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Pharmacy technicians are the front-end persons you see at pharmacies. It is they who actually do the routine work of dispensing medicines – receiving prescriptions, checking for their completeness, retrieving the medication, counting, weighing or otherwise measuring it, preparing the prescription labels, selecting suitable container and labeling it. The filled prescription is then priced and filed, and checked by a pharmacist before being given to the patient.

In effect, pharmacy technician jobs involve helping the pharmacists with the routine tasks of filling prescriptions. The job requires training and certification to understand prescriptions, check their accuracy and completeness, select the right medicines and fill the order attending to all the correct formalities. Technicians might receive requests from patients or directly from doctors. They must be able to decipher doctors’ handwriting and check that the prescription makes sense.

Pharmacy technician jobs are thus more than merely filling tablets and capsules into packets. Technicians might even be required to mix the medication. Where they have any doubts or questions, they must refer these to the pharmacist. That means they must know when and how to ask the right questions!

Other Technical Pharmacy Routines

In addition to filling prescriptions, drug dispensing also involves things like:
Creating and maintaining patient profiles
Preparing insurance claim forms
Reading patient charts at hospitals, preparing and delivering the medicines to the patients (after verification by a pharmacist)
Organizing the medication delivery to avoid mistakes (by assembling a 24 hour supply of medicines for each patient, packaging and labeling each dose separately in the patient’s medicine cabinet), and getting the packages checked by the pharmacist

It is typically the pharmacy technician’s job to stock the prescription and over-the-counter drugs in the pharmacy shelves, and to take inventory periodically. Pharmacy aides will help the technician in these and other routines such as keeping accounts, answering phones and handling money.

Becoming a Pharmacy Technician

As would be clear from the above, the pharmacy technician job require less drug-related knowledge than is needed for a pharmacist but much more knowledge than what a layperson has.

You have to become a certified pharmacy technician by passing an exam to be eligible for a pharmacy technician job. Technician training gives the trainees the skills and knowledge needed to perform the kind of work discussed above.

After completing training, you would typically have to get a state license to work as pharmacy technician. Pharmacy technicians have also to attend specified hours of continuing education through contact classes to be eligible for re-certification every two years.

Pharmacy Technician Job Prospects

A growing and older population, who typically use more medication, means that there will be an increasing demand for pharmacy technicians. New drug discoveries, for treating more and more conditions, also mean greater need for trained technicians able to fill prescriptions correctly.

Wherever possible, employers will prefer to employ the less expensive pharmacy technician than a highly trained (and consequently expensive) pharmacist.

Pharmacy technician jobs are estimated to grow faster than most categories of jobs.

Pharmacy Locum Jobs Are For Those Who Can’t Work Full Time

Pharmacy locum jobs seek to fill temporary vacancies caused by the permanent pharmacy jobholder going on leave, and on other such contingencies. As people are always going on leave or resigning or falling sick and so on, there is a steady flow of locum jobs. Pharmacies cannot legally function without the oversight of a qualified pharmacist and the support of pharmacy technicians.

For the locum employee, temporary jobs might be best owing to the person’s personal circumstances or preferences. They specify their rates of pay, traveling distance, working hours, etc to the locum agency, and also indicate the period during which they would be available for locum work. The agency notifies the employee when a vacancy matching the person’s criteria arises.

It is the locum agencies that attend to the key function of matching employees and pharmacies, both of whom would find things difficult without such an intermediary.

What the Locum Pharmacists Gain

Pharmacy locum jobs agencies help the locum pharmacists utilize their hard-earned expertise to earn good money, without having to be bound by inflexible working hours and other conditions of a full time job. This can prove valuable for those persons who simply cannot work at full time jobs for one reason or other.

The agencies also help locum employees to keep up with developments in their field and also support them with helpful hints. One high value service is keeping an account of each locum’s earnings and helping the person with tax formalities and returns applicable to self-employed persons.

Locums can also get help with pharmacy practices such as pharmacy operating procedures, ordering procedures, computer operations and so on. This kind of support can be invaluable for those who have kept away from work for long periods.

