UK graduates with work experience seeking their second job

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What should I look for in a second job?

Tuesday, 19th of April 2011

It goes without saying that when looking for your second job as a graduate, you should be aiming to move onwards and upwards in nearly every respect - position, salary, responsibility these are all things that should be increasing, right? Yes...mostly.

In the large majority of cases the answer is indeed 'yes'. The occasions that it is 'no' can sometimes be a very hard decision to weigh up. It's dictated by what your end goals are, a very important term that should be lodged in the back of your head twenty-four hours a day, if it is not already.

As many of us know, the job market is competitive, even with the economy now only tail-end in the recession. What's more is that certain industries can be competitive and always have been. These tend to be the more glamorous ones, or at least seemingly more glamorous ones - second jobs in media, advertising and banking are key examples. Many are attracted to these roles but it is the most persistent, insistent and, of course, adequately talented that get through and the land the jobs.

Part of being insistent involves making sacrifices that lead to your end goal. If your own personal end goal happens to be working in one of these sectors, say in television, then a step down fiscally or responsibly from your current job might in the long term be a step up. These companies can afford to pay less because there is so much competition, they know many will settle for less in order to get "a foot in the door".

However, you must be sure that this is what you want to do. Fair enough, I think it can be said with some solidarity that moving "down" to a menial job in a radio station is a good idea if ever since you were ten you've been making recordings on cassette tapes and dreaming of being a radio show host. If you're sitting at your desk and just thought how cool it would be to work with celebs though, or you want a job in advertising because you just completed the second series of Mad Men (all in one sitting!) then maybe we need a reality check. Again, because of the competition these jobs require a lot of their candidates, if you can't put the work in, and do long and sometimes unsociable hours, someone else will.

But there are a host of other opportunities out there that lead to just as enjoyable lives and rewarding careers and in many cases you should be looking for the positions with a little higher salaries that require more experience. These and the alternative can be found here on second-jobber.com. It's all about who you are and what you want.