Graduating Economics with Experience -- Looking for Career -- Advice?

[AdamL]

I'm not sure if it's a longshot asking for advice in a stock-market forum but you guys are knowledgable and experienced. You helped with my mortgage question. I'd appreciate your input.

I'm graduating from the University of Toronto with an Honours BA in Economics & Political Science (double major) and I'm feeling a little lost. I'm not sure where I should be looking for work.

I started a serious job/career hunt over a month ago and so far haven't had any sucess at all. I've had a couple of interviews at temp agencies but they don't seem to be interested in finding me a suitable career -- their focus appears to be on getting you through an assembly-line type process and into a factory or other min wage job.

Direct attempts to contact companies, including sending resumes to the email contacts given in books such as "Canada's Top 100 Employers" or "The Career Directory" aren't pulling any responses.

I have a year of experience as a Business Development Manager with some impressive accomplishments for someone my age. I also have 6 years of experience as a Business Administrator.

Given that and my education, I thought I'd have a fairly easy time finding work. What might I be doing wrong?

How do I get my career off the ground?

Adam

[midas]

First a couple of basic questions:

1. How old are you?
2. What type of job do you want? What Industry?
3. Where do you want to live? Is U.S. an option?

[AdamL]

1. 23

2. Ideally, I'd like to get my foot in the door of a well run and established company like General Electric or General Motors. That way I'd have a chance to prove myself and move up the ladder throughout my entire life.

3. I'd prefer to live in the Greater Toronto Area. Next preference is Ontario, and the US is an option but I'd have a hard time getting in there. I'd need to be sponsored by a company and they'd need to prove they couldn't find any American to do the job.

So basically, #3 is "around here"

[GeorgeF]

If you are sending resumes around forget it. Try networking and get some face to face meetings.

1) You need to regularly read business journals so I suggest you go to the best business library and read the trade publications.

2) Attend trade shows. Most people there can make hiring decisions or introduce you to someone that can.

3) You might try a Dale Carnegie Course (costs money). My guess is that most of the other people taking the class will be middle management types who could actually help you.

4) There might be a problem with you. Maybe poor eye contact or something else. It is a real possibility. Try a career consuler (private that you pay) or even a psychiatrist. It might be worth buying a couple of hours of their time just to see what someone else thinks your problem is.

5) Get a job any job. Even a waiter at a national chain or a UPS delivery person. You might be surprised at the opportunites for advancement and the lack of real competition.

6)Join trade organizations and attend events. You might be surprised at the high ranking people that attend regular meetings of computer users groups and such.

7) As to temping, they get your foot in the door. Once you are their you can try to moove around.

8) As to Canada if there is a comodities bull market you might want to think about mining or agriculture. Sounds like western Canada to me but there might be more opportunities and fewer people to compete with.

9) Do an internship or see if you can take 6 months and do a university research paper on some business.

10) Start your own business. See http://www.score.org/.

11) Talk to the HR person that rejected you. They might be willing to give you an honest answer. I read about a guy that had his criminal records mixed up with a murderer. After a few years of rejections an HR person finally told him the truth, they were afraid of him. He was then able to clear up the record mistake.

[AdamL]

GeorgeF,

Thanks very much for taking the time to help me out and offer advice. I'm putting what you've said here to good use already.

Do you have any particular business journals or trade events which you recommend? I expect my business thinking will be strongly in line with others here (from what I've seen regarding investment advice especially). However, I need to get my feet wet and find some main stream publications.

[GeorgeF]

I suggest you go to the best public/university library there is near you and hang out in the periodical room, ask the librarian. Most likely thay have all the trade publications there.