Last semester I was able to attend a set of lectures given by Caire Brass regarding UK graduate employment and general advice on finding and obtaining a job as a recent graduate. She went into detail on composing an effective CV and also set up a mock assessment center, about which I have written in another blog post.

Overall, the series of lectures was quite useful. I learnt a lot from the section dedicated to CV writing especially, a skill which I had not yet mastered. While I had already written myself a CV, I did not previously understand just how important they are and how much of a difference they can make. Employers apparently spend just a few seconds scanning a CV, so it is absolutely essential to make your CV stand out in all the right ways. My previous CV was awkward and bulky. I had not given it much thought, thinking it would “do the trick”. I have since updated it with more recent information and a better format and structure.

CV writing is difficult. One must condense a life-time’s worth of achievements into a short, punchy page of relevant information. One size does not fit all. Different jobs have different requirements and your CV should always be targeted to those specific requirements that you need to prove you fulfill, just as a cover letter would.

CVs are not only useful for job-seeking. They are also a necessary part of an application to further studies, which is what I aim to do. Given that my degree is coming to an end and I am preparing myself for what’s to come, it was urgent that I obtain not only academic but also technical skills to improve my employability. CV writing is one of those and maybe one of the most important, as it determines whether or not you are even considered for further stages of an application process.

However, I must say I was quite disappointed in the job-seeking advice that was given to us. It was suggested we use job-seeking platforms on the internet to find available positions, which seems to be a popular method here in the UK. I do not think this is an effective way of finding a fulfilling job, as most opening are for basic, unspecialised jobs. Rather than a bottom up approach like this one, which shows you any jobs which loosely correspond to the criteria you input, I find a top down method is much more rewarding and effective in the long term. One must find an institution of which work you admire and which you find truly interesting and work towards obtaining a position there or in related institutions you have found by researching their partners or study area. Obtaining a job may come through applying for work experience or contacting the people in charge, but however hard it is, it’ll always be more rewarding than settling for an adequate position found on a broad website.

I aim to put the knowledge I gained from these lectures to work when seeking a masters degree in Marine Biology and/or a job in a research institute.