What I told graduates during a pandemic

As a 2nd year technology graduate with bp, an important part of my role is to act as a buddy to new joiners starting out. Joining a large company as a graduate or apprentice can be a daunting experience, especially during a pandemic. Having to start work remotely in a company you may not know much about during a period of significant change is not trivial. In spite of this, change provides opportunities especially for new joiners with in-demand skills and fresh perspectives.

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been catching up with new graduates and apprentices to see how the first few weeks have been going and to figure out if there was any good advice I could provide. Funnily enough, I noticed that the same advice kept coming up no matter where those individual conversations went. In retrospect I feel that this advice would have really helped me when I first joined so it’s good to be able to share it with others.

  1. Graduates have a unique position in any company big or small. Good companies will give you the space to learn and innovate so take full advantage of that. In my case, building cloud skills was important as bp makes extensive use of cloud technologies to drive innovation.

  2. Look for mentors and don’t be afraid to reach out to people who inspire you. Microsoft Teams/Slack is a powerful tool as it gives you access and removes barriers to communication. The pandemic also means that senior leaders are always using these tools.

  3. “Specialisation is for insects” is a mantra that isn’t said very often. I used to believe that becoming a specialist in something as fast as possible was the route to success in technology. After reading Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialised World my world view totally changed. I’ve recommended this book. A lot.

  4. Read around the industry that you are in and identify lessons from history. In my case, I knew that the oil/energy industry was ripe for disruption whether that be from the inside or outside. The technology space has been through this for decades and a book that stands out is Only the Paranoid Survive. bp’s desire to reinvent shares a lot of common themes with Intel’s strategic inflection point. Disrupt yourself or expect someone else to do it.

I think/hope the points I’ve mentioned here don’t just apply to bp graduates, anyone starting out in technology could use them to their advantage. Thanks for reading!

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