Get Started: How to Use this Blog Effectively

Since I first created this blog, I have had a steady increase in the amount of queries that people have sent to me, which is great. Mostly the queries I receive are all about applying for work placements. This is why I have decided to write a blog post that is focussed on giving you the most important posts that I have written, especially if you haven’t been following my blog since the beginning. Therefore, below I have compiled a list that could be used as a systematic guide for reading and gaining the most advice I have in my blog so far.

1) Where do I start?

Don’t forget that I have a page on this site that is focussed on where to start when you’re beginning your work placement search. This will probably be the first place you’ll want to go, and within that page, I have listed a few key blog posts that you may want to draw your attention to.

2) Older blog posts

If you haven’t been following my blog since the beginning, then you’ll find that there are a lot of significant blog posts that date back to July last year. Instead of searching for them yourself, here is a good list to get you started.

Blog posts:

Top 5 Tips for getting Work Experience http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/07/5-top-tips-for-getting-work-experience.html

Top 5 Tips for getting Employer Responses http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/07/top-5-tips-for-getting-employer.html

Why Am I Not Getting Employer Responses and What Should I Do? http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/11/why-am-i-not-getting-employer-responses.html

3) Guardian Careers

The Guardian Careers website is definitely worth going on regularly. It holds a wealth of information and advice for students/graduates that are looking for work placements or careers. To start with, if you haven’t already listened, you may find the Work Experience Podcast that I’m featured in helpful.

http://careers.guardian.co.uk/audio/work-experience-careers-talk-podcast

4) Covering the basics

Also, some of you may not know that I have written a series of CV Workshop blog posts that gives advice about how to format and style your CV. Please find the link below.

CV work shop http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/08/cv-workshop-top-5-headings-for-your-cv.html

Additionally, I have written these following blog posts to cover the other application basics.

http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/11/top-5-tips-for-creating-impressive.html

http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/07/top-5-tips-for-preparing-for-intern.html

http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/11/contributing-to-blog-to-enhance-your.html

5) Continue Researching

Remember that should use my blog as a starting point for your own research. I'm currently in the process of finishing my next Guardian article, which is all about the specific research I embarked on when I searched for placements.

Additionally, I know that some of my readers are seeking work placements in alternative industries to publishing but rest assured, the skills and techniques I write about can certainly be transferable.

Above, I have supplied some of the ‘Best of’ blog posts, which will help you to make the best use of my blog. All of the above, is my initial advice to finding and applying to work placements.

Don’t forget that I’m always happy to hear from you if you have any comments, queries or suggestions.

Top 5 Tips for Occupying your Spare Time over Christmas

With Christmas approaching, and the holidays for students inevitable, it’s a great time to start thinking about, and applying for work placements next year. Now is a good chance to set aside a few days over your holiday to update your CV, and write your cover letters for your applications.

To make good use of your time over Christmas you could:

1)Research Placements

Some of you may not have done any research for placements in quite a while. It’s good to regularly check out what companies are offering, in terms of internships next year and graduate schemes, as you may want to apply for those. If like me, you’ll be graduating next year, then you may want to research the general job market too. Keep yourself in the loop and up to date with what’s going on in the specific publishing industry you’re hoping to get into.

Also, look out for my next Guardian Careers article, which will detail how to research for placements effectively. I’m hoping that this will be published in the next week or two.

2) Update your CV

During Semester, it can be really difficult to find time to update your CV. Therefore, holidays are the best time to do this. It shouldn’t take too long to do, so perfect if you have an hour or two free time.

3) Prepare Cover Letters

After researching placements, you may have found a few that you would like to apply for. These placements will probably be sometime after February 2012. If they’re close to this date then make sure you send your application as soon as possible (unless stated otherwise). However, if you’re not looking for a placement until summer 2012 then hold off till January/February time to apply. Even if this is the case, you can still write your cover letters in advance.

For more advice regarding cover letters see http://diaryofapublishingintern.blogspot.com/2011/11/top-5-tips-for-creating-impressive.html. Don’t forget to do your own research too.

