Job Fairs...Worth It or Worthless?

I am sitting here debating whether or not to attend a purportedly EXCELLENT job fair tomorrow. The organization that is hosting the job fair is impeccable and does everything it does 1st class. So why am I hesitating?

I've been to job fairs in the past, but not in probably the past 10+ years. First of all, job seekers at job fairs remind me of herds (I've been part of the herd many times), and in the job hunting game, you never want to be seen as part of the herd---you want to stand out above the herd to the hiring managers.

More importantly, in almost every case, the booths at job fairs are populated by recruiters. Now before recruiters flame me, let's be honest and agree that recruiters have no power to hire anyone. They are the screeners for the hiring managers, and in fairness to recruiters, they can't be experts for every job for which they are working to find candidates. Let's face it---recruiters are salespeople for the company. I've talked to many recruiters over the phone, and when they asked me questions that I'm sure they were instructed to ask, they could not clarify the question for me, as they weren't training and development people (makes me suspicious as to whether they really understood my answers to their questions). Our conversation was of little benefit to me for learning about whether the position might be a fit for me, and remember, a job search is as much as finding a fit for you as it is the company finding a fit for their needs and culture.

All this said, people do get hired by attending job fairs. It just seems to me that the people that get hired from job fairs are high-ranking IT or other technical people. Those of the kind of candidates recruiters would sell their first born to have walk up to them. I'm sure others get hired through job fair attendance; maybe it's just me, a training/HR type that doesn't get any leads or generate much interest from recruiters at a job fair. To me, it's always seemed like it was anything but fair.

So....I've talked myself out of going to the job fair in the morning. I've submitted resumes for the two positions listed at one of the attendee companies and will spend my time networking and seeking contacts for that company on LinkedIn, as well as preparing for a phone interview with a target company at 10am.