Please help me:graduate jobs?

Loopylou_4

Hello,

I would be grateful if someone could please help me as I am at a complete & utter loss right now.
I have recently completed my degree in psychology & I have been looking for a job for a few months now & I am feeling more & more disheartened by the day.
What I would like to know from people who, themselves have a degree is;
How long did it take you to get a job after you graduated?
What was that job?
What sort of salary do you earn?

I thought doing a degree would enable me to get a better job &, certainly one which I wouldn't have been able to get without a degree. I also thought that "graduates can expect to earn a starting salary of around £20,000". I have yet to see any evidence of this & I just feel so depressed because I feel like I have just wasted three years of my life. I honestly don't know what to do.
I feel so frustrated. So many jobs are asking for experience but how the hell are you meant to get it in the FIRST place? It makes absolutely no sense.
& being realistic, what can graduates (in general) expect to earn? It seems to me the figure is more around 12k instead...

I would love to hear other people's stories.
Please can anyone help me?

WHA

Presumably you had a career path in mind when you chose psychology for your degree - have you explored all options relating to your initial aspirations?

I'm afraid most jobs these days require a "relevant degree" rather than just any old subject. In the past when I have wanted a graduate in my finance department, I have insisted on a business studies or accounting degree so that they at least have a general grasp of the principals involved. Otherwise, a graduate with an irrelevant degree and no relevant work experience is no more useful than a school leaver.

You just need to get a foot in the door at a decent sized organisation and work your way up through the ranks. When you have some experience and a track record, you can move to another organisation and so on.

The degree should help you get a job (however far down the ladder) and should speed your progress up the ranks. Now that more and more people have degrees these days, you are unlikely to be able to "over-take" the non graduates and parachuted into higher ranking jobs without doing the groundwork first.

As for salary expectations, like I said above, you are likely to join an organisation at a lower level so will command a salary commensurate with the job you're doing. £12,000 p.a. is a fairly average starting wage these days for basic administrative work.

As to whether it was worth going to University, I'll leave that for you to decide!

secretsquirrel_3

Hi Loopylou
I don't want to make you feel more miserable but I think that the 'Graduate Job' situation is only going to get worse now that the government want 50% of school leavers to attend university - what is the point? My youngest daughter graduated in 2002 with an Environmental Science degree and she is doing a cleaning job with an agency at the moment! She has been temping in an office for ages and just wanted a change. She has been for loads of interviews and has asked for feedback when she has not been offered the job. Most of the comments have been that she was a very good candidate but competition was stiff. Of course temping does not pay well and she has her student loan debt hanging over her too. I don't know what the answer is, I wish I did. Lets hope some other people reply here with some positive suggestions!

Savvy_Sue

If you want to work in the field of Psychology then it might be worth getting some experience as a volunteer. Even if it doesn't use your Psychology directly, it helps. So, for example, if you wanted to be a prison psychologist, see if there are any volunteer visiting schemes in your nearest prison, or even a creche. If you don't really know what you want to do, general volunteering with a drugs or homeless charity might pay off.

I've picked up a wide range of skills through paid and voluntary work, and I know I landed one job pretty much on the strength of skills acquired through voluntary work.

Can't advise on graduate salaries, I'm afraid. I went to university in the days of grants, otherwise I don't know that I'd have bothered, although for my son it still looks like a better deal than getting a proper job - we'll see if he thinks the same in 3-4 years. I read Theology, and all I knew was that I did NOT want to be ordained or teach. At my choice, I've had a series of jobs rather than a career, and the only time I 'used' my degree was when I transcribed a Hebrew exam paper into Braille ...

Woby_Tide

sweeping generalisations but from past experience from myself and peers those with 'specific' degrees or more aligned to careers tended to a) have more idea about where they had wanted to aim for career wise and b)ended up with jobs in majority of cases in relevant field with better average wage than those with a 'wooly'(and apolgies for calling your degree that) degree like psychology. I think as others have said that with so many now going to Uni employers are trying to find more candidates with some relevant experience in their studies than just having 'a degree'. Similar with 'A' levels where people doing 'general studies' say may well have 'an A level' but employers see it as less worthy than a disciplined A level.

Can only suggest to keep an eye out and try and get even som etemp/volunteer work in the field you are aiming for which at least will show willing and hopefully get a foot in the door. I'm also surrpised at how high expectations are of salary, things have moved on evidently.

Sarahsaver

volunteer for sure start or a school who may want extra help
write to professionals asking if you can shadow them or if they will mentor you
get a job in the prison service (they are looking at present - pm me for details!)
maybe do extra study to be more specialised - there are gaps in the 'market' There is only one clinical neuropsychologist in the whole of Leicestershire.
I don't think psychology is wooly btw, I have a certificate in Psychology from leics. uni, and my friend is doing a psych. degree there.
Theres an employment agency here which is crying out for people to work with troubled people - social problems, hostels, childrens' homes and so on and so on. Get yourself into situations where you will meet the 'right people' I am on a local peoples' panel, a local govt. consultative forum, school governor, childcare steering group, surestart volunteer, joined the chamber of commerce...after a while people do notice you, and it is a mixture of what you know and who you know! Best of luck.
btw I am qualified as a teacher, had nearly 8 years in the job but my 1st long term job was in a crisp factory. It's all good! In the end I had a stroke and now I am self-employed and a charity coordinator as well. It's all been useful. You never know what life is going to hand you.

