Immediately upon getting their degrees, freshly-minted graduates often struggle with their next move. Those who are just completing their undergraduate degrees have more choices than those who are completing their advanced degrees. For example, a PhD or an MBA is more likely to pursue a job; someone with a bachelor’s degree, however, is more likely to wonder whether they should pursue a higher degree or get a job that pays well and then go back to pursue another degree at a later time. These decisions are often weighty, paralyzing many into inaction. At such junctures these decisions turn out to be life-altering choices. This article sheds some light on how you can first position yourself while still on the campus and then go about getting the first job so that it is a career builder, rather than a career obstacle. It does not address the dilemma faced by those who do not know if they should continue their advanced degree.
Deprogramming the Campus Mindset
Many students do not adequately plan, well before graduation, during their college days to position themselves more strongly for their first job. Why? For one, they do not have a clear understanding of what the business world expects from them. Also, they simply do not know how to do things differently in college so that they are better positioned when they start their job search. This is the state of “unconscious incompetence.” Most academic curricula and programs promote keeping students insulated from the realities of the business world because those who run these institutions take great pride in “academic purity!” The campus career-counseling center sometimes is not much help, either. Many, who staff it, are more involved in its administrative functioning and its political stature than almost anything else. Often, in a university setting there is a very definite “social order;” how a career center is run depends largely on who is running it and how they fit in that scheme. The purpose of this brief discussion is to move the student reader to “conscious incompetence.” It is provided so that they can look for help or become aware of what they do not know.
Four years is a long time during the impressionable years to imprint your mind with beliefs that are counter to those that run the business world. This is why it is important to start changing your imprinting early, as you get closer to leaving your academic environment. When on the campus the focus is on getting the degree quickly and making the grades. The academic focus is also on solitary (solo) achievements. In the outside world of the jobs, business, and economy all of this matters not as much as most think. Very few employers care to check how fast you graduated. Many do not pay as much attention to the grades (GPA) as those on the campus believe. In today’s business reality, teams are in, solo player is out. So, what is important to the “real world?”
The following checklist may provide some insights on how to manage your student affairs more carefully so that you are better positioned to enter the business world:
- When engaging in part-time work as a student, summer internships, project work, final team project, or any other activity that defines your “brand,” make a conscious effort to differentiate yourself. Rather than just doing what the job is, going out of the way to make something better for the employer on your own initiative has much more value. Create value beyond merely earning your paycheck. When you take on a class assignment don’t be a passive participant to hurry the project, but provide creative suggestions to make the project unique. All of these differentiators can be on your first résumé and they matter more than your GPA. These factors show your independent thinking and your thought leadership.
- Many final-year projects are team efforts, especially for engineering and science graduates. Make sure that you participate fully in the team and understand how teams work. Most of the academic life is spent in solitary assignments and those graduating do not appreciate the value of teamwork, which is expected in business life. Make an effort to understand the team dynamic and how you made a difference to how your team performed. (Here, teamwork does not imply collaborating to earn a better grade than otherwise possible!)
- Take on a role in activities that are outside the academic sphere to develop your leadership qualities. Participating in the campus newspaper, student activities, taking a project to make the departmental laboratory or library a better place and so on. All of these accomplishments can be put on your first résumé and they will go a long way to differentiate yourself from the pack in your first job.
- Identify your own “development gaps” and make a conscious effort to overcome them. For example, if you are afraid to speak publicly, join Toastmasters or a similar group and develop your elocutionary skills. This will not only make you a better leader, but it will also strengthen your résumé. This is now your differentiator.
- In your senior year take on someone who has just entered the college campus and help them in some way to make their life easier. Remember your own early days and see how it might have made it better for you. In doing this work you make yourself a better person and it is something you can write in your otherwise “empty” first résumé. In the business world this is called mentoring. Empower yourself to mentor others.
