Graduate and jobless.

To all those who refuse to look at 'rubbish' jobs.

They can be excellent so long as you have a good manager. Take up interviews and see what the boss is like. Yeah, the pay may not be great, but it's a damn sight better than doing nothing.

But, if you've put the effort into getting an education you can't settle for doing the same job as someone who hasn't put that effort in.That's not being a snob, that's recognising your own abilities and your own hard work.

[...]

I haven't spent the last 5 years working my arse of to end up serving burgers to abusive people.

What on earth makes you think you're entitled to a decent job just because you've spent the last 5 years in eduction, probably doing an irrelevant degree?

Looking for advice how do you all tailor your CV to suit jobs which you just want to be able to bring in some money? So like part time sales assistants, mcdonalds workers, catering staff, admin assistants etc.

At the moment mine clearly says I'm a graduate looking for a career working with children then lists all of my experience relevant to this and I find it easy to sway it this way. But when it comes to why do I want to work for mcdonalds, I do have relevant customer experience but just need to spruce it up a bit.

What on earth makes you think you're entitled to a decent job just because you've spent the last 5 years in eduction, probably doing an irrelevant degree?

This.. people dont give a **** bout your degree unless its in something useful, think medicine, law, engineering, sciences, econ

I knew I'd get someone saying that - no offence - I guess it's my articulation. I don't have a sense of entitlement. The way I see it is - if you work hard you ought to be in a better position than those who have chosen not to work hard. I'm not talking about only academia either. But the way this country is at the moment it's seems to be the case that those who don't work hard - or actively pursue not working at all - get given everything. Whilst the rest of us end up breaking our backs to earn a pittance.

Also, the government is constantly telling us we need to be educated to get good jobs. Then once you are 'educated' employers tell you you're over educated and won't employ you. It's ridiculous. Why wouldn't people be pissed off at spending an extra 5 years in education for nothing? If you're constantly being told to get an education and then when you get one you're told it's worthless - why would you not be pissed off? I'd be more shocked if people felt fine about that actually.

I knew I'd get someone saying that - no offence - I guess it's my articulation. I don't have a sense of entitlement. The way I see it is - if you work hard you ought to be in a better position than those who have chosen not to work hard. I'm not talking about only academia either. But the way this country is at the moment it seems to be the case that those who don't work hard - or actively pursue not working at all - get given everything. Whilst the rest of us end up breaking our backs to earn a pittance.

Also, the government is constantly telling us we need to be educated to get good jobs. Then once you are 'educated' employers tell you you're over educated and won't employ you. It's ridiculous. Why wouldn't people be pissed off at spending an extra 5 years in education for nothing? If you're constantly being told to get an education and then when you get one you're told it's worthless - why would you not be pissed off? I'd be more shocked if people felt fine about that actually.



Oh so we don't need history teachers or music teachers etc? Let's not have anyone do a degree in those things. Let's have no one qualified to teach those subjects. No history A-levels or GCSEs. We'll just just teach sciences, maths and Law. Sounds great.

I knew I'd get someone saying that - no offence - I guess it's my articulation. I don't have a sense of entitlement. The way I see it is - if you work hard you ought to be in a better position than those who have chosen not to work hard.

I'm not talking about only academia either. But the way this country is at the moment it seems to be the case that those who don't work hard - or actively pursue not working at all - get given everything. Whilst the rest of us end up breaking our backs to earn a pittance.

Also, the government is constantly telling us we need to be educated to get good jobs.

Then once you are 'educated' employers tell you you're over educated and won't employ you. It's ridiculous. Why wouldn't people be pissed off at spending an extra 5 years in education for nothing? If you're constantly being told to get an education and then when you get one you're told it's worthless - why would you not be pissed off? I'd be more shocked if people felt fine about that actually.

Customer service is a great start. Team work, organisation, and flexibility are all good skills for that line of work too. They don't want to see anything technical, but more generally personable, hard-working, and able to cover shifts when needed.

Admin assistants may need to include a bit about your computing skills though!

Yup I have all of that on it. Should I put the skills section before the work experience then?

For admin roles I have specialist qualifications so have added those, wrote a rough wpm and stated what programs i'm familiar with.

I kind of think the other 3-5 other roles are all focussed on children put people off. I've been volunteering for girl guides on and off for a few years, a peer mentor for my uni and worked at a summer camp in america. I'm struggling to really relate these explicity to customer related roles.

Life is way too short to put up with the kind of abuse that I got from customers in McDonalds.

If you've done GCSEs, A-levels and a Degree, you invested at least 5 more years into your education than the people who left education at 16 and got low paid jobs.

I haven't spent the last 5 years working my arse of to end up serving burgers to abusive people.

That is because you obviously don't have the confidence or skills to handle customers. Nobody has to take that kind of abuse (and yes, I have worked for Maccy Ds, in pubs, on building sites, as a steward, as a glass collecter, as a kitchen porter, in various retail stores). Learn to deal with it properly.



