Researching career options

A good place to start is by looking at the job options related directly to your degree subject - but remember that this is just a starting point and you have many more options than this! Prospects' What can I do with my degree? suggests roles related to specific degree subjects. You could also use the LinkedIn Alumni tool to search for profiles of graduates from your subject at Cardiff University and see what jobs they are doing now. If you don't have LinkedIn, read our advice on setting up a profile.

Use graduate websites like Prospects and TargetJobs to explore different job sectors of interest. Sectors are areas of the labour market, for example education, healthcare or accounting and finance, within which exist lots of different jobs. This can be a useful way to start researching a general area of work you find interesting and then identifying specific roles within that field.

A great way to generate career ideas is to look through current job adverts (read our advice on job-hunting for websites we recommend). You may stumble across roles you've never heard of before! Try to adopt a traffic light approach to gauge your initial response to the jobs you see - red for jobs you absolutely would not like, amber for jobs you aren't sure about yet and green for jobs you could potentially be interested in. Spend some time thinking about why jobs you have selected are red, amber or green - what does this start to tell you about some of your work preferences?

When you are looking at job adverts, remember to always look beyond the job title. Different employers will call jobs different things - the name of a job itself very rarely gives you an accurate indication of what the job involves! Read the description of the role in the job advert to get a better insight and use resources like Prospects' job profiles to research specific roles further.

Student Futures organises many employer events for students and graduates throughout the course of the academic year, including careers fairs. These provide a great opportunity to meet with employers and find out about graduate opportunities, work experience and career options with a wide range of local, national and international organisations. Keep an eye out for employer events in your Student Futures Account.

Rather than working for an employer, you might want to be your own boss! Perhaps you have your own business idea or will be working in a sector where freelancing is common. We have lots of support for students who want to start their own business and develop their entrepreneurial skills.

Talking to professionals working in a job or sector that interests you is a great way to gain insight into what is involved in working in that area. Student Futures runs a mentoring scheme which matches students with professional mentors working in their field of interest (check to see if we are currently accepting applications in your Student Futures Account). You could also connect with people working in your area of interest directly on LinkedIn - read our advice on how to use LinkedIn to network effectively.

Work experience, whether this is a paid internship or short shadowing opportunity, is a great way to get firsthand insight into a job, sector, type of employer or type of work. This gives you an invaluable opportunity to test out a career idea, build contacts in the sector and gain a new experience for your CV. Student Futures organises work experience for students - read our advice on finding work experience.