Graduate Scheme Panic

We’ve all got friends like it. Maybe you were one. Maybe I was. Who knows. 

“Fancy a drink?”

“Sorry, can’t I’ve got Amnesty/Foodwaste/Save the puppies AGM”

“Tomorrow lunchtime?”

“Lunchtimes? Are you serious? I’m interviewing local councillor/David Bowie/the Queen”

And now, post-university, they’re unemployed. They got a 2:1 (achievable), joined and ran every club under the sun (harder) and are personable. But they don’t have a job.

What went wrong?  I have several friends in this position and almost all of them have one thing in common:

They blindly applied for graduate roles.

Graduate roles are seen as the be all and end all of a university career. No graduate role? You are derided, cast aside and rejected by the university alumni people who call you up every week asking you what your leaver’s destination is.

“Seeking employment?” they sniff? “Did you not get on a graduate scheme?”

The phone line mysteriously goes dead. Your university doesn’t want you as a statistic. Seeking further employment doesn’t look great when they’re trying to attract new blood. 

“Oh him?” They’ll tell their supervisor. “No, we couldn’t get through.” And your number will be erased from the university alumni relations office contact book.

 But applying for too many roles when at uni, or post uni, is dangerous too. At some point you stop caring what the results of these applications will be. Graduate scheme at British Tobacco? Oh ok then, might as well. But you won’t get it, because you really couldn’t give a shit. The big four? KPMG? PWC? Well, are you good at  maths? No, but, well, go on, you might as well. And then you get rejected.

Because they know you didn’t wake up that morning, punching the air and saying: “Yes, one more step towards a lifelong career in audit!”

As previous posts have shown however, just because you want something like crazy, it doesn’t mean you’ll get that either. BBC graduate scheme-didn’t even get an interview. And I pretty much ticked every box going. And then some. Because graduate schemes are not the be all and end all. Focus on small production companies. Approach a small newspaper. Call up a regional auditors in your parents local town. Any architects nearby who’ll take you on for a few weeks of work experience?

Graduate schemes aren’t always glamorous. And quite often they can drag you through the hoops with you unwillingly holding the reigns with one hand. At each step you question whether you want it. But you keep getting through until the final selection day when you’re hideously rejected. And then you realised after all that work, preparation and effort, you’re still no closer to getting a job and the end of university is just 4 weeks away.

But don’t panic. Don’t apply blindly. Don’t rush yourself off your feet trying to fit mad amounts on your CV.  Relax, think about your point. What do you think you were put on this earth to do? What would you like to do? Because my guess was it wasn’t to end up working in a faceless office in front of a computer counting steel-piping imports. And if this was your dream, and you’ve achieved it: well done!