Thursday, 28 March

Getting a foot in the door: A practical approach to making yourself employable

Feature Article
Jobs are not easy to come by

Finding a job is difficult. Regardless of which part of the world one find himself or herself, there is no guaranteed employment for anyone and more so within the formal sector. In Africa particularly, graduate unemployment is so endemic that it’s become a national security headache for governments across the continent.

Ghana is no exception to this phenomenon as the situation is so dire that at a point there was an Association of Unemployed Graduates. Successive governments have all touted various interventions to reduce unemployment; yet, the number of unemployed people and redundancies continue to swell up in their thousands each year. Perhaps what’s more troubling is that there is no end in sight, not now, or in the near future. Interestingly there are people who believe that employment opportunities are all round us, except that mostly, people don’t position themselves well enough to get employed.

So in this piece I will attempt to provide some practical ways by which young graduates seeking employment could make themselves preferred job candidates.

You are the job, keep working on yourself

The first cue to understanding the requirements of you as a prospective employee, is to realise that you are the one thing that you are seeking – the job. This means you should perpetually work on yourself. Working on yourself is to upgrade and build your capacity all the time in readiness for the dream job. This is extremely important in that Ghana’s education system is generally grammar-based much to the neglect of technical and vocational skills.

This makes it quite imperative that to stand out as a job candidate, you acquire skills that give you a competitive urge over others. These skills range from being able to do things with your hands to using your mind to get things done. Outside of what one learns in the classroom, one needs to be able to build oneself skillfully. Obtaining a degree is just an evidence of completion of a course and not in any way a testament to one’s occupational proficiency.

I know several graduates who can’t type a document, use the computer or perform basic office tasks; yet consider themselves ready for the job market. In this age and time, you can’t be a serious job seeker if all this is not part of your skills. The world is moving at a digital speed making the basic skill these days computer-based and it is important that as a job seeker, you keep up. Working on yourself is to also be mindful of your attitude towards work.

Having a good attitude perhaps is the most important thing when it comes to working on oneself as it is sure to set you apart from other contenders. Remember all the things you put on your Curriculum Vitae and application letter? – Team player, able to work under pressure and with little or no supervision, etc. – make sure that’s exactly what you intend to be once employed.

So until landing that job make sure you stop at nothing in building the right work attitude, broadening your knowledge base and acquiring a skill because it is only when you have worked on yourself as a job seeker that you can attract the real job.

Carve a niche, be great at something

A few years ago, in my formative years as a communications’ person working in a prominent media house, a friend who had been elected Student Representative Council (SRC) President at his school reached out to me to be a Master of Ceremony (MC) for their official welcome event for fresh students. It was a nursing school and the event was a pageant they called, ‘Miss Akwaaba.’

Being a media person, I guess he thought I should be able to do it without any stress; well I thought so too myself. So I prepared quite thoroughly, got in involved in the activities leading up to the pageant two weeks prior. I even learned a few medical terms just to impress the crowd.

 On the night, I impressed, presentation was good, stage presence was good too and all that I thought was required of me as a MC, I delivered. Yet, the audience wanted something extra and I failed miserably. They wanted me to do something; dance, sing or be cracking jokes which I simply couldn’t do. Their verdict at the end of the show was that I was too serious and monotonous and failed to liven them up.

Few weeks after that, I had an opportunity to MC another school-related event. This time, it was a graduation ceremony for a media school. And with the feedback I got from the pageant, I thought this time around, I should be less formal; after all, the common denominator in both events was students. And since I couldn’t bring myself up to sing or dance, I learned a few jokes which I occasionally interjected in between my presentations.

At a point, the principal of the school asked that I should do an appeal for funds from the parents and guests who had come for the event. I refused because I told him I didn’t know how to go about that duty to which he expressed his surprise as to why I couldn’t do so as an MC. Thankfully, there was a co-MC who did the appeal. For me, I did a great job because I got the audience laughing all throughout the event; at least that is what I thought, until after the programme, the man who hired me came to me and said, I was overly jovial. Once again, I failed to live up to expectation as an MC.

There is a raging debate on the need for one to be versatile when it comes to one's abilities. To some, it's a sure way to getting ahead and becoming a preferred job candidate. In fact, in a knowledge-based world, being versatile is very crucial as it ensures that one is able to fit in any environment of work.

