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Let my mum know I give Career advice to students…

Blog by October 27, 2010

Threesides Marketing - stand out and be noticed
Stand out and be noticed... or grab a bucket and assume the position (and yes - that's Fleur under the bucket re-enacting what it felt like before she worked at Threesides!)

Every now and then you’ll have one of those ” I feel really old” moments.  You know how it goes – Go to a bar on any given friday night and everyone looks about 12 years old – that sort of thing.  Okay  – I know I’m only 30 (and 3/4) but there’s lots of people younger than me these days (and I found a grey hair the other day).

I had one of those moments last week when I got asked to present a talk at the University of Canberra to a group of marketing, advertising and tourism students.  A careers talk! Does that mean I finally have a career?. Have I made it in life? Quick call my mum and let her know – maybe she’ll stop hassling me about ‘am I earning enough’ and ‘is business going okay’?  Yes mum – I have a real job and everything is fine (how’s retirement by the way – can’t wait to get there!).

As a matter of fact mum, I now share advice with students about how they can find employment and turn their degree into a job – you should be proud.  So here’s my tips for final years students at the University of Canberra on…..

How to Get a job in tourism or marketing (or both)

  • Take and make opportunities for yourself – because no one will do it for you.
  • Everyone at Uni gets a degree – are you getting noticed for anything else?
  • Get work experience in a related field – and do lots of it. It’s unpaid but it’s priceless.
  • Use the “I’m a Uni student” line as often as possible because once you graduate you won’t get any more work experience opportunities
  • Aim to stick in a job for around 2 years – you will get good experience and training and then look at the next opportunity
  • Apply for and win awards – nothing helps you stand out like an award.
  • Invest your ‘free’ time in building your own personal brand locally.
  • Don’t run away from Canberra too quickly – build a skill base here and then head to Sydney, Melbourne or London and you’ll get paid heaps more.
  • Want a job with us? – make sure the interview isn’t the first time I am meeting you.
  • I hate reading CV’s – I much prefer Googling you and seeing what the web tells me. Silence means you are boring and have never done anything worth publishing on the web.
  • Show people you have a good attitude, you can use your initiative, you have common sense, a sense of humour and you can use your initiative. Anything else you can be trained on.

What you need to do now:

  1. Work out how much time you have left at uni – split it between work, study and work experience
  2. Quit your irrelevant, Friday night drinking money, weekend job and go and get one in a more relevant industry
  3. Identify 4-5 places you would like to work and contact them to do work experience or just to introduce yourself.  Don’t mass email them – ring and say hello.
  4. Get involved in any extracurricular activities on campus that will help you build your experience and profile.
  5. Start building your experience portfolio, your name in the industry and your professional profile.
  6. Go and change your privacy settings on facebook – if I am interviewing you – I will do a background check first!
  7. Start a blog about what you know, get onto LinkedIn and start optimising your professional profile.
  8. Don’t wait, don’t complain and get on with it!

As you might have worked out these would apply to most people in any town and any stage of life, but it seems a lot easier to go back to your old uni and feel important for 30mins  – sharing pearls of wisdom as someone who has been there and done that locally.

I’m very much still doing it – so will make sure I update this post in a few years with everything else I know between now and then.

– Todd