Graduates

Final year students and graduates should enjoy their last few weeks of college life while they can. Because finding a job this summer is going to be very, very hard.

For final-year college students on both sides of the Atlantic it's little more than four to five months until final exams. But with jobs becoming increasingly scarce, what are they going to do next?

Graduates in Western economies may seem umbilically attached to their mobiles and social networks, but they risk being overtaken by even more technologically savvy students from emerging economies.

Work-life balance is another casualty of the downturn, with college graduates reporting being pushed to work harder, come in earlier and stay later.

After years of expecting to waltz into their ideal career, nearly three quarters of American graduates are now seriously worried about their chances of landing a job at all when they leave college.

Employers are less concerned about how well graduates performed academically than how they get on with colleagues and how well they communicate.

With the employment market looking tougher by the day, nearly half of American students graduating from college this summer expect to have to fight tooth and nail to land a job.

In the latest podcast for graduate job-seekers from workplace engagement specialists, Best Companies, Wayne Turmel talks to Paul Farrer, Chairman of the Graduate Recruitment Company, about the possibilities and pitfalls around applying for that all-important first post-university job.

But finding that first graduate job is only the beginning. The next challenge is to make that job a success – those vital first 100 days. So what are the things new employees can do to help - or hinder - their careers just as they are getting started? Listen to this podcast to find out.

Nothing is more important to the new graduate than finding that first position and using it as a launching pad for a fulfilling professional life. With all the changes taking place in business, finding a company that offers opportunities for ongoing development is crucial.

Fewer than half of all new Graduates last two years at their first job out of college. So how can you ensure you find an employer that is a good fit with your personal and professional objectives?

More than two-thirds of college graduates are worried about how the state of the economy will affect their chances of landing a job. Not that that's going to stop them demanding the earth from employers.

The Generation Y of up-and-coming workers are all too readily dismissed as spoilt, demanding slackers. But, as a survey suggests they are in fact just as hard working and hungry to succeed as their parents, is it just generational sour grapes?

They're ambitious, green, technologically savvy and flexible. But the Generation Y workforce is also over-confident, unrealistic, self-centred and demanding.

Finishing university in the UK and looking to enter the job market? Perhaps you may just want to go back to bed if the answer to that question is 'yes'.

The recovery of the Japanese economy means more and better opportunities for students entering the workforce.

Look around the average workplace and it's a sobering thought that the proportion of employees who are uncommitted and likely to leave within two years outnumbers those who are truly loyal.

Six out of 10 U.S. hiring managers looking for college students to fill internship positions and if they play their cards right, many of these are likely to be offered a permanent job.

Despite graduating from a top-10 UK university, Seb has yet to land a graduate job and is worried that his strategy is flawed. Carl Gilleard, boss of the Association of Graduate Recruiters, has some valuable advice.

Faced with an ageing workforce, British employers are falling over themselves to woo new graduates. But in the process, they risk creating a generation of demanding, poorly behaved, job-seeking brats.

Fred has been on the graduate programme at an international bank for almost two years but feels that the programme is not meeting his expectations and that he has been treated like a temp wherever he's been posted. Patricia Soldati offers some advice.

While earning a bit of cash over the summer never goes amiss, what students really value is work experience that leaves them better equipped to land a permanent job when they leave college or university.

Britain will start to suffer a corrosive loss of skilled jobs to rivals overseas if its universities do not begin to turn out more science, engineering and technology graduates soon, employers have warned.

Despite record numbers graduating from universities, British graduates have never been so poorly qualified for the world of work, a veteran recruiter has complained.

Britain is awash with vacancies for graduates, yet employers are struggling to find university leavers with the right skills - or the right attitude - for the job.

Choosing the right degree to study at college is one of the most important decisions you will make in your life. But a third of British graduates believe they chose the wrong option, a decision that has held them back in later life.

City financial firms are increasingly looking abroad to hire new recruits because foreign university graduates are felt to be more mature than their British counterparts.

Just in time for back-to-school, the number of interns being hired by U.S companies is rising sharply, according to a new poll, with nearly half of firms expecting to be on the look-out for student talent this year.

One in three British employers has to send workers for remedial training to teach them basic English and maths skills that they have failed to learn at school, employers have complained.

Universities have been warned that they need to do more to build links with local employers if they want to increase the workplace skills and employability of their graduates.

