College grads need ‘real-world’ skills before they can get ‘real’ jobs

From Why Your College Grad Can’t Find a Job, career advisor Allison Cheston:

The hallmark of someone who had found career success after graduation from college turned out to be early internships. And that typically meant sustained experience throughout the year, not just summers.

Limiting your focus to academics is a mistake.

Many of them, often with encouragement from their parents, have had their heads down doing schoolwork instead of taking advantage of internships offered on campus or, more creatively, developed by the students themselves.

Yes, maybe a parent found them a summer internship through contacts or within their own profession, regardless of whether that was a particular interest area for their child. And that is better than nothing.

Students become more valuable to employers by spending time in the real world.

But many have never been in an office setting and had the experience of having to work hard for a difficult boss. They may not understand the sense of urgency that permeates the fabric of most work environments, and they may misread the cues and signals of prospective employers and recruiters as they search for a job.

Can’t we all relate to that?  There’s nothing like a real job with a demanding “unreasonable” boss to learn what’s expected in a work setting.  A student’s first work experience can often be a volunteer position or the most menial of jobs.  The important thing is to get a foot in the door and begin to learn the skills that employers value, starting with the ability to show up on time every day.
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Related articles

• ‘Six in 10 internships lead to jobs’
• Senior Struggles: The pros and cons of taking an unpaid internship (careercenter.dsa.umich.edu)

‘Six in 10 internships lead to jobs’

Six in 10 internships lead to jobs, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, an employment research group also known as NACE.

More details from the NACE website:

April 28, 2011— For students looking to get their foot in the door with an employer, there’s more evidence that taking part in an internship could be the answer, according to results of a new survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE).

Employers responding to NACE’s 2011 Internship & Co-op Survey reported that an average 39.1 percent of their entry-level hires from the Class of 2010 came from their own internship programs. In addition, the responding organizations reported converting, on average, nearly 58 percent of their interns into full-time hires.

“That’s the highest conversion rate we’ve seen since we started tracking this on an annual basis in 2001,” says Marilyn Mackes, NACE executive director.

Accounting, at least in part, for the highest-ever conversion rate: “Students accepted job offers from organizations at which they interned at the highest rate we’ve ever seen,” says Mackes.

In 2010, 86.5 percent of interns offered a full-time job accepted it, up from 83.9 percent in 2009—the previous “high-water” mark.

“This suggests that students were somewhat wary about the job market and opted to take the offer rather than gamble that something better would come along,” says Mackes. “As the job market improves, it’s likely that we’ll see that change as students have more opportunities available to them.”

Latest reports do not indicate that the job market will improve soon, all the more reason to start working now on next summer’s internship.

Start working now on next summer’s internship

Regardless of your major, or what kind of job you eventually want to end up in, you probably would love to land the internship of your dreams next summer. Whether this means an unpaid internship at one of the hot startups of the week or a glamorous investment banking internship on Wall Street, it takes some work to stand out from the crowd. As is often the case, this work takes time to do well – and can be done exceptionally well if you start earlier.

Here are three tips for college students from Vishrut Srivastava at CollegeInfoGeek.

1. Start thinking of how you’ll market this summer’s experience, whether you’re flipping burgers, working on a personal project to read the complete works of Ayn Rand or just watching every episode of all the ‘60s sitcoms featured on Hulu.  (Although, I hope you’re not spending all your time this summer watching TV!)  What have you learned that will be of value to a future employer?
2. Update your resume so you’ll be ready for the fall application season.
3. Keep up the networking.  Take advantage of this summer’s opportunities to meet new people and let them know you’ll be seeking an internship for next summer.

A rising college sophomore I know tells me his grueling job this summer has motivated him to be more aggressive about pursuing an internship for next year.  I think that’s the way it’s supposed to work.