Anyone else feel like they have/will have no idea how to help their kids enter job market now?

I agree with Linkedin. My son's Uni career's advisory services were hot on telling students to create a Linkedin profile and keep it updated. In a few of his graduate scheme job interviews (and various managers in his graduate job in the latter year) have mentioned his Linkedin profile so they've clearly been looking at it as part of recruitment process and line management within the workplace.

Make sure they get familiar with LinkedIn. I hate it more than any other social media platform I've ever used, but it's so much cheaper, easier and quicker for companies to use LI than agencies when recruiting now.

I think the main role parents will play in helping this generation enter the job market is moral support. Its going to become the norm to apply for 3-400 roles before you get a bite, and that's got to be massively overwhelming and disenhartening.

I agree. Far too many older people just don't understand how bad things are these days. My son managed to get a graduate scheme job - he was one of only 10 for one of the UK's largest insurance firms, and he said there were thousands of applicants. The year after they've only taken on 5 on the same scheme he's doing. That is for the entire country, not just the office he works in! It's crazy.

He also looked into apprenticeships before deciding on Uni. Absolutely nothing at all within commuting distance of our home town meaning he'd need to move which is impossible to afford even shared housing on a very low minimum wage apprentice scheme job! The nearest was nearly a two hour drive away - the wage wouldn't even have paid for an older banger and fuel costs! It may be good in the big cities or if you live close to a big employer like BAE, but out in the regions, smaller cities, towns etc., the only "opportunities" are often tin-pot tiny firms who usually get their apprentices via the local college of FE and have very limited career opportunities if you don't want to become a builder, hairdresser, car mechanic,etc.

@MaturingCheeseball

Times have certainly changed. Posters saying “do a paper round” “get a holiday job” - !!!! Businesses are operating on a shoestring now and no longer employ heaps of Saturday kids

It's not just shoestring. It's regulation and the marketplace. Our village newsagents has no "paper boys" anyone - they have a handful of mature adults who use their own cars. So few people have papers delivered, the rounds are huge instead, i.e. one round IS the village, impossible to do it all on foot or by bike. Another round is the next village a few miles away - again, needs a car. They cover several villages since the village's own shops closed. No single round has enough houses being delivered to for a youngster to do it by foot nor bike! We're along time past the days where a single round was a single road done by a lad/girl walking as so few have papers delivered.

Likewise regulations prevent people from working in some workplaces from a young age, such as prohibitions on young people working in kitchens. Licensed shops can't have school age people on the tills as they can't sell alcohol nor tobacco etc. Even if your business isn't caught, you still need permission from the local council/school to employ a school age child, which often takes weeks/months to obtain.

Yes, it’s come to an AI interviewer vs. an AI candidate!

dc passed one AI test but then the next stage is doing more tests but in person. It boils your head!

Yes AI and these tests. I also read that there is much cheating going on. I don't condone it but I can imagine parents do or even 'buy in' help to ace the tests. It's all a bit ridiculous.

Absolutely tougher than the 90s.

And certain sectors, as you say, ridiculously competitive. I read somewhere that JP Morgan, the investment bank, had 500,000 applications for 400 jobs!!

And with the online processes and diversity barriers, it's virtually impossible for a white boy to get a foot in the door in terms of grad schemes. I guess they have to find other ways...

I agree with contextualisation for uni applications but I don't agree with cutting out a large percentage of the population due to them NOT being female, 'diverse' or with a disability. I do agree that those groups should be helped and with roles ear marked in terms of a %, but maybe the pendulum has swung too far, and a huge group of young men are feeling left behind.

Yes, last year the local museum offered post GCSE apprenticeships but he couldn’t apply as he is a graduate. There is nothing for him, apart from volunteering which doesn’t pay his bills.

There are so few openings for entry level. And those that are want experience, pay pennies, and are part time. It's soul destroying.

Like @HostaCentral my DC really wants to work in heritage but so much of the research and conservation work organisations like the National Trust is done by volunteers. NT and English Heritage are making redundancies at the moment as well. PhDs are like hens teeth.

Passing a van driving test is also useful as you can be a delivery driver.

Lorry driving isn't a bad job if you aren't academic.

My younger DC has first and Master’s degrees in History, did semester abroad, volunteered and took a CS job just before lockdown as a temporary measure. Seems well and truly stuck and finding any promotion really difficult He’s dyslexic his manager disagrees with the diagnosis as he has degrees. Obviously she knows better than the Educational Psychologist who spent hours assessing him. I have suggested he retrains in something more hands on like Physio, occupational therapy or Speech therapy but he feels very cynical about healthcare as his medical friends are having a hard time.

But as I said for “graduate schemes” it is increasingly difficult to demonstrate that you are a great candidate, no matter how many extra jobs you’ve done and soft skills you’ve acquired.

Dc received a rejection, after doing the AI tests and having an AI interview, with the explanation that their academic profile was lacking. Er, I don’t think so.

