A guide to your work experience options

Vacation placements, internships, work shadowing - take a look at the typical work experience options you're most likely to come across.

Work experience tops every graduate employer’s wishlist, so take a look at the main options you’ll come across in graduate recruiting:

1. Placements with graduate employers

The term ‘placement’ is loosely applied to any formal, structured work experience and is favoured in the construction and engineering sectors. It could involve working on a specific project or gaining a working knowledge of various departments.

What’s in it for you? If you play your cards right, a graduate job. Some organisations recruit as much as three-quarters of their graduate intake from work experience placements.

Some organisations recruit as much as three-quarters of their graduate intake from work experience placements.

If you have received structured training and gained understanding of a specific project you’ll have plenty of material you can use as evidence of your skills and potential in future job applications. It could even help you in your studies; some students report that the discipline of working in a professional environment sharpens their approach to learning and puts their studies in context.

There could be a financial benefit too. Some placements are paid and if it goes really well an employer may be willing to sponsor you during the final year of your degree course.

What’s the downside? Early application deadlines are common and the competition is tough, so try to find out about placement schemes well in advance. Start your search at the beginning of the academic year in which you want to do a summer placement.

2. Graduate internships

Internships are essentially the same as placements but the term is preferred in business sectors such as IT, management consulting, investment banking and finance. The big players of graduate recruitment tend to offer internships in the summer between the penultimate and final year.

What’s in it for you? In some sectors it’s virtually impossible to get a graduate job if you haven’t got an internship under your belt. The pay is usually good. As an intern in a large company you can speak to lots of current graduates and then make an informed decision about what sort of role would suit you.

What’s the downside? These schemes tend to attract high calibre applicants, so they are extremely competitive. Again, you need to do your research well in advance so that you don’t miss application deadlines, which are typically between October and January before the summer of the internship.

3. Sandwich courses

This kind of work experience is a year of work/study sandwiched somewhere between your first two years and final year at university. Sandwich placements are also often known as industrial placements as they are typically a part of engineering, science and construction-related degree courses, although the term could also be used to describe a year abroad as part of a language degree.

Those doing industrial placements are paid a reasonable wage by their employer during the year. Universities should have a placement tutor or industrial liaison officer to help you arrange your year in industry.

What’s in it for you? You’ll make loads of contacts, gain invaluable understanding of the industry and pick up soft skills such as teamworking, planning, organising, and commercial awareness to flesh out your academic credentials. It may also be a vital part of your degree course.

What’s the downside? A year-long placement is a significant commitment so make sure you end up in the right place. For the best results, treat it like a dry run of your first graduate job.

4. Vacation placements

These placements are specifically structured to fit your spring, summer or winter university vacation dates, lasting from two to eight weeks.

What’s in it for you? Vacation placements are often paid. They are a great way to try out new things outside of term-time study, and an opportunity to fit in work experience that will make you attractive to an employer within a relatively short period of time. Even a couple of weeks can be long enough for you to get a real feel of whether a particular sector or company is right for you.

Vacation placements and schemes are a great way to try out new things outside of term-time study.

What’s the downside? Opportunities to get your teeth into project work may be limited. The shorter your work experience is, the less chance you have to make an impression and the less likely it is that those working for the company will take a personal interest.

5. Gap years

Gap years give students the opportunity to take a year out immediately after graduation. With the right mindset a gap year can develop many employer-attracting skills and competences, so before you get down to the local travel agents and start asking about cheap flights to Australia, spare some time to think ahead to how you can market your experiences to recruiters when you return.

What’s in it for you? Knowledge and experience of other countries, and especially of working in other countries, can be very beneficial in an increasingly global graduate marketplace. If you plan your gap year well and use it wisely, you’ll gather evidence of your soft skills and impress graduate recruiters with your resilience, independence and initiative.

What’s the downside? The cost of paying a gap year organisation to offer you a structured, project-based experience can be significant and will put some graduates off, though you don’t have to go down this route to planning your time out – you might decide to sort out your work and travel yourself.

You may feel that getting a graduate job sooner rather than later is the best way to improve your finances. After years of study, you may also be keen to enter the world of work and start climbing the career ladder, and there are no guarantees that the graduate job market will have improved by the time you return.

How to make the most of your gap year and market it to graduate employers

6. Part-time or casual work

Work experience doesn’t have to come in a formal package. Casual or part-time work while at university or over the holidays can help you fund your degree while also picking up important skills such as teamworking, customer service, commercial awareness and so on. Whether it’s working in a bar or office temping, you can use your work experience to give unique examples of times when you’ve had to prove yourself in a business environment and difficult situations you’ve had to overcome.

