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!

Being a fashion intern

So far it’s been less like Devil Wears Prada and more like the sofa of my kitchen on a rainy Sunday afternoon. People are constantly on a migration towards the teapot, huddled with laptops, casually typing out stories and shouting jokes around the room. In essence, it's essentially like any other office I’ve worked in, except there’s music.

Time Out is a  fantastic place to work and everybody is incredibly friendly, if a little busy.

My work so far has not been confined to coffee runs. Instead I’ve been in touch with PRs, writing out reams and reams of listings, generally getting confused with the image uploader they’ve got here. Most difficult, I've had to work out what Miu Miu means.

I am not your stereotypical Fashion Intern. For one, I don’t really care about fashion, and, as I pass the theatre/food/travel desks my head inclines wistfully towards them. But it’s a great step in the right direction and it mans that I get to shock friends and family with style advice. This comes from somebody who is happiest in leggings and oversized tee. 

I don't think it's going to turn me into some crazy Rachel Zoe lookalike (see! Fashion reference!!!), but it's making me appreciate the work that goes into producing a magazine as 'simple' as Time Out. 

 

How to get a job in London

Ok, so the job market is horrendous worldwide, apart from perhaps, Australia. Otherwise, the streets are akin to the 1930s. Even the colour has been sapped from the London streets, everything is in sepia, and for some reason, men have started wearing cloth caps and have swapped their Nikes for large shoes with gaping holes in the toes. Yes, we’re in a vast, yawning hole of depression, but there are still jobs to be had in London town, just how to go about it.

• Ensure you have friends in high places. This is easier said than done, obviously, but loitering around in coffee shops does have its advantages when it comes to making connections. I have now been offered a grand total of two jobs, just from having the fortune of sitting next to the right people at the right time. One man insisted that I come and interview for a job at his ski and snowboard company, despite the fact that I can’t ski or snowboard. Another man eyeballed my pictures that I was doctoring on my laptops and gave me a business card for freelance photography. I still earn money this way. So if you’re particularly lazy, and you prefer the idea of loafing around drinking hot beverages all day over, then waiting for the job to come to you is one way of succeeding in the London job market. I am proof that it can happen, you just a happy smile and to look job hungry.

• Go classic. Local restaurants and bars will respond to your efforts to traipse around the capital handing out promising looking CVs to all and sundry. Open the door to the establishment with a smile, extend your arm to the manager for a polite handshake and state why you’re there. Hopefully this will be enough to show the place you want employment in that you’re an excellent choice and that if nothing else, you have the stamina to be on your feet for hours on end.

• Do what my friend did and stand out from the crowd with quirky CVs. One of my friends, desperate to get a job in PR, poked his CV into a balloon, filled it with Helium and then left it at several PR firms, hoping to get their attention. He labelled it as a gift to the boss and provided a handy pin to prick the rubber. Do your research first: a small quirky surprise to a young PR manager could be a fatal shock induced heart attack to an older one. Worked for my friend though: he was offered called for five interviews in as many hours. While I don’t suggest that you copy this idea to the letter, other ideas are delivering your CV wearing fancy dress, presenting your CV in a 3D origami shape (if this is at all relevant to your job-perhaps applying to be a burger flipper in Maccy D’s won’t call for such a level of creativity) or making a hanging mobile out of your CV and sending it in a package to PR firms nationwide.

• Get in touch with a recruitment agency. Sometimes, these places can help to place you with the company of your dreams. Often, they arrange a little pre-interview with you first to make sure that you’re not going to embarrass them. Just make sure you’re clear about what type of job you’re looking for. I once went for an interview with an internet company who quizzed me about my computer coding skills and looked more and more dejected with every answer I offered. At no point had the recruitment consultancy suggested that I would need to be able to program or build websites: they’d told me that they were looking for someone to write product descriptions. Mad.