4) Work on application extras

Christmas will be the best time to get prepared, if like me, you know that you will need to submit a portfolio along with your CV and cover letter. You may also see where there are gaps in your portfolio, for example you may not have enough variation in cuttings etc. You can work on this and do things such as, working on the University newspaper as a Writer or Editor. For those that are in your final year, this may be your last chance to get involved, and it will definitely look good on your CV.

If you’re not going to be submitting a portfolio, then it’s a good idea to get to know the companies that you’re most interested in gaining a work placement with, or even a full time job with later on. This will be especially useful when you’re composing your cover letters, and even at a later point in time, when you will be going for interviews. The more preparation you do, the easier it will be to achieve all of this and be successful at it.

5) Social Networking

Make sure you try and get yourself out there (and stay out there) - in whatever way are possible. For example, if you’re writing a blog, keep advertising and use social media to get more people aware of it – even employers.

If you’re not writing a blog, then get a LinkedIn account and a Twitter account to boost your online presence. Follow around careers and recruitment profiles, as they’ll post up vacancies etc. For instance, some of these profiles that I follow have followed me back, and retweeted my blog advertising tweets. This is how my blog made it into Gradvine Daily. However, even if you don't have a blog, any kind of recognition that you could get is going to work in your favour.

Some of this blog post has been slightly more geared towards writers/bloggers, but I think you could all gain something out of this. Next Tuesday I’ll be expanding my social networking tip as it is very significant. I’ll especially try to aim this at the non writers. Don’t forget to get in contact and tweet me if you have any questions. Also, get in touch if you’d just like to make blog post suggestions.

Top 5 Tips for Creating an Impressive Cover Letter

Cover letters are a major part of your work placement application. However, a lot of people I’ve spoken to, find the cover letter the most difficult - particularly in terms of content and style. Therefore, I have listed five top tips below that will begin to help you with writing your cover letter. However, I always suggest undertaking your own research too.

1) Talk about your achievements

Introduce yourself and talk about any achievements or skills that you think are the most relevant. You could have this at the start of your cover letter in a ‘short and sweet’ introductory paragraph.

2) Focus on the company

Make sure you show an interest in the company that you are applying for, and what they do. For example, if they are a book publisher, make sure it is clear that you have an interest in their books. Specifically, this is important if you are applying to a well-known company as they will receive plenty of work applications, and will then start to filter people off this way.

3) Be concise and to the point

The cover letters are not meant to be long. I would say between half to a page long. Therefore, it is important to be to the point and concise rather than having extensive sentences, which in effect do not say anything.

4)Proof read

It is very important to proof read your cover letter, and of course, your entire application. Employers will not be very forgiving if they see numerous spelling and grammar mistakes, and this is even greater if you are applying for an editorial based position.

5) Make sure you do the final checks

Once your cover letter has been completed and you are happy with the style and content, you can then make the final checks. Try to avoid fancy fonts, for instance, size 12 Times New Roman or Arial will be fine. Additionally, make sure word processor has completed a spell and grammar check.

For those unaware, you can also improve the spell and grammar check that word processor does within the settings. Therefore, to improve the checker you can set it to check both grammar and writing style, and as well, it can show you readability statistics.

So don’t hesitate and start applying.

Contributing to a Blog to Enhance Your Portfolio

Are you a keen writer and would like to build yourself an online portfolio?

futurerising tweeted on the 17th of November, "Want to contribute a blog / experience / story to futurerising? getintouch@futurerising.com".

Contributing to a blog is a great way to work whilst you're studying. This is because you can work from home, and not be restricted to any set hours. I've been doing this myself at Cocokouture and The Guardian; they both offer me good work experience that will look great on my CV. If you're doing regular work, and building up a portfolio on your CV, then this will look great to a future employer. So, don't hesitate and have a think about what futurerising could do for your CV/portfolio.

To find out more information visit: http://www.futurerising.com/contribute/

Website Pick of the Week

Guardian Careers

For those who have been following my work experience over summer 2011, will know already that I write in the Guardian careers section, so it will come as no surprise to find that they are my website pick of the week.