How these suggestions translate into a “Business” résumé for a fresh graduate can be easily visualized by comparing it to its quotidian “Academic” counterpart, where a person merely lists their academic credentials, list their coursework, and grades. In the Academic résumé the job seekers keep their focus on the scholarly achievements. Such message does not capture the business world’s attention because it does not speak the employers’ language. The “Business” résumé, however, presents a good rounding out of activities on the campus and shows how using the business language to present credentials, makes for a compelling résumé. In transitioning from the academic world to the business world one must learn how to translate their scholarship into leadership.
The Biggest Transition
Why is going from being a student to getting a full-time job is such a big deal? There are many reasons: the foremost is that being a student in your school, college, or university, you enjoy a “rank” that few share. You were the top dog in the highly ordered academic world during your graduation year. Many fraternities bestow unlimited powers on the graduating class, allowing them to “order around” any one else of “lower” rank, even those graduating barely a year behind them. You enjoy certain freedoms of expressions that others respected and even promoted.
All of that comes to a sudden halt at the doorstep of your first job. In fact, your status completely reverses. In your first job, you are the new kid on the block. You don’t know anything! Although no one says that to your face, the treatment and its implications become apparent in every interaction you suffer, even at the hands of those who are hierarchically “below” you. Your ability to adjust to this new treatment and how quickly you adjust to this shift determine how quickly you integrate in the new culture. Some bring their campus “nerdiness” to their jobs and expect the business world to respect it. They are the ones who find that their integration periods are the longest; some never do integrate and stay on the fringe, hoping that others my join in or that the future fresh crop of recruits will bring in more of their own type. Nearly 20% of new hires drop out in two years in the labor market because of this problem.
Your First Job-Some Considerations
How you land your first job is driven by many variables. The most influential are your own vision of yourself, how you have managed your academic development, and the state of the economy. Here, academic development does not merely mean scholarship and grades; it includes how you rounded out your overall development and the perspective you hold of how the world really works. If you just graduated, you are full of hopes and expectations.
Many graduate without knowing what they are going to pursue because they have little or no idea if a job provides what they are looking for. Many are happy just getting a paying job that allows them to apply what they have learned in their years of schooling. Many are so deep in debt, especially with student loans and permissive credit card limits that they jump at the chance of making “real money.” In such situations, and some others as well, many end up going after the highest-paying job available, regardless of other important factors. Often this means taking a job that pays well, but without knowing what they are getting into.
The reason why merely looking at how much money you make in your first job is myopic—albeit seductive—is that there is a reason why some jobs pay such high salaries compared to other jobs for similarly qualified candidates. Some reasons: high-risk jobs (oil exploration), and dead-end jobs (construction). The other aspect of going after such jobs is that once you get used to the salary what matters is how you are able to derive some satisfaction from what you do. If the job offers no lateral expansion into other areas to enrich your career because similar jobs pay much lower salaries in other industry verticals, it is financially difficult to consider making a move into other areas before it gets too late to make such a change. Then the job does become a dead-end job and the career even more so!
Acing the Interview
Once you have decided on how to go after the right job the following tips are offered to ace the interview and get the right offer:
- Research the company well and know the questions to ask about your job, company, and industry
- Get a great resume pulled together that shows a good balance between your scholarship and leadership.
- Get your business card ready. Few bother with this. A well-presented business card with a clever tagline can make a big impact. For example if you are software engineer have a tagline A Software Acrobat!
- During the interview don’t allow yourself to be interrogated. Ask intelligent questions (see #1) and engage in a dialog. Interlace your research in a conversational way.
- Be confident, poised, and alert. You must show your eagerness and alacrity to win over the interviewer. Express your interest in the company and what it does, even if it is “C” company for you.
- Line up several serial interviews and land multiple offers in a short time. Ask to be given a few weeks to make a decision. This will allow you to collect multiple offers and sit on them until you are ready to make the best decision. You may even be able to negotiate an offer from an “A” company to get the best package. Then determine which one keeps you on the best career track.
- Do not choose an offer based on money alone, especially if it is abnormally high
Going after your first job after your degree is one of the most important decisions you’ll ever make. Make sure that it is the right one!