For many recent graduates who have just returned home for the summer, overdrafts drained, the fleeting prosperity of the student loan a distant memory and far-off future, a stop-gap job in a pub, restaurant or office environment is the solution to short-term poverty. It can ensure that when (if) you secure a permanent, career-oriented position in a few months time, you will have sufficient money padding your account to - possibly - relocate and start a new life elsewhere.
Unfortunately, such stop-gap, minimum wage, 30 hours a week positions elude many of those sitting on honours degrees from Russell Group universities. Precisely, perhaps, because they are sitting on such degrees, stop-gap employers presume that their new flock of applicants don't plan to stick around long. But their new flock of applicants can't propose to go elsewhere until they have the means to do so, and a summer spent in front of Jeremy Kyle is of infinitely less worth than even a minimum wage position washing dishes in a local hotel. Graduates are excluded from these positions, despite genuinely wanting and needing them, because employers assume that there is no sincerity in their desire for employment. It is not unfair, per se, of employers to assume this; after all, few graduates will still want to be waiting tables in a few years' time. But especially for the summer months, recent graduates can be desperate for bar work and find it similarly elusive as the first rung of the career ladder.
It is difficult. Banks start their niggling letters, reminding you that interest-free overdrafts will expire, parents gesture kindly but firmly towards recruitment websites, and while what you want more is a carefree summer with the promised land of employment waiting at the end, you have no money for the former, and no promise of the latter. It is easy to stagnate. And the less you do, they less you are prepared to do. Procrastination become effortful, let alone application after application - for either stop-gap or real-life jobs.
Graduates - persevere. Hand in CVs to every pub, restaurant, hotel and shop within easy distance of your home. Emphasise your position: you can offer infinite hours, immediate availability and, if you have any practical experience, stress it. Continue to apply for 'real-life' jobs as well; do not let inactivity deter proactivity. It is a difficult summer for the lost generation; you must remain upbeat.
Phoebe, GRB Journalist
