20 replies to this topic

[Cooperman]

In my very first lecture in uni the lecturer told us " 80% of graduates will be working in completely different roles to their degree within 10 years of graduating"

I graduated 8 years ago with 120 people on my course, only a handful are still working within the industry.
My advice would be to broaden your search to other job roles. From my experience employers use a degree to gauge how good you are at learning, so your degree could only be partly relevant to the job but it indicates you have the ability to learn.

It took me nearly 4 years before I got a career rather than just a job. You just have to keep applying even though its frustrating. One "graduate" role I applied for wanted 5 years experience... How does that work!
A couple of jobs I applied for I left my degree off my CV and I had more success :/


Good luck with the search.

I hope he wasn't a lecturer in English as he should have said '....will be working in completely different roles FROM their degree within 10 years.......'

(Sorry, I couldn't resist that  ).

[humph]

A couple of points worth mentioning

1. You haven't been travelling yet? If not when do you expect to return and start work? Most companies will either want someone to start straight away or will take one intake of graduates each year, usually August/September. If your plans for travelling mean you can;t fulfil the former, and won'tbe back in time for the latter then this may be holding you back.
2. Most companies expect graduates to start straight from uni, but you graduated in 2014.  This isn't a problem at all, but you need to make sure that you fill the time between graduating and now on your CV with good working experience. The last thing an employer will want is to see gaps in a CV that suggest that you've graduated and then done nothing with your time.
3. Your hobbies and interests along with any responsibilities and awards that go with them e.g. scout leader, Duke of Edinburgh award etc. are very important on a graduate CV as yo're aware.  They show leadership skils, trustworthiness, & responsibility. At the very least they will give an interviewer something to ask you about in an interview, and give you an opportunity to talk about something with enthusiasm and knowledge. Hobbies like reading, music etc. are of no use whatsoever.
4. If you get an interview make sure you do plenty of research on the company, you can guarantee the first question will be "So what do you know about us here at......? When you answer "Not much really", the interviewers first thought will be to wonder why you have even applied to them other than desperation.
5. As a graduate you really need to be applying all over and willing to travel/relocate to get a job. This can be difficult on a graduate salary, and a wrench if you have family/partner, but unless you're willing to do so you'll only limit your opportunities. I worked away 5/6 days a week for the first 5 years of my career, it's a pain but do it whilst you're young. Remember, it only needs to be reasonably short term, getting your first job is always the most difficult, once you've got one any further career moves will be a lot easier. Stick with it.

    

[TMW.Racing]

Is a bit of a left field approach but it's a very good starting point if the automotive sector is your aim is to look into being a contractor.

 

I graduated in Summer '13 with a degree in Motorsport Technology, I'm now contracting at Jaguar Land Rover. Its a different route and not for everyone as you dont get the perks of a permanent employee (i.e. paid holiday / paid sick leave etc etc) but what you go get is a massive amount of experience, a huge opportunity to make a good name for yourself for the future, a good working environment and bloody good take home pay for a first role out of uni! Its proving a very good starting point for quite a few grads, myself included!

 

Best way in if you are interested in going down this route is to trawl collective job sites - indeed.co.uk is a very good one as you can search by role and location. Once you find something, phone the agency first to find out more about the role and to introduce yourself to them - that way you can get more info on the role, but more importantly they will be expecting and waiting for your CV so it hopefully wont be lost in the list!

 

Like I say, not for everyone but has done well for me!

 

Good Luck!!

[se_juggles]

Im a chef so it is not hard to find work anyway as we have a website called caterer.com and once your cv is on there agencies call you constently with jobs. That said if we want to get into a high quality establishment we do something called a starge which is where you go and work there for a week un paid in the hope that they will offer you a position either because of your hard work, or because a position becomes availible. I am not sure if this would be possible in other jobs but it might be something to think about?

[miniman24]

Thanks for the replies to this, Ive been taking it all in. Just a bit more background info, yes I graduated in 2014 and I realized pretty much instantly that, as humph says, I would need to be applying to jobs nationwide and be able to re-locate. Straight out of uni this was impossible as I didn't have the money to be able to, so I planned to work locally to me for a year in order to be able to re-locate - that year is now up and I have saved up the money, so I am applying to nationwide grad schemes.

 

RE extra curricular activities, I don't think a lack of those is holding me back, here is the relevant section of my CV:

 

Personal Accomplishments to date  
   
Silver Duke of Edinburgh Award plus full preparation for Gold
Running of successful online business dealing with high value products (vintage rally navigation equipment being the main focus)
Accomplished at Computer Aided Design
Attended Air Cadets for 4 years between the ages of 14 and 18, attained rank of Corporal
Drill commander and events organizer at Air Cadets
Walter German Rose prize for Technology
Total restoration of two classic Mini’s, one the only example of its type known to exist
Accomplished skier
PADI Open Water Advanced Qualified Scuba Diver.
Rookie lifeguard silver qualification plus competition at county level swimming events
BTEC Level 2 in public services
Highfield Level 2 food safety certificate
Full, clean UK driving license.
 

As the second one says, I have also started my own business dealing mainly with the restoration and sale of Heuer rally clocks - its been very profitable in the short term but is not sustainable - I think Ive probably worked on about half out them out there and its slowing down, I never meant it to be anything long term though.

 

Im applying to all kinds of roles, from engineering related ones to sales and management etc - not heard back from any yet though.

 

Are there any kind of apprenticeships that take on graduates? At this point Id be willing to work for less if it gets me into a big company, maybe should have gone this route after my A-levels!

 

Thanks for the advice

Edited by miniman24, 26 May 2015 - 05:40 PM.

[humph]

where are you based?

 

As a CAD user have you come across BIM (Building Information Modelling)? The government decreed that all public sector building schemes should be BIM compliant by 2016, and the construction sector is way behind where it should be so it's a growth market.

 

http://www.bimtaskgroup.org/bim-faqs/

 

http://www.autodesk....deling/overview

 

There are jobs like this one available, it's just an example, location isn't ideal.

 

http://mycareer.cost...age=1&jobID=640

Edited by humph, 26 May 2015 - 07:38 PM.