• Move out to the provinces. A growing number of graduates are opting not to move to London to find work. Despite the feeling that London is almost a primate city in the UK, more and more jobs are being found outside the capital for graduates. Jaguar Landrover recently offered a shedload of engineering roles for new engineering and physics students, while the BBC’s move to Salford has ensured that it’s no longer imperative for debt-ridden graduates to shell out more money for London accommodation. The big cities of Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds and Birmingham have a variety of jobs on offer, and, best of all, you’re less likely to be competing with EU workers who come to London tempted by the glitz, the glam and the exceptional restaurants. No-one ever went to Manchester for the glitz and the glam. 

I didn't get rejected SHOCK

Sometimes the JobHungryGrad really has to pinch herself. This often occurs when I've received rejection letters from companies I haven't even applied for or been invited to job interviews. This is such a rare occurance that sometimes JobHungryGrad's partner need to get the smelling salts out to revive her before she has the energy to blog about receiving an invite. Seeing as I don't often get job offers (it's the nature of the role of being constantly JobHungry) I rarely register shock at getting a job offer. Let's just say I'm out of practice.

So my initial reaction was this:

How do I celebrate a feeling other than rejection?

I have a job offer. Interesting new concept.

Relief: it's all over now (apart from the need to  apply for extra income part time job

But this is the anger for all the grads out there who are still wasting their wonderful young lives trying to find the elusive job of their dreams. Don't give up. Fierce determination. Pride. And lots of love from JobHungryGrad. 

Why it's important not to isolate yourself

Pret a Manger provides comfortable seats, ample plug sockets and an environment of white noise. At this Pret in Victoria, I'm starting to recognise the people around me. A teacher to my left, who comes to Pret to mark his papers in his free lesson periods. The server who knows what coffee I want in the morning (although the real coffee I want here is 'None Pret, your coffee tastes like grit') and the two girls who have more work coffee breaks than I'm sure their company allows.

It's nowhere near as sociable and friendly as a real workplace, but at least JobHungryGrad doesn't feel isolated and stuck at home.

I think isolation is the most danger that an unemployed graduate looking for work can put themselves in. There is a feeling that its totally possible to disappear from society and that nobody would notice. You, locked alone in your house, in a London suburb, could very easily disappear from the network and no-one would know. Of course, it's not true, but full days of having to converse with your mind, your fingers, and whoever might email you during the working day can leave you with a sense of solitude to the extent that you  start to feel as though you might be auditioning for the leading role in Gabriel Garcia Marquez' seminal tome.

If you're one of these filthy job-hunting scroungers, get to a coffee shop, zone into your work for the week and get on it. Hint number two: dress up. I'm wearing formal clothes because it makes me feel as though I'm 'really' working. Wear a hoody and gym leggings and chances are people won't take you quite as seriously.

Plus, good things come from working in coffee shops looking nice:

• On friday I got asked out on a date by a hot Danish guy 
• I've been given business cards from people after we've got chatting and they've heard my sad and desperate JobHungrySadGrad situation
• I got free coffee in Pret last week. I KNOW. 

Plus be courteous with your table/laptop space, or if you want to annoy telegraph readers, go crazy:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/9254698/Wi-fi-lingerers-in-coffee-shops-are-causing-territorial-disputes-academic-research-finds.html

It has been six days...

It has been 6 days since I last posted in this blog. Congratulations, JobHungryGrad must be busy with her new, high-powered 9-5 executive graduate position! Well done JobHungryGrad!

*Cue hollow laugh

Instead I have been writing. Writing won't get me a high powered 9-5 but it has brought me a sense of fulfillment and happiness. But that's not as important as money, is it? Because when we die, after a short average of 78 years on this beautiful, wonderful planet we call home, whether or not we achieved enlightenment will be ignored: instead what will count is the financial legacy that we will leave to our children and grandchildren.

Isn't it?

Recently, I watched all three (long story) of my grandmothers die or grow old while losing all the money they had managed to put away for a 'rainy day' because they had money, so they had to pay full fees for their nursing homes or house-care. Those who had less, were given grants or their 'fees' for these NHS services were subsidized.

This is not me, at 23, throwing down my towel and declaring that from now on, I will forgo work because I don't want to pay my nursing home fees. That would be ridiculous. But my generation now has a painful and lengthy period of financial woe ahead of us: in my graduate job I worked my ass off. And for what? My current housemates get in at 10pm and leave at 6am. Why? And for what?

