Graduate recruitment: trainee vurglesplatters needed!

So, in a hilarious turn for the weird, in my new job one of my responsibilities in graduate recruitment.

“Do you know anything about graduate issues?” they asked me, and I sort of burbled a bit and then got afraid they'd seen my blog. (IF SO: HI GUYS.)

I actually really enjoy my job. People are still nice, I'm getting more responsibilities, I don't have horrible jaggy days where I hate myself and my job so much I just want to cry or burn down the office or possibly both. Okay, I still occasionally think 'Is this it?' and the Circle line is the bane of my life, but things are on the up.

My job has also opened my eyes about graduate recruitment. Now, I've actually been part of several recruitment drives before, and I've also a few years now of HR and employment law and all that stuff. All the things I've said previously remain valid. However, never before had I seen specific graduate recruitment. Sure, I've seen the other side of it as an applicant, but this is new to me.

And finally! it means I have something relevant for blogging about. My reflections on London, whilst fascinating to myself, are a wee bit off message, and a lot of the other stuff is difficult to write about in a sufficiently anonymous way.

So, for future reference, I work in a company that specialises in providing vurglesplat experts to the wider world. What's vurglesplat, you say. Well, bluntly, it's a small industry full of nerds and I'm not being specific. Crucially, I work in the HR department. The technological people may as well be doing vurglesplat for all I understand of it. It makes for an entertaining night at the pub, where they talk about their projects and then look at me expectedly.

Anyway, we are now looking for junior vurglesplatters. Vurglesplat is something you can study at uni in modules and in specific postgrad courses, and even if your interest is only peripheral then it's okay, because lots of training is provided. Good degree in something vaguely relevant – business! maths! IT! engineering! all elements towards vurglesplat! - and perhaps some work in the field, ish, and that's all we're asking.

Stupidly, I thought this would be easy.

Here are some of the reasons why graduate recruitment is harder than it needs to be.

1. Vurglesplatters are really, really bad at explaining their job. You have no idea how long it took to come up with a job advertisement. “No,” I had to keep on gently saying, “two years industry experience is not a reasonably request.”

2. Once that's done, have you ANY IDEA how terrible university job centre websites are? UNIMAGINABLY AWFUL that's what. As all sensible students and graduates now, they are a great resource for looking up jobs that are specifically hiring from their particular institution. I did hours of research about universities that offered vurglesplat and did a good course using similar vurglesplat theories. I looked up league tables. Careers Centre, I want to hire YOUR students. WHY OH WHY do you have websites that are nigh on impossible to use and why do you staff not reply to emails?

(Although I'd like to take a moment to big up my alma mater St Andrews for its swift response within 20 minutes to my query. Knew I could trust you, guys! Some other institutions, that will remain nameless, have stayed quiet for a WEEK now.)

In all seriousness, a job that should have taken perhaps an afternoon at best – simply uploaded a job specification to 25+ institutions, how hard can that be? - took me three days. I do have other work to do, you know.

3. Yes, yes, it's probably easier to advertise on Milkround and Prospects. They cost a lot of money, did you know that?

So, all of those things are an issue and a barrier between graduates and soon-to-be gradautes getting a job.

I can't talk much about the process, because it's only just got started. However, we have started to get some applications through. We don't have an application form with lots of silly questions, because no one wants to write it, bluntly. All we ask for is a CV. Here are The Disorientated Graduate's hints and tips to get through the screening process (i.e., er, me):

1. We are asking for people to be vurglesplatters. Sure, trainee vurglesplatters, but it's still a specific role. DO NOT tell me about how much you're enjoying training to be an English teacher. Seriously, though, did you even read the job specification? DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG IT TOOK TO UPLOAD IT TO YOUR INSTITUTION?

2. Grammar and spelling are your friend! So, it must be said, is a covering letter. They're not essential, but it's a good way of listing your 'soft skills'.

