New Year New Career... Opening the right door easily

Erin Boyle recently wrote the following article appearing in seven regional APN newspapers

Graduating from study is an exciting time. There is no doubt embarking on a tertiary course can do great things for your career but to make sure you successfully move on to the next step you will need to consider a few things.

For quite a few disciplines, organisations are keen to hire in advance, so placements for lawyers, accountants and engineers in particular are often done up to 12 months in advance. For those in their final year of study in 2012, it really is a good idea to start planning for those intakes.

Tim Watts and Robert Milne are the directors of GradConnection New Zealand and they say students need to be prepared in advance for their future careers. ‘‘The graduate job market is quite different to the traditional recruitment concept. A lot of the big corporations, like Contact Energy, Telecom, Fonterra, the major banks, they do almost all of their candidate sourcing from March to May for graduates to start the following year. They tend to work out what skills they will require across the board and not just for the ‘in demand’ candidates, like engineers. They will often look for people to fill HR, marketing and all those sort of organisational roles.’’

GradConnection was started three years ago by three Wellington friends who decided to launch their concept in Australia. Then, two-and-a-half years ago, Watts and Milne opened the New Zealand company and, since then, GradConnection has been growing from strength to strength. ‘‘Last year, we averaged about 17,000 hits a month and that peaked at 26,000 visits during our busiest times. We have around 60 clients ranging from major corporations to large nationwide accounting firms.’’

Gradconnection.co.nz enables organisations to create profile pages that can take potential job applicants further than the traditional job ad. These businesses can develop more of a brand presence and showcase all the opportunities and career paths offered. Future graduates access a wide range of tools, as well as potential employers, just by creating a personal profile and chatting on the forums.

Watts and Milne are thrilled with how students, graduates and organisations around New Zealand have responded to the GradConnection website but say that more businesses throughout the country need to be accepting of the skills and talents graduates can bring to organisations of all shapes and sizes. ‘‘New Zealand really does a poor job at investing in tertiary graduates compared to our cousins across the Tasman’’ says Milne. ‘‘So we want to encourage more businesses to come together and feel empowered to hire graduates. A lot of organisations have negative preconceptions about graduates and see them as the ‘too hard basket’, but we want to show that there is so much value they can add.’’

For those who have completed their studies but haven’t managed to secure employment yet, never fear as there are still many opportunities around and Watts has some words of advice. ‘‘Whether you were unsuccessful with applications last year or haven’t even put your CV together yet, there is still time and a variety of starting points. ‘‘Perhaps you could look at roles in other towns? There are definitely some gems outside of the main centres, they might not be as readily abundant but there are the opportunities there that the average student doesn’t look at straight away.’’

He also stresses it is important to not be disheartened by being turned down for jobs. ‘‘I know people who have felt like it was the end of the world that they didn’t get the job they wanted. And it ended up being a blessing in disguise as they took a slightly different path and ended up at the same place or finding they were suited for something else. Don’t take it personally, employers predominantly are looking for the right fit for their organisation, this just may not be you.’’

And while they know it can be a tough market out there, Watts and Milne say there is little room for error when it comes to showcasing yourself to be the best you can be. ‘‘There is so much advice and help out there that it’s unacceptable these days to not be prepared. Think of CV as your first piece of work for an organisation and, if you get an interview, dress for it as though it is your first day of work there. ‘‘Try to figure out how you can differentiate yourself from others and how you can convey that edge to a potential employer in a professional and interesting way.’’