Many new graduates are left facing uncertain job prospects

THIS year’s graduates face mixed fortunes in the jobs market as business and industry count the cost of Covid-19 and deal with ongoing disruption to normal operations.

Some companies are pulling graduate recruitment, some will have smaller numbers and delayed starts, although, elsewhere, prospects are bright.

One high-profile casualty is Irish Distillers’ Jameson International Graduates Programme, a three-year sales and marketing internship that recruits between 10 and 30 graduates annually.

It is the first time in the 29-year history of the programme that Jameson will not have a new intake of graduates, but a spokesperson said with the spread of Covid19 globally, it would not be possible.

Global analytics software company First Derivatives, a major graduate employer, said its intake this summer will be “relatively small”.

The Newry-based firm will “see how the market evolves” in deciding how many school and university leavers it takes on.

“Although the numbers will be relatively small, I am expecting as we go through the summer that we will be taking in graduates,” First Derivatives CEO Seamus Keating said.

Meanwhile, KPMG, Ireland’s largest private sector recruiter of graduates and one of the Big Four accountancy firms, confirmed it was going ahead with 400 graduate recruits, in line with previous years.

A spokesperson said the programme, which typically starts in the autumn, might start one month later.

In the communications sector, it’s also business as usual at Vodafone, which confirmed it was taking on 40 graduates.

At the business organisation Ibec, which runs a graduate

recruitment programme for a number of big-name companies, head of education and innovation policy Claire McGee said any impact would be broadly reflective of labour market trends.

She said: “In the sectors that have experienced the highest level of disruption, such as non-food retail, tourism, and specific programmes that focus on business development for international trade, there will be a significant impact as these businesses comply with Covid-19 restrictions and social distancing.

“In other industry sectors, graduate programmes, like all business activity, will be under review to determine how they can proceed in line with new working arrangements.”

But Ms McGee said Irish businesses still relied on a strong, graduate talent pipeline and this would be more pressing as the economy begins to reboot.

College careers services also have their fingers on the pulse and Cathy Savage, senior manager at UCD’s Smurfit School Careers Network, said the impact on the class of 2020 was “unclear”. She said all employers had said the situation was fluid and they would respond as necessary.

Ms Savage said while larger professional services firms had placed a freeze on experienced hires so that they could understand the impact of Covid-19 on their business revenues, “it appears to be business as usual in terms of graduate recruitment with all firms planning to start graduates in September”.

In technology companies, she said it depended on the sector, with those connected to travel or tourism having stopped recruiting, those connected to e-commerce or healthcare continuing to recruit, and some recruiting regardless.

Unsurprisingly in a pandemic, Ms Savage described the pharma sector as strong.

“Typically, our students secure roles between July and February, therefore, if we see an easing of restrictions around social distancing late summer, the students could be well placed between November and January.

“However, compared to last year our students will face significant challenges with their job search as competition for roles intensifies.”

She couldn’t predict what the recruitment market would look like between September 2020 and February 2021.

Trinity College Dublin’s director of careers, Orla Bannon, said the situation was evolving but, at the moment, was a mixed picture.

She said areas that were relatively stable as of now in terms of graduate employment included finance, professional services, law and IT, while broader sectoral areas such as retail, tourism, hospitality and aviation had been badly impacted by the pandemic.

University of Limerick’s head of careers, Gavin Connell, who is co-chair of the Association of Higher Education Careers Services (AHECS), said while some employers “hit the pause button”, there were “sectors where things are booming”.

He said retail and hospitality were experiencing difficulties, “but they always find a way of bouncing back”.

IT and pharma were buoyant and other areas where there was a spike in interest for graduates included marketing, supply chain/logistics, property management and project management for construction, he said.

With social distancing and other health restrictions, many graduates who get the call will face virtual interviews and online inductions.

AHECS is among the partners in the NextStepSupport. org initiative from recruitment services provider Group GTI, an online resource to help students understand their employment prospects and assist in developing skills such as for virtual interviewing.