Paul Redmond: 'Generation Crunch!' Careers, Employability, and the Credit Crunch – new concepts for old ideas. Slides from the University of Liverpool Learning and Teaching Conference 2009. Due in part to the credit crunch, globalisation and the sweeping changes that are taking place in organisations, this year’s graduate recruitment market is in the forefront of a profound shift. Gone are the old certainties about ‘career’, ‘security’ and ‘graduate jobs’. In their place has come a new social and economic realism. Though today’s students are at the forefront of these changes, few have any experience of economic recession, unemployment or falling standards of living. But as ‘Generation Y’ - the world’s first ‘digital natives’ - will this lack of knowledge and experience prove to be a help or a hindrance? The aim of this presentation is to explore the current state of graduate recruitment in the UK, the conceptualmeanings attached to terms such as ‘employability’, ‘graduates’ and ‘employment’, what employers really want from graduates, and how higher education can best prepare students for a future that as yet does not exist.

1. Generation Crunch! Careers,
Employability, and the Credit Crunch –
new concepts for old ideas?
Dr Paul Redmond, Head of Careers and Employability

2. • Jobs with top firms down by 17%.
• Biggest losers: investment banking (- 47%),
retail (-26%) and accountancy (-15%).
• Microsoft – 5,000 applications for 25 jobs.
• Applications to leading firms up by 30-50%.
Overview plummet by 32% over past 2 years.
• Media jobs
• Still buoyant: public services (+51% in 2 years)
and the armed services (+17%).

3. But not all sectors face recession

4. But not all sectors face recession
“It’s business as usual. We are in it for the
long term, and our graduate recruitment will
continue so we can meet our goal, which is
to have the right skills and capabilities in the
organisation to meet the energy gap of the
future.”
Bob Athwal, RWE npower

5. Not all are in recession
“We are fortunate, as a business with very
little exposure to the credit markets, to be
relatively unaffected by the economic
downturn. .. we are particularly attractive
in a downturn … Previous years have
seen double-digit growth. 2008 finished
with an excess of 25% growth.”
Dan Ronald, MD, Aldi.

6. • 1991: last major recession (graduate
vacancies down by 32%);
• 1999: 34%: fall in vacancies linked to drop in
manufacturing demand;
• 2002-3: 6% fall, linked to dot com bubble.
So what’s different now?
We have been here before …

7. More globalisation.
More deregulation.
More debt.
More competition.
More Internet.

8. ‘The internet has created a global psyche.
The web has mentally joined us at the
hip, so we can no longer put our heads in
the sand. If that sounds painfully
contorted, it is because it is. Just as no
country can decouple itself from the ailing
global economy, none of us as individuals
can decouple ourselves from the ailing
global psyche ...’
Lucy Kellaway, FT, 01.02.09

9. ‘… Through blogs, websites and e-mails
the world’s economic ills are fed to us on
a drip all day long. It is not just that we
hear about bad things faster, we hear
about more of them and in a more
immediate way. My worries become
yours, and yours become mine. On the
internet, a trouble shared online is not a
trouble halved. It is a trouble needlessly
multiplied all over the world.’
Lucy Kellaway, FT, 01.02.09

10. The “War for Talent?”
“The recession has meant that the War
for Talent has been won – by
employers. From now on, it’s not the
graduates who will be calling the shots,
but us.”
Times 100 graduate recruitment manager, Jan. 09.

11. Weapons of mass rejection

12. Percentage of employers using various selection
techniques when selecting graduates.
1999 2009
Only accept on-line app’s 2% 76%
Only accept paper app’s 98% 2%
Telephone screening 10% 40%
On-line exercises 2% 36%
Personality tests 35% 64%
Numeracy tests 25% 80%
Verbal reasoning 23% 71%
Assessment centres 21% 79%

13. What do employers
want?

14. ‘According to a survey of 500
directors, when recruiting, 64% said
graduates’ employability skills were
more important to their firm than the
specific occupational, technical or
academic skills associated to a
degree.’
Institute of Directors Skills Briefing, Dec. 2007, ‘Graduates employability
skills’.

15. Stephen Green, Group Chairman, HSBC, 14 Jan. 09
“We recruit up to 1,500 graduates on
to one of our 70 graduate
programmes around the world. For
those jobs, globally, we receive
around 100,000 applications. As 90%
have a 2.2 or a 2.1 and will therefore
meet our criteria, it takes something
extra to stand out.”

