Want to be a Campus Brand Manager next year?

Are you interested in being a Campus Brand Manager or Ambassador, and representing a company on campus during the next academic year?  If you are, you may be interested in the jobs below – full details and application information can be found on the Careers Service website.

Campus Brand Managers or Ambassadors carry out work on campus to help promote their organisation’s opportunities on campus to fellow students -  job details, requirements and pay will differ depending on the company.  Being a company’s representative on campus can give you an invaluable insight into marketing and brand management, help develop your skills, give you great first-hand experience to put on your CV and is an opportunity to learn about the organisation as well!

Here are just a few examples of roles available at the moment – for more, please search the vacancies section of our website:

• Deutsche Bank Campus Ambassadors – they are looking for FIRST years to represent them on campus. If you’re a proactive and enthusiastic team player and want to join the financial sector, you’ll need to apply by Wednesday 6th May!
• Teach First Brand Managers – they are looking for SECOND years to represent them on campus for up to 3 hours each week.  It’s a flexible role so you can fit it round your studies. If you’re sociable, well connected around the university, able to work as part of team as well as independently, make sure to apply by Friday 15th May.
• GlaxoSmithKline Campus Brand Manager - they are looking for a student to help them achieve their campus marketing strategy in this part time job. If you’re committed, motivated and pro-active, they want to hear from you by Sunday 17th May.

Jobs Seen on the Street 30.4.09

Part time jobs for this week are:

Seen on the Job Centre Plus website
(Enter job ref and click ‘GO’ for details)

• Breakfast Staff at Travel Inn (Salford) REF: SSF/13107
• Private Home Tutors (all subjects) at Tutor Me REF: FTS/129476
• Administration Assistant (Fridays 10-2pm) REF: SSF/13136
• Bar Staff (Sale) REF: ALU/64783
• Administrator at Scoota Mart (Trafford Centre) REF: STY/86584
• Receptionist at Premier Travel Inn (Trafford Centre) REF: STY/86551
• Shop Assistant at Help The Aged (Altrincham, Saturdays) REF: ALU/64719

 

Jobs Seen on the Street 23.4.09

Part time jobs seen this week include:

Seen on Oxford Road – Courtesy of our roving reporter Anna…

• Part time Sales Advisors at Maplin Electronics (opposite BBC)
  Required at weekends, approx 16 hrs per week
  Apply in store  or online at www.maplin.co.uk
• Bar Staff and Promotional Staff at Odder (opposite BBC)
  Ask inside the bar for details - they have already had lots of applications so don’t wait too long!

Long hot summer…

With the end of the academic year fast approaching, now’s a good time to think of how to boost your CV over the summer months.   Work experience can be invaluable.  The Shell Step scheme is now open to second year/penultimate year and final year students and offers eight-week paid placements with small and medium-sized companies and community organisations.   For other work experience ideas go to the work experience section of the Careers Service website. If you fancy doing a bit volunteering check out Time Bank and Do It.  Both will help you find something near to where you live.  And, of course, there’s volunteering info on the careers site that’s easy to register for and browse.   If you want to brush up your IT skills, or learn something new, why not ring the government backed careers advice service tel 0800 101 901, and ask about short courses.   However, it’s worth seeing what’s out there before you commit.   Finally, don’t forget to register for vacancies on our website so you don’t miss out!

Careers Forums – Have your say…

As of today there’s a new way for you to get some of your careers questions answered and have your say about anything careers related – you can use our new Careers Forums.  They are really easy to use as all you need to do is login in with your university username and password. Once in there, you can view the current discussions and categories, post a comment, or start a discussion.

The forums have been launched as an opportunity for you to ask any questions you have to fellow students and graduates, and to get advice from others who may be in the same situation as you (or have been in it recently).  Discussion categories on the forums include: ‘Help! I don’t know what I want to do!’, ‘Applications, Interviews and Psychometric Tests’, ‘Job Hunting’, ‘Staying in Manchester’ and more.

When you’re in the forums, make sure to have a look at the short  ’House Rules and the ‘Getting started with the Careers Service Forums’ guides before you start.  Apart from that, you’ll be ready to go and we hope that you find the forums useful!

My Career in …

This is a new thread looking at people who have chosen careers outside the mainstream or who work in a more unusual setting.  All too often we hear about the same big corporate career opportunities and it is easy to forget that there are alternative careers and routes into careers available. We hope that by reading their stories it will inspire you to think more widely and creatively about your career options.

Coming soon – My career in… Video editing

Jobs Seen on the Street 16.4.09

Part time jobs seen this week are as follows. You might notice we started splitting the posts up as they were getting rather long, so don’t forget to click ‘read the rest of this entry’ for the full list of jobs. Hope people are finding these useful!

Seen on the Arndale Centre website

• Sales Assistant at Adidas – closing date 19th April!
• Sales Assistants at Card Factory
• Office Cleaner

Seen on Employment 4 Students website

• Mobile phones specialist at Currys (Sale) 

Get yourself a ‘careers mentor’ – Part II

Back in February I wrote a post which you can read here extolling the virtues of finding someone to champion your career, a ‘careers mentor’ if you like, even while you’re still a student. I said that a good mentor could help you work out your career plans, give you advice on how to present yourself effectively in applications and interviews and how to ‘network’ your way into a job, and they might even help set you up with some work experience.

