Despite the much-hyped economic growth in the country, many graduates still have a hard time finding suitable jobs.
One of the many complaints by employers is that graduates don’t have relevant skills for the changing job market. The thing that best demonstrates a job market candidate’s skills, training, and applicant’s aptitudes in certain area is a career paper. Such research can help you to summarize your strengths and crucial skills. If you are a college student getting ready for the job market, it is important to understand what skills employers want.
The most recent unemployment rate statistics stand at 3.6%. September 2019, unemployment rates were at a 50-year low, according to the latest reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). However, these numbers don’t highlight the challenges graduates experience when looking for that perfect job. Many have to start at entry levels in industries where they never wanted to work.
Employers complain that graduates’ expectations and the situation in the job market are different. If you are in college, it is important to appreciate the qualities employers want. In many cases, the paper qualifications don’t matter so much because recruiters want employees who can easily adapt to their new workplace.
Below are some qualities that point to the graduates with the best potential.
Enthusiasm and Passion
If a graduate shows passion in what they do, it is likely they can excel in their position. It is more about enthusiasm and readiness to learn than experience. If you are an employer looking for new hires, you might not get many with hands-on experience, but their passion and enthusiasm should count for a lot.
Self-motivation
When looking for new hires, an employer should look for self-motivated graduates. It is a quality that lacks in many students just come from college. There are complaints that Millenials want everything on a silver platter, which poses a big challenge for recruiters. Self-motivation is a sign of long-term potential.
Clear Vision
Most graduates have lofty ideas about life, but most of these are not applicable in real life. An employer looking for potential should pick graduates who have a clear vision about what they want to do. A self-directed graduate has clarity of vision and expresses it clearly.
Team Players
Graduates who can demonstrate their ability with others in projects have the potential to succeed in the modern workplace. The modern workplace is challenging, and one can only succeed by collaborating with others.
Understand Their Strengths
Graduates with potential understand their strengths and clearly state these during interviews. These strengths set them apart from the other candidates. Employers will ask job candidates to detail their strengths. However, they want more than a mention but a description of how you have applied these strengths in specific situations.
Independent Thinkers
The best recruiters will go for independent thinkers, and this is a quality potential employee should strive to demonstrate. While some traditional employers want conformity at the workplace, the modern workplace requires fresh ideas, and these will come from employees.
Strong Communication Skills
Effective communication skills are essential in the workplace. In today’s highly interconnected world, employers should look for graduates who can initiate or keep the conversation going. As a graduate looking for work, you have to demonstrate the capacity to communicate clearly.
Go-getter Attitude
The modern workplace is fast-evolving, and employers want people who can easily adapt. While good grades are important, employers want to hire go-getters who can easily adjust to different work situations. As a graduate, you need to show employers that you are not laid-back but rather outgoing and ambitious. It is the mark of a graduate with great potential.
Problem-solving Skills
In today’s fast-paced workplace, employees have to think on their feet. There’s no time to call for meetings every time. Employers want to hire people who can make decisions quickly and apply them.
Problem-solving skills are a sign of great potential in a new hire. If you can demonstrate your critical thinking capacity, it is easier to impress the employers and get the job.
Proactive Character
Employers want to hire graduates who can take the initiative. Proactive employees take situations in their hands and make the right decisions on the fly. This is an important attribute in the modern workplace.
If, for instance, a company has an online platform, there’s no time to waste when nurturing a potential customer. Decisions have to be made fast, or else the customer will click away. Proactive employees are in high demand in today’s workplace.
As a potential employee, one way to show you are proactive is by asking probing questions about your job during the interview. It shows you are forward-thinking and proactive.
Final Thoughts
These are only a few of the attributes employers will look for in new graduates. While grades and job experience remain important in the workplace, employers are looking beyond these. They want long-term potential and not someone just looking for an income. It is easy to tell graduates who have long-term potential by the way they answer interview questions, and what they ask during these sessions.
More importantly, giving potential recruits practical problems helps the recruiter identify crucial qualities such as problem solving and creativity. If you are an employer looking for graduates with long-term potential, these ideas will help. For college students getting ready for the job market, it is time to start honing these skills to boost your chances.
