UK Work Experience/Intern

dimothy10

This is most probably a bit of a long shot but desperate times call for desperate measures and all that. Anyone here got any contacts in the London area that I could tee up for some work experience in IT? Most of my own personal contacts have come up short for whatever reason so I thought a change in approach might be in order. Failing any personal contacts does anyone have any companies they successfully badgered to get a foot in the door?

Why the change in tact? Well, my experience to date has been frustrating. I have my A+, Network+ and MCDST but all those seem to amount to very little for jobs in London. Lack of interviews and interest in my CV (except from inciduous companies asking me to pay £2000 for a golden handshake/work placement) has started to get to me now and I am close to having to make a decision to settle for a different career choice, just to make me feel less wretched. Will happily work for nothing and at strange hours. Will send CV to anyone interested.

Cheers

Tim

Turgon

Hi Tim,

Im finding that the UK is now catching up with the US regarding things like learndirect and troops of people getting entry level certifications through certification schools. Even the callcentre guy who helped me with my car insurance over the phone was doing certs on the side to get out. It's a competitive market for new people because there are so many of you out there. There is hope though. I think more UK employers than before are starting to become aware of these certifications, although they may not fully understand what they are, so there is some 'equipping' going on. A good bit of advice is to hit your local reference library and get all the yellow pages out for the London area. That's a lot of books. Go through all the computer sections and make your list of IT shops, do the same for recuitment agencies. Then send your CV out direct and follow up any leads. You may send out many speculatives with this approach but it can lead to enquiries. Also get registered with every employment agency you can find. Years ago I got my first break after taking a punt on scouring the town to find any obscure recruitment office I hadn't already found. I found one, walked in and they were very helpful. They sent my CV to the regional office that dealt with IT jobs and a few weeks later I got a call, an interview and then a job. All that after getting the newspaper each week for months, applying for advertised posts and regularly visiting a local employment agency that continually came up with nothing for self starters such as myself back then. So sometimes some initiative on your part is what you need. How did I find them? Yellow pages.

Good luck.

beeeeees

Hi Tim,

London is a fairly hard place to crack but someone with your certs should be able to find a job soon enough. The best places to try to break in around the London area are IT Tech jobs at schools. Schools usually have a high turnover of entry-level techs so there are frequently jobs going. Try areas like Surrey and even places as far out as Brighton seem to have a good few entry jobs about. Search for a list of schools around the area and go to their website looking at vacancies. Most of them don't take out expensive ads and advertise locally. Seems to be the same up in Manchester where I live now but with a lower cost of living seems to come lower wages...

Cheers
Simon

dimothy10

thank you both very much! had not even considered schools before nor indeed scrolling through the yellow pages for ideas for speculative cvs. you have both managed to breath new life in to my job hunt (and me to some degree!!). Any other suggestions are always welcome though lol.

tenrou

It's a tough market at the moment. There are so many people going for the jobs that comanies are able to be a bit more picky about who they're going to hire. When I was fresh out of Uni it took me a good few months to get a job and even then it was a pretty low paid contract, you just have to keep pressing on and things will turn around.

London isn't really the place you want to start your career in either. The wages in general are barely any better than the rest of the UK for lower paid jobs but the cost of living is a lot higher.

Have you had a look for any of the really short term contracts liek 2 weeks to a month. No-one higher up the chain is likely to want these becuase they don't offer any security but they could be perfect for you to get a bit of experience.

nel

You def need to get your cv out there. Contracting maybe a good way to go if your willing to move about abit, even in the short term.

Also check out sites such as jobserver, cwjobs etc which are updated frequently for contact/perm work.

Good luck.

laidbackfreak

In addition to what's already been said above, check out the the local government\nhs sites.
They rarely use jobs boards or recruitment agencies, and are always on the look out.
www.nhs.net
etc

Kaminsky

A lot of companies just can't afford London anymore although there is a lot of IT out by the Docklands area and Isle of Dogs.

Lot of companies around Reading and further afield around Birmingham, Manchester and Sheffield. Look on Jobserve.co.uk to give you a good idea of decent agencies to help avoid the cowboys. When you get interest from dodgy companies, don't even reply to them. Eventually they stop pestering you.

Keep up the certs though.