But apart from joining an established mentoring scheme like Manchester Gold, how do you go about finding such a person and getting them on board? Here are some suggestions:

1. First identify your goals. What do you want to get out of your mentoring relationship? If you’re set on a career in the theatre but have no contacts and limited work experience, maybe you want someone who works in the theatre world and is very outgoing and well-connected, as they might be able to help you open doors, make contacts and get some concrete experience to go on your CV. If you have no clear career direction yet, maybe you want someone who has a wide range of experience in different sectors and roles and can be a sounding board to talk through different options and help you create an action plan. Of course, there’s no guarantee you’ll get exactly what  you want, but it is useful to start out with a clear goal in mind. That way, you’ll be in a better position to identify individuals to approach and know what to say when you’ve found them.
2. Who to pick and where to find them. Once you’ve established what support you’d ideally like from a mentoring relationship, you need to figure out the best strategy for finding the right person. It might be tempting to go for a fairly senior person in an organisation (it would look great on your CV right?), but the reality is these people are usually incredibly busy and 9 times out of 10 won’t be able to offer the support you need. Consider looking for someone who might have graduated a bit more recently, as they might a) be able to relate more easily to where you’re at as a student, b) be flattered that you’re asking for their advice, c) be more likely to have the time to help you, and d) feel they can get something out of it themselves (i.e. it might also look good on their CV!).

   As with any kind of advice on networking, start by thinking about who you already know and put the feelers out with friends and family to see if they know anyone who might be able to help you.If you’ve tried that, be canny with the web. Search for people in your chosen sector (if you have one) who write blogs and use social networking sites liked Twitter and LinkedIn for professional purposes. These kinds of people can be good bets for mentors because a) they’re already ‘out there’ networking with others in their industry, and b) they’re also doing something over and above their normal day-to-day job.One approach could be to think about an organisation you’d like to work for and go on their website and look for staff contact details or even a mini-bio or profile (sometimes on an ‘About Us’ page). Then look for any connections you might have with them – is their job title something you want to do, are they a University of Manchester graduate (!), can you spot any shared interests? Then type their name into your favourite search engine perhaps with a keyword (e.g. their employer or the sector/specialism) and see what else you can find out. Look for people who generate a lot of search results (e.g. a blog, discussion forums, a LinkedIn listing, journal articles etc) and – very importantly – openly share their professional contact details online.

3. How to approach the person. OK, so you’ve found someone with a strong web presence who seems to be open to online connections. How do you approach them? A targeted e-mail can be a good option, or you could start with a softly softly initial connection on Twitter or LinkedIn.If you are writing an e-mail, make sure you say:
   - Who you are and what you are looking for.
   - Why you’re contacting them in particular. Focus on the connections between you and why you think they’d make a great mentor. As with job applications,  be specific and show you’ve done your research, e.g. you could refer to some interesting posts on their blog or something you’ve found on their staff profile.
   - Be modest and flexible about what you hope to get from them. You don’t want to put them off by asking for too much at this stage and doors might open later.
4. Expect some knock backs and non-responses. Obviously many professionals are very busy and won’t always be able to help. You might not even get a response at all. But don’t be put off – if you stick at it and ensure you keep contacting the right kinds of people with personalised, focussed (not generic and vague!), approaches, you will eventually strike gold!

Jobs Seen on the Street 9.4.09

Part time jobs seen this week include:

Seen on Just Jobs 4 Students website

• Travel Advisor at First Choice/Thomson
• Military Marine Engineer at Territorial Army
  (plus various other roles)

 Seen on The Jobs Mine (Manchester Evening News)

•  Administrative Assistant at The University of Manchester
  (previous experience required)

 

Changes to the Undergrad Blog

It’s spring and time for bringing in the new, and we’ve just made two changes to the blog:

Undergrad blog welcomes Finalists!
The main focus of the Manchester Undergrad Careers blog has been on careers topics aimed at Manchester undergrads in any year before the final year. That’s because, alongside this blog, we were also piloting a blog specifically for finalists. We’ve now decided to combine these two blogs and make the undergrad careers blog the careers blog for all Man Uni undergraduates, whatever year you’re in. Most of what we already blog about – exploring career options, events, jobs, applications etc – will be just as relevant to finalists, but we’ll also be including some posts which are particularly targeted at students graduating this year. I’d also like to welcome our Finalist team bloggers, Jenny and Adele, who are now joining the Undergrad blog team! Look out for their profiles appearing on our ‘About us’ page.

Recession info.
You might have noticed the new tab at the top of the page labelled ‘Recession’.  We’ve created this section as we know that the economic situation and the effect it’s having on recruitment is an issue causing concern for students.  In the section, you’ll find some information and FAQs about how the recession may affect you along with tips and links to other sources of information.  We’ll be adding to the Recession section and also posting news here as and when something relevant comes up.