The Guardian probably should have been listed much sooner than this as it is a great source for reading about careers. I'm a big fan to say the least. Anyway, the blog section covers anything from CV's to disfigurement in the workplace, it is certainly thought provoking and holds a wealth of insight.

Moreover, besides the blog, there are many podcasts, live Q&A's and a directory containing the best career blogs (where you'll find my blog listed) and much more.

Visit the Guardian Careers website at: http://careers.guardian.co.uk/careers-blog

For links to my podcast, live Q&A and debut article, please go to the 'About Me' page.

Website Pick of the Week

This week I have chosen a website that I came across via Twitter. The website is called careercake.com, which is a blog offering great advice, and tips for people on how to kick start their career. The Career Cake blog was created by Aimee Bateman, and features professional videos covering a range of careers. However, if you don’t have a specific one in mind, why not have a look at the more generic ones such as, ‘CV Advice – the personal profile’ or ‘What to ask the interviewer?’. It’s a very useful blog and it is particularly interactive - I highly recommend it.

Visit Career Cake @ http://careercake.com/

CV Workshop - 'Skills' heading

If this is the first time you are viewing this blog series, please refer back to the first summary post called 'CV Workshop - Top 5 Headings for your CV'.

I have left one of the most important CV headings till last; this is because this section should be a very clear and concise part of your CV. This is significant as employers will want to look here to determine your suitability for the job/placement.

I’ve placed key skills at the end of my CV, but really you can put it anywhere, the reason I placed it at the bottom is because it seemed like a nice section to round off my CV. Thus, effectively I’ve got a section summary containing the skills that I’ve learnt from the above (education, employment history and experience).

A really obvious skill to include in this section would be your computer skills. This skill is one of the most significant these days as everything is going electronic so, your employer will want to know whether you’re at least computer literate and to what standard. This is particularly true in the publishing industry - they do want people with computer skills. These skills are transferable in terms of Ebook production, websites and digital marketing. Luckily I have a double A-Level in ICT so I have quite a lot of computer skills that I can put in this section. However, if you’re struggling with this section you should at least put some of the basic skills down. This could include MS office package (a lot of people can use MS office), familiarity with a MAC or Windows operating system, typing speed etc. It’s definitely the little skills which will count – so don’t leave stuff out thinking that it will just be assumed.

As always, don’t forget to keep this section consistent with the other headings. So, I’ve spoken before about indentation and bolding/italicising fonts; make sure this heading is the same. Keep your font between 10 and 12, so that it’s readable and make sure you’re not too experimental with size or fonts – if in doubt, you can’t go wrong with size 12 times new roman.

I hope you’ve found the CV workshop series useful. At a later date, I will do a template for a CV, so that it can be more easily visualised.

CV Workshop - 'Extracurricular Activities' heading

If this is the first time you are viewing this blog series, please refer back to the first summary post called ‘CV Workshop – Top 5 Headings for your CV’.

If you have done a lot of extracurricular activities at school or university, then this heading is definitely a good optional extra for you to have on your CV. For instance, I’ve worked on the University student newspaper, which is significant experience as it is part of my journalism experience. In particular, the student newspaper is well recognised in the publishing industry, so if that’s the direction you want to go in, then the student newspaper is a great starting point. Furthermore, it’s really important to detail all your activities, even if they don’t directly relate to the work you’re applying for. This is because these activities develop many skills e.g. team work, which all relate to the work place.

As I have emphasised before, make sure that all the extracurricular activities are detailed in chronological order starting from your most recent position at the top, and work your way down. Also, as an added thought, try to make sure that you’re consistent throughout your CV in terms of layout, font and sizes etc. If you’re following this blog series, an easy way to format the extracurricular section is to do so in the same way as the education section. So, you’ll be using a template that looks a little bit like this:

{Start date} – {End date/Present} NAME OF POSITION/ROLE, LOCATION, Brief DESCRIPTION

Please do remember that the above template is just a guideline of what you could do with your extracurricular activities section. I would strongly advise doing some of your own research and having a look at CV’s that are considered strong.

The next and final CV Workshop will be for the ‘Skills’ heading.