1st year YIB guidance

Current 2nd year BSc Management with International Business (YIB) student Alvaro Ferreira who has  secured a placement with Ascot Wealth Management offers 1st year YIBs the following advice: 

“Psychometric tests were an essential for all my placement applications, in fact they are the key for getting through the recruitment process of most placements whether you do it online or once you are invited for an interview. I highly recommend to get your head around these as early as possible, how they work and what to expect from them as different companies will have different types of tests”

Alvaro shares other tips with 1^st year YIBs in this video profile: http://yibprofile.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/alvaro-ascot-wealth.html

And other Year in Business students talk about their placements here: http://yibprofile.blogspot.co.uk/

This year the School of Management Placement team has brought forward some of the workshops run for 1^st year YIBs to better prepare students for making applications in their 2^nd year. Rae Roberts from Careers has just run a workshop on CV/ Applications and Kinga Zaczek from CEDAS has run one on Psychometric testing.

Kinga's interactive workshop on Psychometric tests gave YIBs an overview of the different tests Companies typically use  (eg numeracy, verbal, situational, personality tests) and the opportunity to work through some examples.

Some of the tips can be found in the attached blog article:

http://yearinbusiness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/tackling-pyschometric-tests.html

Rae Roberts ran a CV preparation workshop which got the students thinking about what employers are looking for in terms of applicants: namely Fit, Motivation and Ability.

Rae highlighted how YIBs should study placement advertisements to identify the employer requirements and then ensure they clearly convey their relevant skills/ experiences, backed up by evidence.

Companies are often looking for a range of competencies which can include:

Communication, Leadership, Initiative, Team building; Priority setting, Problem solving skills.

Students can demonstrate their skills and experiences from a range of examples based on Education ; Extracurricular activities/ sports within and outside College; Voluntary work and Work experience.

All work experience is valuable and students should not under sell any role. Eg responsibilities of a shelf stacker at Tesco Slough could be described as:

> stacking shelves, helping with customer queries, unpacking deliveries OR as

>  being responsible for ensuring the fruit & vegetable section of this busy store was well stocked and within date, which involved working to tight timescales ; maintaining 100% accuracy on stock checks for food on display being within date; providing polite and friendly customer service to shoppers who were looking for items on the shop floor; maintaining accurate records when checking in up to 6 new stock deliveries per shift.

Students were surprised at the speed at which recruiters typically make their initial check of CVs.
Rae referenced this to demonstrate the importance of of ensuring key, relevant skills were highlighted clearly. Students should use clear formatting using bullets, clear headings, clear font (eg Arial); 11pt font minimum; spell checked and 2 sides length.

Rae is available for 1:1 consultations with YIB students to assist them as they pull together their CVs.

More information on CVs on Moodle employability page:https://moodle.royalholloway.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=3259&section=8

More information on value of work experience:http://yearinbusiness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/work-experience.html

Example of involvement in an extra curricular activity: Enactus society http://yearinbusiness.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/the-enactus-conference-benefits-of.html