3. You may not have relevant industry experience. When I left uni, my industry experience was to be a cleaner, a care home assistant or a shop worker. So I sympathise with you, particularly if you have a good academic background and have passed the first two stages of my checklist. So, as a hint, turn your part time job into an example of how good you are at the world of work based on the job specification. Does the job want good time management? Well, you need that if you work in a shop because of the different tasks that need doing WHILST still being able to drop everything and serve a customer! Teamwork? Well, being a waiter involves being part of a chain of people involved in one single aim! Think outside of the box, a bit. Personally I'm deeply sympathetic but there's only so much I can to make other people look at your CV.

4. To return to point 1, seriously, do look at the job you're applying for though, yes? I am fed up of logging POINTLESS applications.

That's the only experience I have thus far. We've barely started shifting through applications, let alone interviewing and that. Still, it's interesting and also GOOD BLOG MATERIAL.

Now if you'll excuse me I have a stinking cold and need to return to curling up in a blanket.

How To Definitely Get A Job After Graduation

… okay, that title is a lie. Sorry. There's no set way for anyone, at all. This entry is more a vague set of tips about what to do in the search for an elusive job post-graduation. A survival guide, if you will.

As dissertations reach and completions and exams start to look like something that might go away soon, many soon-to-be graduates are looking into the maw of employment and wondering what on earth they're going to do with their lives. You may well have a plan, or a job-related degree. Best of luck, teachers, doctors and accountants! I am aware that everyone has trouble with first jobs, but at least if you have a direction then you know where to start looking.

But what of those of us who are cast into the ether without any clear direction, what should we do? It's all very well to beat our chests and rent our clothes and bewail that we didn't take the time to visit the Careers Centre, but alas, for some of us the Careers Centre is too far away now. These are some very vague tips for anyone who is currently resembling a headless chicken and have no idea how to go about even starting to look for a job:

1. If you want to go the graduate scheme route, go nuts – they're designed for graduates. Milkround and Prospects are both good websites, and I managed to get a few interviews/assessment centre places with them.

2. Apply for everything that takes your fancy, but tailor your applications. A general CV is a boring CV. Why do you want to do that job? More importantly, what unique thing can you bring for that particular role?

3. “£25,000 OTE!” means 'Slightly above minimum wage unless you're really, really good at sales'. If you're really, really good at sales then hooray for you! If you're not, though, a sales job will probably make you unhappy. Sorry.

4. If you don't understand some of the job terms used, then that's fine! If you don't understand the whole advert, then there's only so much you can blag.

5. “This job is below me!” No, it's not. Get out of that mindset right now. Work is a good thing to be in. The job may be hell, and you may not enjoy it, but the job you're doing now? The waitressing, the call centre, the data inputting? Some people do that for their whole life. Work is a good thing to have, and that McJob will keep you with some money, some self-esteem and if you're clever, will help give you a leg up into the job you want to do.

5a. Did you have a student job? Can it be transferred or made full time in some way? That's what I did, and within two weeks of transferring to a different store in a different region (translation: I moved back in with my parents) I got promoted to supervisor. Okay, I left that job, but it means I have MANAGEMENT EXPERIENCE which is, on a technical level, gold dust.

6. Don't buy an interview suit until you have an interview. It's soul-crushing to look at it, unworn, swinging gently in the wardrobe.

7. Beware the recruitment agencies. They will lure you in with a job title and it turns out they just want you on the books. I am on more recruitment agencies books than I can shake a stick at, and I've never got a single interview out of them, let alone a job. Recruitment agencies, unfortunately, also advertise very real and current jobs. Read the adverts carefully and ask about their client for this role. If they have a specific client, it's probably a real job. If it's vague, they don't.

8. Lastly, keep in contact with friends. Not for networking, you mercenary bastards, but just to keep in contact with people you may have moved away from during the job search. Frankly, it's good for the soul.

Strawberry jam on toast

We all have a story about the job that got away. As graduates start to come out of the universities, ashen-faced and stumbling into the merry-go-round from hell that is job-seeking and rounds and interviews, you find yourself getting a little attached to The Job Of Your Dreams.