I left education at 16 and invested 5 years in working my way up through various jobs at various companies and ended up on a graduate scheme (before I went back into education and did my first degree). By the time I was 21, I had a good 5 years of full time work experience, professional qualifications that were precisely relevant to my job and good experience and knowledge of what I needed to do and what was expected of me. I was a known quantity - employers could trust that I would be reliable; I would turn up on time and put the hours in, I could deal with people properly in a work environment, I would be able to get on with things and wouldn't be a scared fish constantly asking for help and needing to be prodded in the right direction.

Compare and constrast to someone who has a degree and nothing else - they are simply a much less proven quantity and offer employers ten times as many potential headaches. The fact that they were able to get a degree does not give an employer much confidence that they will be effective in the workplace. They know what it takes to get a degree, they know nearly everyone does it and they know that you can get a 2:1/first without the hard work, self motivation, consistency, people skills etc. etc. that would be needed to thrive in most other endeavours. That is why a lot of the banks/magic circle firms etc. favour people who did varsity level sports etc. because they see that as more of an indicator of those favourable qualities.



The rest of the world doesn't see it that way. The rest of the world would see you as a kid who got up at 10am every day for 50 weeks of the year and maybe did 40 hour weeks for at most 2 weeks of the year. Nobody sees that as hard work and nobody sees your humdrum qualification (i.e. a degree) as being worth any money to them. It isn't about undervaluing yourself - it is about being realistic about your experience and qualifications and how little they mean to anyone else regardless of how hard you reckoned you worked for them.

x

That is because you obviously don't have the confidence or skills to handle customers. Nobody has to take that kind of abuse (and yes, I have worked for Maccy Ds, in pubs, on building sites, as a steward, as a glass collecter, as a kitchen porter, in various retail stores). Learn to deal with it properly.

I left education at 16 and invested 5 years in working my way up through various jobs at various companies and ended up on a graduate scheme (before I went back into education and did my first degree). By the time I was 21, I had a good 5 years of full time work experience, professional qualifications that were precisely relevant to my job and good experience and knowledge of what I needed to do and what was expected of me. I was a known quantity - employers could trust that I would be reliable; I would turn up on time and put the hours in, I could deal with people properly in a work environment, I would be able to get on with things and wouldn't be a scared fish constantly asking for help and needing to be prodded in the right direction.

Compare and constrast to someone who has a degree and nothing else - they are simply a much less proven quantity and offer employers ten times as many potential headaches. The fact that they were able to get a degree does not give an employer much confidence that they will be effective in the workplace. They know what it takes to get a degree, they know nearly everyone does it and they know that you can get a 2:1/first without the hard work, self motivation, consistency, people skills etc. etc. that would be needed to thrive in most other endeavours. That is why a lot of the banks/magic circle firms etc. favour people who did varsity level sports etc. because they see that as more of an indicator of those favourable qualities.

The rest of the world doesn't see it that way. The rest of the world would see you as a kid who got up at 10am every day for 50 weeks of the year and maybe did 40 hour weeks for at most 2 weeks of the year. Nobody sees that as hard work and nobody sees your humdrum qualification (i.e. a degree) as being worth any money to them. It isn't about undervaluing yourself - it is about being realistic about your experience and qualifications and how little they mean to anyone else regardless of how hard you reckoned you worked for them.

they know what it takes to get a degree, they know nearly everyone does it and they know that you can get a 2:1/first without the hard work, self motivation, consistency, people skills etc

since a person in education can work part time and still get a formal education, whilst you are working full time and getting no formal education. Someone who works part time can write the same skills on their CV (timekeeping, dealing well under pressure etc) as you, plus an education.

Again, why do you assume that people who went straight from school to uni have no work experience or extra curricular things on the CV whatsoever? None of my uni mates have simply done their degree and nothing else.

I knew I'd get someone saying that - no offence - I guess it's my articulation. I don't have a sense of entitlement. The way I see it is - if you work hard you ought to be in a better position than those who have chosen not to work hard. I'm not talking about only academia either. But the way this country is at the moment it seems to be the case that those who don't work hard - or actively pursue not working at all - get given everything. Whilst the rest of us end up breaking our backs to earn a pittance.

Also, the government is constantly telling us we need to be educated to get good jobs. Then once you are 'educated' employers tell you you're over educated and won't employ you. It's ridiculous. Why wouldn't people be pissed off at spending an extra 5 years in education for nothing? If you're constantly being told to get an education and then when you get one you're told it's worthless - why would you not be pissed off? I'd be more shocked if people felt fine about that actually.



Oh so we don't need history teachers or music teachers etc? Let's not have anyone do a degree in those things. Let's have no one qualified to teach those subjects. No history A-levels or GCSEs. We'll just just teach sciences, maths and Law. Sounds great.

A lot of people are in the same (or a similar) boat. I graduated LAST year (Biology, 2:1) and I've been stuck in my rather rubbish retail job since. Plenty of people I know from Uni are also having the same issue -- working in jobs they could easily get without a degree (retail, bar work, etc.) while hoping something better comes up.

So, not only are you competing with graduates from this year in this awful economy, but you are competing with those who graduated last year and even the year before that and beyond. Getting a good job appears to be down to luck these days.

What I will say is that any job is better than no job as at least you will have some money coming in. You may have to omit your degree from your CV if you wish to land a retail job. Most retail places are not going to hire someone like a graduate, knowing they will bugger off at the first whiff of a better opportunity (which would be understandable, obviously).