After four or more years in school, it is every college student's goal to find his or her dream job post-graduation. However, students worldwide are finding that the economy is turning their dreams into nightmares.
On Feb. 24, Career Services held a 'Technical Job Search' in the hope that it would facilitate students' job searches in the current economy, no matter how grim it may seem at first glance.
The National Association of Colleges and Employers states that the top three characteristics that employers look for in potential candidates are communication skills, honesty and high interpersonal skills. Unfortunately for college students, NACE also states that the skills most lacking in new graduates are communication skills.
'In my opinion, I think there's a potential for a generational gap there,' said Holly Justice, an engineering career counselor at Career Services. 'If that's how a new grad is being perceived, then it is important for [students] to address [and change that].'
Besides needing to work on communication skills, many college graduates need to work on their résumé, which should be direct and concise. According to the experts, résumés should be available in a digital version and include keywords that will make it readily appear in an online search.
Web sites like Monster.com and Careerbuilder.com are some of the more popular sites that allow businesses the option to search résumés for potential employees.
Sites like these reward people who are active in checking their progress in a job hunt. If a person is continually checking progress, it shows a company, through consistency, that the prospective employee cares about his or her future.
However, Justice warns students about being overactive on job searching sites because not every job offer is legitimate. Scammers realize that the kinds of people that are looking for jobs, like new graduates, are desperate, and illegitimate sites like to take advantage of that. If a company is asking for a credit card or social security number, the odds are that the site is not real.
'I had one student come in telling me that she gave away her credit card number to a company like this,' Justice said. 'She never got a response back from them after having her bank account cleared out.'
Besides having a great résumé, an 'elevator pitch,' or a 30-second advertisement of what an individual has to offer, is also important. The only time to make a great first impression is the first time, and according to Justice, not enough students perform well enough to make them stand out from others.
Although the aforementioned details are important, perhaps the greatest tool to utilize during a job search is networking. According to NACE, over 80 percent of jobs are acquired by means other than interviewing. More often than not, people are set up with a job through contacts they already know.
Justice recommends creating an account through LinkedIn.com to strengthen networking connections.
'If Facebook is the social side [of a person], then LinkedIn is the professional,' Justice said.
LinkedIn allows people to network via mutual friends. If a person has five friends that have five more friends, then there are 25 connections that can be made. Though effective, LinkedIn isn't necessarily the greatest networking tool for UB students to use.
Instead, UB offers a Meet-a-Mentor program where alumni and students can talk about anything, whether it is professional or social. Justice highly suggests taking advantage of the program because of the face-to-face contact it provides. In addition, the shared experience of going to UB can lead to a strong connection.
UB's next Careerfest is going to be held March 3 at Alumni Arena. Justice anticipates that 75 or more employers will participate.
'[Career Services] has a great deal of optimism going into [Careerfest],' Justice said. 'Compared to the last couple of fairs, this is looking to be our largest one in a while.'
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