More than three quarters of young people coming into the workplace have a higher estimation of their abilities than is the reality – and so may find themselves in for a rude shock.

Britain risks running out of scientists because faults in the education system are leading many young people are turning their back on science and technology, Britain's biggest business group has warned.

While an increasing proportion of white students in Britain dream of careers in publicly-funded organisations with index-linked pensions and a good work-life balance, those from other ethnic groups are far more likely to aspire to careers in finance or business.

Almost a quarter of British graduates hunting for jobs have walked away from potential employer because they had been put off by the organisation's behaviour during the recruitment process.

In an increasingly competitive jobs' market, U.S companies are becoming ever more reliant on interns when it comes to sourcing new talent, with salaries rising as a result.

More than a sixth of graduates applying for jobs would be prepared to cheat to get an advantage over their candidate competitors, a British survey has discovered.

Work experience and a strong work ethic are more important than the type or class of degree when it comes to graduates getting ahead in the jobs' market, a new UK survey has found.

Graduates coming on to the UK jobs' market this summer will be in high demand, with starting salaries rising as a result. Yet big questions remain over how prepared they will be for the world of work.

The UK economy is being held back by a damaging disconnect between graduates and employers, with the changing values of young people leading to a lack of understanding on both sides of the other's needs.

Graduates in the U.S are increasingly having to show they have leadership and problem-solving abilities alongside good quality internships or work experience if they want to secure a top flight job.

This year is looking increasingly promising when it comes to job prospects and salary increases for U.S. graduates as employers' demand for educated labour grows.

Smaller U.S. employers worried about competing with large corporations for graduate talent can take heart form a new survey which finds that seven out of 10 graduate job-seekers would prefer to work for a medium or small employer.

Britain's graduates are leaving university without the social, communication or team-working skills needed to survive in an increasingly competitive corporate world, employers have complained.

Employers will have to un-learn everything they have ever held dear about graduate recruitment and talent management if they are to cope with an ageing workforce and the erosion of the degree as education's gold standard.

School leavers do not know enough about the working world or the career opportunities open to them, and are being let down by bad advice, employers have complained.

Britain has lost more skilled workers to the global "brain drain" than any other industrialised country, according to a report by the World Bank.

Fears that anti-age discrimination laws to be introduced in the UK next year will spell the end of graduate training schemes are probably wide of the mark. But it is clear that how employers recruit and train graduates will have to change significantly.

Demand for graduates from employers is likely to get more, not less, fierce over the next year, despite growing uncertainty over the UK jobs' market, a survey has suggested.

An employer "kite mark" has been launched to help graduates and students find work experience that is actually valuable and not just filing or making the tea.

With growing numbers of graduates entering the jobs market, a survey of medium-sized employers has found that work experience is more important than having a degree-level qualification for entry-level candidates.

It's not just Britain's school leavers who are under fire from employers. Graduates too have been labelled as mediocre and unprepared for the workplace in a national survey of over 4,000 firms.

More than half of graduates who left university last summer or earlier are still looking for their first graduate job, according to a report from recruitment agency Manpower.

With the debts of Britain's graduates set to grow even larger when variable tuition fees are introduced next year, employers worried about the knock-on effect of the spiralling cost of higher education are beginning to offer graduate trainees practical financial help.

Graduates who leave applying for jobs until late in the recruitment calendar – i.e. now – are less likely achieve levels of success in the modern workplace, according to new research.

The 80 best ideas from around the UK developed by student and graduate entrepreneurs – and not just where to find the cheapest pint or the best way to annoy the neighbours – are being showcased at an event in Cambridge.

Europe faces an IT skills shortage as accelerating retirement rates, a decline in the number of IT graduates and changing skills requirements collide with growing demand for specialists with more business-oriented profiles.

Graduate vacancies and salaries in Britain have risen for the second year running with demand for graduates from accountancy and professional services firms rocketing.

Students graduating from universities in Europe and the United States this year are optimistic about finding full-time jobs, but far from certain that their jobs will meet their expectations.

An over-supply of graduates in Britain means that having a degree is no longer a guaranteed ticket to a lifetime of higher earnings.

London and the south east of England may still be the financial and employment powerhouses of the UK, but more and more graduates are preferring to live and find work elsewhere in Britain.