How college grads can ace a head start career.

Where you are seeing yourself in the next 5 years? 

This is the most favorite question of all the global recruiters (ps - obviously after "tell me about yourself). 

But this is no joke. If you really want a jump in the career and even though for the first time. You need to ask this question yourself after every session. Because realizing the three or five-year goal actually makes things interesting. 

Most recruiters don't understand why college grades don’t find their job after 6 or 7 months after graduation. While options like campus placements, internship opportunities, freelancing roles are still open for these freshers. They still don't get the candy at the shop. 

Cause freshers don't understand the window. 

If a fresher gets a real vision of what he/she wanna be, they can seed them in the perfect soil. Without a clear picture, they might get a perfect job but not a breathing one. Most of the freshers realize this thing in the first place and take remedies according to that.

They change organization, they change the industry, they change their CV and more than half of them change their vision. 

More you look into it, more you realize that... 

These are not mistakes, these are actually challenges

I broke the scenarios into 4 major challenges which every fresher should make to avoid

1. You need to know your island

This is a non - negotiable process. You need to know your island before getting your life into corporate. You need to understand that you will not get a life-saving parachute once you get out of that college gate. Figuring out what you need in a corporate start with a vision. 

Some of you need a 5-day working company, flexible working hours, informal dress codes and then you land up in a job which you hate not because of the environment but because of the profile. 

If you only take some time and invest that time in researching you will get the answers for your vision.

A person who wants to be a marketing head in the future joining the army doesn't make any sense. What if he chose a PR company. 

A developer choosing a Saas industry. Someone who likes to build product joining a product based company.

This is the thing you must know, your island, your company, which can improve you for the future. 

2. Planting before gardening

It's doesn't matter how much you score in your final semester. A recruiter always checks what you did to stand out in this competitive market. 

INTERNSHIP is the building block when it comes to improving your career at the best. This is the platform where you can take your maximum risk. This is the platform where you can make unlimited mistakes. In short, this is where the original learning starts. 

Internship always helps students to understand the work-life. The life goals get a clear vision in this small duration platform. Not only education or personal development stage, but internship actually provides you the road for networking. You might get your best mentor as your Manger rather than YouTube gurus. 

Finally, the confidence that most students lack gets improved with a better internship. 

Tip: you can actually change your field through an internship, seriously nobody will judge you. 

3. Put your entire investment on researching

Most freshers usually shoot the bird in the dark, they blindfold apply in every job ads. Obviously this process can increase the level of selection, but this also likes getting a new depression. The vast majority of the freshers accidentally land in their first job and try to get out before 6 months. That becomes a red flag for their future. 

The best way to avoid these red flags is by researching the industry first and then research the company. Reading the job description and updating the CV accordingly won't use as a trick nowadays, but learning what a company needs nowadays will help a lot. Know more about the company even before going for an interview actually make you a standout candidate. 

4. Feed your CV

Nobody cares what's your hobbies are

You can write a list of them and that makes only one second for a recruiter to ignore that. 

Why not try to invest time on - 

1. Writing clear career goals

2. Your upvotes on the completed internship

3. Those coolest freelancing project

4. The skills that made you a pro from the beginner

5. you volunteer exclusives, if you have any. 

Recruiters usually interest in looking at the thing which can make to improve the profile, rather than your interest in basketball. 

The Globe believes that the coming college grads have minimalistic approach when it comes to a job, they think freshers need quick promotion, isolated role, minimum monitoring or no monitoring, accomplishing them for dragging a seat.

Well, it's not at all like that. Both recruiters and college grads need to understand the impact a fresher brings to the organization. Throughout the era, these fresh bloods always bring new ideas, go-getting approach, and a proactive environment in the organization.

It's just through the chasing for dreams we all forgot what we chased and we went with the flow, That is when a more experienced guy should come in front and forwards a helping hand towards these freshers and get them a real version of the corporate world, rather than the one which is showing in movies and all.

PS - Even though I still can't say I'm fully an experienced guy in this, but after reading a few blogs and listening to some podcasts, I really wish I knew these things before.