As and when each locum job is taken up, the agencies can smoothen the induction process by providing employer-specific information to locums. Information such as contact details, working hours, parking details and so on can help the newcomer fit into the new engagement quickly and smoothly.

What the Pharmacies Gain

Unless a pharmacy employs surplus staff, operations can be disrupted when a key employee, such as a pharmacist, goes on leave or otherwise becomes unavailable. Considering the high pay of the professionals, it is not an economic proposition to employ surplus, backup staff.

In such a context, the pharmacy will have to find a new employee at short notice. This becomes particularly difficult if the employment is for a short term. Instead of focusing on its business, the pharmacy will have to go out looking for qualified employees willing to fill the temporary position.

Agencies that specialize in pharmacy locum jobs will have a good number of locum pharmacists in their database, many of whom might fit the pharmacy’s requirements. Pharmacies can thus quickly find a temporary replacement by approaching the agency.

In Britain, the National Health Services – NHS – works with a network of agencies that provide locum professionals when needed. In this way, NHS is able to function with few disruptions.

What are pharmacy jobs? Where are these jobs available? How do you qualify for these jobs? This article seeks to answer these questions. In the USA, there are more pharmacy jobs than qualified pharmacists. It is thus a good career option.

Pharmacy Jobs

Medicines can be prepared and dispensed only by qualified pharmacists. In olden times, they used to mix drug products from measured raw materials according to doctor’s prescriptions. These days, they dispense pre-measured tablets and capsules produced by pharmaceutical companies. They also advise patients on the use of prescription and over the counter medicines.

In addition to technical knowledge about the required purity and dosages of many medicinal products, pharmacists also require the human touch and ethical sense to deal with customers in a trust-building manner.

Pharmacists find jobs in numerous settings, such as retail pharmacy outlets, hospitals & clinics, healthcare facilities, drug research and development, pharmaceutical sales and marketing, government agencies and universities.

Pharmacists work as pharmacy managers, clinical pharmacists, IV pharmacists, retail pharmacists and in other roles.

Who Employ Pharmacists?

Some of the major employers of pharmacists are listed below.
Retail (and Internet) pharmacies need pharmacists and pharmacy managers.
Pharmaceutical companies need pharmacists for drug research & development, and for sales and marketing.
Hospitals, clinics and healthcare facilities need pharmacists to oversee the formulation, storage and dispensing of medicines at their facilities.
Government agencies and home care facilities also need the services of pharmacists.
Armed services need pharmacists in their medical services sections.
Community and consultant pharmacies are other agencies that need pharmacists.

The demand for pharmacists exceeds supply in the USA.

How Do You Qualify as a Pharmacist?

Pharmacy is the science that deals with collection, preparation and standardization of drugs.

As a preliminary for your course in pharmacy, you need to attend college level classes in such subjects as chemistry, biology, physics and mathematics, for about two years. You might also have to pass a Pharmacy Colleges Admissions Test.

You then have to complete a 6-year (or 5 year) Pharm D. (or B.S.) curriculum prescribed by an accredited college of pharmacy. Internship under a qualified pharmacist and passing a state examination are other typical requirements before you become a licensed pharmacist.

Continuing education is a typical requirement to renew the license.

The skills in pharmacy practice include not only dispensing prescriptions but also communicating with patients and healthcare professionals. (You need to acquire the skill to read doctors’ handwritings!) They also include understanding the responsibilities of professional ethics.

Other important skills include the management of a pharmacy practice, and consulting with other healthcare professionals.

Availability of Pharmacy Jobs

As you would have begun to appreciate by now, pharmacists are trained professionals providing an essential service in healthcare. They are in high demand by many agencies and this situation is likely to continue.

In fact, all the pharmacy jobs are not being filled now for want for qualified pharmacists. A career in pharmacy is thus a promising career.

Pharmaceutical jobs belong in the healthcare industry, a fast growing industry. An aging population and new developments in diagnosis and treatment (leading to increased use of medication) are the main factors leading this growth.

The pharmaceutical industry itself is a big part of this growth story. In addition to bringing out a steady stream of innovative products and equipment, the industry also gets these to the notice of healthcare professionals through their network of medical representatives.

