• Michael Penn will graduate from Fordham University with a Masters in Global Management in two weeks
• The industrious student has not heard from Goldman Sachs, but has had several interviews
• Penn says the experience and surrounding attention has changed his life for the better

By Ryan Gorman

PUBLISHED: 18:14 EST, 16 August 2013 | UPDATED: 18:15 EST, 16 August 2013

Having not heard from Goldman Sachs after applying online, Michael Penn took matters into his own hands by handing out coffee and doughnuts August 8 on the sidewalk outside the bank's lower Manhattan headquarters.

Facing the end of school and having no job offers, Penn, 23, decided he had to do something to stand out. So he set up a table on the sidewalk outside Goldman Sachs advertising a website with his resume and contact information - all because he wants to work for the famous investment bank.

‘It is the pinnacle, it’s everything we learn about in school, it is the top,’ Penn told Fox Business when asked why he wanted to work for Goldman Sachs.

Though Penn told Fox Business that he never did get an interview with the famous investment bank, he has had several interviews, and for that he’s grateful.

Penn is graduating with a Masters in Global Management from Fordham University in two weeks and is looking for work in business development.

The idea was to stand out by doing something unique, as well as getting in front of potential decision makers, Penn told multiple media outlets.

‘It’s just simple economics — supply and demand. The jobs are there. There are just more master’s and MBAs out there now. You really need to get out there and differentiate yourself,’ he told ABC News.

His table had a banner with his website, www.HireMichaelPenn.com, and his coffee cups came with custom-made sleeves that had contact information and a short job seeking pitch to anyone interested.

It didn’t take long for Penn to hear back from someone interested in his brand of ingenuity.

‘My girlfriend saw you doing this, she took a picture,’ Penn told WPTV a potential employer said to him. ‘I'm intrigued. I want to speak with you, how fast can you get down to my office?’

Penn was there later that morning for an interview, and has had several since, according to reports.

Though he still has no job offers, Penn told Fox Business the drastic action was necessary because he couldn’t see himself having to live in his parents’ basement like so many of his fellow graduates.

The whole setup set Penn back only $150, he told Fox Business, and even that had to be earned. Penn’s mother funded the operation by paying him to design a website, he added.

His website lists his experience, multiple degrees and even that he was a US Chess Federation National Co-Champion at age nine, in 1998, his studies on three continents and his co-founding of Finding Refuge, a non-governmental organization whose goal is to eradicate child slavery in Ghana – Archbishop Desmond Tutu is a spokesperson.

Despite the down economy and considerable student loan debt from graduate school Penn remains hopeful.

‘My life has changed for the better,’ Penn said, ‘I’m so fortunate, so blessed and so grateful.’

Penn is just the latest in a series of people who have been forced to use innovative means to find jobs during the so-called Great Recession.

In 2011, several people put their faces on billboards in multiple stations of San Francisco's BART transit system, and set up the website www.weallneedjobs.com. The campaign resulted in eight people finding work, according to the site.

During the height of the recession, in 2009, Jamie Varon was out of work and started the website TwitterShouldHireMe.com. The site went viral on social media and Twitter executives brought her in for a meeting, she told CNN. Something else happened though, she discovered her talent for web design, so did many others.

Varon has since started Shatterboxx, a web design company.

'You're not always going to get the company you're going after,Varon told CNN, 'but you could get something better.'