Episode 95 – A Parents’ Guide to Helping Their Child Get a Graduate Job

May 26, 2020 Podcast

Welcome to the 95th episode of the Graduate Job Podcast. Over the coming weeks students would normally be graduating and heading out into the world to start looking for a graduate job. This transition period from university to work is a stressful enough time, not helped often by the extra pressure placed on recent graduates from parents. Which is why this episode is dedicated to parents and how they can help their recently graduated kids find a graduate job. Get them to download it, download it for them if you have to, but try and get them to listen to it. In today’s episode, I explore 8 key things that your parents need to do to help you as you try and get a graduate job. I cover why worrying and panic is not going to do anyone any good, and why your parents might be out of touch with the modern world of work and recruitment. We delve into why they should be thinking about your needs and not theirs, and why getting their chequebook out to fund a masters isn’t the answer. We look at what they can do to help, why they should think about dropping me an email, how they can utilise their network, and why their mindset matter. No matter where you are on your job search for a graduate job, just graduating or already applying, this is an episode you need to listen to. Links today and a full transcript can be found in the show notes at www.graduatejobpodcast.com/parents.

Before we start let me tell you about the brilliant course I’m working on cunningly titled “How to get a graduate job”. This course is packed chock full of decades of experience into one step by step guide of everything you need to do to get a graduate job. There are videos, guides, handouts, cheat sheets, example CVs, example covering letters, example answers to those annoying 200-word competency questions, help with telephone interviews, video interviews. Look if you need to know it to get a graduate job it’s in my course. The course is going live in August, but to be the first to hear about it and get it at a never to be repeated price with special bonuses, head to www.graduatejobpodcast.com/course and leave me your email. Right, on with the show.

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Transcript -Episode 95 – A Parents’ Guide to Helping Their Child Get a Graduate Job

Announcer: Welcome to the Graduate Job Podcast, your home for weekly information and inspiration to help you get the graduate job of your dreams.

James: Hello and welcome to the Graduate Job Podcast, with your host James Curran. The Graduate Job Podcast is your home for all things related to helping you on your journey to finding that amazing job. Each episode I bring together the best minds in the industry, speaking to leading authors, graduate recruiters and career coaches who bring decades of experience into a byte size weekly 30 minute-ish show. Put simply, this is the show I wish I had when I graduated.

Hello and welcome to the 95th episode of the Graduate Job Podcast the UK’s number 1 careers podcast. As I record this in sunny Leeds on a Bank Holiday Monday, I’m only a mile or so away from Leeds University and its Great Hall, where students would normally be graduating over the coming months. This transition period from university to work is a stressful enough time, not helped often by the extra pressure placed on recent graduates from parents. Which is why this episode is dedicated to parents and how they can help their recently graduated kids find a graduate job. Get them to download it, download it for them if you have to, but try and get them to listen to it. In today’s episode, I explore 8 key things that your parents need to do to help you as you try and get a graduate job. I cover why worrying and panic is not going to do anyone any good, and why your parents might be out of touch with the modern world of work and recruitment. We delve into why they should be thinking about your needs and not theirs, and why getting their chequebook out to fund a masters isn’t the answer. We look at what they can do to help, why they should think about dropping me an email, how they can utilise their network, and why their mindset is so important. No matter where you are on your job search for a graduate job, just graduating or already applying, this is an episode you need your parents to listen to. Links today and a full transcript can be found in the show notes at www.graduatejobpodcast.com/parents.

Before we start let me tell you about the brilliant course I’m working on cunningly titled “How to get a graduate job”. This course is packed chock full of decades of experience into one step by step guide of everything you need to do to get a graduate job. There are videos, guides, handouts, cheat sheets, example CVs, example covering letters, example answers to those annoying 200-word competency questions, help with telephone interviews, video interviews. Look if you need to know it to get a graduate job it’s in my course. The course is going live in August, but to be the first to hear about it and get it at a never to be repeated price with special bonuses, head to graduatejobpodcast.com/course and leave me your email. Right, on with the show.

1 – Don’t Panic

So, parents, let’s start at the beginning. Your bundle of joy is now all grown up, they’ve graduated into the middle of a global pandemic and they have no idea what they want to do….. I can feel your blood pressure rising from here. Think Corporal Jonesy in Dads Army and DON’T PANIC!. Stress, panic, whittering and worry is in no one’s best interest. Listen to episode 89 of the show on the coronavirus and getting a graduate job, graduate recruiters are still hiring, the latest stats show some firms are trimming intakes by 10-15% for later in the year, but that means there are still tens of thousands of jobs out there. Worrying and passing on doom and gloom things you’ve read in the papers to you kids is not going to help. The graduate recruitment cycle isn’t even open at the moment as I record this in May, and the majority of companies on the graduate ‘milk round’ don’t open their doors till September. If your kids haven’t got a laser-like focus on exactly what they want to spend the rest of their life doing at this precise moment in time that is fine as well, don’t worry. Because point 2 is…