Prudent

I realise you are looking for an immediate job. However thinking more long term, Educational psychologist are very much in demand. Many authorities are facing shortages because they can't recruit staff. Pay around £35k +, but does involve extra training. I think you get £20k per year while doing this course.

Sarahsaver

really? darn! I need to do that training! LOL If you want to be an ed. psych you have to have education qualifications too such as a PGCE, I think I'm right in saying.

EconomyCarla

Loopylou, try not to get too disheartened, as the worse you feel, the less motivation you have and the less likely you are to get a job! I know it is easy to say, but you have to try and stay motivated. I think university is a worthwhile thing to do, no matter what degree you get. You gain lots of skills such as research, self-discipline, analytical skills and so on. There are a lot of skills you will have without having ever really thought about it. Don't regret university!

I graduated from Liverpool Uni in 2002, worked as a recruitment consultant (£17k) (a job I got by temping there - always a good way into any organisation), left after 12 months and temped again as a secretary in a Community Mental health Team (£11k), then worked for 6 months fo the University of Liverpool (£16k). While at the CMHT, my boss persuaded me to look at the NHS Graduate Training Scheme and I realised that it would be a good way to get up the career ladder as quickly as possible. so I applied and got on to it last year (2004 - £19k start, now up to £21k). There was a lot of competition, but if you don't try, you will never know. I never thought I was the sort of person who would be good enough to get onto a Graduate scheme, but I did, so there you go!

But you are not alone, I have quite a few friends who have struggled to get decent jobs since graduating. I think one of the most important things is to sort out in your own mind what it is you would like to do. Once you have a few ideas, go to your local unoversity careers office (it doesn't have to be the one where you went to uni, you can go to any uni one). i have found them to be very helpful. If you have any office type experience, do some temping, becasue as I said, it can be a good way into an organisation.

And good luck! Don't give up and don't despair...
xx

Loopylou_4

Thanks everyone so much for your replies.

WHA - you are so right when you say it's about getting a foot in the door, I just wish I could get my foot in! I did have a career plan mapped out sort of - but people around me keep telling me that I should just get a job doing anything for now & then start looking for jobs that interest me more. They say it's easier to get a job when you already have one? The thing that frustrates me the most is I just don't feel like I want to be doing a job I was doing when I was 16 or 17. That's why I went to uni in the first place! Thanks for your reply.

Secret Squirrel - thanks for your reply. I totally agree, the competition is so fierce these days & I'm assuming that is why companies are now requiring experience as well as a degree. Hope your daughter can find something she wants soon.

Sue - Hi, thanks a lot for your suggestions. I have done voluntary work in the past with MIND because I knew it was a good thing to have for what I wanted to do. I would consider doing voluntary work again with them or similar organisations, but I really need to be earning money. Once I have a job then I would try & volunteer for even just a few hours, so long as I am earning money. I just can't afford to do voluntary work. I do know though that it's a very good thing to do & it looks good because it shows you are dedicated. Thanks again.

Woby-Tide - hmmph, so a psychology degree is wooly?! I'm sure many of us with psych degrees would disagree with you there. It does kind of annoy me the way people seem to mock psychology degrees as though they are a joke & are not a "proper" degree. It's a lot different to how you might think & we cover such a vast amount including a great deal (far too much!) of statistics. Anyway, thanks for your suggestion, as I said above, once I have a job earning money, then I can think about doing voluntary work as I know it's a good thing & a step in the right direction too.

Sarahsaver - thanks for agreeing that it's not a wooly degree! I will assume you read what I wrote above about voluntary work. As for the prison service, I am interested in forensic psychology & I'm aware quite a lot of people with psychology degrees do work in prisons, however, I'm not sure the people around me would be happy with me doing that sort of thing. A while ago, I saw something I was going to apply for working at the local prison but then I was put off by someone telling me they would not be happy with me working with such violent people (i'm a weak little female! :P) so now I'm not sure about that!
I do need to get in to the right mix though but it's so hard to get started. Every week in the paper there are jobs advertised for learning support assistants which I think may be a good thing to do, but the pay is just terrible. £6,000 for goodness sake! I wouldn't be too bothered but I really need to earn more than that because being at uni for three years drains the bank balance & I have a mortgage & bills to pay. & yes you are right about the teaching qualification to become an eduactional psych. It's a pretty long route to take as I did look into it.

Prudent - what is the course that pays £20k whilst training? Is that a post grad course for the teaching qualification? I might look further in to that. Thanks

Carla - thanks so much. Your post helped me to feel a little better I have seen quite a few jobs advertised for recruitment consultants, did you not need any experience in that area? I wouldn't mind doing some temp work but I didn't know if you needed specific secretarial qualifications or certificates for typing speed?? I can touch type (I did an online test recently & it said I was at about 65WPM) but I don't have any certificate to prove this. I do have office experience too. What is the actual graduate course you are doing?
Thanks again for the help

NAR

Loopylou wrote:

(i'm a weak little female! :P)

It doesn't take a psychologist to work that one out! :P

(Sorry just bringing a little levity to the situation - I'll get my coat!)