For money? To survive? To achieve? To fulfill their ambition?

Or because we are expected to?

What is the right thing to do?

My generation has many questions, and perhaps, Messrs Cameron and Clegg, we'd like them answered. Where will all this lead, and when will this stupidity, this waste of human resources cease? 

Life cannot continue like this.

Jumping through the hoops of frustration

 Today I got some feedback for a job I felt that I had pretty much nailed. I didn't get it after jumping through 3/4 interview hoops. (THREE OUT OF FOUR. I know).

"We thought you were polite, well mannered, kind, friendly, enthusiastic, a pleasure to work with, an asset to be proud of for any team, passionate about our company/brand/identity, intelligent and an excellent communicator. But you didn't tell us how you'd created real change." 

Fair enough. I bombed on one of the pre-prepared interview questions. And why is that? Because I have never created 'real' change. I'm 23. I'm not Mark Zuckerburg. Yes, I worked on the Living Wage Campaign for the cleaners at the Minsitry of Justice. Yes, I co-ordinated fundraising for Burmese refugees in Thai refugee camps, but no, none of these things created 'real, everlasting change'.

Anyway, for those of you who are applying to jobs right now or are also unemployed (ahem, freelancing), I'm sure you know exactly what I mean.

It is an insane achievement to even be invited to interview right now. You could have the bestest CV in the whole wide world, and there's still a fat chance it would just be deleted as it entered the inbox of your recruiter. Job hunting today feels completely arbitrary.

But of course, if you're going through the motions of trying to find a job, you have to try to maintain this positive happy facade. Friends and relatives don't understand.

"Oh, you have so much experience, I'm sure you'll get a job in no time." This comment makes my blood boil. I know that. But yet I'm still job-less. Having experience in 2013 means nothing. Having 'enthusiasm' and 'intelligence' means nothing.

Job hunting is a process of luck. You can market yourself out of the window but essentially, it feels pretty random to me.

Did I mention that I got rejected from a job and the feedback was as follows: You misplaced a comma.

Am I sad and depressed?

Other than a fact that I'm currently house sitting for a friend whose housemates all work for the civil service fast stream, the company I just left, the most depressing thing is that I feel like everything's a little pointless.

That's not to say that I'm sad, depressed or suicidal, it's just you kind of have a little more time on your hands so you start thinking about where it all went wrong/right (if, like me, you're still convinced that leaving your last job was the best thing you could do right now). Here's an example. I was sitting on the bus yesterday at 6pm.

Teenage girl to her grandmother: I had extra art class today but I had to leave early because I needed to go and take my lifeguard exam but then I realised that I had left my swimming costume in the dance studio during rehearsals.

That is exactly what my life was like approximately 5 1/2 years ago. Minus the dance and plus some piano lessons. All the people I've met who are unemployed so far are either moping, don't have any experience because they spent all their time getting drunk at university and doing nothing else, or just aren't applying to anything. I'm in denial, and am calling my new period of unemployment 'freelancing' until the point when I get a new job and I can breathe a sigh of relief that the unstructured days of yesteryear are over. (I actually love it, I just feel guilty that I love it rather than conceding to societal mores and working a 9-5 because I'm not currently getting paid enough to buy milk).

So occasionally you do wonder what the point of it all was. Those of us who have jobs mainly dislike them, some lucky ones love them, and some lucky people who have excellent connections have excellent jobs. Others decide to risk it, change the direction you're pointing in and try to start again.

As my friend Clare's wardrobe says: 'If you're not happy with where your direction is taking you, turn around.'

What does an unemployed graduate do with their spare time?

As a JobHungryGrad, it is likely to assume that I have been applying for jobs by the bucketload. Assume away, but it would be untrue.

Instead, I'm drawing mind-map diagrams when I hunt for jobs. I presume that if I want to work in the future as some kind of writer, let's say journalist, then right now I want to be looking for jobs that allow me to communicate with people. That may not necessarily be a writing job (though bonus points if it is) but it needs to be a job where I get to discuss, debate and engage, because that's what I like doing.

