How to Get a Job with No Experience
8 brutally honest tips
To get a job, you need experience. But to get experience, you need a job. That, my struggling brothers and sisters, is the glorious catch-22 of job hunting. Armed with nothing but a skinny resume, a glaring reminder of how exceptionally unexceptional you are, the prospect of landing a first job (or internship) is so far-flung that you’re ready to call it quits before you’ve even begun the magical journey to adulthood and financial independence.
Lucky for you, I’ve done the leg work, speed-read through ostensibly titled articles dispensing generic advice, and I’m here to condense everything I’ve read and learnt from personal experience into 8 brutally honest tips.
#1 Go fishing
Seriously. Go fish. With little to no working experience under your belt, casting a wide net is an imperative — and by wide, I mean wiiiiiiiiide. You stand a higher chance by applying to a higher number of jobs, and that’s mathematically something we can all get behind, trained statistician or not.
That being said, use your noggin and do not blindly apply to every and any job opening. Yes, go fishing. But we want fish, not seaweed and random mossy rocks.
Be diligent, read the job ad, and identify the skills required. The more specialized, the better. Those are the skills that you would ideally be able to tuck under your belt and have reflected on your resume after your stint. Being qualified for a job requiring specialized skills without any qualification is tough, I know.
But unless you plan on a career in administration, consider passing on the obscure job that only demands low-level data entry skills or what have you not. Apply to jobs of comparable skill sets to yours. It’s all about the transferable skills, people!
Tailoring cover letters, sending in resumes, filling up job applications on janky recruitment portals… is it repetitive? Uh-huh. Arduous? Very much so. But the reality is, you won’t hear so much as a squeak from a hiring manager, neither will you ever know if your painstaking efforts granted a review of your application to begin with.
To that sorry end: c’est la vie. My haphazard guesstimate would give a 1 in 15 chance of receiving any type of a reply, so expect radio silence but do not be deterred. As Yoda would say if he was moonlighting as a career advisor: another way, there is none. So keep applying.
#2 Get interview reps in
With the chances of a response so unlikely, all the more is it so for an interview. To be less of a bumbling fool at interviews, one must get those reps in and actually sit through 10-15 minutes of wanting to facepalm yourself at every given moment.
Nothing improves your interview performance better than experience, which is why applying to as many jobs as possible is important. You may not get the job, but you will expose yourself to a greater chance of being able to practice your interview skills.
Protip: ask the interviewer for feedback. While there is no guarantee that your request will be entertained, there is no harm in asking either way. No shame in wanting to up your game, hey?
#3 Beggars can’t be choosers
Need I say more? It’s slim pickings for us folk with no prior work experience. Expect to settle on the first opportunity which presents itself and for your starting job to be far from ideal. Working your way up is the name of the game.
#4 Resumes are not the be-all, end-all
Resumes get an interview, but interviews secure the job. There are 101 resume writing tips, templates, dos, and don’ts that seemingly tend to contradict each at times. Skip the fretting over the alignment of your text and font selection/size. As long as your resume is polished, you’re good to go.
#5 Cash in on your connections
Save me the spiel on self-pride and whatnot. Chances are I’ve said the same myself. Pulling strings does not negate your merits. It simply puts you in contact with the right people who could potentially grant you an interview, but that’s only half the battle. There’s no certainty you’ll even pass the interview and score the job. Of course, that’s assuming that you’re a regular person whose social connections don’t run high enough where a job is but a phone call away.
To that end, open that golden mouth and ask! Ask the parentals if they know of anyone working in an industry of potential interest. Ask friends and former-friends-turned-acquaintances if their company has openings. Put yourself out there. Speaking to working professionals gives you industrial insight and helps you social network. Friends knowing you’re on a job hunt are also more likely to act as your proxy and relay job openings if they come across one in passing.
#6 Kill with manners
Manners maketh man (or woman) and no truer words have ever been spoken. In your correspondence, strike a tone between formal yet personable. This is especially applicable to cold emails to a direct contact.
Strategically bait them into replying to you by creating your own script. Delivering the same line used by everyone else will just have your email binned. Do your research for content to craft an interest piquing message that will impel the recipient to look at your resume. Being polite helps convey sincerity, which tends to strike a personal connection and distinguish you from the next person taking a shot in the dark.
#7 When opportunity meets dumb luck
No matter how much of a stretch it may seem, do not discount the possibility by focusing on the improbability. The job market is unpredictable and job hunting involves a bit of luck.
You’ll never know when that cold email will pay off, or if a friend comes through, or if a company mystically has an opening. Though there may not be a job opening at that moment in time, retrace your steps and hit that refresh button like you would hit that… I kid. But bide your time and constantly be on the lookout by revisiting prior job sites.
#8 It gets better
Much like some other pleasurable activity where the first time is always uncomfortable and painful, hand on heart, job hunting does get better and easier (although I can’t comment on the pleasurable part). Once you’ve inked that first work experience on your resume, you’ve cleared the biggest hurdle to kick-starting your working career.
Alright comrades, that’s all I’ve got. Godspeed to you all and remember: everyone starts from nothing.