Work experience doesn't have to come in a formal package. Casual and part-time student jobs can count too!

Advice on part-time jobs: from basic employment law to university job shops

What’s in it for you? Graduate employers welcome evidence that students have dealt successfully with the world of work. You might not think toiling at a fast food outlet counts for much, but a recruiter who’s looking for motivation, perseverance, stamina, the capacity for hard work and a realistic attitude will disagree.

If you can show that you’ve performed well in a job that isn’t your heart’s desire, you’re in with a fighting chance of convincing a graduate recruiter to give you a job opportunity that matches up to your potential for growth. Graduate recruiters also understand that you may need to balance the need for hard cash with the search for work experience that gives you the opportunity to learn and develop.

What’s the downside? You may wonder why you’re spending time, money and effort on a degree, only to find yourself manning the till in a shop or working the coffee machine in a café. Don’t lose heart. Remember, it’s likely that your future employer once also did an equally repetitive job.

However, it’s a good idea to try and get at least some work experience that is relevant to the career sector you want to enter, so try to fit something suitable in if you can, even if it’s just for a couple of days.

7. Voluntary work

Voluntary work is essentially giving your services for free.

What’s in it for you? In the case of charities and conservation work, your passion and commitment will impress potential graduate employers. You may even be able to help out in a role that’s close to your chosen career route, such as finance, IT or press relations. Volunteering can also be the way into media, such as TV, PR or magazines, where starting from the bottom can often be the only way in.

What’s the downside? You need to balance the potential benefits, both to yourself and to the organisations you might be able to help, against your immediate financial needs.

8. Work shadowing

Work shadowing is a much shorter form of work experience that involves closely observing a professional in their daily working life (usually spending one day to one week with them) to see if their job interests you and to get a personal view on working life in a career area that interests you.

What’s in it for you? You may be able to organise this relatively easily through a personal contact and while it shouldn’t take up too much of your time, it will demonstrate your commitment and initiative. You may not get much of a chance to perform any tasks but you should come away with a clear idea of what the job involves, and if you impress the person you’re shadowing you may have consolidated a useful contact.

Make career contacts through networking

9. Work tasters

A work taster is another short form of work experience that’s more hands-on than work shadowing. Sometimes offered by employers in conjunction with careers services.

What’s in it for you? There should be a chance to get actively involved in the work of the organisation. Gives you an insight into job roles or business departments. Easy to fit in.

What’s the downside? Less of a chance to make your mark than a longer placement.

10. Unpaid work experience

In sectors such as the media and publishing, a period of unpaid work experience, arranged speculatively, may be the best way in.

What’s in it for you? Contacts. Insight. A chance to shine.

What’s the downside? You may find yourself stuck with dogsbody work. If it’s a relatively short placement it’s probably worth your while to grin and bear it, but if you’re looking at a more significant time commitment, you may feel that if you’re going to be stuffing envelopes or doing the filing, you’d prefer to be paid.

11. Organisations that can help you gain work experience

There are numerous organisations that can provide you with access to work experience opportunities that will boost your chances of getting a graduate job, both in the UK and abroad. You can look for casual work, internships or volunteer placements, whether for a gap year or for a summer vacation, through an organisation such as BUNAC.

You could also investigate the possibility of taking part in a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTPs). These are particularly applicable to engineering but opportunities are available in a range of sectors. KTPs are part-funded by the Government and are a three-way project between a graduate, a university and an organisation, usually a company but sometimes a charity or local authority. Rates of pay are competitive and the projects can last for anything between ten weeks and three years and often lead to permanent employment.

There’s also a wide range of opportunities on offer through the various programmes run by Step, a work experience initiative that is backed by a mixture of universities and government departments and agencies. Step has strong links with a variety of employers, from small businesses to multinational corporations. It offers three core programmes: Step Classic, which offers project-based summer holiday placements; Graduate Step, offering two to three month internships for recent graduates; and Step into Industry, for students seeking six- to twelve-month sandwich placements.

What if you don’t have any work experience?

Most graduate recruiters will find it a little odd if you’re poised to graduate and have had absolutely no exposure to the world of work, whether in a casual job or work experience placement. However, the vast majority of graduates will not be in this situation – although they may make the mistake of assuming recruiters will not be interested in the work experience they have.

Recruiters in some graduate career sectors will expect to see evidence of directly relevant work experience on your application. For example, you will struggle to get an interview to train as a barrister if you haven’t undertaken a period of work experience in a barrister’s chambers, known as mini-pupillage. The work experience sections in our career sector information will tell you all you need to know about what recruiters want.