Then, as a rule, it rejects you.

Living with my parents again, and doing a part-time job in order to have a little disposable income and keep a little self-esteem, I applied for Jobs I Wanted To Do. Unfortunately, these jobs very rarely felt the same towards me. Getting an interview would be INSANELY EXCITING! Except it would be a telephone interview, or a recruitment agency looking to exploit graduates to swell their books. Look out for them, they're sharks.

I applied for a graduate scheme and was surprised on my lunch break by a telephone interview, which ended up taking place surreptitiously in the kitchen of my job. She enthused about my cover letter, my experience. A day later I was invited to an interview in London, which I truly tripped off for, staying overnight in a Richard Curtis film with My Successful Godfather in London.

I left his beautiful Islington house to catch the Tube, wearing a business suit and using an Oyster card, and found myself lured into fitting in with this world, as I emerged from the train into a world with the Gherkin towering over it, and people flitting around drinking coffee and clutching free newspapers. Do you know how hypnotic that is, to someone who spent four years being told that this was her destiny, and instead folded clothes in a shopping centre? You don't see the poverty that you know is lurking just around the corner, you don't smell the pollution or sense the stress – the glamour just temporarily oozes out, mixing with the nerves of the interview to make a heady cocktail of desire and hopes.

I spent the day in an office block overlooking the river, completing tasks and an exam, and got chatty with my fellow applicants. There were sixteen of us, and four jobs going. There were only three people for my stream – good odds, by my reckoning. They told us that over 3,000 had initially applied. As I left, and headed back on the train, I hoped and prayed I had the job. I felt good, positive. I wanted that job more than burning. I knew it would be hard, but it would work. They told us we'd know in a week.

By 5pm a week later, I had heard nothing. At all.

Two days later, I sent in an e-mail querying if they'd had the time to make a decision,and I was told they'd tell me soon. Three days later, in the middle of a shift at work, they did. I hadn't got it. No, there wasn't any real feedback – I was just as good as the other candidate, but they'd decided to go for him instead. I thanked them for the time, went back to work, and managed not to cry all day. I went to to a yoga class that night, and half way through just started bawling like a child. It wasn't my best possible moment. My parents were working late that night, I remember, and they came home to me snuffling on the sofa and hugging a bottle of wine and tearfully telling them there'd been a terrible mistake and I was stupid and shouldn't be allowed out of the house again ever.

The next day I got another call for an interview, for a different company. My mood improved exponentially, and people kept on telling me this was proof I was awesome. Duly I went for the interview, and worked out that by the end of the thing that I might well swing this one, but it wasn't a job I desperately wanted. The move to Scotland would have been worth it, but the job would have been crap. I was cool with not getting it, I thought. I would get more interviews, I thought.

I didn't get the job, which I still say is for the best. I was cool with it when I got the phonecall. I continued with my day. I got home from work. I put some toast on, planning to go to the gym for a few hours but needed a snack before I went. I buttered the toast, and put on a generous amount of strawberry jam. Mum came into the kitchen. “Did you get it?” she breathlessly asked me as I took a bite of the toast.

“Oh, Mum,” I said, and then cried all over her. I still can't eat strawberry jam.

–

I may sound like a drama queen here, but everyone has one of these stories. Looking for work is soul-destroying, as you analyse yourself, open yourself for judgement, and more often than not come up negative. I tell this story occasionally, and people always pipe up with their own equivalent. “I didn't get into the Civil Service scheme because I DRANK WATER TOO NOISILY,” a friend will always indignantly tell me. As many graduates try head into the world of work, hopefully things will fall into place for people and prospective interviewees won't have to feel like this, but I think its inevitable, sometimes.

I'm going to try and post in the next few weeks some more practical tips on job-hunting for the new graduate, and how to dodge through the scams that exist out there, but with the econmoy officially in double-dip recession I felt like I had to write the bad stuff first, before getting to the positive stuff. There is positive stuff, though. I promise.