However, it's even much more essential that in being good at many things, you are also great at something. As a person, you should be known for something. That means you hone your skill in a field that can be attributed to you. Simply, carve a niche of excellence and mastery over something people can identify you with.

My attempt at being an MC made me realize that, although as a communication's person, people expected me to do that listlessly, I just couldn't bring myself to doing it to the satisfaction of my audience. Yes, I know you may be thinking, I should have improved and got better; and trust me, I did. But if you expect me to crack jokes, dance, sing or do something to wow a crowd as an MC, I just couldn't do that. So I turned my attention to writing and perfected my skill in the field and have since written hundreds of articles and received several accolades for it.

Carving a niche is not to neglect the salience of versatility, but to be bold about your ability and send an incontrovertible signal to a prospective employer that if they are seeking the best Information and Communication Technology (ICT) person, Customer Service person, artist, painter, marketer, nurse, teacher, you are the one. It's to acknowledge that though the world of work expects you to be the proverbial "Jack of all trades," you would be a master of something.

In recent times, I have observed a trend where people pursue several degrees in different fields for the mere fact that they can do it. A Bachelor's Degree in Arts, a Master's in Economics, another Master's in Philosophy, then another in International Relations and so forth. While this may seem appealing and add on to your personal aggrandisement, it demonstrates a lack of mastery over one subject area of study and puts you in a poor position against someone who might have say, three degrees in one subject area.

Carving a niche is to identify and become aware of your strength and capacity. It helps prevent a situation where you become a square peg in a round hole because you claimed you could do anything. These days, people looking for employment are often heard they can do anything. Carving a niche helps you to specifically follow a career or work path while eliminating the ‘anything’ rhetoric because there is no job description as ‘anything.’

To carve a niche is to stand tall, be unique and identifiable in a world where everyone claims to be able to know and do everything - and oh, there is never such a person.

Present a good CV/Resume

Curriculum Vitae (CV) or Resume remains a valuable document in securing a job. And this is why there cannot be a compromise on the completeness and the veracity of the information you put on them. But first, you need to know that a CV is not the same as resume, although they are often used interchangeably.

 A CV would have personal profile, every information about your job history, educational credentials, whether they are relevant to the work you are seeking or not. It captures the totality of what you want your potential employer to know you have done, and can do. This makes a CV quite detailed and could take several pages of paper.

Resume on the other hand details mostly your experiences that are relevant to the job you are seeking. So besides the standard personal profile and academic qualifications, the only thing that matters here is your job experience that is apropos to the requirements of the job being sought for. On a resume, there is no need to tell your employer you were an attendant at your aunt’s shop for three years when you are applying to be a teacher. So whereas CV is required to be comprehensive, resume just cuts to the chase.

Perhaps what is more important is to know what to put on any of these documents especially on the personal profile column. Unless one is explicitly required to provide it, information such as religion, marital status, ethnic, group, hometown are completely irrelevant.

Then there are referees or references. Whoever you put on your CV as a referee could be the most important key to securing a job and that is why it’s vital you use someone who is reliable and sure to say good things about you when contacted by your prospective employers. The person should also be someone connected to the job you seek. For fresh-out-of-school graduates, lecturers and National Service work bosses may be good references. But if you’ve worked before, be sure to use someone from your immediate work place.

I once sat through an interview session where one lady with a very impressive CV got herself in trouble when asked why she had used her pastor and secondary school teacher as referees. This was someone who had completed university seven years ago, worked at three different places and still decided to use a pastor and teacher as referees. This also brings in another conversation about the need to always part ways with your employers on an amicable note – we will look this in detail later.

Having a good CV or resume is salient in that it gives your employers an inkling into your abilities, experiences and qualifications even before they meet you physically so be mindful of what you put on it.

There are a lot of factors to notching up a job besides having a good CV, great aptitude or being unique. In the second part of this piece, we will take a look at other ways such as volunteerism and social capital as a means to landing a job. Until then, know that regardless of how difficult finding a job is, people still get employed in their numbers daily, and if you truly position yourself and prepare, you could soon be gainfully employed.

 

Source: Classfmonline.com/Samuel Obeng Appah