IT employers want graduates with work experience

Now more than ever, IT employers can afford to be choosy, with a host of equally smart and well qualified candidates chasing the graduate opportunities on offer. So how can you make sure you stand out from the crowd? Maximise your chances of getting graduate recruiters’ attention by securing work experience.

Prove your commitment to a graduate career in IT

A string of programming languages and a 2.1 are no longer enough. Technology recruiters look for graduates who are well rounded, enthusiastic and capable of operating in a dynamic, customer-focused environment. Any experience of working life immediately sends out the right signals, as it shows you’ve got the drive to develop yourself and widen your skills base. If you manage to get experience in IT itself, so much the better; you’ll also demonstrate your commitment to your chosen career.

IT placements and internships

Some graduate employers in the IT sector offer technology internships or formal work placements that can range from a couple of months during the summer vacation to a full ‘sandwich’ year as part of your degree course.

Many employers use their placement schemes as the first stage in graduate recruitment; research carried out by the University of Manchester careers service suggests that up to 70 per cent of placements lead to a job offer with the same company.

You could also seek out less formal opportunities, such as a two-week vacation placement or a couple of days work shadowing. These are often available through smaller employers, whom you can contact directly.

• What to do if you've missed the deadlines for IT summer internships

No IT internship? No problem

If you can’t land an IT-focused summer job or longer-term placement, don’t panic; you can use just about any work experience to your advantage as long as you identify the skills you have developed and show how they are relevant to the job you’re applying for.

Any part-time jobs you’ve held while at university or at home over the holidays can provide examples of the all-important transferable skills that employers look for: teamwork, commercial awareness, time management, planning and customer service, to name just a few.

Give some thought to how you can quantify your achievements. For example, if you raised money for charity, how much? If you ran a society, how many people were involved? If you organised a ball or event, how many attended? In the same way, organising and funding time spent travelling may also give you useful examples of your competences.

Keep track of your IT placements

Keep detailed records of what work experience you’ve done, where, when and what you learned, and keep this list up to date. Come application time you can easily scan for the skills and examples that relate specifically to the role you’re applying for.

You should then be able to walk into any graduate interview situation with real confidence, and walk out with the result you want – your first graduate job.

Top tips for finding IT work experience

• Start planning your work experience from your first year of study. Most employers looking for placement students only take applications from the beginning of your second year, but planning ahead is ideal.
• Arrange your own placement or work shadowing through contacts from your careers service or your university's job shop. Year-long industrial placements and formal vacation programmes are the ideal, but there are never enough of the latter to go round.
• If you really can only find a supermarket job, try to make more of it. Ask for additional responsibility. Find out how the business is run and talk to managers. That way, you might be able to get a bit of work experience in a more relevant job function.