Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: Career Opportunities for New Graduates
Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: Career Opportunities for New Graduates This article relates to the Career Opportunities competency and explores issues such as internal growth opportunities, potential for advancement, career development importance, and the relationship between job performance and career advancement. Evaluating the Career Opportunities competency in your organization will determine whether your employees believe they have a chance to grow within the organization. Studies show that lack of career opportunity is one of the top reasons why employees leave an organization. Also, continually hiring open positions from outside the organization can be detrimental to morale when a qualified candidate is available internally. Topics covered in this competency are: perceived opportunity for advancement, existence of a career development plan, and organizational commitment to staff development. This article, Career Opportunities for New Graduates, is part of AlphaMeasure's compilation, Tales From the Corporate Frontlines. It tells how a group of HR employees tried a new twist on an annual event and discovered ways to improve their company's strategy for career development. Anonymous Submission I have spent the past 25 years working in the HR department of a large financial services company. Every spring, our department gets buried in a barrage of resumes and cover letters from fresh, talented graduates eager to begin their careers with our company. Every year, our hiring execs choose those that fit the company's needs best at that particular moment in time. Obviously, businesses are eager to hire new, young, fresh workers. They are enthusiastic, intelligent, and eager to work hard and establish their careers. They are also relatively cheap, as any honest hiring exec will admit. But once these grads are hired, and begin their careers---then what? After noticing that after five years or so, very few of these graduation season new hires were still working with our company, we set out to find out why. We decided to try something different during this year's interview process. As a little experiment, we added questions about what these new grads expected in terms of career development and advancement, and got some surprising answers. Following are a few of their biggest concerns--- * Availability of career development programs. They consider training and mentoring to be a top priority. Realizing that college is only the beginning of their learning process, our interviewees want to know that the resources they need for professional growth are readily available. * Internal promotion vs. external hiring. Candidates are eager to follow a career path inside the company, and concerned that their path may be blocked by external hiring for desirable positions. They are willing to work their way up-as long as it's possible. * A reasonable chance for upward mobility. As long as they feel that the opportunity for career advancement is possible, they will remain. But a huge fear is to be pigeonholed in a dead end situation. Once that happens, they would rather move on. These kids have invested time and money in their educations, and they are serious about getting the most from that investment. We performed this little experiment in conjunction with data obtained from a recent employee satisfaction survey showing how our current employees perceive opportunities for growth and advancement within the company. We took that data and compared it with what these young career candidates expected from a potential employer. We were able to zero in on problem areas and develop effective solutions. They weren't aware of it at the time, but this year's new recruits helped to shape the future of the company where they hope to build their careers. We hope they stay around to do just that. © 2005 AlphaMeasure, Inc. - All Rights Reserved This article may be reprinted, provided it is published in its entirety, includes the author bio information, and all links remain active. Measure. Report. Improve your organization with an AlphaMeasure employee satisfaction survey. Josh Greenberg is President of AlphaMeasure, Inc. AlphaMeasure provides organizations of all sizes a powerful web based method for measuring employee satisfaction, determining employee engagement, and increasing employee retention. Launch your employee surveys with AlphaMeasure.
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Do these things
Include your full name - don't use nicknames or abbreviations
Use a telephone number that you can always answer - use a cell phone if possible or make sure there is an answering machine at the listed phone number
Use bullet points to highlight information - it is much easier for an employer to absorb relevant information while scanning your résumé
Print your résumé and cover letter on high quality paper - when printing your résumé you should use paper with at least 50% cotton content
Be concise and get to the point - say what you need to say and nothing more
Use action words and descriptive phrases - be creative when trying to get your point across using as few words as possible
Target your résumé - address your résumé to the position you are applying for to show that you are really interested in working for that company
Focus on relevant facts only - list skills, accomplishments and personality traits you know the employer is looking for
List quantitative support for statements made - back up your skills and experiences with real scenarios, facts and figures
Begin statements with action verbs - action verbs demonstrate your importance to the achievement or experience being described
Don't do these things
Have any grammatical errors - always have someone else proofread your résumé for errors and flow
Have any spelling mistakes - always spell check your résumé, your contact's name, and the company's name
Misrepresent your background or experience - employers oftentimes verify this information and can fire you if it is discovered that you were dishonest
Fill in employment gaps with unrelated information - wait to discuss this information in person to put a positive spin on it
Use lengthy paragraphs - employers notoriously skip over paragraphs in résumés
Use long sentences - just like paragraphs, the reader easily skips over long sentences
Use personal pronouns - keep your résumé impersonal for a more professional image
Forget to list basic skills - all employers want to see that you are a team player, take charge of situations and are reliable
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CV Writing ? How to Write a CV
A winning CV has 2 objectives:
To illustrate your strengths and maximise your chances of getting through to interview and to put factual information, such as dates, places, names together in a presentable and readable form.
