Alumni Outreach

European Alumni Warm Intros From a French Program

You have a real network from your French program, but it feels invisible when you need it. Here is how to turn a shared campus into a 30-second favor that gets you introduced.

Find Your Warm Intro →

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A plain LinkedIn search buries the people who would actually help you.

It ranks by prominence, so the most-followed, most-messaged names sit on top. FindWarmIntros surfaces the coworkers who share your school or a past employer - the people most likely to reply - and hands you a ready-to-send intro.

Example - what you’ll see
in
Someone who works at your target company
🎓 Same university as you  ·  💼 Shared past employer
🔥 Strongest
in
A recruiter at your target company
🎓 Same university as you
🎓 Alumni

✍️ Ready-to-send intro“Hi - we both studied at [your school]. I’d love to hear about your path to a company you are targeting before I apply…”

… plus everyone else in your network who can put in a good word.

See who can refer you in - pick your target company:

Short answer: Find alumni from your French program (MBWay Lyon, Modena, or your campus network) who already work at your target firm, using LinkedIn school filters or your program alumni directory. Message the ones who share your exact campus and cohort era, lead with the shared program instead of the ask, and request a two-line internal referral, not a coffee. A warm intro from a fellow graduate reaches the hiring team far faster than a cold application ever will.

Why your French program is an underused referral engine

Programs like MBWay Lyon and the Modena network graduate cohorts every year, and those people scatter across firms all over Europe. Most of them list the school on LinkedIn and quietly feel loyal to it, even years later. That loyalty is the asset. A stranger owes you nothing, but a fellow graduate of your campus will read your message differently because you passed through the same place.

The mistake is treating alumni as a mailing list. You do not need hundreds of them. You need the two or three who already sit inside the firm you want, because they can walk your name to the hiring manager in an afternoon.

How to find and approach the right alumni

Precision beats volume. A shared campus and a close graduation year gives the other person a real reason to help, and it makes your message impossible to mistake for spam.

  • Filter by school, not just company. On LinkedIn, open the People tab of your target firm and add your program as the school filter, so you see only graduates who already work there.
  • Prioritize the closest overlap. Same campus and a graduation year within three of yours means you likely shared professors, buildings, and references. Contact those people first.
  • Lead with the program in the first line. Open with the shared school and cohort before you say a single word about the job, so the reader knows within one sentence why you are worth a reply.
  • Ask for a referral, not a meeting. Request that they forward your name and one line to the hiring team. That costs 30 seconds, while a coffee costs an hour and often gets declined.

Let a tool do the finding so you spend your energy on the message

The search itself is tedious. Cross-referencing every graduate of your program against the firm you want, then guessing who is close enough to your cohort to actually respond, can eat an evening. FindWarmIntros does that finding-and-ranking part for you: you name the target firm, and it surfaces the real people there who share your school or a past employer, then drafts a warm intro you can edit.

That leaves you free to do the part software cannot, which is writing something honest and specific. Mention the professor you both had, the campus you both walked, or the year you overlapped. Specific beats polished every time, and it is the reason a fellow graduate says yes.

Frequently Asked Questions

What if no alumni from my program work at my target firm?
Widen the shared thread. A past employer, a shared internship, or a mutual professor can open the same door. If truly no one connects, ask a well-placed graduate at a similar firm to introduce you to their contact at your target.
Should I message alumni in French or English?
Match the person and the firm. If they graduated from a French campus and work in France, opening in French signals the shared background. For a graduate now at an international firm elsewhere in Europe, English is usually safer. When unsure, a short bilingual opener works.
How long should the first message be?
Four sentences. One naming the shared program, one saying why this firm, one clear ask for a referral, and one that makes saying yes easy by attaching your one-line pitch. Long messages read as work and get ignored.
Is it rude to ask a graduate I have never met for a referral?
No, if the ask is small and honest. Fellow graduates expect these messages and most are glad to help when it costs them 30 seconds. It becomes rude only when you demand their time or hide the ask behind fake networking.

Keep going

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