Students Seeking Employment

Students often seek my counsel about finding work in line with their studies and aspirations.?I never refuse. I’ve nothing to lose, and maybe one day, down the track they might in some way demonstrate their appreciation.

Here are two examples about approaches from two international students.

Luis is from Peru where he was a manufacturer of women’s corporate attire, marketed through local department stores. He described his operations as highly automated and used SAP for the management of operations and finance. He knew his stuff. Following his MBA studies he planned to settle with his young family in Australia; preferably with employment in the industry that he knew.

One day after a lecture he sought my counsel on finding suitable employment.?He said that virtually nothing appeared in the on-line job sites, and when something did come up he had no success in even getting to the interview stage. He was getting very frustrated, and I could sense depressed.

Here was the plan of action that we developed.

Forget sending emails and letters in the post. Enhance your social media profile, and cold call.

• Enhance your LinkedIn profile with articles that demonstrate your professional interests and experiences.
• Put a copy of your resume and your academic transcript in your LinkedIn profile.
• Identify specific local clothing businesses where you would like to work.
• Then search through LinkedIn for people who work in these busineses.
• Send a message to these people asking them for the name and email address of their human resources manager, or if there isn’t one, the GM or MD.
• If this only presents a few contacts, specifically visit the others and politely ask at reception for relevant names.
• Now prepare personal letters to these individuals, affix a copy of your resume, put them in a large envelope, and in your best hand-writing address it for their personal attention.
• Finally, dressed smartly visit these businesses to hand deliver the sealed letters.?

In the following semester break Luis did this. He identified ten targets, mostly clothing manufacturers who produced school uniforms, corporate attire and merchandise for major events.

After only eight days two of the targets invited Luis in for an interview. And then I received the following email.

Hi Dr Paul

I have amazing good news. I got a part time job in a company like mine. This company manufactures corporate, school, sports and hospitality uniforms. I have started in a position in the production department, tracking the process from inbound logistics until dispatching. I have started two weeks ago and they are so flexible and understand my work limitations.

?I really appreciate all your support in this journey...

?Thanks to encourage me to change my strategy, to visit specific companies rather than apply on Seek.

It’s over five years now and Luis rose to a more responsible management role in the company, and sold his share in the business back in Peru to his business partner.

And the icing on the cake is that his wife and two small children have joined him in Australia with a plan to settle permanently.

The second example is that of Rajan K C, an environmental researcher from Nepal. He’s in Australia to support his student wife, and is working as a process worker in a poultry business.

We met following a presentation at a job seeking forum for international students. Rajan enquired whether I could mentor him in his search for an internship or employment relevant to his environmental interests and skills.

A few weeks later we met over a coffee. I learnt that he had a masters degree in environmental studies, had produced a very professional quality video?on sustainability in mountain villages, had delivered a paper at an international sustainability conference in France, and was passionate about developing a career as an environmental scientist. He was very articulate and I even saw himself as a doctoral candidate one day. All of this convinced me to take him on as a client.

It hasn’t been an easy road, frustrating at times with his shift work often making appointments difficult to arrange. But we made progress.?So far he has been interviewed by a manufacturer of compost and soil improvers, an environmental issues consultancy and the CEO of a civic tidiness organisation. All see promise for him, but as yet nothing has eventuated.?

His video production skills are very good. He owns some sophisticated equipment, so I encouraged him to produce some short documentaries on environmentally friendly products manufactured locally. He is keen to do this to enhance his social media profile.?He can be contacted on [email protected]