How to cultivate confident, creative graduates
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Recent graduate outcomes survey data has shown that a marginally higher number of graduates from my institution’s College of Art are going into employment, but fewer are going into highly skilled, meaningful employment. This implies that many from this large cohort of graduates end up underemployed and experiencing low career satisfaction.
These insights reinforce the emphasis we rightly place on careers education and the sharing of labour market information. A focus on better preparing students for the more fluid career paths found in the creative industries can help mitigate this threat.
Our careers service has run the Creative & Cultural Careers Festival (CCCF) since 2014, when Edinburgh College of Art first merged with the university. This series of events and support is different from other labour market-themed campaigns, focusing on imparting information and inspiration about the sector over recruitment. Its format and themes change to reflect student interest and sector movement but the following elements remain integral to its success:
- Industry collaborations
- Networking with alumni
- Wrap-around information provision that supports the development of specific skills required to succeed in the creative industries.
Industry collaborations
We work closely with creative industry professionals and umbrella bodies to provide students with broad support. Each year, we engage approximately 50 industry contacts across themes, such as festivals and events, marketing, museums, galleries and heritage, publishing and screen and stage.
We collaborate with Creative Edinburgh, the city’s largest membership organisation of creatives, to host pop-up stands, networking sessions, interviews with local artists and skills sessions. This allows students to connect with and see the support networks available to them both during and after their studies. Similarly, our work with partners such as BAFTA Scotland, Bectu and Publishing Scotland sparks new connections between alumni and students, who benefit from insight and advice.
You can build strong relationships with partners by making an effort to engage with their events, meeting and understanding key players and finding ways to support their objectives. When you make these kinds of efforts, partners are often prepared to do the same.
One student attendee commented: “It was great to hear real-life stories of how people got in, concrete advice for how to do so myself, and importantly, a good picture of what the day-to-day role is like.”
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Alumni and student networking
An alumni presence at these kinds of events offers students opportunities to interact with industry on a more personal, peer-to-peer level. These interactions are especially valuable in industries without obvious, direct graduate roles. Alumni can offer insight into their career journeys and what they did (or wish they had done) while still at university to increase their chances of success. Because of this, we prioritise finding alumni speakers for all panels or networking sessions. We collaborate with our alumni relations team and academic colleagues across the institution, and use the LinkedIn alumni search function to identify these individuals.
We prioritise time for informal, in-person networking with these alumni during these events, giving students the chance to ask questions, make connections and build their confidence while practising crucial industry skills. If you wish to do the same, I recommend preparing students in the following ways:
- Give them a set of questions to get them started
- Create and distribute event guides with listed speakers and organisation bios
- Give them a chance to listen to others’ questions before asking their own.
Another student attendee said: “It’s such a fantastic opportunity not only to meet with the speakers but to connect with other creatives at the university – peers on other courses who could be future collaborators.”
Wrap-around information provision and support
When we connect students with industry figures, we expose them to the positives and negatives of working in the creative industries, and provide key labour market context. We can supplement these interactions with skills-based sessions to equip students to navigate these realities. During CCCF, we run sessions covering how to find work, succeed as a freelancer, build resilience and write creative CVs.
We want to inspire and enthuse students to work in the creative industries while acknowledging the challenges involved, so we ask speakers to touch on potential realities such as the fact that many graduates will start their careers in fairly low-level jobs. This helps achieve this balance.
Another student attendee said: “It’s overwhelming to find a career in this industry so I found the guidance reassuring”.
The transition into graduate employment in the creative industries can be challenging, so we must equip our students with the tools to navigate it. Data from recent CCCF campaigns shows that roughly 90 per cent of students have a better understanding of the sector after our support. This helps better manage expectations, hopefully enabling them to progress further in the industry.
Tailored careers education and support for future creative practitioners means providing students with the appropriate tools, resources and experiences to make informed choices about their futures.
Ailsa Wright is an employer engagement adviser at the University of Edinburgh Careers Service.
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