Employment Edinburgh
Employment
Towards the end of your student career, the whole employment issue will raise its neatly coiffured head.
Your university’s careers service will help. They differ in size, effectiveness and what they’ll offer to do for you. but you’ll want to mastermind the hunt for yourself anyway.
Job Fairs and Graduate Recruitment Fairs will most likely become a regular fixture in your life. Employers have stands where they try to convince you to work for them and you try to convince them to employ you. Despite how it sounds, people and jobs don’t pair up quite as easily as you might think.
The name fairs’ makes them sound like summer and, sure enough, they’re most prolific in June and July. But that’s where the similarity ends. There’s not a swing boat or tombola in sight. If you’re after a rural metaphor, they’re more reminiscent of cattle markets, only most of the livestock are wearing suits. Strangely enough, the cattle theme continues these fairs and mini-fairs are known at individual universities as the milk round’.
There are general fairs for jobs across the board and specialist ones for different industries or fields. Each offers seminars and advice, and they provide a unique opportunity to meet hoards of potential employers all in a flock.
Make an irresistible CV and take plenty of copies along with you. Dress up smartly and sell yourself. Be prepared for an interview on the spot.
Even if you don’t end up with a job, you can scout the territory, find out about different jobs, different companies and how to get in to what you want to do. You can also network get names, numbers, contacts and pick up on the leads later.
You can find out what fairs are where in the Education and Careers section of the Independent on Thursday or the Graduate (Rise’) section of The Guardian every Saturday.
After graduating, if you’re not walking straight into a job, take the opportunity to pick up some office and IT skills or to improve on what you’ve got.
If you’re not completely sick of education, you could even enrol on a short training course. There may be yet more costs involved, but there are a few schemes to help out. See www.waytolearn.co.uk for more information.
If you’re lucky, you may even find an employment agency that’s willing to give you some free, basic training even if it’s nothing more than improving your typing speed or introducing you to a software package. Don’t knock it. Keyboard skills and computer literacy are often a decider when it comes to getting a job. They also make life easier once you’ve got one.
A balanced budget
- In the red: handling debt
- After university