2 – The world has changed

The job market is dramatically different from the one you will have entered. Jobs for life, final salary pensions (unless you’re applying to the civil service) don’t exist anymore. Millennials and Gen Z are forecast over there working life to have 12 different jobs and 4-5 careers…that’s 4-5 completely separate careers. The options for careers and work has opened up exponentially, with new possible careers not having existed 5 years ago, let alone when you might have started working. This increased choice and options are exciting, but they can also be paralysing. Things which might have held true when you started working aren’t now. Travel abroad, years out, career breaks, side hustles, these aren’t looked down on by graduate employers but are actually encouraged. You don’t have to get a graduate job straight after university, the world has changed, and you need to recognise this.

3 – You child is not an extension of you

Which brings us on to point 3, which could be hard to take. Your child is a unique individual. They are not you. Resist the urge to try and push your child down a particular path, down something you have done, something you wished you had done, something you think will be a ‘stable career’, or a ’good job’. Your kids will have their own ideas and will want to forge their own path. You might have been forced to follow a particular path by your parents, but it doesn’t mean that you have to do the same to them. Which takes us to point 4.

4 – Encourage your child to find the best job

As a parent, you might be anxious that they find a job as soon as possible and push them into accepting the first thing that comes along. Instead, encourage them to find the best job for them. Don’t let them settle for a job that isn’t a good fit for their skills and interests. Buy them a copy of the book StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath, links in the show notes, which will help them to think about their strengths and where they lie. Life is too short to be doing something that you don’t enjoy and don’t want to do. I’m sorry if you have been doing that all your working life, but don’t encourage you kids to do the same. It is possible to find a job you love. Encourage your child to start on the right foot. Money and progression in a career will quickly follow excitement, skill and passion.

5 – Further study isn’t always the answer

One fall-back position for parents is to encourage their kids into further study, a masters, a PhD. This can often be a really expensive mistake. Yes, it will provide them with structure, and something to do, but it won’t necessarily provide benefits in helping them get a graduate job. Recruiters crave work experience more than anything, the chance for you to show them that you can operate in a real-world professional environment. Academia isn’t the real world. Some master’s degrees are very career focussed and set you up well for a getting graduate job afterwards. Most don’t. Another year in the library doing a master’s in art history, isn’t going to be as valuable as the practical work experience you would gain in a job.

6 – Find them a coach

We have talked about what you shouldn’t do, but what should you be doing to help? One thing you can do is point 6, which is to find them a coach. A coach can encourage, offer support, advice, help, insider knowledge of the graduate application process and most importantly….its not you. I can say things honestly and openly to my clients, I can tell them that they need to pull their finger out. From me they take it in the spirit it was intended, from you it would be nagging, getting on their case and the cue for rolling of the eyes, teenage-style strops and arguments. Remove yourself from the process and get expert help. Send me an email at hello@graduatejobpodcast.com or check out my coaching page at https://www.graduatejobpodcast.com/coaching/ I am already starting to fill up spots for the upcoming recruitment cycle, so don’t leave it too late. I only work with a limited number of clients so I can offer in-depth personalised support, so don’t leave it too late.

7 – Offer your contacts

Another thing you can do to help is point 7, to offer your contacts and network. Contacts are still crucial when you start your career. Your kids will benefit immensely from speaking to people in industries of interest, asking questions and finding out more about what a role might be like. This isn’t asking your friends if they have a job going, this is allowing your kids to make connections and find out information. A crucial aspect of this though is that your child needs to own the contact and the relationship. Give them the details and leave them to it. Don’t take over and don’t make the call for them. Let them do it when they are ready.

8- Be patient

The final stage today might be one of the most difficult for you. Point 8 is, be patient. Don’t be bugging your kids for progress every day. Getting a graduate job is a process and a slow one at that. From the online application to the assessment centre, it could easily be 6 months with some of the slower graduate schemes. As an applicant there is only so much chasing you can do, you just have to wait. A parent nagging and asking for updates every night at dinner isn’t going to make for a happy house. Bide your time, be patient, encourage them. It can be a difficult journey, but it is one where they will get there in the end. So there you go 8 tips for parents and, episode 95 done. Shownotes over at www.graduatejobpodcast.com/parents where there is a full transcript and links to everything which we discussed today. I’ve 95 episodes on every aspect of getting a graduate job, so head on over there and listen to your heart’s content. If you are enjoying the show and want to help, please rate, review and subscribe wherever it is that you listen. Also, sign up to hear about my brilliant online course ‘How to Get a Graduate Job’ which I’m working on now, which will be out in August. I hope you enjoyed the episode today, but more importantly, I hope you and particularly your parents, use it and apply it. See you next week.