How to Find a Job After College: College graduation is just around the corner, which means it’s almost speech season. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good graduation speech and all the platitudes that come along with it, but very few of them give guidance on how to find a job after college.
We want to help. At HubSpot, we’re lucky enough to interview and hire a lot of recent graduates, so I’ve rounded up some advice below based on interviews, applications, and feedback we hear from hiring managers, recruiters, and job candidates alike. And for free templates and tools you can use to put the advice below into practice download this post’s complementary guide here.
But before we dive into how to find a job after college, let’s first shed some light on why the job searching process is so difficult for college graduates.
Why is it hard to find a job after college?
One of the leading factors that make finding a job after college difficult is fierce competition.
According to Statista, the percentage of the U.S. population that have a 4-year college degree has steadily increased since the 1940s. As of 2020, 38.3% of women and 36.7% of men have completed four years of college or more.
“wp-image-138289 size-full” title=”How to Find a Job After College” src=”https://www.tipsclear.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/How-to-Find-a-Job-After-College.jpg” alt=”How to Find a Job After College” width=”1000″ height=”667″ /> How to Find a Job After CollegeWith college degrees becoming more and more common, graduates are finding it difficult to stand out to employers. The competition can be even more intense for college students who either did not complete an internship in their field studies while pursuing their education.
With that said, here is some advice to make finding a job after college less daunting.
12 Tips for Finding a Job After College
1. Narrow down your search.
I asked a recent college graduate how many applications he submitted to companies each week as part of his job search. His response was, “As many as I need to get my parents off my back.”
Unfortunately, sending out countless applications isn’t strategic and is typically unsuccessful because:
- It’s hard to stick out from the pack of other applicants when you’re trying to be all things to all people.
- You can’t properly research and follow up with hundreds of job applications.
- Juggling too many applications can increase the likelihood of spelling mistakes, misstating goals, or missing scheduled phone screens.
Instead, I recommend doing enough homework to reasonably target 10-12 companies. This way you’ll have the time and energy to give each application the attention necessary to ensure they’re filled out properly. And you’ll be able to better hone in on the unique skills you’d bring to the job and really stand out to employers.
2. Talk to 10 people about their jobs.
I recommend scheduling a 30-minute, well-organized and orchestrated phone interview with someone familiar with the company or its field.
Ask a friend who graduated recently, a neighbor from your hometown, or check in with your career services office to ask for some input. If your immediate network isn’t a great re, get to work on LinkedIn — identify individuals with job titles that interest you and ask if they would be open to a quick conversation.
Regardless of the field you choose, you are going to spend a lot of time at work, so it’s worth investing the time beforehand to understand what roles will actually be like after you secure the job.
3. Reach out to entry level employees.
You’ll want to focus on selecting people at or close to entry level jobs as they’ll give a much more realistic sense of what your day would be like and what skills you would need to succeed. This step can help you significantly refine your search and align your applications accordingly.
While it may be tempting to reach out to senior leaders, it would be better to wait until after you have clear context on the types of roles you’re most interested in pursuing.
4. Ask Good Questions.
Focus on asking questions about what their average day looks like:
- What do they work on?
- Are they mostly working alone at a computer or in meetings with other people?
- How (if at all) do they interact with their boss?
- What’s the culture at their organization like?
- What do they like about it and what do they wish they could change?
- What’s the most important skill to succeed in the job they have, and why?
These types of questions are specific and give you a real sense for what it’s like to actually do a given job.
5. Listen.
Active listening can be the single most effective tool in identifying the right company and role for your skill set.
Ask your professors and advisors if they know alumni working at companies where you could be a good fit. Ask your previous employers for feedback on what you’re best at and what you can do better. The answers to these questions should help inform your job search, but you need to actively listen to make their advice actionable.
Moreover, take good notes during these conversations. I’d recommend creating a Google doc with:
- The name of the person you’re talking with
- The company they work for
- Key takeaways from the call
After these conversations, make clear follow-ups and carve out time after every informational conversation to thank the person who gave you their time.
6. Identify three job tracks and create a playbook for each one.
After your phone calls and interviews help you identify a few roles that really interest you, visit the career site for a few of the companies in your preferred geography that offer the roles you’re seeking. Take note of the specific skills the position demands.
Many applicants skip this step entirely, but it’s imperative to understand what the hiring managers are seeking and what experience is most relevant to the career paths you’re targeting.
Recognizing that the best hiring managers can screen for potential and skill, you need to craft a compelling narrative for why you are positioned to succeed in a role. Does that mean you need to check every single box? Absolutely not, but you do need a compelling story for why you are uniquely suited to the position.
Far too many people send the same resume for multiple positions that require very different skills and experiences.
To avoid this, my recommendation is to fill in the blanks of this sentence before you start on a resume or cover letter: “I would be a great (_______________) because I have _________, ________, and _______ skills as evidenced by my work with ___________ and _____________.”
This may seem elementary, but when you’re in the thick of a job search it’s easy to get lazy and ship the same materials to everyone. Creating a clear, concise summary of why you are positioned to succeed in a given role is a great foundation for the materials you’ll create next before applying.
7. Craft compelling application materials that tell your story.
Far too many people treat creating their resume, cover letter, and any other necessary application materials as a chore to be completed or a checklist to be generated. In reality, recruiters and hiring managers scan through hundreds if not thousands of resumes on a weekly basis, so make their lives easier by creating a truly compelling narrative on your interest in the role.
Telling a great story doesn’t mean filling every square inch of space on a page. In fact, the best resumes and cover letters use spacing, italics, and bold text to make the materials more readily digestible and enjoyable to read for the hiring manager.
When it comes to crafting your narrative for applications, don’t underestimate the role of activities outside of work: You don’t need a formal internship or summer job to show that you’re interested in and capable of blogging, or a seasoned job in sales to show that you’re passionate about engaging people.
Did you blog for your college admissions office to help recruit incoming students? You should include that experience if you’re applying for a marketing, recruiting, or human res position.
Did you use iMovie to create videos for your university