We start our discussion of pharmaceutical jobs with a look at the medical representative.

The Medical Representative

The medical representative sells by educating doctors about the latest in treatment. Good medical representatives can save many hours of a doctor’s time (spent otherwise for keeping up with developments in the field of treatment). This is an essential task as new medications with greater effectiveness are constantly being developed.

The representative explains to the doctor how the medications work, and how they are an improvement over existing treatments. The representative receives intensive training that equips the person with product knowledge and sales skills. They also accompany experienced representatives to learn effective practices.

Thereafter, they have to fix appointments with GPs, get to the GPs during the short time they are free, explain things clearly in the little time available and meet their targets regarding sales calls and sales.

The Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry – ABPI – conducts exams, and has also laid down a code of conduct. They act as the governing body of the industry and attend to complaints about false claims about medicines, and any malpractices or misbehavior on the part of representatives and others in the field.

Product Managers

A product manager is a marketing specialist who plans the marketing campaign for a product and keeps track of the campaign results. Product managers decide how to make convincing presentations with clinical evidence and other materials. They arrange to produce the sales literature for a product and continuously monitor the impact the literature, and the campaign in general, are producing.

Sales Managers

Sales managers, former medical representatives themselves, lead a team of medical representatives. It is their responsibility to train and motivate the representatives for maximum effectiveness.

Regulatory Affairs

The pharmaceutical industry is governed by numerous regulations. Their sales campaigns need to be approved – from permission to sell a drug for a particular use to what they can include in their sales literature. A great deal of procedures and processes are involved in getting needed approvals. Going after these formalities has become a full time role for persons with an eye for detail and familiarity with legalese.

Other Pharmaceutical Jobs

The emphasis above has been on sales related pharmaceutical jobs. Actually, pharmaceutical companies need pharmacists, clinical researchers, HR managers, and other technical and non-technical persons to run their operations.

Pharmaceutical companies spend heavy sums to discover new drugs, and then to conduct clinical trials in a phased manner till the drug is finally approved by the Federal Drug Administration for marketing.

People with required training and experience are needed to attend to all these operational aspects and many pharmaceutical jobs are available in non-sales areas. Both sales and non-sales people can expect good pay in the pharmaceutical industry.

If you have called a companys customer service call center or a computer manufacturers tech support department lately, you probably have had the joy of experiencing outsourcing for yourself. The inefficiency of non-native English speakers as tech support personnel is astounding; however, corporate management across the US feel the money saved in salaries by sending jobs to southeast Asia outweighs the nose-dive in customer satisfaction ratings. Forrester Research predicts that by 2015 at least 3.3 million white-collar jobs (136 billion in wage earnings) will be outsourced outside the US.

As US consumers demand lower prices for goods and services while seeking higher and higher salaries, corporate America is caught in the squeeze and has sought a solution outside the borders of the US. But what if there is a solution closer to home say in Arkansas?

Outsourcing to rural America may be a win-win solution for the growing problem of rising salaries and demand for lower cost goods. With the cost of living up to one third lower in rural areas of the US compared to major metropolitan areas such as San Francisco or New York, salaries are lower and talent is more abundant. IT salaries in rural America can be as much as 40% lower than in large metro areas, offset by a lower costs of living. It makes sense to send customer service and IT work to underemployed workers in areas such as North Carolina and New Mexico.

What types of jobs might be prime targets for rural outsourcing? Most IT positions from software developers to project managers can be sent to rural America as can most jobs that have a home-based element. Customer service centers are being moved out further from urban areas to take advantage of available labor and native speakers of English.

Outsourcing within the borders means broader opportunities for executives and managers who wish to opt out of the urban lifestyle and settle in smaller towns that provide safer environments with less stress. Taking a job in a rural area may mean a 20% pay cut but usually the lower cost of living offsets the cut, and may actually reduce expenses such as gas and food costs.

