For whatever reason you can't give up your holiday time for voluntary work or a summer placement, The answer may be closer to home (well, uni).
Summer placements nowadays are becoming just as competitive as internships and let's not get started on work placements. Some are just about as competitive as graduate schemes! But there will be many out there who can't afford to work for free or travel half way across the country for a few weeks - if you don't have friends or family that are close that will let you stay, a massive fortune will have to be spent on B&B's. Many will want to do summer work closer to home to afford that holiday they rightly deserve, or many have great plans for a summer full of partying (we can never do enough at the ripe old age of 20yrs old and by god do we deserve it!).
So, what's the answer? Well, the good news is it's at uni and it's not so competitive. The answer is to join a society/group that is relevant to your ideal career.
So if you are interested in PR, why not join the union newspaper society? If you are interested in Marketing or Accounting, join a society and become the secretary/ event's secretary or treasurer. These don't sound as prestigious as a summer placements with Ernst and Young or a top PR firm down in London, but it shows interest from an earlier starting point and at least you'll have something down. If there isn't a society that fit's your ideal career, why not create one?
Prospective Lawyers look into debating teams or human/animal rights society
Events Management: join a society (or sporting society) and try for the events secretary - if they don't have one, say they should and try run for it! (I did!)
Radio or TV? A good number of Universities have a TV or radio station within the union. If they don't have one - well, make a start in getting one!
Prospective teachers could look into a society that offers voluntary teaching within the local community.
Future politicians could also look into the debating team and go into the society that represents their chosen party and be as active as possible within the university and local community.
Anymore you can think of? Feel free to comment below.
Hope this post will be hopeful for those looking for a chance to gain experience within their chosen field.
H
Showing posts with label CV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CV. Show all posts
Tuesday, 16 November 2010
Sunday, 12 September 2010
Thinking about work experience?
So...
Had two weeks doing work experience for two top leading companies in very different roles; Client Executive at a world wide Insurance Brokers, HR consultants, Marketers, PR Executive and Business Developers at Dickinson Dees. Interestingly, the style of work experience differed by a large degree.
What are the different styles of work experience?
I shall discuss two types as these are the two I experienced: experiencing the work that A does for B, the theoretical understanding of the role and "a week in the life of...", to watch the role in action.
The former I would imagine most would think work experience would involve; sit down with each of the departments and each would set a small, relevant task to do within a time frame, to gain a taste of the work they are involved in. Most of the tasks I was given as seen in my previous posts was research, e.g. "how the scrapping of the default retirement age would affect Dickinson Dees". I would then sit with each department and have their role discussed and ask any questions. This form of work experience is more theoretical and gives an insight into the style of work they do.
The second, the "week in the life of..." was with Marsh. I would imagine this is how they would treat their trainees, therefore not the work experience style as above, but a flavour of the work one would be given. I got an insight intohow the Client Executive organises their week and handles their clients. I enjoyed this as I was able to watch their projects being worked on and what their plans were with the projects in the near future. In conclusion, I got to see their job in action, so a more practical method of work experience.
Two very different and interesting styles. If you are interested in looking into work experience, I would certainly recommend it and I have hopefully shed some light into some of the possible varying types available. Depending on the work style and the company, you may want to query into the style they have planned for you, or would plan for you. Best of luck and I hope you enjoy your work experience!
H
Had two weeks doing work experience for two top leading companies in very different roles; Client Executive at a world wide Insurance Brokers, HR consultants, Marketers, PR Executive and Business Developers at Dickinson Dees. Interestingly, the style of work experience differed by a large degree.
What are the different styles of work experience?
I shall discuss two types as these are the two I experienced: experiencing the work that A does for B, the theoretical understanding of the role and "a week in the life of...", to watch the role in action.
The former I would imagine most would think work experience would involve; sit down with each of the departments and each would set a small, relevant task to do within a time frame, to gain a taste of the work they are involved in. Most of the tasks I was given as seen in my previous posts was research, e.g. "how the scrapping of the default retirement age would affect Dickinson Dees". I would then sit with each department and have their role discussed and ask any questions. This form of work experience is more theoretical and gives an insight into the style of work they do.
The second, the "week in the life of..." was with Marsh. I would imagine this is how they would treat their trainees, therefore not the work experience style as above, but a flavour of the work one would be given. I got an insight intohow the Client Executive organises their week and handles their clients. I enjoyed this as I was able to watch their projects being worked on and what their plans were with the projects in the near future. In conclusion, I got to see their job in action, so a more practical method of work experience.
Two very different and interesting styles. If you are interested in looking into work experience, I would certainly recommend it and I have hopefully shed some light into some of the possible varying types available. Depending on the work style and the company, you may want to query into the style they have planned for you, or would plan for you. Best of luck and I hope you enjoy your work experience!
H
Sunday, 15 August 2010
Time to shine!
Tomorrow I start my first day with a company which I am very excited to be spending time with. I am very unsure of my target job so I think having tasters will benefit me greatly and it will also give them a taste of who I am too. I have learned I can't say too much in my blogs so I shall not say the name of the company in fear of getting into some kind of trouble (funny democracy we are in?). I shall be blogging the basics of my day for the next fives and my adventures with this particular company. It shall be brief because I know of the need for confidentiality.
The week after I start another week of work experience with a different company in a different part of the country and if I am able to, I shall blog briefly about that also. This particular one is in a completely different sector: HR and I have chosen it because I have seen that there are a lot of job vacancies in HR. Hopefully with a week of work experience behind me, it will show interest and I shall shine a bit more on my CV.
So yes I have been very busy setting these up. I am also planning some more work experience with another company in a totally different sector altogether! This one might be harder to get, but we shall see.
Overall, I think that these two weeks will shed some light into what I want to do, or what I want to stay away from. I think work experience is great and I hope it will really pay off as I have such little formal work experience behind me. In this current climate, I need anything even somethings which are slightly unusual, to stand out in the mountains of CV's recruiters receive for jobs.
I have to be an entrepreneur about this and look for the gaps which other competitors aren't looking at. I think most graduates who are not in work need to chase up new strategies to find and win the job they deserve.
H
The week after I start another week of work experience with a different company in a different part of the country and if I am able to, I shall blog briefly about that also. This particular one is in a completely different sector: HR and I have chosen it because I have seen that there are a lot of job vacancies in HR. Hopefully with a week of work experience behind me, it will show interest and I shall shine a bit more on my CV.
So yes I have been very busy setting these up. I am also planning some more work experience with another company in a totally different sector altogether! This one might be harder to get, but we shall see.
Overall, I think that these two weeks will shed some light into what I want to do, or what I want to stay away from. I think work experience is great and I hope it will really pay off as I have such little formal work experience behind me. In this current climate, I need anything even somethings which are slightly unusual, to stand out in the mountains of CV's recruiters receive for jobs.
I have to be an entrepreneur about this and look for the gaps which other competitors aren't looking at. I think most graduates who are not in work need to chase up new strategies to find and win the job they deserve.
H
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