Another great night was had to showcase the opportunities that startups present for those looking for their first role in a competitive graduate market.
While some graduates chase their parents dream of working in a big name corporate, more savvy graduates target small, nimble startups, working hard to solve noble and often global problems side by side with start-up founders.
Shubham Bawa, final year Software Engineering student from the University of Melbourne, spoke of how interning with a startup in the La Trobe Accelerator program to produce their POC then MVP, using the latest front end mobile development tool (flutter by google), led to securing a full time gig with a larger software development company, one week before finishing his internship.
Emily Cheng, Accounting Graduate from Federation Uni spoke of her disappointment of being excluded from Big 4 Graduate Programs because of an archaic HR policy where these so-called “Global Accounting Firms” will only take on Australian Citizens, to have one of them come knocking on her door two years later after smashing it at a smaller but equally brilliant firm that bats well above their weight in the specialist area of R&D Consulting.
Sam Brown, Founder of Pelikin, an Australian Startup that provides a multi-currency free banking app and prepaid Visa card for young travellers, spoke of how interns in IT & Accounting assisted his new business go global.
And finally, Andrew Klyscz of Pitcher Partners Melbourne spoke of how, whilst most graduates clamber to competed for Cyber Security positions with the big banks, literally thousands of privately owned and/or small businesses, with the same issues as the banks, but with quicker career progression through a wider variety of work tasks for graduates, were being ignored.
The conclusion: even if you do wish to work in a big corporate one day to make your parents proud, a great way to get there is to start in a smaller, nimbler, start-up where the learning is often faster, the tasks broader and where your work will have more consequence.