At 17 if you can get them to pass there driving test even if they don’t have a car it’s good to have

once 18 get them to to the
door safe badge SIA for security work it’s cheap & easy to do and once you have it you will always have some form of work

it’s great little filler for both temporary and permanent work
my son and his mates spent summers doing the festival circuit as security so Glastonbury reading. V festival and local ones

General security is often long hours but you might only have to do 1 long shift a week to make decent money if your a student

my son and a few of his mates also spent summers in Ibiza and Majorca working in the big clubs and bars as they required some English security ( pre Brexit so much easier to do )

its also soft skills shows that you can deal with just about anything hard working and reliable which employers like

DD has an First at UG and a Masters. She has very little work experience, cafe, cattery, some volunteering. She, and her friends actually, are being turned down for minimum wage cafe and retail jobs. These are only 4 hours block over two or three days as well, nowhere near full time. They don't want graduates.

She has a humanities degree, and wants to work in heritage, also rubbish wages, and hardly any full time roles.

At the moment she is just trying to keep busy, get that first job, some money, and look at getting even more qualifications. She is trying for PHD's too, but again finding for humanities is non existent and university jobs are all being cut, so...... She is looking abroad too.

Businesses are operating on a shoestring now and no longer employ heaps of Saturday kids.

The ones that do won't employ kids! My DD16 and because of employer liability insurance, she is deemed too young for a lot of places. She had the same issue even trying to get work experience – she got knocked back a few times before she got her day release placement because the companies could only take on 18s and above.

Best thing you can do is make sure they do a worthwhile degree if they are going to uni or get a good apprenticeship if they are not.

Worthwhile degrees are things like law, medicience, hard sciences, engineering, anything numerate basically. There are a wide variety of jobs available to anyone with good numeracy skills, finance and accountancy, programming/IT, STEM and moving on to management after

For non academics support in getting them a good apprenticeship is key. Skilled trades can earn far more than a lot of low value graduates in soft subjects. Plumbing, electrics, plastering and painting, tiling/fitting, building and landscaping are all good things to be in.

I worry about this too.

one thing that reassures me is nowadays you can pay experts to support you- university coach/ CV & job application receiving etc. I have a friend who does it and she’s brilliant. I would have no problem throwing a few hundred quid at it- it’s so important to get support in a competitive workplace.

for those saying it ever was thus - yes and if I can do anything to make it easier for my children I will. No one helped me and I struggled for years longer than I needed to.

The thing about what jobs your parents did when you were 14 is purely for DEI monitoring purposes. Employers won't be using it in their hiring decisions... the hiring managers won't even see this info in most cases.

My parents were in their 40s when I was born. They’re boomers and the world has changed so much since they were young.
I didn’t even know the difference between university and college until I was 17. Not kidding.

It’s partially my fault for not telling them anything about what I did at school but they had no idea what a gcse was. Back in their day they were called o levels and most kids left school before doing them and still managed to get a good job.

It’s interesting to see on Mumsnet how much others advise their kids through the young adult/teenage years. Im glad I had my kids young so I’m not as out of touch as my parents are

Times have certainly changed. Posters saying “do a paper round” “get a holiday job” - !!!! Businesses are operating on a shoestring now and no longer employ heaps of Saturday kids.

What has really put a spanner in the works for my dc is the application process. Faced with 1000s of CVs (all auto-uploaded) employers are arbitrarily culling. Then follow AI tests and even AI interviews! It doesn’t seem to matter what your qualifications are let alone “soft skills” - to get through the door you are competing with masses of candidates, perhaps most of whom are unsuitable but if they’ve “passed” the algorithm they’re not eliminated.

And don’t get me started on “woke” hiring practices. What business is it of an employer what job your parents had when you were 14?!

I'd suggest grads even knowing that these attributes are important is half the battle. Being aware of the need and importance of developing the personal attributes required by more employers is the first step. I think schools and universities are pretty poor at helping kids personally develop - getting a part-time job can help, but to get the best from their experience, they really need to understand that employers want more than a degree, and experience isn't about the knowledge acquired, it's the interpersonal skills developed, especially in the early days.

Yes, but like a lot of "parental" duties, lots of parents don't have those skills themselves, so can't pass them on to their children. Hence why schools, Unis and employers have to fill the gap. I've no doubt that "some" parents can instill all those qualities and attributes, there needs to be "outside" influences to fill the gap when the parents can't or won't do it. And a workplace, any workplace, is a good place to start to do that, probably better than a school.

Of course, work experience absolutely helps to develop those qualities, and it is to be encouraged, but there are many other things that parents can do to facilitate the development of such qualities before kids even get to the age where they might be thinking about getting a job. And focusing on those qualities/character traits makes it relatively easy for kids to go out and find their own part time jobs/work experience opportunities.

Whilst I agree, a lot of those skills can be acquired by actually having a job, i.e. real life experience.

Personally, I was an immature mess when I left school. It was getting my first full time job, working closely alongside adults, that I matured and started to acquire "adult" skills like those you mention. I was a completely different person after just a few months, I grew massively in confidence, resilience, etc. That kind of thing can't easily be "taught" it has to be experienced in real life. I think that's why a lot of employers insist on work experience, relevant or not, as ANY work experience for a decent length of time will mean some workplace skills, even if the type of work is nothing like the job being applied for.