It pays to investigate small town opportunities which, granted wont have as many opportunities available as the big metro areas, but the upside is youll also have a lot less competition. For example, McKesson Corporation, a large pharmaceutical distributor, relocated a primary data center from San Francisco to Iowa and saved an estimated 10 million in annual salary costs. Besides the salary cost benefit, there are other benefits to keeping the work at home including friendly time zone spans, cultural understanding, common language, and preserving the tax base. The political and economic benefits cannot be underestimated, either. Nashville, Tennessee provided Dell Computer with tax incentives to locate a manufacturing and customer service location in their area.

Rural Sourcing, Inc. (http:www.ruralsource.com) of Jonesboro, Arkansas creates white collar jobs by keeping work that would otherwise be outsourced overseas in towns like Greenville, North Carolina, and Dubuque, Iowa. RSI provides project work, call centers, and other commonly-outsourced jobs to the talented workers who spring from the sticks and wish to stay there.

Jennifer Daly a native of Manchester, Tennessee, a small town of approximately 20,000 people says, Nearly all the top 10% of my high school graduating class have left the area. We all went to college and got engineering, computer, or education degrees but couldnt remain at home because there just werent any jobs here. Its too bad. This is a great town to raise a family.

Manchester, Tennessee fits the profile of the type of town RSI targets for new locations available talent, near large universities, with a low cost of living and good education systems. Similar small towns experience a brain drain when the young professional adults with new degrees are not able to settle at home but rather must move away to find jobs. Jack Allen, an IT executive moved to Austin, Texas to ride the dot-com bubble but ended up back in his home town of Perry, Georgia after the bubble burst. He now commutes an hour each way to his new position in McDonough, Georgia. I want to raise my kids in a small town. Life is quieter and safer here.

With the post-911 era of urban flight, bringing the white collar jobs to small town America is a growing trend. Professionals in rural areas are as well-educated as their urban colleagues and are not as burdened with high housing costs and other cost of living items. Bringing the jobs to them that would otherwise be sent to India, Malaysia, or Pakistan benefits everyone in terms of cost savings and better customer service.

The job search process involves a lot of planning and attention to detail, so its no wonder that many people quickly feel overwhelmed and even a bit out of control. The best way to avoid this is to organize your job search so that you have a clear strategy outline and a structured schedule to keep you moving forward.

Outline your strategy

Start by creating an outline of your job search strategy. List the tactics you intend to use, and the amount of time you will devote to each tactic. A typical list might include the following:

Network with contacts
Search online job sites
Search newspaper ads

Some employment experts say that less than 20% of all jobs are found through the newspaper or online, with the other 80% found through networking. Knowing this, decide how much time you are going to devote to your job search, then allocate that time accordingly.

Define the steps

Next, for each tactic create a list of the steps involved. Here is what this might look like for the Network with contacts tactic:

Call the contact
Ask to meet for 30 minutes to get their feedback and suggestions on your resume as well as your job search strategy
Confirm the date, time and location of the appointment
Meet with contact, taking notes on the conversation and collecting one or two referrals to other contacts you might meet with
Follow up meeting with a thank you note
Check back with contact after one to two months if you are still searching for a job

Once you have the steps listed, you will have created a checklist for yourself to help make sure you complete each step along the way.

Create a schedule

Now create a schedule of daily activities so that you are doing something with your search each day. A basic schedule might look like this:

Morning

- Call two contacts to set up networking appointments
- Write questions to ask during each appointment
- Prepare resume packet for each appointment made
- Prepare and send resumes for job found online or in the newspaper

Afternoon

- Attend networking appointment (if previously scheduled)
- Write thank you note following appointment
- Check one or two online job sites

Weekend

- Prepare for new week
- Check online job listings

Track each activity

For each tactic, track all of your activity. You can use computer software or a plain notebook with blank pages. The idea is to keep notes on each days actions, checking them against your master checklist for the tactic.

Lets use an example. You want to make a networking appointment with Suzy Smith, so start with a blank page and put her name at the top, along with relevant contact information. Each time you do one of the steps defined as part of networking (make the phone call, prepare a resume packet, go to the appointment, etc.), mark it down on Suzys page. Note the date, time, action taken, and any notes you may have.

