Lee Smith - Kick Start Your Career: Successful Strategies and Winning Techniques

Kick Start Your Career

For new graduates, the key challenge remains how to secure that first career-related job. Full of guidance and tips on how to handle the complex field of job hunting, Kick Start Your Career can help navigate an ever-changing job market and secure your chance at your desired career. It is a valuable investment in your future. It advises the reader on how to:

stand out in job applications;

use social media for job searching;

create resumes and cover letters that stand out;

succeed at interviews.

It provides a practical, hands on, step-by-step approach. With an integrated Personal Plan that helps create key job search documents it directs soon-to-be graduates towards achieving their career aspirations. Accompanying online resources include examples and templates, which can be downloaded in Word format to help you prepare resumes and other job search documents.

This book will help graduates progressively build up job-hunting resources skills, achievements, resume, cover letter and interview responses and turn this into a practical outcome: a new job. It is a key companion to any student or recent graduate exploring the job market.

The aim of this book is to help young graduates navigate the job-hunting marketplace and succeed in getting their first career-related job. It is a key companion to any student or recent graduate exploring the job market.

Lee Smiths professional life included developing young graduates. He holds multiple qualifications in applied science and technology. Extensive experience in preparing Personal Development programmes led to a focus on helping young graduates transition from university to find their first career job.

John van Genderen is Professor Emeritus at the University of Twente, the Netherlands, and International Visiting Professor at Wuhan University, China. He has carried out education and training programmes at universities worldwide. He has also assisted numerous young graduates in finding suitable employment both at home and abroad.

This book helps graduates manage the dramatic change from a university environment into a professional career. The books guidelines and assistance are very helpful. Kick Start Your Career supports the goal of university that graduates are successful in finding a career job. It is a valuable resource for graduates. Highly recommended!

Dr.-Ing. Christine Pohl, University of Osnabrueck, Germany

Students are continually looking for information, knowledge and skills that will set them apart from others in the job market. This publication will provide that resourceand fills a very significant gap that should have global interest.

Professor Stuart Phinn, The University of Queensland, Australia

The book provides practical guidance to students on how to secure the right job in an increasingly global market. It provides insights into employment opportunities in USA, UK, Europe, Asia and other regions, and strategies to successfully join the dynamic international workforce.

Professor Anupma Prakash, University of Alaska Fairbanks, USA

The change from a university environment into a professional career is quite dramatic. Studying is different from working. Different responsibilities, initiatives to design work flows, etc. create a lack of confidence. The identification of own capabilities and potential that could match a suitable job is a challenge. Often graduates are not used to selling themselves and stand for their talents and possibilities. This book will be an invaluable companion to all new graduates.

Professor Ochir Altansukh, National University of Mongolia, Mongolia

This book aims to encourage and help young graduates. It does just that. This is so important at a critical stage in the life/career of graduates after investing so much into attaining a degree. It is also valuable in that it encourages and provides alternate career options and support at a tough time.

Matthew McDade, Australia

First published 2018

by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

and by Routledge

711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

2018 Lee Smith and John van Genderen

The right of Lee Smith and John van Genderen to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Smith, Lee, 1948- author.

Title: Kick start your career / Lee Smith, John L van Genderen.

Description: 1 Edition. | New York: Routledge, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017018243 (print) | LCCN 2017020383 (ebook) | ISBN 9781315158532 (eBook) | ISBN 9781138067547 (hardback: alk. paper) | ISBN 9781138067660 (pbk.: alk. paper) | ISBN 9781315158532 (ebk)

Subjects: LCSH: Job hunting. | Social media. | CYAC: Vocational guidance.

Classification: LCC HF5382.7 (ebook) | LCC HF5382.7.S655 2018 (print) | DDC 650.14dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017018243

ISBN: 978-1-138-06754-7 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-138-06766-0 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-315-15853-2 (ebk)

Typeset in Optima

by Sunrise Setting Ltd, Brixham, UK

Visit the eResources: www.routledge.com/9781138067660

Appendices

Congratulations you have just graduated or are about to graduate. An exciting career waits ahead, or does it? Universities provide education, but is this enough for graduates to win a career-related job?

What then is required to secure that job? What knowledge and new skills are required? How does the job market work? What opportunities exist and how to find them? What role does social media play in job searching and how to use it?

A wide range of questions come to the fore: how to stand out in a competitive market; how to prepare a resume and cover letter that will make an impact; and how to handle interviews so there is a job offer.

Job hunting is a new challenge for graduates. Most books provide information and leave it to the reader to try and work out how to apply it. This book is different. It is based on helping graduates develop their Personal Plan for securing a job. This converts information into actual practical outcomes. It will provide the material you will need for job applications such as a resume, social media bio, cover letter and interview preparation.

The aim of this book is to help young graduates navigate the job hunting marketplace and succeed in getting their first career-related job.

The origin of the collaboration by the authors in this book was a common commitment by them both to meet a need: to help graduates handle the major challenges of job hunting. And to succeed!

The collaboration encompasses the practical experiences of the authors in guiding young graduates towards their first career job. It builds on a lifetime of experience of both authors in the academic and university side through to the management side of government and private sectors. It covers all aspects of winning a job from the graduates perspective to understanding the prospective employers perspective. The expert advice of other specialists is incorporated to provide valuable insights. The authors provide the bridge to help you, the graduate, make a positive transition to a new job.