2nd year students

What is employability?

Simply put, this is whether you are likely to have the right skills to get recruited when you apply for jobs.

In other words, whether you have the skills that employers are looking for in the people that they hire. Skills such as managing your own time effectively; working under your own initiative; your ability to work with other people; taking responsibility/ownership for a piece of work from start to finish are all important, but there are many more...

How to get 'employability skills'

Taking a placement as part of your course is a great way to learn, and give you examples to demonstrate, solid employability skills to future employers.

You can expect real, hands-on experience and responsibility with organisations that are used to supporting undergraduates at this stage of their career, helping them to prepare for the transition into full time employment and vocational careers.

In some cases, a successful placement year can also lead to a permanent job offer upon graduation. However, the very nature of studying a degree is providing you with opportunities to develop skills employers are interested in - e.g. joining in with team activities; conducting research and identifying key information; deciding on your own essay titles; planning your time to make sure deadlines are providing team working, analysis, problem solving, and planning and organising skills - all of which are needed when you are working.

In addition to your studies you should look at securing vacation work or undertaking work experience/ shadowing in the sector you are interested in - this will help you stand out in your applications as it shows your future Employer a level of motivation and commitment to your chosen career path.

What should you be doing now?

Speak to your Faculty Placement Officer to understand more about timelines and process for doing the 12-month placement as part of your course.

If you are unable to commit to 12-months in industry, think about applying for summer internships, or vacation schemes as they may be called, and research the deadlines to apply.

These vacation programmes are offered typically by larger Companies providing around 8 weeks of structured work to give an insight into their organisation and field of work - therefore another great way of testing out career options, and enhancing your CV whilst getting paid over the summer.

Taking part generally will provide you with opportunities to learn and develop new skills:

If you have an idea of what you might like to do, but do not want to work whilst studying, try and set up some work shadowing or work experience to see what it is really like to work in that environment.

Identify specialist websites, publications, discussion boards for your chosen career path and look for opportunities to network with others to learn more about skills needed in that sector, and ideas of what you can do to obtain these skills.

Think about electives for this year and dissertation topics for final year - are any particularly relevant to different career paths that you are considering? If so, it may influence what options you have for applications once you have graduated... Start by identifying when you need to make these sorts of decisions, and spend a bit of time researching your options and the doors that they may open.

Use your 'Personal Development Plan' (PDP) throughout your studies to help track your experiences and achievement as it will help you identify what skills have contributed to your successes, and what skill s you were lacking where you experienced disappointments. It will help you identify things you like doing, and help you work out career options later on, and will help you identify situations to refer to on your application forms, and at interview.

How Careers & Employability can help

There is support available for you through a dedicated Careers specialist within your faculty - your 'Employability Coordinator', or EC as we call them for short, is a member of the Careers & Employability Service, but they sit onsite at your Faculty Student Office so are easy to find.

Your employability co-ordinator will support you in this stage of your career planning and research through:

  • Awareness raising on different types of careers in your sector
  • Skills development workshops run in conjunction with the Students’ Union and your Faculty Placement officers
  • In addition, you can visit the Careers & Employability offices at Cooper House where you will find a bank of computers for you to use (at no cost!) to conduct your careers search, and an information library covering career and post graduate study options, and how materials to help you prepare for the different stages of recruitment.
  • Through JobShop and jobs fairs, we also provide access throughout the year to local employers looking for part time & vacation staff.

Don’t know what to do?

There are loads of websites that will help guide your thinking and may give you some good ideas for further research.. Don’t worry, there is still plenty of time, but to keep your options open, you should start thinking about this sooner rather than later - if you are not sure where to start, contact your employability co-ordinator for advice.

Talk to others - family, friends, tutors, colleagues - they know you well, and will undoubtedly know about lots of different types of jobs and roles that may give you some further inspiration.

Use your holidays productively - temporary or vacation work is a great way of testing out different types of working environment - For example:

Would you rather be office-based or outdoors?
How different is accounting work and marketing?
Would you rather work contributing as part of a team, or be responsible solely for your own output?
And what is the real difference in working in the public and the private sector?

Temp work can be enlightening to see what suits you and your preferences and what does not!

It can be confusing, and some people find themselves questioning whether they are on the right degree course - if this is something that concerns you do go and see your Student Liaison Officer to talk through your options at this stage.