expectation of privacy by a student.
Do students at my school only have access reviews from other students at my school?
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- Students will be able to view reviews from all schools across the Handshake network. This is a core principle of our Reviews feature. We believe that harnessing the power of the network will provide a significantly more valuable experience, for students to be able to see reviews from a far broader set of employers and job functions. For example, if you are a student at a technical school in Arizona, but are interested in working in design in New York, you will likely benefit from reviews shared by design students at a school in the New York area.