Why aren’t students in revolt against the system for Graduate employment?
Sometimes we are surprised by the extent to which huge numbers of people are prepared to accept a bad deal. The current system by which students find a first job is a mess. We’re trying to fix a rotten system on behalf of two groups of people, but it can seem like hard work trying to persuade people you’re doing them a service.
If you’ve read our posts before, you’ll know that we want students to realise that the current system of finding gainful employment is not set up to their best advantage, and we’re trying to help employers (particularly SME employers) achieve something their budgets have previously precluded them from enjoying (having a presence on campus!)
In the case of students, we can’t seem to get across to them the sense of urgency around genuine career-planning (we’re not alone, lots of employers have told us that they’ve had the same trouble for years).
The current entry-level jobs market is dominated by the system set up to service Graduate recruitment into large “blue-chip” employers. It really is a well organised industry and many people earn their living working in this area (think about the careers officers, the recruitment companies, the in-house HR specialists, the CV-writing workshop people etc etc).
The trouble is this. Only 10% of students get “graduate-level” jobs via this well-publicised route.
Yes, that’s right, only 10% of graduates in a typical year secure a graduate-level job. We couldn’t believe it either.
The “remaining” 90% will probably get a job, but it most likely won’t be at Graduate-level, or with a large employer. Not getting a graduate level job diminishes the argument for incurring student debt.
In summary, the entry-level job market is a huge bottle neck.
For fairly obvious reasons, this 10% figure isn’t widely published (if it was better known, fewer people would go to university, and lots of people in the education industry make a living out of this traffic). I’ve never really been able to get anyone to quote this figure in a formal context. I learned it by going to a recruitment industry conference, which I guess most students won’t ever get to visit.
What we at Bizenko want to know is why students “accept” this position. They get very little career-planning value out of the process. In essence, they are a bit like “turkeys voting for Christmas”.
We hope that students behave this way because they haven’t yet heard about Bizenko, or why our service can help them. Our service is designed to help students build confidence in face of this mess. We can’t guarantee everyone a job, but we can give you the ammunition you need to build a career despite the inadequacies of the system.
At Bizenko, we want individuals to take the attitude that they no longer wish to be herded through a brutal bottleneck simply for the sake of making life easier for the recruitment industry. We want individuals to demand more from the transition from education into employment.
We want the students to understand that if you become a customer, people start to pay attention to your needs. However, if the extent of your career planning is that you rely on free advice about writing CV and application letters, then the system will treat you very poorly.
If this sounds good to you, please get in touch, or register on the website.
