Preparing for your career throughout university

Now I am in the final year of my degree, I have spent a lot of time researching and applying for jobs for when I graduate. The job-hunting process has been a journey that has stretched across my entire time at Birmingham.

First steps

Like many others, I did not have a strong idea of a career after finishing sixth form. One of the reasons I chose a Maths degree was to keep my options open and spend more time discovering what I was looking for in a career.

One thing I did in my first year at Birmingham was write a CV. Having never done this before, I found this quite tricky at first. This was the first time I used the support of Careers Network: they provide access to an online CV checker which was extremely useful. I also attended careers fairs, giving me an idea of what companies and industries I could potentially work for.

Gaining skills and experience

In second year, I began thinking more about gaining some work experience. I was not interested in a year in industry since I was enjoying my course, so I focused my efforts on internships for the following summer. These opportunities are targeted at students with one year left in their degree and usually last 4-8 weeks.

I booked an appointment with an advisor through Careers Network to talk about how to get started researching for these roles. I applied to some jobs but this was not particularly successful. However, it did make me aware of some skills I could develop. I completed several courses on LinkedIn Learning, provided by the University, to fill some of these knowledge gaps such as Python coding.

In this year, I gained experience, skills and confidence in several ways. Being a Treasurer of a student society pushed me out of my comfort zone since I took responsibility for a wide range of tasks, most of which were different to anything I had done before. In addition, I took on paid roles at the University as a student ambassador, working on events such as Open Days, and as part of the Guild’s team for Welcome Week. All these experiences improved my confidence working in a team and communicating to others.

Changing my journey

At the start of third year, I began my search for graduate jobs. In addition to careers fairs and advice appointments, I went to some events targeted at developing skills for interviews and other steps in the application process. Every event and appointment I have been to has given me some new knowledge to take forward with me.

However, I still did not have a clear idea of what types of roles interested me. This made me quite overwhelmed, so I attended a Careers Network drop-in session to talk through my concerns with an advisor, which really helped. The application process for many graduate roles is difficult and time-consuming: I felt that I needed a lot more time to strengthen my skills. I made the decision to convert my course from a 3-year BSc to a 4-year MSci, since I was enjoying my course and was struggling to balance job applications with my degree and my role as Chair of a student group.

This gave me the opportunity to do more research, understand my strengths better, and continue to seek opportunities to improve my skillset. One resource that particularly helped me was a website called GraduatesFirst, provided to me by Careers Network. Here, you can practice the assessments and video interviews which are common tasks in job applications.

Searching for jobs in final year

The extra preparation made me feel much more organised going into final year. I started my applications much earlier than the previous year and had become much more decisive on what roles to apply for. Graduate roles have a lot of competition, so it is important to take each application as a learning experience, whatever the outcome. Each one made me understand better what my interests were and where I could develop further.

I am pleased to say that I have now secured a job starting in September. After reflecting on the successful application process, every experience I have mentioned in this blog gave me skills and confidence that helped me perform as well as possible.

I want to end by emphasising that everyone’s journey is different and at times challenging. Make the most of the support provided and don’t worry if you need to take a different path to those around you.