How to Get Experience When Every Job Expects It
You've just graduated, and it's time to look for jobs. As you scroll through postings, every role seems to require years of experience. But, how do you get experience if no one will hire you without any experience? It's a real catch-22.
We're talking with Olivia Truong, Senior Talent Acquisition Specialist with our sister company, Impact Recruitment. She hires for many of Impact's internal positions, so we'd say she knows a thing or two about experience requirements. Olivia is going over why everyone asks for experience and how to avoid this vicious cycle. Plus, her biggest piece of advice:
"If you meet about 80% of those requirements and you know that you can bring transferable skills, just shoot your shot and apply anyway. You never know what can happen."
Watch the video to learn all Olivia's tips and tricks!
Transcript
Q: Why is a job 'entry level' if it requires 1-2 years of experience?
Great question. I know that can be frustrating. Let's say you just finished school, and you're looking to gain your first job, and you see all these roles posted that list two to three years of experience; it's a bit of a catch-22. A couple of things to remember is that sometimes employers are looking to hire candidates with a little bit more experience, and experience can be subjective from company to company. Some companies may hire people with volunteer or internship experience, while others may be willing to hire somebody with zero experience.
Another thing to remember is that often this is used as a tool to limit the number of applications a company gets. So, for example, if a company was looking for an Administrative Assistant, and they posted a job that had little to no requirements, they may end up getting hundreds of applications, and that's a lot to sift through. So if they instead post a job, the same job, and list two to three years of similar related experience, that's going to limit the number of applications they get.
Q: How can I get relevant experience easily?
Start small; your first experience doesn't have to be paid experience. You could get experience in a number of ways. So, for example, through school, through your courses or classes, volunteer, extracurricular activities, and internships. Being proactive helps too. So, if you're ever interested in joining a company and you see that they're not hiring right now or they don't have any roles listed that you qualify for, you could reach out to the contact or the recruiter and inquire about internships, unpaid internships, or maybe a project you can take on just to get experience in the field.
You could also be proactive in reaching out to people in the industry. So researching the type of field or role you're trying to get into and finding people in that in that industry, and setting up what we call an informational interview. So that means offering to buy them a coffee or tea for 15 to 20 minutes of their time and sitting down and having a conversation where you can ask them questions about their career journey, learning about how to break into that field. You never know what doors that could open. They could have leads for you, and it can help point you in the right direction.
Q: What's your best advice for a new job-seeker?
Don't get stuck on all the job requirements listed. Often those requirements are describing an ideal, perfect candidate. So if you meet about 80% of those requirements, and you know that you can bring transferable skills, just shoot your shot and just apply anyway, you never know what can happen.
Second point is networking. Be proactive and reach out to people in the industry, HR contacts and recruiters because you never know where that could lead. Just being proactive and not being afraid to introduce yourself. Sometimes landing your next job might just come down to timing and a bit of luck.