As a recent graduate, you may be dissatisfied with your current job role or be itching to be in the right position to apply for your dream position. Getting stuck at the bottom of the career ladder can be easy, and this can lead to a great amount of dissatisfaction and frustration when it comes to your career. If you are looking to get promoted quickly and ensure that you are able to constantly progress, here are some top tips for college graduates.
· Take a Graduate Degree
The first thing that graduates should think about is whether they have finished with their education, or whether they are happy to continue to learn in the future. Taking a graduate degree can be integral to moving up the career ladder after you have left college as it can allow you to build on the knowledge that you have gleaned from your previous course, as well as increase the number of job opportunities that are currently available to you. Taking a graduate degree can also be one of the best options for recent graduates as it can allow them to study from any location in the country, rather than having to spend another couple of years at a campus college.
By enrolling in a degree program, graduates can balance their education with a need to gain experience in the working world. By doing so, as soon as you complete your degree, you will have all the skills that you need to speed up the career ladder and get promoted to a position of responsibility quickly. Marymount University, for example, offers family nurse practitioner programs to recent graduates that can build on your knowledge of registered nursing and ensure that you can instantly apply for positions of responsibility on the completion of your course.
· Get the Right Skills
As a graduate, it is unlikely that you will have been taught all the skills that you need or that you would have had a chance to improve all of your skills while you were at college or university. If your training was purely academic while you were at college, you should now focus on building up the right skills you need to move up the career ladder and to apply for higher-level positions. This will allow you to have both the academic and practical background that you need on your resume if you want to attract the attention of potential employers.
The skills that you look to hone should include both technical and soft skills that are integral to your sector. For instance, if you are a recent graduate, it is unlikely that you will have had many opportunities to practice your leadership expertise outside of small group projects and collaborative tasks. However, the more responsibility that you take on at work, the more leadership you will have to show. Then, you should begin to practice leadership both throughout your studies and when you graduate in order to advance your career. If you are looking for a promotion, you might want also to focus your efforts on leadership or interpersonal skills before you start applying for higher-level positions. You can hone your skills by taking on projects within your firm, volunteering at other corporations and shadowing others, or watching webinars that may help to train you.
· Discuss with Your Employer
As a new graduate, it may be a daunting prospect to speak to your employers about your career goals. However, if they do not know that you are vying for a promotion, it is unlikely that they will consider you for any roles that come up. You should aim to discuss your career plan with your employer as soon as possible, with the majority of employers holding annual one-to-ones that are the perfect opportunity to discuss your intentions. They will then be able to help you construct goals that will allow you to fill in the gaps in your resume and stop any weaknesses that are preventing you from getting the promotion of your dreams.
· Showcase Your Worth
More than anything, if you are a recent graduate who wants to progress, you need to be able to showcase your worth from the very first day of your new job. Rather than simply seeing your job as a way to make money, you need to show your employer how skilled you really are.
You should make sure that you work hard at all times and that you take on extra projects and work which you can use to prove your worth to your employer. You should consider staying late and writing down or saving evidence of all your successes at work. You can then produce these in interviews and place them on your resume when an available position opens for you.
· Create a Career Plan
If you believe that your career pathway is currently aimless and is failing to be as streamlined as you may want it, you should focus on creating a career plan which can allow you to lay out the steps that you need to take when you venture into the world of work. You should make your career plan as soon as you leave college, and this should include the experience that you need to get, the job positions that you need to hold before making the jump to your dream role, and any other actions you could take that could potentially propel your career. If you are struggling to develop this, you should hire a career advisor to help you to complete your plan.
· Look for Exterior Job Opportunities
The job market is your oyster as a recent graduate and many companies are looking for skills like yours. Rather than stay in a job position that you are unhappy with, what is stopping you from seeking out exterior job opportunities that can meet your expectations for progression?
If your current firm is lacking progression opportunities, you should consider harnessing job boards and networking events in order to discover the right positions for you within your industry. This will allow you to keep progressing and reaching your potential on the job market with an employer who respects you and your expertise.
