Graduate job confidence slumps to fifteen-year low

A recent survey of this year's finalists by High Fliers Research reveals that confidence in the graduate employment market has hit a fifteen-year low.

The research was based on face-to-face interviews with over 16,000 final-year students - roughly a fifth of those due to graduate this year from the thirty universities included in the 2009 UK Graduate Careers Survey.

Confidence in the graduate market has now reached its lowest point since the survey was launched back in 1995.  A majority (52%) of finalists regard the prospects for new graduates as ‘very limited', with only 36% expecting to start (or be looking for) a graduate job this summer.  Just over a quarter (26%) plan to undertake further studies, 17% intend to take time off or go travelling, and 8% expect to take up temporary or voluntary work.  That leaves 12% who are currently undecided about what to do next.

Despite a substantial increase in the volume of job applications, the number of finalists who succeeded in obtaining a ‘definite' job offer during the annual milkround process has fallen by around a third compared to 2008.  High Fliers Research MD Martin Birchall notes that, "although many students began their job search earlier than usual and made an increased number of applications to employers, noticeably fewer have been successful in securing a graduate position than last year."

42% of student job-seekers remain concerned that, even if they do succeed in finding a graduate position, their job offer might be withdrawn before they start, while nearly half (48%) are worried that they might be made redundant during their first year of employment.

A third of those looking for work said that, in the current climate, they'd have no option but to accept any job they were offered, while a sixth said that the scarcity of graduate jobs had led them to apply to employers that they weren't really interested in.

This year has also seen some significant variations in the pattern of applications to different employment sectors, with one in six job-seekers confirming that they'd targeted employers who appeared to offer the greatest job security, rather than generous salaries or high-quality training and development.

The most popular career destinations for the ‘class of 2009' are teaching, media and marketing.  (It's the first time that teaching has been a preferred destination for university leavers.)

Accountancy remains as popular as ever, while applications to engineering employers and public-sector organisations have increased by a sixth.  In addition, the number of finalists applying for IT positions has risen for the first time in nine years.

The picture in the financial sector is rather different, however.  The number of applications to merchant banks (last year's second most popular career destination) is down by a third, while there's also been a fall-off of interest in other areas of the financial sector, and indeed the property sector.

Expectations of starting salary have dipped slightly this year (for the first time on record) to an average of £22,300, with more than a third of finalists believing that employers will reduce salaries this year.

On a more upbeat note, the overwhelming majority (90%+) of final-year students said they'd enjoyed their time at university and would recommend it to others.  (Fewer than one in seven said they wouldn't have gone to university if they'd known how tough the graduate job market was going to be.)

Despite the very difficult graduate employment situation, concerns have been expressed in some quarters of the graduate recruitment marketplace (by employers as well as careers services) that levels of gloom and/or cynicism about the state of the jobs market may be slightly overcooked.  AGR chief executive Carl Gilleard noted recently that around a third of AGR member firms were still accepting graduate applications.  And for any employers looking to get into graduate recruitment for the first time, it could be a very propitious time to start!