Career Research Report Briefing

• Purpose of the report

• Required information

• How to conduct your research

• How to structure and layout your report

• Submission Requirements

• Beware the Penalties

Enhancing EmployabilityModule code: 5BUS1085

Why is this assignment important

• This report will support you in considering your future career and give you important information in helping your make career planning decisions

• It will provide you with an awareness of the knowledge, skills and experience required by a recent graduate

• It will enable you to become aware of the opportunities available to graduates in the current jobs market

• You will be research information on the skills, knowledge and experience employers are looking for

Free Career & Skills Matching Tools

• Prospects Planner www.prospects.ac.uk in the Jobs & Work Experience area

• TargetJobs Careers Reportwww.targetjobs.co.uk in the Career Planner area

• Adult Directionswww.cascaid.co.uk/adultdirections Use licence code: goalhome12

The Task

Having identified your profession or sector of employment you will need to:

Research the current and future expectations of employers, the likely future trends in graduate employment in this profession or sector and what recruitment and selection methods being used

You should then be able to produce a summary of the key skills, knowledge and experience which employers require from graduates seeking roles within this profession or sector

What will you be researching?

You need to research and decide upon a profession you are interested in for example: Operations Management, Retail Management, Marketing, Sales, Human Resource Management

OR look at a particular industry sector that you are interested in working in when you graduate for example: the media, not for profit, tourism, finance, sports and leisure

You may be interested in other career options, for example teaching or entering the armed forces or the police

You may be already working within your chosen career area, so you will need to consider future roles, promotion opportunities or transferring to other departments within the company

Carrying out the research

Enhancing Employability - Information Resources

Preparation of your CV• You will need to review and

develop your CV – seek support from Careers, Employment & Enterprise Services to help you with this

• You should prepare your CV exactly as your situation is now – not what you hope it will look like when you graduate!

• Your CV is a crucial starting point to your graduate or placement job search

• You must attach your CV as an appendix to your report

Research a current opportunity• You will need to identify one current

role being advertised that you would be interested in applying for when you graduate

• You will also need to provide the advert or information on the current position that you identified as an appendix to your report

• This will form the basis for a large part of Assignment 3 – your Career Action Plan

• In Assignment 3 you will reviewing yourself against the requirements of the role that you identified in this assignment

Researching your report

Make use of both primary and secondary research

Structuring your report

Introduction and Contents• What your report will cover and how you make your decision on what

sector/profession to focus upon – written in the first person so use “I”• Number your pages and include a contents page

Section 1 – Research • Terms of Reference – what you are researching • Methodology – how you carried out your research, what sources of

information did you use

Section 2 - Main findings• General Employment Trends in the sector/profession• Opportunities for recent graduates – including a current advertised role• Skills, knowledge and experience required, selection methods used

Section 3 - Conclusion • Brief reflection on key findings, how you will make use of these within your Career Action Plan & Self Reflection report – Assignment 3

• This should be written in the first person “I”

References and Bibliography

• Reference sources used to research and construct your report• Make use of primary research from Employability Week and the Careers

Fair

Appendices • Your current CV and a copy of the advert or information on the advertised role

• Include a photo of your Employability Passport

Employability Week Passport• Don’t forget that you need to

include a jpeg of your passport in the body of your report

• Include this as one of your appendices – not as a separate document

• You need to ensure that you refer to your research, learning and reflection as a result of attendance at the sessions within your report as appropriate

• You need 5 separate stamps on your passport to be eligible to receive up to 10% of the module marks

Writing your reportA report ‘reports’

on somethin

g in a concise, formal

way using clearly defined sections

presented in a

standard format,

which tell the

reader what you did, why and how you did it and what you found

A report should

be written concisely, in a business like manner, and have

headings and sub-

headings

The main

body of the

report should

be written in the third person apart

from the introduction and

conclusion which should

be written in the first person

Note the

available marks for each section

and ensure

that you take

account of these in how

you construct your report

Remember

to include your appendices

and all your

references and

bibliograph

y

Laying out your report

Use Calibre/Times New Roman/Arial

12pt with 1.5 spacing

Use 14pt headings and 12pt sub-

headings

Have a title page and a

contents page

Use page numbering from the

Introduction page onwards

Include a final word count on the title page

Refer to the CASE Guide to Report Writing for more

information

Submission Requirements

Your report must be submitted to the correct

assignment tab

• Ensure that you submit on time – by 10:00 on Monday 17 November 2014

Ensure that you submit in the

required format

• Only submit an MSWord document (doc or docx), submit one document containing all sections

• Label your document as follows: EE1:Your name: Student number: EE1 (eg John Smith 1234567 EE1)

Stay with the required word

count• The word count for this assignment is 1200

words (+/- 10%)

Beware of the penalties

Failure to label document correctly or submitting the

wrong type of file• a penalty of 5% will be deducted from your mark

Failure to submit on time

•Penalties will be applied from 1% for 1 – 30 minutes late to your mark being capped at 40% if you are more than 300 minutes late

Failure to stay within defined word count

•Penalty of 1% deducted from overall mark for each 120 words over word count

Failure to accurately state word count

•a penalty of 5% will be deducted from your mark

Extension Requests You must apply

for an extension if required by 10:00

on Monday 10 November 2014

You must provide a

valid reason

and evidence

if required to

support your request

Do not assume

that your

extension has

been granted

unless you

receive an email

confirming this

is the case

Mike Rosier