This advice goes out to anyone who’s got their dream degree but not their dream job.
I remember having a conversation with a young acquaintance who was enrolled in a PR/Comms degree. She boldly said to me: “When I finish my degree I’ll walk STRAIGHT into a management role.”
At the age of 20.
Er, no.
Students often believe that a piece of paper will open all the doors with loads of money — but unless you’re a graduating doctor or dentist, this is pretty unlikely.
Here are some tips to help students get the experience they need while studying. Whether you’re a student straight out of school or the parent of one (or you’re just looking to change careers), this is advice worth taking.
1. Do your research.
What type of company do you see yourself working for? Is it a government agency, a private business or a huge conglomerate? These are pretty important questions to ask yourself, because they form part of your mud map in navigating the real world for your dream job.
There’s a plethora of organisations in the world, and there will be at least half a dozen that you’ll want to work for. You just need to work out which ones they are.
Check out company profiles, their ethos and their work, all of which will usually be on their company website.
2. Seek guidance.
I was always a great believer in obtaining feedback to check in on how I’m travelling.
Your lecturers are there because they have the experience to not only teach you but to guide you. If graduation is looming and you’re in a flap because you’re not sure which move to make next, your lecturer is the first person you should be having a chat with. They’re the people who will know where your strengths and weaknesses lie and how you can work on them.
This also prepares you for working under a boss that will give you feedback from the minute you get a job.
3. Prep your resume.
This is a big one. You need to have a kick-arse resume.
Forget the hobbies of ‘walking on the beach’ or ‘travelling the world’; these are nice things to want to do, but don’t really relate to working.
You can impress your future boss with your ‘interestingness’ when you get an interview. But for now, populate your resume with things that the employer you want to work for will be looking for.
Don’t worry about end-of-year exam results: just demonstrate an understanding of the role and show the evidence for this.
4. Find an internship.
Think work experience is just for bored high school spotty teens? Think again.
When you’re doing your degree, you need to be scoping the industry out for some work experience, which is usually called an internship. You need to be doing this in your first semester at the earliest.
I tend to advise students that they need to find their groove with the course content to make sure they’re happy with the course they’ve chosen and then start to approach employers they’d like to work for.
An internship is a wonderful opportunity to get a sense of the industry you’re planning to work in and, offers you some actual experience you can put on your resume when you graduate. If you do manage to score one, always be punctual, dress appropriately and be enthusiastic for any task you’re given.
Sadly there’s no magic potion for finding a job when you finish up at uni, but these tips should help you get prepared and more importantly, get noticed.
Now, go forth and find work.
Footnote: The family friend’s daughter is now working as a receptionist. She didn’t follow any of this advice. I rest my case.
What advice do you have for finding your dream job?
Want more? Try these:
The job interview mistake I didn’t even know I was making.
How to make your CV look impressive (no graphic design degree required).
Top Comments
What's wrong with being a receptionist, aye?
Yes I noticed that too, I'm sure many a stellar career has began from being a receptionist, after all, what better way to get your foot in the door after getting a degree, better than an unpaid internship anyway.
Since when did Australia decide that "internships" (aka free labour) was something students or post-students needed to do? Why should young adults have to work for free to get experience? What happened to "graduate positions" that were paid - as they should be. Unpaid work experience is to get a taste of different jobs, for school-age children to give them an idea of what career they might like to pursue. Unpaid work for more than a week or two, for adults (even young adults), is called charity - and most young adults looking for work (including University students) don't have the time to do a lot of charity work, as they are too busy trying to earn a living to pay the rent. How do you expect them to study, and do part-time work earning money to live on, AND do an unpaid internship?
Unfortunately the reality is that without those unpaid internships under your belt, most employers will not hire you. I am a past graduate but returned to university 6 months after graduating to complete my masters. So far, I've completed 5 internships that were outside the scope of 'student placement' which all lasted approximately 3 months (they were done part-time 2 days per week). Simply attaining them was difficult due to insurance and liability issues, but without them on my resume I can easily state that my resume/CV would be looked at and thrown right in the bin if I were to apply for a position. Many of my friends have struggled for months and even more than a year in attaining a job in their area of study after graduating, even with an internship under their belt. Long gone are the employers that give graduates a chance or provide them the opportunity for experience.
I ESPECIALLY love employers advertise vacant positions and state they are open to recent graduates on their advertisement but stipulate in their requirements that 2-3 years of experience is required. What the?
Students who are aware of such struggles, are working part time jobs, studying and putting in extra hours of internship or placement hours and in turn sacrificing sleep, exercise and social gatherings with friends and family because they need to earn some form of income to stay a float. Unfortunately for many students like me, I don't receive a dime from Centrelink or any government agency whilst I study and our parents aren't in a position to support to such an extent that we are able complete internships without working part-time simultaneously. But in the end, I can only hope that my lack of sleep and looking like a zombie most mornings will pay off once I graduate!! It would be fantastic if more paid internships were available to students, because lets be honest, there is only so much sitting in a lecture and a tutorial will teach you!!! Here is hoping things change!!!
I think it depends on the "culture" of the industry. In IT which I work I have never heard of anyone doing an unpaid internship outside of a University placement.
Gentrified slave labour
It's definitely goes off the culture of the industry! Unfortunately anything slightly creative, an internship is a must before graduating. Some people won't even consider giving you an internship if you've already graduated. It's a horrible attitude employers have, because they simply cannot understand that some people can't afford to give up two days of potentially paid work to do an internship. It gets harder if you're doing a degree that you have to buy expensive supplies for on top of doing internships, to the point that I know several people that have had to defer their studies or change completely.