Startup Recruiting at Harvard

There isn’t a standard startup recruiting timeline. Some recruit a year in advance while some recruit in the Spring or a few months before the summer starts. However, Harvard offers many resources for students interested in working at a startup and students interested in creating their own startup.
Harvard Startup Career Fair
Under normal circumstances, Harvard hosts a startup career fair at the iLabs. Harvard and non-Harvard startups set up displays that summarize what they are working on and students are invited to walk around the iLabs, look at the various different startups and network with startup founders and employees.
Due to COVID-19, Harvard is instead hosting a virtual Harvard Startup Week this year from Monday, February 22 to Friday, February 26. Employer representatives will be invited to take part in various educational and networking events over Zoom. Startup week is open to all Harvard students.
Harvard iLab Resources
Harvard has an incredible resource known as the Harvard Innovation Labs (iLabs for short). The Harvard iLabs offers many different resources and opportunities for students interested in the startup sphere, including but not limited to a AR/VR Studio, a Pagliuca Harvard Life Lab, and much more.
The Harvard iLab also offers the Harvard Venture Program, which provides valuable resources and a supportive community for students who are working on creating their own startup. Students can apply to the Venture Program at any time of the year.
The Harvard iLab also offers the President’s Innovation Challenge, which is an annual competition amongst startups to win a portion of a $510,000 grant. The President’s Innovation Challenge is a prestigious competition that has helped many startups reach the next level. Applications open in early December and close in early January every year. This year, applications for the President’s Innovation Challenge opened December 9th and will close on January 6, 2021.
The Harvard iLabs also hosts many events for students to learn more about the iLabs and other core aspects of entrepreneurship.
“Going through the iLabs was really helpful. I highly recommend scheduling a lot of meetings with people in the iLabs. The iLabs has experts come through to give advice, which helped me a lot. I also learned from someone who created a biotech machine learning startup. She was very pragmatic and straightforward about how difficult it is to take technical innovations and turn them into a viable product, which was really eye opening for me.”
- Founder of Strada Routing, Harvard Class of 2023
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