Monday 6 July 2009

Fewer chances of getting a job

The average number of graduates chasing every job on offer this year has risen to 48 and graduate starting salaries have been frozen, a report says.

There were 25% fewer jobs available in the UK on the last recruitment round, the Association of Graduate Recruiters said after surveying 226 members.

A report on BBC News basically says us graduates are highly unlikely to get a job - there are fewer jobs, more graduates, more competition and if we do get a job it will not be very well payed since salary rises are being frozen.

You'd think that someone with my varied skillset would see jobs all over the place but it's not true. There are fewer jobs and I "can't do" a lot of the jobs advertised. The problem is that those job advertisers seek a couple of things that I, on the face of it, can't give - experience (e.g. 2+ years), certain skills in Biology like basic genetic analysis which which we were never taught in Medical Sciences (!), skills/languages in IT like C#.NET, MSSQL and Oracle. How am I meant to get these skills if I've never done them?

I'm pretty sure I can learn all of these and very fast if I was given the chance but they never do give you a chance. There's always someone out there who has tried these things that you lack but may not be as good as you but they will get the job anyway. And in order to have experience in a work environment I need a job in the field to get such experience - personal experience is not good enough for them. Catch 22. It's depressing.