The reason why I left the Civil Service was because I found the work a little dry, and although I applied my all to it, as Einstein said, "When a man sits with a pretty girl, it will feel only like a minute". When he sits with an ugly piece of detailed primary legislation, your life blood will sap out of you drop by drop. Basically, if you enjoy your job, it won't feel like you're working. Instead, it will feel as though you're partying all day.

So what am I trying to do about my sucky predicament? Well, first of all I have to get over the psychological guilt issue that I brought this on myself and others around me. I did, I know it's true, but now let's remedy it:

• 1. I am writing, a lot. I have been spreading my writer's seed around tens of online travel websites, I've been updating my travel blog and I've been adding to my non-fiction book on travelling ethically whilst undertaking budget travel.

• 2. I've started a business with a friend that I've had circulating around my mind for months but had to put it off until I have 'more time'. I now have plenty of time so I'm not getting my teeth into this project, which is fun and very exciting.

• 3. I've started to teach myself comprehensive SEO technique and HTML/CSS. Because my friend laughed at me when I told him I didn't know how to write HTML (I still hold that it was a bit cocky of him to do so) but now, I'm learning. How can I possibly become a good all-round journalist if I can't even code.

• 4. I've resubmitted applications for a Masters in Journalism Course at City University (but I wasn't meant to tell anybody that in case that stops me from getting a job)

• 5. I'm seriously thinking about the offer than was made to me to head out to Cambodia and go and work on the Pnomh Penh Posth for three months. SERIOUSLY THINKING ABOUT IT.

• 6. I'm buying a house.

• 7. I'm training for a 10k. Somewhere, somehow, I've always been a terrible runner but now the time has come to learn how to run 10k. So far the most I've managed is 8k, but I'm so close.

• 8. About to start a fiction book about sex-trafficking. That'll cheer me up no end during my inevitable weeks of job hunting.

• 9. The time has come to perfect the art of making Choux Buns. This time is tomorrow, ready for my boyfriend to come home from work.

• 10. Try to be happy, and if that fails, go out and take pretty photographs.

Greetings from the JobHungryGrad

One week ago I was employed on a graduate scheme.The Civil Service Fast Stream to be precise.  I'd got the job while I was at university, and it was the best and worst thing that's ever happened to me. It was the best thing because potential employers are pretty impressed that I got on the scheme, and the worst, because despite how impressed they all are, it now makes me too qualified to do anything.




Why did I quit my graduate job?

Firstly because it wasn't in the area that I wanted to work in, nor remotely close to it. It was designed to build skills for working in the civil service and for thriving in the civil service. Those on the scheme who were lucky enough to get a job with a corporate posting would probably fare quite well out of work right now, but, believe it or not, writing primary legislation, briefing ministers and writing speaking notes for parliament. Again, everybody seems really impressed by these skills, but once I've left the interview room they're all scratching their heads in realisation that their company 'don't have no ministers to brief' so I'd probably fail. 'Next!'

Secondly because the hierarchy was extreme. People in the civil service laughed about their colleagues being too regimented by grades and levels, and then balked when somebody asked them to do something they felt was beneath them. "But I'm a grade 7!". It's a well structured and interesting place to work, but I felt that I needed to work somewhere with a bit more freedom. I hated the fact that I had to check whether I was allowed to email somebody before I sent them a letter just in case they were too senior for me to approach them.

Thirdly. I want to write. I am happiest when I am writing all day long. It feels like my fingers are dancing when they fly over a keyboard and only when I'm writing do I get the numbing sense of pleasure that this is what I was put on earth to do. However. I'm not an idiot. What jobs are out there for people like me other than the 'satanic grist of the content mill' as the Guardian recently described copywriting websites?

So I have been applying for jobs that I wouldn't mind doing. More on the current situation of job applications from a JobHungryGrad soon. But please note that I am not a HungryJobGrad or worse, Hungry for a Graduate Job. I am looking for a job that isn't necessarily for graduates, but one that is interesting, requires some brain work and most of all, I get to communicate with others, regardless of whether they've been working here for 6 months or 60 years.