Tracking your activity creates two benefits. First, when you have multiple activities happening at the same time it is very easy to get confused or lose track of steps that still need to be taken. Using your tracking log, it is easy to see at a glance where you are at with each activity and what next step is coming up. The second benefit is that it keeps you focused and active in your job search. It is easy to procrastinate and postpone looking for a job, but if you have to note daily activities in a tracking log you will feel more motivated to get moving and take action.

Action items

Finally, keep a separate list of action items that need attention right away. If, for example, a contact tells you about an open position at a colleagues company and suggests you call about it, this goes on your action item list to be handled within 24 to 48 hours. This list is a great way to deal with emergent issues and opportunities, while still staying organized and keeping up with your regular schedule.

Hunting for jobs nowadays is a very competitive and sometimes cut-throat affair. Here are a few tips to help you get the edge in searching out and landing the job of your dreams.

The Curriculum Vitae
The CV is the first, and at most times the most important part of applying for a job. Since potential employers have to whittle down practically hundreds of applications to a few valid ones, they will have to base their narrowing down efforts using the CVs they have collected.

Studies have shown that about half of the employers decide to accept or reject job applications based on the related work experience listed in the CV. A third of the employers decide to reject or accept these job applications based on the layout design of these applications.

1. Make Your CV Stand Out
When preparing your CV, make sure your CV stands out among the rest. It should be the type that is appealing to the eyes, making the evaluating personnel want to read the CV. Step two is for you to make sure your CV lists the related work experience you have had in relation to the job you are applying for.

1. Make Your CV Concise and Relevant
Avoid making your CVs too long. It may make it irrelevant to the evaluator. Remember that the employer is a person to whom time is important. If your CV shows that you value hisher time while showing the most relevant information in the least amount of time, you will have won one important battle.

2. Always tailor your CV to the job.
You may have had previous experience that may not be related to the job you are applying for. Some people keep many different versions of their CV for different job opening purposes. Make sure your CV is appropriate for the job. A one-size-fits-all CV may not be the best way to go since the employer will have the impression that your previous efforts have not been focused enough to produce any specialization on your part.

3. Write about your achievements
You may add your achievements, but make your statements factual and relevant. It does not do harm to advertise yourself, but make your advertisement matter-of-fact and not just hot air. You may want to skip on listing your weak points as the CV is not the avenue for such discussions.

4. Polish Your CV
Your employer will know if you have put enough time producing your CV. If heshe sees that you have put sufficient and thorough effort into your CV, heshe will assume that you will do the same in your work. This is a big plus for you. It is not uncommon for some people to spend days or even weeks polishing and buffing their CVs.

So you want to look around for your next career step but you are concerned that your current employer will find out and give you an early exit? Confidentiality in your job search is a reasonable concern and makes the way you approach finding your next position all the more important. Confidentiality and privacy issues in todays hyper-informative world are issues that should be taken seriously.

Keeping your intentions of changing jobs a secret is a challenge but secrecy is in your best interest. Case in point: Hilda was a highly paid pharmacist working for an independent pharmacy in Atlanta. She was approached by a new independent pharmacy who was a direct competitor of her current employer. The word leaked out that she was considering taking a directly competing position and her employer terminated her employment out of concern for operational security. As pharmacist-in-charge, she had full access to retailwholesale pricing, future plans, insurance reimbursement rates and customer information all data that would be highly desirable by the competitor. Hildas employer just could not take the chance that she would leave and take all that information with her so they terminated her. Unfortunately, the competitor did not make an offer of employment to Hilda and she was left out in the cold not hired, and fired. If she had taken greater pains to keep her options confidential, she may not have ended up in the predicament of suddenly being unemployed.

On the flip side, it may be tempting to let slip to your current employer that you are looking around for new opportunities to provide some leverage for a raise or a promotion. Fishing for a counter-offer is a no-win situation. In a survey by the Wall Street Journal, 93 percent of employees who accept counter-offers to remain with an employer leave anyway after 18 months. If you are unhappy enough to spend months hunting for a new position, dealing with recruiters, and going on interviews, the true value of a counter offer should be questioned. Employers make counter-offers for their best interest not the employees. Employers need to make sure projects are completed, that deadlines are met, and that production does not lag. An employee who accepts a counter-offer has branded himself as disloyal and possibly a gold-digger and will forever more be viewed as such by superiors.

