The Gradconsult blog

Careers and Employability Teams are growing, and the recruitment of senior staff has become more challenging. This has led to more University Careers Services taking the decision to create their own talent pipeline to grow their own new leaders. When the best practitioners are promoted to management positions, it can be difficult to juggle the required change in mindset from operational to strategic with the additional responsibilities of managing people. Even the best practitioners need some help to stop being so hands on and start consulting, negotiating, managing, and leading. We are excited to launch the Gradconsult Emerging Leaders Development ... read more

by Juliet Hayes Looking for jobs, like many things in life, can be super difficult. I’ve been there, trying to find something that both interests me, and is related to my degree. But sometimes, that’s just not what you end up doing. Those circles definitely can have overlap, but it might take time to find precisely in which career or job that overlap falls. Take me for example – I’ve got a BSc in Geography, and an MSc in Environmental Management. My three current passions in life are geography, helping people, and the careers field. Who knows where I’ll find ... read more

by Amber Bytheway I’m in my late twenties. I work as a Project Consultant for an award-winning early careers and talent consultancy in Sheffield. I am very fortunate, working at a SME that I have the privilege of working and learning from all my colleagues in Gradconsult. A rare statement, I know! I also have the benefit of working with this hugely knowledgeable team whilst being able to work from anywhere in the country I choose. The founder of Gradconsult not only knows my name, but I see them every week, have support from them whenever required and am always ... read more

by George Theodorou Coaching. Something I’ve believed I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Hearing about people’s experiences. Hearing about their thoughts and feelings. Hearing about their goals and aspirations. I’ve always wanted to help people to deal with whatever they are facing, and to help them get ‘there’. My passion for helping people has been a part of me for as long as I can remember. I’ve always been fascinated by human behaviour and have naturally been inquisitive about people’s thoughts and experiences. I felt like I could help people by hearing about their experiences and offering my ... read more

By Rachel Brown I’d love to get your thoughts on setting targets to improve diversity within organisations. Recently, I was encouraged to read that 92% of respondents to a research survey in the UK reported that their organisations are already focused on improving diversity and inclusion. (“Let’s Get Real About Equality: When Women Thrive 2020 Global Report“ published by Mercer in March 2020). A couple of weeks ago, I was pleased to join a roundtable session that demonstrated just that. Organised by Shepherd and Wedderburn for their suppliers and wider network, it focused on Diversity and Inclusion (or Belonging and ... read more

By Mike Grey There’s no doubt that students are brilliant. You are brimming with skills, ideas and potential. So why is this not always fully reflected in graduate recruitment processes? I often talk with students about the Dunning-Kruger effect in relation to their performance in graduate recruitment processes. It has prompted powerful reflective discussions, supported them to develop their self-awareness and often encouraged them seek help from careers professionals to develop their competence in making graduate job applications. What is the Dunning–Kruger effect? The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias stating that people with low competence at a task often ... read more

By Tim Elgar For some of you – this is easy. There is someone who jumps right into your mind and you can quickly recount why you thrived under their leadership. However, I ask this question a lot as part of leadership development programmes and for the majority it’s a difficult question. Most responses take attributes or characteristics of certain leaders and piece meal them together. Some openly admit they don’t think they have ever had a great leader and find it much easier to reflect on the ‘bad’ leaders they have experienced. Some have never reflected before on the ... read more

By Rachel Brown Why its important your new starters feel “safe”. For many years I have been working with leaders to support them in creating psychologically safe work environments. Employees who feel psychologically safe are more engaged, less fearful, more innovative, and perform better (the list goes on – if you want to know more, I highly recommend “The fearless organization” by Amy C. Edmondson.) 10 weeks ago, I started a new role and was plunged into a completely new type of organization with a very different culture. It got me thinking of the importance of psychological safety for new ... read more

By Tim Elgar This post was originally published on Tim’s LinkedIn page on 11th August 2021. Here is the link Coming up to 6 weeks in now in my new role and with my annual leave coming next week I thought it was a good time to reflect and share some learning. The first reflection relates to being an ‘expert’ and this whole notion. When you start a new job it is a clean slate. You have been hired through a robust (in Gradconsult’s case) recruitment process, but the relationship is new and we have this natural curiosity about whether ... read more

By Rebecca Fielding Whether you are a graduate employer seeking to increase (nay double) your available candidate pool, or a university wanting to improve the number of your graduates entering highly skilled graduate employment post-graduation there seems to me to be one simple solution that no-one is really talking about. It’s simply learning to drive. A recent (January 2018) report commissioned by the Department for Transport, conducted by the University of Oxford and the University of the West of England, Young People’s Travel – What’s Changed and Why?, has demonstrated a significant and sustained decline in the number of young ... read more

The first few months of any graduate programme from September to December are busy. From induction to line manager briefings, the first placements and inevitable first bouncers working out they are in the wrong place. January is often the first chance to come up for air and do some thinking about the year ahead. The programme structure, budget and core topics will most likely have been set for some time, but there are a few key questions I’d encourage all graduate developers to ask as we all plan and prepare for 2018: • Has the business environment, leadership, strategy or ... read more

By Kylie Cook Originally published on LinkedIn Every week, on movie night, my husband asks me what I want to watch, and every week I shout SHREK 2 at the top of my lungs. I don’t know how it started, but it always makes me chuckle on account of me being very easily pleased. My demands for the cinematic delight of everyone’s favourite CGI ogre are rarely indulged, but I know the film pretty well nonetheless. What’s the point? Well, there’s a bit where Donkey and Shrek are talking about people being like onions and having layers*, and I think ... read more

By Jane Clark Originally published on LinkedIn I wonder how many of us really practice what we preach? OK – so let’s clarify that question a bit more. What I mean is, I wonder how many of us find the time in our busy working day lives to take a pause, and get to know more about the people we work with daily and how we can support each other more? There are lots of different models, methodologies, frameworks and complexities to help us solve some of these questions, and it’s making use of the right tools at the right ... read more

Originally published in Issue 1 (Autumn 2017) of ‘The Student Employer’ Magazine by ISE. By Amy Collins and Rachel Seignot Bright Network research suggests graduates see a prestigious reputation and a fast-growing, innovative image as the most important criteria in an employer. But what other, more practical, aspects are they looking for? As recent graduates who have taken a wider look at the graduate recruitment market whilst working at Gradconsult, Amy Collins and Rachel Seignot explain their decision-making process behind applying for graduate jobs. When first considering graduate job applications, we both created a ‘checklist’ to narrow down the myriad ... read more