You have arrived! Now is the time when you must
"put your money where your mouth is" so to speak. If you
have done the assessment, research and the internship(s), this should
be painless and maybe even, fun. However, if you totally disregarded
the past three stages, this may be a bumpy ride for you.
First thing that you should do is schoolwork. You
cannot get a job or get into graduate school without grades that are
at least good enough to let you graduate. The second thing is job
(or graduate school) search. Treat the
job search as if it were another class. In addition to doing homework,
you should organize what job search activities you need to do for that
particular week. All job searches require looking at a variety of
resources and following leads both on and off-campus.
Both a job search and a graduate school search begin
with the same thing: organization and research.
In order to do either successfully, you need to be organized and
detail-oriented. To start your organization, visit Career Development
Center and obtain all registration or other job search materials. Keep
everything together in an easy-to-access folder and when you get the
opportunity, read it all! We cannot stress how important it is to read
and reread materials you receive regarding your job search. Many
publications contain dates, complicated last names and minute details
that if you get wrong could have a severe impact in your employment
potential.
If you decide to pursue a full-time position following
graduation, consider registering with CDC for On
Campus Recruiting. Registration allows you to be eligible to
interview with the 300 or so companies that recruit
on campus and for resume referral to hundreds of others. There are
a variety of organizations that
recruit
on campus, including: school districts, military, non-profit agencies,
consulting firms, large corporations and small, family-run companies.
All majors are eligible to interview and a multitude of organizations
are interested in students of any major. A myth that is perpetuated
about on-campus recruiting is that it only serves business and
engineering. Not true! While a large number of organizations that
recruit are what could be termed, "business-oriented,"
liberal arts and other students should not rule these companies out as
possibilities. Nevertheless, there are several fields that do not
recruit on-campus (i.e. advertising/PR firms, design houses, anything
related to sports or teams) because they do not have to. These
organizations receive thousands of unsolicited resumes each year
without the help and expense of on-campus recruiting. Yet, on-campus
recruiting a good way of diversifying your job search efforts and to
gain practice interviewing and interacting with recruiters.
It is important to "leave no stone unturned"
in your job search. Do not rely only on on-campus recruiting to find
your position. Use it in conjunction with job vacancy listing,
classified ads, phone contacts, Internet research, as well as
referrals from faculty and professionals. By staying organized with
your information, you can serve all of your contacts in a better
manner and make the next process (research) a little easier.
With a job search or a graduate (or professional)
school search, research is very important. You’ve assessed your
interests, values and skills, now it is time to apply them to
real-life opportunities and find a "niche" for you in the
world of work. Use the information you found out about yourself in
your research of organizations and schools. You need to know if you
are going to feel comfortable in these places and that the
opportunities are going to put you in a position to grow as a
professional and a person. For example, you are very interested in law
school. You know from your self-assessment and values that you are a
person who likes to help people and are very activist in your nature.
You have always been interested in public policy and human rights. So,
with these things in mind, would or should you consider a law school
that focuses very much on the corporate perspective of law or would
you rather attend a law school with an "activist" bent?
However, if you had not researched law schools (or a graduate school
or an organization) how would you ever know if its organizational
values conflict with your personal values? The thing is that you would
not. This, in the long way, is why you need to research. Devoting time
to finding out more about the opportunity and organization will pay
off in tenfold later on.
To do your research, you should be pursuing in-depth,
factual resources, rather than accounts from friends or other casual
information. Your research of an organization should include current
job requirements, trends for the future, and where the best
opportunities for your interests and competencies are likely to be
found. This means attending career fairs and evening meetings,
spending time in the Career Resources @ CDC
utilizing organizational literature and conducting informational
interviews to get a more personal perspective. For graduate
(or professional) school searches, the same research should occur
in addition to learning more about institutions and their
requirements, entrance exams, speaking with faculty and visiting
campuses.
While you are doing your research, you should be
polishing your professional job search skills. These skills include
knowing how to prepare a professional resume
appropriate to your career field, knowing how
to conduct a an effective interview that will present your skills
and qualifications in terms that respond to an employer’s needs, and
knowing how to prepare and manage the written communications that are
required in job correspondence. Professional job search skills also
require an awareness of employers’ perspectives and timetables and
an understanding of the extra qualifications that they value-
leadership skills, multicultural experiences and sensitivity,
awareness of contemporary ethical issues in the world of work and a
global perspective.
For those of you considering graduate (or professional
school) this is an important time to think about, in addition to
professional skills, your professional goals at the present (they will
most likely change at least a bit upon completion of
graduate/professional school). Most graduate and professional programs
ask students to write an essay. Usually these essays need to
communicate why you are choosing to pursue a particular program, a
little bit about yourself and your views and what you plan to do in
the future. Many graduate programs (especially those requiring
original research or are highly competitive) want students that are
going to feel comfortable and whose interests are similar to those of
the faculty. This does not mean you should alter your professional
goals to attend one school or the other, rather you should research
carefully to cultivate a list of schools that reflect an education
that will satisfy your professional goals.
Okay, you have researched and written a resume, bought
a snappy suit and you are ready for action, but where are the
interviews? The interviews will come once you have sent those resumes
out with well written cover letters in response to vacancies,
networked to find good contacts and generally kept abreast of all the
openings in your field. They will come! You must be persistent, but
patient! Schedule an appointment with a
CDC staff member to discuss your progress. Often, you need someone
else, besides yourself, to think about what you are encountering.
Counseling can offer you a fresh perspective or open up opportunities
you may not have seen before.
Finally, this stage takes time. If you do not secure a
position or graduate/professional school entrance prior to graduation,
have a back up plan. Are you going to move home? What interests you?
Is there a job you can secure that will provide you with flexibility
and funds to keep on searching? Can you get on a waiting list? Most
importantly, do not give up or give in!