Common sense rules when going about a confidential job search. Do not use your work phone, email, or company cell phone to conduct any job search activities. Do not surf the job sites during your lunch hour or at anytime on your work PC. Be careful of the conversations you have within earshot of other co-workers. Do not leave your resume lying on your desk at work. Keep your plans and intentions quiet, even from close office friends whom you feel you can trust. Request confidentiality from all potential employers until an offer is made.

Beyond the obvious, consider the following tips for keeping your job search hush-hush:

Remove identifying information from your online resume. Replace your name with a generic title such as Senior Marketing Executive. Use only your cell phone number and a web-based email address that can be dropped after your job search. City and state is sufficient for address no need for street address or zip code. Remove your current employers name and replace it with something that is descriptive, yet unidentifiable such as Major Manhattan-based Financial Organization.

Be careful in your networking. Networking is essential to an effective job search, but indiscrete networking can breach your wish for confidentiality. Networking carefully can be even more difficult in closed industries or highly-specialized fields. Ask more questions than you answer in group settings; talk about possible employment options with decision-makers only; and provide your resume only to someone in a position to assist you confidentially.

Protect your references. References should only be provided in an interview, and preferably not at a first interview. You dont want your colleagues getting wind of your intentions before an offer is imminent.

Consider a confidential job search agent. If you have an annual salary of greater than 500,000 andor you are well-known in your industry, hiring an agent to conduct your job search might be a good idea. The agent can extend inquiries without breaching confidentiality. An agent is not a recruiter, but rather someone who works for you individually to act as your liaison with potential employers.

In addition to confidentiality in a job search, everyone should be concerned about protection of privacy. Never, ever give out your social security number, drivers license number, or bank account numbers to anyone during the job search process. There are scam artists out there who will take advantage of your vulnerability as a job seeker to steal your identity, your money, and your reputation. Privacy Rights Clearinghouse has some helpful tips for protecting your privacy during your job search at http:www.privacyrights.orgfsfs25-JobSeekerPriv.htm.

The World Privacy Forum has an excellent article about an Internet job scam that is a must-read for anyone considering using the Internet for their job search. This particular job scam involved 23 Internet job boards including Monster.com, CareerBuilder.com, and PreferredJobs.com. The scam involved a posting that required the new hire to transfer money into their personal bank account and then transfer it back out to an account overseas via Western Union, keeping a percentage of the total amount for their work. According to victims of the scam who responded to the article, the interview and application process for the position was extremely convincing and they were totally taken in. The article can be found at http:www.worldprivacyforum.orgjobscamreportpt1.html.

The bottom line is that confidentiality starts with you. A secret shared is no longer a secret and cannot be controlled. If you are serious about keeping your career ladder climb quiet, you must take the precautions that are necessary. Employers have a great deal to lose when they lose employees human capital investment, corporate information, competitive data so keeping your intentions to leave might well be in your best interests until the time is right.

Getting into the labour market after school or college is a daunting prospect and thats without the minefield of jargon, overnight advances in technology and discriminatory attitudes.

OK – Lets bust a bit of that jargon! What exactly are transferable skills?
Quite simply, they are things you can do in one area of your life which can be used somewhere else.

Lets take an example. As a student, did you get all your assignments in on time? Were you able to set up extensions if your work was late? Did you learn how to type quickly and use a number of computer programmes effectively? Did you hold down a part-time job and manage to juggle work with study and your social life?

If you answered yes to all, or at least some of the above, you have demonstrated an extensive range of skills, such as effective time management, negotiating and good communication skills. Now, you may not give them such grand titles, but if you were filling in a job application form, thats exactly what youd call them.

Youve been picking up skills from the moment you were born. The problem is that you take most of your skills for granted. Thats something weve got to change! So grab a pen and paper, get yourself a cup of coffee and lets get started.

Choose any role youve had in your life.

As a graduate, youll have spent a large part of your life so far as a student and so well use that in our example. Have a go at brainstorming the skills you developed in your school or student days.

What did you come up with?

