Give me a chance!

Two readers who have asked to keep their names under wraps explain why it’s not all a bed of roses for graduates.

Quarter-life experience

I couldn’t agree more with two of your recent articles – ‘quarter-life crisis’ and ‘voice of (lack of) experience’. I am definitely in the throws of a quarter-life crisis and certainly suffer from a lack of experience.

When I was 5 or 6, I thought that being 25 would mean I was a grown-up, happily settled in a job and steadily climbing the career ladder with my own place and well on the way to getting married. Now I’ve reached the age of 25, the reality couldn’t be further from my childhood hopes. I’m in a job I’m making do with, living at home and single.

Having separated from my boyfriend, I find myself back at home with the parents as I can’t afford my own place on what I earn – I’m nowhere near.

I went to uni, worked hard and played hard and happily came away with a 2:1 degree. Now, two years down the line, I’m in a job that I could have got if I’d left school at 16.

It’s the same old story - I don’t have enough relevant work experience. But until someone gives me a chance, how am I going to get that all important work experience?

Some might say, be proactive, you have to make your own luck, but I can hardly give up my job (albeit poorly paid) to do voluntary work because how would I live and pay my bills? And working full time, I can’t fit voluntary work in as well.

I’ve tried to impress my boss, to show what I’m capable of but my efforts go unnoticed.

After I went to my last interview, I was told they didn’t think I’d manage in a big company when I’ve only worked in smaller companies (never mind the fact it was for the same job in the same type of company!) And as much as my job now is far from ideal, I feel guilty about bunking off to go to interviews. You just can’t win.

I wish I’d known whilst at uni or before, what I know now. But that is the joy of hindsight. The only consolation is that I’m not paying my student loan back yet.

I’ve got friends who left school at 16 who have been working for years and are now married and friends who went to uni and been travelling - I feel left behind.

I’m wondering what I really want and what’s the best way forward, and do I really have a choice? Everyone's done things, doing things, and are overtaking me and here I am stuck in a job and stuck at home with the parents!

TRAPPED BY CATCH-22

My graduate experience has been the pits. Each time I receive emails off your company I feel like laughing.

I graduated in 2004 with a 2:1 in History all bright eyed and bushy tailed, willing to take any career and the world on. How naive I was!

I have applied for over fifty graduate schemes and am under no illusion that many get onto them - my old university careers service tells me approximately 6% of all graduates.

The Catch-22 situation of being a graduate is the fact they want you to have experience but how are you going to get the experience if no-one will even give you a chance. Consequently I find myself working in a supermarket behind a deli counter, questioning the entire reason why I actually dreamed of going to university to further my 'prospects' from the age of seven.

I worked hard on my degree and have tried to get jobs but to no avail. I am entirely disillusioned by the garduate treadmill and my degree.

I am an intelligent, enthusiastic, hardworking and reliable person, yet no-one has given me the chance, and such is the case for thousands of graduates. Prospects: please bear this in mind when sending the emails.