The Undergraduate Commerce Society at UTM hosted a workshop in the Davis Building last Tuesday to help students and recent graduates find jobs.
The session titled How to Find a Job was presented by Cassandra Jowett, the content manager of TalentEgg, an online job portal and resource website geared towards students.
Students need to differentiate themselves from other students graduating at the same time by effectively communicating their unique experiences and talents, according to Jowett.
“Sadly, everyone in this room is a clone of everyone else. You’re all graduating with the same degree, probably with very similar experience,” said Jowett during the presentation. “Probably, there are things about you that are special, but unless you tell those to employers, you all look the same on paper.”
Students have more free career-related resources available to them than any other group, and should develop a strategy to take advantage of them, said Jowett. She also gave tips to improve résumés.
“If each [bullet point] on your résumé doesn’t list an accomplishment, then it probably doesn’t need to be there,” said Jowett, referring to the tendency to give detailed job descriptions of previous employment.
She identified two major recruiting cycles that students should be aware of: in September companies hire students for entry-level positions for the following year, and in January they hire interns for the summer.
Students should take the extra time to tailor their résumé and cover letter to individual employers, and to use social media platforms to network with recruiters and industry professionals instead of relying on email, said Jowett.
“People get so many emails these days. They’re really looking to engage with students on Facebook or Twitter—and LinkedIn,” said Jowett. “Stick in people’s mind; that’s the whole idea. […] When they get your résumé, they might connect all that extra stuff to your name.”
The event was the first time UCS has collaborated with TalentEgg, and was intended to help students with the winter recruitment season, according to Fatima Tariq, the director of corporate relations at UCS, who was part of the team that proposed holding the workshop.
“I didn’t want [students] to be nervous about the upcoming recruitments. I’ve been through it in the summer, and it’s not as nerve-racking a process as it seems to be,” said Tariq in an interview. She urges students to keep pushing even if they get a few rejections.
“Try to learn how to improve yourself and what areas you didn’t do that great in,” she said. “Keep trying, and eventually it will happen.”
Forty-five students registered for the workshop, one of many events UCS holds annually.