Communication Skills

You had no chance of surviving as a student – and even less chance of passing your exams – if you couldnt communicate the knowledge and skills that you are at college to learn.

How did you communicate this information? By writing essays, giving presentations or talks, delivering a lesson to other students, answering questions, writing a thesis? You may have devised questionnaires and interviewed members of the public, written articles for on or offline publication or for a college newsletter. Youll have taken notes and summarised information from books and lectures. Think about each subject you studied and write a list of the methods of communication you used, both oral and written and write examples of each.

Teamwork

As a student you will have been exposed to group work of some sort – I know, Im a teacher! You may have had to research a subject to make a group presentation or for a written assignment, or perhaps you produced a class newsletter or were involved in a community project with classmates. If you have played any team sports in your spare time, you will know a lot about what it takes to work as a member of a team.

Ability to work alone and on your own initiative

Much of the work you did at college was not group work, but stuff you had to do alone and you probably had to motivate yourself to get on with it. So, how good were you at getting all the work done? You may not have liked it, but if it had to be done, chances are you did it. How did you use your own initiative? Did you devise ways in which to make remembering information easier? Did you come up with creative ideas to make your work different and interesting? Did you find a job which you were able to fit in with your studies and which solved some of your financial problems?

Ability to meet deadlines

Deadlines – You certainly had a few of these in your student days. Did you meet them? You may have learned the hard way, sitting up all night at the last minute, but most people manage to get things in on time. And if you didnt, how well did you negotiate an alternative solution?

IT Skills

As a student you will have used, at the very least, the internet, email and word processing packages. Your college will probably have provided free tuition in these and possibly also in programmes like Powerpoint and Excel. You may also have developed other skills in your own time or when you were at school, such as web design or programming. Add all these to your list.

Research skills

You will have had to do some form of research for your assignments and for your thesis or dissertation if you went to university. Write down the methods you used internet, specialist libraries, journals, interviewing, using questionnaires, doing case studies.

Communication skills, teamwork, ability to work on your own and to use your own initiative, ability to meet deadlines, IT and research skills are all high on employers lists of essential attributes in a graduate employee. Your job is to provide examples which prove that you have these skills. So, using the information in this article, make your own list of specific examples. They will help you shine both on paper and at the interview.

Waller Jamison 2005

Job Applications Common Interview Questions Part 2

What, would you say, is your greatest weakness?

No one likes admitting to weaknesses, but this is a favourite interview question, and one you need to be prepared for.

This is not the time to confess your deepest secrets or expose embarrassing mistakes you have made in previous jobs. You should choose an area in which you don’t have quite as much experience or confidence as you’d like – something which you will have the opportunity to work on in the job for which you are applying.

It should not be something which you are expected to have already mastered, but something which will be useful for the post and can be developed over time. If you will be expected to give regular presentations, for example, saying that you find this difficult won’t go down well. However, if this isn’t expected at your level, but would be once you’ve moved up the ladder, you might say that you find it a bit nerve wracking and could do with more practice.

Check the job description and person specification for essential and desirable skills and be sure to choose something which is non-essential. It could be that you are unfamiliar with a particular software package which only plays a small part in the job.

Once you have decided on your weakness, be sure to emphasize your willingness to improve and your awareness that you will have the opportunity to do so in the job.

And your greatest strength?

Many people have much more difficulty finding a strength than admitting to a weakness, but if you are asked to supply the latter, there is a good chance youll be asked for a strength as well. So be sure to prepare something.

Which aspects of your present job are you naturally good at? Is there anything about your work which has been praised by managers or commented on by co-workers?

If you are just leaving college, which skills did you develop as a student or in other activities such as voluntary work being a team player, researching information, communication skills?

You should also relate your chosen strength to the job youre applying for. What is it that the interviewers want and that you know you can deliver?

Your strength needs to be based on reality and should be strong. This is your chance to shine, to bring your best qualities and abilities to the attention of the interviewers. Saying youre quite good at working in a team wont cut any ice. You must illustrate your team-working skills with an impressive example, something the panel will remember when they come to make their decision.

Preparation is the key to answering interview questions make sure you do it.

Waller Jamison 2005