» Helping students get (better) jobs

GradStart for Universities—programme definition

What is GradStart for Universities?

GradStart for Universities is a programme of workshops and associated supporting activities which raises students’ abilities before and during job search.

It is tailored to the needs of, and situation in, each university in which we work.

Outcomes

Students

These are the specific outcomes the programme seeks for its students:

to find more and better graduate vacancies
to perform well in interview and selection processes
to receive relevant job offers which the students accept.

There are also valuable incidental outcomes. Each student will be able to develop the skills he or she needs:

to approach their studies in a more business-like manner
to relate better to fellow students and to the staff of the university and
to create a network of contacts useful both professionally and personally.

The university

As students realise the outcomes above, the effect on the university will be:

a higher proportion of students secure employment within six months of graduating
the university graduate prospects ranking improves
the external perception of the university ris
the university has the opportunity to raise the entry requirements for new students.

‘Employability’ and ‘Recruitability’

We believe that it is useful to make a distinction between ‘employability’ and ‘recruitability’.

Employability embraces all the skills, mental qualities and strengths, and attitude (approach to work) that are needed to be a successful employee in a business, both individually and as part of a team. This requires competence in teamwork, management and leadership, commercial awareness, business and financial awareness, and other subjects.

But, however valuable, these are of little use to graduates who are not able to get a job in which they can demonstrate their mastery of them.

Graduates also need to be good at the things which will get them a job:. We call these skills and attributes recruitability:

understanding and managing themselves—motivating themselves, being resourceful and resilient
dealing with people and influencing them.

They determine the graduate’s likelihood of being recruited.

Recruitability skills are, of course, needed in work. They are the components of employability which have to be in place first.

How GradStart tackles ‘recruitability’

We work with students on the following—enough to get them through the door of their first full time employer:

improving (in some cases substantially) their engagement with the process of job seeking—this requires working with them on their personal characteristics and personal management skills
developing their skills in applying for jobs, internships and other work experience opportunities—this includes interview skills, written communication skills and so on.

We know that any sensible employer recruits on attitude, not ability. Ability in accountancy and finance, for example, can be demonstrated by a student’s degree and their professional accreditation.

What employers need—and look for—are recruits who are self-reliant, articulate, who have interpersonal skills, who have an awareness of the context within which they will be working, ie, wider business and commercial issues, and have the right attitude. This is likely to have been achieved through work experience and the development of these ‘soft skills’ GradStart provides.

GradStart for Universities—programme definition

GradStart for Universities is a programme workshops and associated supporting activities tailored to meet the needs and situation of each university in which we work.

Typically, each student is part of a group of up to 20 individuals. Each group receives:

five half-day sessions for the second term of the first academic year
ten half-day sessions for the first two terms of the second academic year
five half-day sessions for the first term of the third academic year
support from an online job search planning app
handouts which build into a library of expertise.

Each session will be up to 2.5 hours giving a maximum of up to 50 hours workshop time per student over three years.

The workshops

We believe it is more important that students develop a good level of understanding and proficiency in a restricted set of skills rather than being exposed to a much larger volume of content which they do not have the time or opportunity master.

The high level subject areas we will cover are:

Managing oneself

This area addresses the personal characteristics and skills we need to be successful:

empowerment, self-confidence, resourcefulness, motivation, resilience

In short, acquiring insight and knowing what to do with that insight. This forms the basis of a good attitude. Students also need to be able to handle negative pressures:

stress, anger, anxiety.

Influencing others

This covers:

assertiveness, empathy, patience,
purpose and outcomes, rapport, communicating the message, stories, feedback.

We create a ‘facilitating environment’ which empowers the students to change themselves and which supports them when they choose to do so.

We achieve this in a variety of ways which recognise that people learn best when they are in their feelings and are most likely to change their behaviour when they address their feelings and beliefs.

We use exercises; we run discussions (sometimes in pairs, sometimes in the group); and we use stories. We do use some ‘chalk and talk’, to teach relevant and helpful models.
We set up a ‘buddy’ system whereby students are paired-up and asked to support each other between sessions.
We show by example: the whole programme should be one long illustration of Influencing skills.

Supporting activities

Assignment

We believe it is important for students to have a record of their performance on this programme. Students will be asked to carry out an assignment, documenting their learning and work seeking activities, such as:

documenting the parts of the workshop content which particularly influence them
attending networking and other events provided by the employer engagement programme
logging the findings of any research they undertake
carrying out specific tasks set by the workshop facilitator.

The benefits of such an assignment are:

it evidences their work, and provides collateral which can be shown to potential employers
it enables the student to demonstrate non-academic work activity in the university
it will helps the student remember and recall the content of the programme during interview
it encourages the student to develop good work habits.

Practical work

Practical exercises will be set and carried out during class sessions, and between classes. The aim is to get students practising the necessary skills and therefore we need to give them the maximum opportunity to do so. Exercises will be geared towards:

good time management
self-motivation
self analysis
choosing and practising a more helpful attitude
role play exercises
ad hoc presentations.

Employer engagement programme

We believe it is essential that students get contact with external businesses, and the businesses have contact with them. The extent to which mechanisms are in place to achieve this varies widely from university to university. We provide consultancy (and assistance, if needed) to create strong relationships between the university and the business community. This enable students to experience:

presentations by local, national and global companies about business to the students
learning and discovery of the variety of job roles required within a business
networking with businesspeople
involvement of businesspeople in mock interviews.

Supplementary online resources

We augment the programme with online educational resources. These give students the opportunity to study additional content between sessions to widen their understanding: