EPFL Forum
Founded 42 years ago, the Forum EPFL association organises one of the largest job fairs in Switzerland each year, aimed at students from the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne. The event takes place at the SwissTech Convention Center and brings together over 200 companies and 140 start-ups from various sectors over five days. This essential meeting aims to promote exchanges between future graduates and recruiters, and to facilitate the professional integration of young talents from EPFL.
EPFL Forum
Founded 42 years ago, the Forum EPFL association organises one of the largest job fairs in Switzerland each year, aimed at students from the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne. The event takes place at the SwissTech Convention Centre and brings together over 200 companies and 140 start-ups from various sectors over the course of five days. This not-to-be-missed event aims to foster exchanges between future graduates and recruiters, as well as to facilitate the professional integration of young talents from EPFL.
In 2016, MobileThinking was tasked with maintaining the old platform of the EPFL Forum. The latter was nearing the end of its life and no longer met the committee's needs. In 2018, we began to develop a comprehensive specifications document for a new platform. Several design workshops were conducted with committee members to better understand the needs and complexities of organising this recruitment fair. Development began the same year and concluded a year later, in 2019. The platform was inaugurated at the 2020 edition, which brought together 146 companies, 60 start-ups, and 2,300 students.
Since then, we continue to evolve it with new features each year. For instance, since 2023, the EPFL Forum has organised a dedicated day for NGOs, which can register on the platform and reserve a stand. New services have also been added for start-ups, allowing them to request access to the CVs of registered students. On the organisational side, the committee can now manage the number and size of stands available for reservation for each day. Various improvements have also been made to the management of meals and invoices. The committee can also organise different events throughout the year for students, such as CV creation workshops. Student registration for these workshops is done directly on the platform.
What was our approach?
Design aspects
The organisation of the EPFL Forum is complex and takes nearly a year for the committee. This complexity arises from the significant number of services offered to both companies and students. The platform has become central to this organisation, from reservation to billing. The committee changes each year, which brings in new ideas for services or improvements.
Companies can reserve and manage:
- a booth and equipment
- meals for their employees, with management of dietary requirements
- presentations and associated materials
- workshops, equipment and catering
- cloakrooms, as well as appointments organised via the platform
- badges
They can also manage their profile, visible to students.
Students can:
- manage their profile and CV accessible to companies
- book appointments with recruiters via the interview boxes
- register for workshops
- sign up for other events of the EPFL Forum throughout the year
Companies can view a filtered list of registered students and their CVs. Students can view the list of companies and book appointments or workshops.
Technical Aspects
The platform has been developed using the Laravel framework for the backend and a combination of Blade and Vue.js components for the frontend. The first version was created with Laravel 6 and is now updated to version 10.
Technically, each module is based on a common foundation, making the platform generic and ready for the addition of new modules. Each module is governed by an access rights system; a company can only see what pertains to it, and the same applies to students. Services such as workshops or maintenance boxes can be made visible to everyone or only to students who meet certain criteria (level or field of study). These rights are managed via a permissions module applied as middleware, blocking all unauthorised access.
All modules are tested automatically. Over 1,200 unit and functional tests are run with each update.
In conclusion
We always enjoy working on this platform, as well as with the organising committee of the EPFL Forum. Each year, the new committee brings fresh ideas for improvements and gathers valuable feedback from users. Through this approach, the platform evolves regularly, thus facilitating its maintenance. Although the services offered to companies generally remain the same, the means made available evolve and modernise. For the 2024 edition, significant changes are actually planned to further simplify appointment management and, consequently, recruitment for companies.
Since 2020, the platform has hosted 4 editions of the EPFL Forum, with the 5th currently underway. More than 10,800 users have created an account since the first version, including 9,000 students. Over 1,000 companies have registered during these years, reserving 650 stands, 120 interview booths, and more than 1,000 meals. More than 15,000 appointments have been organised between companies and students.