Focal Point
It is claimed that the human eyes are naturally drawn to a focal point one third down from the top of the page. Therefore, put your most useful information in this area. It might be your Profile, Key Skills, Professional Qualifications or details of your most recent employment. You can choose whichever you think is most important and relevant to your application.
Always get a second opinion when you have put your CV together. It is difficult to be objective about oneself.
Presentation
It is often thought that a CV should be fitted on to one side of A4. This can be difficult if you are a mature applicant with a long employment history. If you need to go on to a second page make sure that the CV is spread out over 2 whole pages, not one and a half pages as this looks messy.
As a 'rule of thumb' there should be more white than black on a page to make it easier to read.
Always write a rough draft first. It can be as long as you like as you will edit it later. Always start with your Career History as this will highlight your Key Skills and help you write your Profile.
Once you have compiled your draft copy you must edit it.
1. Take out anything that will not help you get where you want to be.
2. Write in the 'third' person as much as possible keeping 'I' to a minimum
3. Never use the past tense e.g. use "supporting senior management" rather than "supported senior management".
4. Use short sharp sentences cutting out any waffle and jargon.
Headings
Name
Print your name in bold type at the centre top of your CV. If there is any doubt as to which is your surname, e.g. James Martin, indicate by using capitals or underlining.
Address
Top left of CV. Full address including post code.
Telephone
Top Right of CV. Full dialing code and daytime and evening numbers if possible.
Date of birth
Put in full such as 13th December 1962. Do not put your age. Bearing in mind that you will be close to the Focal Point now, this might need to go at the end of the CV under 'Personal' along with other details such as marital status and children.
Marital status
You do not have to include this at all. If you choose to, make sure you use only "married" or "single". Do not use divorced or co-habiting. Put at the end of the CV under 'Personal'.
Children
Its up to you whether you include this information or not but if you include it put it at the end of the CV under 'Personal'
Profile
This is an introductory statement about who you are and what you have to offer. You should complete this last although it is positioned prominently in the CV, possibly in the Focal Point. It should be no more than two sentences and include the most important facts about yourself. You can include skills, achievements, responsibility or personal qualities.
e.g. Highly motivated Account Manager with successful direct and telesales experience in hardware and software industries.
Key Skills
Several Key skills should be highlighted after you have analysed and edited your employment history.
Pick out no more than six.
Make sure they are relevant.
Do not include dates. A key skill can come from an earlier job or an outside interest.
If you are short on direct experience and qualifications you may have skills arising from your personality, i.e. Interpersonal skills, e.g. "the ability to relate and communicate with others".
Some examples of descriptive words to use in key skills are:
Administering
Implementing
Budgeting
Leading
Reorganising
Forecasting
Advising
Employment History
Always start with your most recent employment. Break down your job functions as much as possible. The job description on your contract might provide a starting point or, consider how your employer might advertise your job. You should have more to say about your most recent, and therefore most relevant, employment.
Include successes and achievements especially if it saved the company money.
Don't have any employment gaps. If these occur explain them briefly.
Qualifications
If you are a mature applicant you can leave these out as career history is more important.
Put the highest qualification first with year achieved. If you have a degree you can leave out the lower qualifications altogether or include the basic information.
Do not include poor grades or failures.
Professional qualifications
Only include those that are still current.
Training
Only include training that is relevant to the position for which you are applying.
Interests
Only include interests that are unusual or which indicate transferable skills, achievements or responsibilities.
Reasons For Applying
This finishes the CV off with a concluding statement and puts the application into context. Don't imply you are out to gain advantage to yourself such as "I would like to join the company to gain additional experience".
Instead, concentrate on what you have to offer, "my experience at??would be useful to the company because????."
Finally
Your CV should be available soft copy or on good quality plain white A4 paper.
Do not use double sides.
Only fold once and enclose an SAE
Copyright 2005 CVwriting.net
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