Vol . 1: The First Day of the Rest of Your Life
Senior year of college: a time most often spent desperately clinging to the last remaining vestiges of youth and freedom before the impending doom of graduation, when you’re ousted from your warm, carefree college existence and into the cold, cruel, “real” world. And contrary to what your blithe existence of the last year of college tells you, that impending doom is closer than you may think.
Since childhood, we’ve heard adults reiterate Thomas Jefferson’s famed quote “Do not put off till tomorrow what you can do today” over and over in an attempt to dissuade us from a youthful norm: procrastination. And as you attempt to apply this phrase to your first semester mid-terms, papers, and, eventually, your finals, I invite you to ponder something else: What are you going to do when you graduate? For most, this question is often ignored until halfway through second semester, or possibly ,in a worst case scenario), after graduation.
Consider this. Upon that fateful day of hideous mortar boards and equally disgusting graduation gowns, you will be one of hundreds of thousands of young people walking the line. And odds are that a very high percentage of them will be looking for a job. Where does this leave you? If you’ve waited until after graduation to even consider the idea of employment, the odds are stacked against you. In a down economy, where the unemployment percentage is stuck, and seemingly frozen, at 9.5%, finding a job is not what it used to be. In the “old days”, when you graduated, jobs were practically thrown at you. In a bull market where the Dow Jones Industrial Average was soaring at 14,000, companies were ecstatic to hire wet-nosed, bright-eyed young kids right out of college. And many of you graduating this year may still be operating under the pretense that finding a job will somehow be easy. Dispel any notions that lead you to that conclusion. Many of you will also have unrealistic expectations of the jobs you will be offered and the salary you will be paid. The days of being hired right out of college right into middle management with a $50,000 a year salary and awesome pension plan are gone. In today’s world, you have to have a Bachelor's degree to even be considered for a position as an administrative assistant, which is essentially a very fancy title for a secretary. On top of that, many companies are requiring at least two to three years of experience in a professional setting for entry-level positions. So this begs the question, where does this leave you? What is YOUR plan?
Despite all the doom and gloom, there is a silver lining, and something to be learned from those who have graduated before you. And fortunately, it’s a very simple concept. Plan ahead. Instead of waiting until the last minute to find a job, start looking NOW. Most companies will accept resume submissions with a “graduation pending” in the education section. In fact, they welcome it. Not only will it get you ahead of the curve of 99% of the recently graduated job-seeking population , but the companies to which you apply will appreciate your proactive attitude. And if everything works out in your favor, upon graduation you will be able to say that you already have a job, which I’ve heard is an amazing feeling.
Also, consider the companies to which you decide to apply. Evaluate your major, your strengths, your weaknesses, your experience (professional or otherwise), and make sure that the jobs you are applying for are jobs you can realistically be considered for. A large part of most peoples’ lack of success on a job hunt (myself included) is reading the job description and not necessarily the requirements. You would be right in your thinking that answering phones, taking messages, penning correspondence and generating reports would be a job simple enough for a chimpanzee, but unless you can show on your page long resume that you are capable of doing so, no company is ever going to consider you for the position. It brings light to the age old conundrum: you cannot be hired without experience, but if no one will hire you, how are you supposed to get experience? One suggestion, which is in my opinion the best, is to get internships. As awful as working for free might sound, an internship is by far the most efficient way to get the kind of professional experience that employers value so highly. In addition, it will give you a more diversified pool to choose from when seeking out letters of recommendation, whether it be for graduate school or a company that offers more prestige. There is also a large possibility of being hired on with the company for which you intern, pending that you like the environment and you play your cards right.
This is not to say that there isn’t a single college senior who doesn’t have a plan. On the contrary, there are several people who have been working towards their respective career goals since day one of freshman year of high school. But if you don’t find yourself among the select few who have their entire lives planned out in painstaking detail, now is the time to start. Start planning and making decisions. If you decide that working isn’t something that you want to start at the moment, start looking at graduate programs. Know the tests you need to take, how many letters of recommendation you need, and what the other requirements are. If you decide that you do want to find a job, start researching companies now. Make use of the career centers at your respective universities, get your resume lined up, and look for internships. It doesn’t so much matter what exactly you’re doing as long as you’re doing something that’s furthering you toward some kind of career goal. It may seem asinine and pointless, but if you beat the rush, you will thank yourself. You will never hear anyone, 50 years from now as they reflect back on their life, say “Man, I really wish I hadn’t planned ahead.”
-Kelly Sabey
