A whopping 40% of UK graduates fail to get graduate calibre work 2 years after earning their degrees, according to a recent Guardian article. This afternoon, Christel, who is in the final year of her degree, set off to Manchester to undertake a 4-week (unpaid) work experience at the BBC alongside completing her dissertation. She tells me she thinks she is the only one she knows in her year to be doing this; that many students are “going to wait till they graduate next year” before seeking out work experience. I guess, for most of them, if things don’t work out they can always move back home. For Christel this is not the case – she has spent a significant part of her life in local authority care. Come next May or earlier, she needs to find work, pay the rent and bills – no safety net. And there’s no way she is planning on working in a bar, unless it’s for extra cash. 
Reid Hoffman, co-founder and chairman of Linkedin, argues in his new book “The Start-up of You” that people need to think of themselves as entrepreneurs, not literally, but as a mindset, so making sure they continue to adapt and develop their skills to retain a competitive edge in the job market. For young people studying for a degree, gaining multiple work experience opportunities are crucial for learning vital skills and for having even half a hope of actually working in a job related to their degree. Christel worked incredibly hard to get accepted onto her work experience schemes. She also has a consistently updated portfolio of independent work, a bang-on LinkedIn profile and she networks. I reckon she will be successful in working in her (very competitive) industry. Yet I know she is an exception. At her university it’s only in the final year that they have what is called a “professional practice” elective – that’s where they learn how to write their CVs. Not enough, never enough these days! 
Reid Hoffman says: “you need to be adapting all the time. And if you’re failing to adapt, nobody – not your employer, not the government – is going to catch you when you fall”. Adaptability and pro-activity are actually inner resources we can easily develop, if we really want to.
We live in harsh times and there’s no sign they will get better any time soon. It’s not just young people who need to get moving – competition is so fierce in every industry – the amount of time spent in any one job is decreasing rapidly.
Passion is cited as one of the key elements for being entrepreneurial and, yes, most people work harder and better when they care about what they are doing. But passion alone is not necessarily enough to recognise and grab new opportunities. These days we need a whole raft of skills at our fingertips – from being proactive to having a positive attitude. From being resourceful to being resilient.
The Advantage – a new book focusing on how we find, build and develop our inner resources to cope better in our changing world will be published by Pearson Business in March 2013. Unimenta exists to help trainers and teachers develop these skills in their learners – membership is free. Visit www.unimenta.com
