What is a coffee chat?

What happens in a coffee chat

Coffee chats happen on video, by phone, or over an actual coffee. A 20-minute chat usually follows a simple shape:

1. Thanks and a minute of small talk. Thank them for their time and ask how their week is going.
2. Your introduction. About a minute on who you are, what you are exploring, and why you wanted to talk to them.
3. Their story and your questions. Most of the time goes here. Ask open questions about their path and their work, and follow up on what they say.
4. A time check. A few minutes before the end, mention the time and let them decide whether to keep going.
5. The close. Ask who else you should talk to, thank them, and ask if you can stay in touch.

Because you asked for the meeting, you run it. You prepare, you bring the questions, you keep time, and you let the other person do most of the talking ¹³. The questions guide walks through each part, minute by minute.

Coffee chat, informational interview, or job interview?

The names overlap, so here is how they differ:

• Coffee chat with an alum or professional. An informal talk you request to learn about someone's work. You ask the questions. This is what these guides mean by a coffee chat.
• Informational interview. The name most career centers use for the same meeting. UC Berkeley's career center puts it plainly: "It is not a job interview, and its purpose is not to find job openings" ¹. Some advisers suggest saying "conversation" when you ask; one found the softer word "takes some pressure off both parties" ⁴.
• Employer coffee chat. During recruiting season, some companies host one-on-one chats with a recruiter or a recent graduate who works there ⁵⁶. They are relaxed, but they are part of recruiting. One career office warns that "Employers take attendance," so only sign up if you will show up ⁶.
• Job interview. The company asks the questions and decides whether to hire you for a specific role. A coffee chat has no role on the table.

Who to have coffee chats with

Alumni of your school. A shared school is a real reason to reach out, and career guides note that alumni often enjoy helping students who are following in their footsteps ²¹. Research supports the instinct. In a set of experiments, undergraduates were more willing to grant a request from someone they believed shared their birthday, first name, or fingerprint type, while a trait they believed was common did not help ⁷. Those studies did not test schools, but the lesson carries over: name the specific thing you share, like your school, program, or club.

People doing the work you want to do. Talk to someone in the role, a few years ahead of you, rather than the HR team ²⁴. Advisers differ on how far ahead. One suggests people five to ten years into their careers ⁴; another suggests one or two levels above where you would start ⁸. If you mostly want to know what the first years feel like, stay closer to your level. For a longer view of the field, go a little further.

People in roles you are still weighing. A coffee chat is a cheap way to test a path before you commit to it.

Why people you barely know can help

In Granovetter's classic 1973 study of job changers, 54 people had found their job through a personal contact. Only 16.7% saw that contact often at the time; 55.6% saw them occasionally and 27.8% rarely ⁹. When he asked whether a friend had told them about the job, respondents often corrected him: "Not a friend, an acquaintance." The sample was small, drawn from professional, technical, and managerial workers in one Boston suburb in the 1960s, so treat it as a starting point.

A far larger test came in 2022. Researchers ran randomized experiments on more than 20 million LinkedIn users over five years ¹⁰. Moderately weak ties produced the most job moves. Up to a point, ties with more connections in common helped, but adding ties with more than ten connections in common lowered the chance of a move. The pattern varied by industry: weak ties helped more in digital industries, and strong ties helped more in less digital ones. Two caveats: the study counted a "job transmission" when a connection later became a coworker, which is a stand-in for job help, and two of the authors worked at LinkedIn.

Close ties still matter. In data on 6 million Facebook users, most people got job help through one of their many weak ties, but any single strong tie was worth more ¹¹.

So reach out to alumni you have never met, and ask the people who already know you, like professors and former managers, too.

What a coffee chat can and cannot do

A good coffee chat can give you:

• an honest picture of the work, including the parts people like least;
• the words people in the field use to describe what they do;
• names of other people worth talking to;
• and sometimes, later, once you have built a real relationship, a referral.

Referrals are worth understanding. Across nine large firms in three industries, referred applicants were more likely to be hired than applicants without a referral, even though the two groups had similar skills ¹². In one study of one US financial-services firm, referred candidates were 6% of applicants but 29% of hires, and more than twice as likely as job-board applicants to get an interview ¹³. Career centers note that referrals carry particular weight in finance, consulting, and technology, and that they are not expected everywhere ²¹⁴.

A coffee chat cannot get you a job on the spot. Harvard's career office is blunt: "DON'T ask your contact for a job, even indirectly" ²¹⁵. Asking puts the other person under pressure and tends to cut the conversation short ¹⁶.

It is also not a secret door into a hidden job market. You may have heard that most jobs are never posted. For US jobs that require at least a bachelor's degree, Georgetown University researchers estimated from 2013 job-ad data that 80 to 90% of openings are posted online ¹⁷. A posting is not always how a job gets filled, though, which is where knowing people helps.

One honest caveat. Hiring through referrals has costs too: a labor economist's review notes that it can disadvantage women and minorities and can tilt toward friends and family ¹⁸. If you do not have family contacts in the field you want, that is one more reason to build connections early, on purpose.

The four steps

1. Ask. Pick one person and send a short, specific request. See how to ask for a coffee chat, with email templates.
2. Prepare. Research the person, practice a short introduction, and choose your questions. See questions to ask in a coffee chat.
3. Have the chat. Keep to the time you asked for, and save one question for who else you should talk to.
4. Follow up. Send a thank-you the same day, act on their advice, and tell them how it went. See how to follow up after a coffee chat.

FAQ

How long is a coffee chat?

Usually 15 to 30 minutes. Most career guides suggest 20 to 30, so asking for 20 minutes is a safe middle ¹². Stick to the time you asked for unless they offer to keep going.

Do I pay for the coffee?

If you meet in person, offer to pay, since you invited them. If they insist on paying, accept graciously ²¹⁹.

Should it be on video or in person?

Either is fine. One guide calls meeting in person ideal and a video coffee perfectly acceptable ²⁰; another says what matters is talking in real time, at whatever time and on whatever platform suits the other person best ¹⁹. If you happen to be in their city, offer coffee. Otherwise, video is normal.

Can I ask for a referral?

Most career guides say to keep referrals out of a first chat ¹⁹. One says asking can be fine once you have learned about the company and the person's role ¹⁴. The safer rule is to wait until you have built some trust and found a specific opening. The follow-up guide covers when and how to ask.

Keep reading

• How to ask for a coffee chat, with email templates
• Questions to ask in a coffee chat
• How to follow up after a coffee chat