16. “Recent recruits include a graduate who
taught English and Spanish in
Guatemala; one who ran a restaurant;
another who worked in the Beijing
Paralympics; a Punjabi singer who’s been
on TV. Another graduate from Cameroon
had published a book and set up a small
business selling second hand clothes
from New York to Africa, before joining
HSBC.”

17. “Strong academic performance is
a prerequisite ... but those with
the employability edge will
demonstrate experience and
skills gained inside and outside of
study.”
Sonja Stockton, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP

18. the Employability Edge?

19. Daily Mail : 10/12/08
‘City law firms only ever interview
Oxbridge graduates and, normally
speaking, someone from Leeds would
not get a look in. This isn't because
firms look down on other universities –
it is simply because they consider that
Oxbridge fulfils their needs, so why
bother to broaden the net?’

20. “Unpaid internships are incredibly hard to
get, and one does have to use every
contact you have ever known,” says
Geraldine Foster, who works at a
management consultancy in London.
“Being able to offer them is a currency
that senior managers trade to help
their friends and, in turn, their own
children.”
Sunday Times, 18/01/09

21. Player or Purist?

22. “The stereotype of Oxbridge Man is no
longer the gold standard … The
‘gentlemen’ are losing out to female and
male ‘players’ who combined elite
credentials with other aspects, as
employers look for ‘cosmopolitans’ rather
than ‘locals’. Narrow experiences, even
those of the upper classes, may now be
discounted as lacking the flexibility to
work in different social contexts’.
Brown & Hesketh, ESRC, (2003).

23. The Purist
“It’s all about being you.”
Views process as
essentially objective.”
“What’s it got to do with
anyone what I do outside
of University?”
“If I don’t get in, it clearly
wasn’t meant to be.”

24. The Player
“Recruitment? It’s a game,
we’re the players.”
Consciously seeks out
new opportunities and
challenges in which to
shine.
“If I don’t succeed, I’ll
learn from the experience
and try again.”

25. Career Strategies

26. 1.Financial flexibility
• Flexibility is the key to
surviving difficult
economic conditions;
• Try to avoid all
unnecessary purchases
(cars, houses, dogs!);
• Access not ownership;
• Take control of your
finances before they take
control of you.

27. “Don’t own nothin’ if you can help
it. If you can, rent your shoes.”
Tom Peters

28. 2. What’s so special about YOU?
• What is your USP?
What are you offering
that others aren’t? What
is it about your USP that
employers should know
about?

29. 3. Focus on adding value
• Not all organisations
have vacancies, but all
organisations have
problems.
• Your task is to find out
what these are, then
show how you can solve
them.

30. 4. Always have a Plan B.
• Careers seldom run smooth.
Everyone has to start
somewhere – even if that
‘somewhere’ wasn’t on the
original map.
• Be ready to challenge your
own assumptions.
• McJobs needn’t remain
McJobs.
• Don’t judge organisations
by their brand reputation.

31. 5. Self-reliance
• Don’t expect anyone to
look after your career
for you. Chances are,
they won’t.
• Your vision of where
you want to be is your
greatest asset.
• Establish your goals,
and review them
regularly.

32. 6.Quality not quantity
• A few well-researched,
well-presented
applications always beat
the scatter-gun approach.
• It’s also a lot more time-
efficient.
• Avoid CV templates and
anything that makes you
appear standardised.

33. 7. Do your homework
• Employers expect you
to be an expert
researcher when it
comes to doing your
homework on their
organisation.
• When you’ve done the
work, ensure that you
demonstrate just how
much you know.

34. 8. Network
• Most jobs still go to
people with access to key
networks. Who you know
– and who knows you - is
therefore vital.
• Apply different job
search strategies.
• Tip: informational
interviewing.

35. 9. Internships
• The value of work experience
is greater than ever.
• Placements – paid or unpaid
– can set you aside from the
competition.
• Employers view work
experience as a sign of
commitment and motivation.
• It can also give you a head
start on new opportunities.

36. 10. Formula for Crunchonomics
Q + WE + S x C = Emp.

37. Graduate Internship Programme
www.liv.ac.uk/careers/graduates/mgip.htm

38. Paul.Redmond@liverpool.ac.uk
www.twitter.com/paulatliverpool
www.youtube.com/user/paulatliverpool