Here we are. Your graduation is just around the corner and the time to prepare for your first job has come. You will probably have days when your future ideas are clear, mixed with those where you have no clue of what you would like to do but above all, you have no idea how to get a job in fashion straight out of university without experience.
Do not worry. We all have been there, you’ll make it too.
The fact that you are a member of GO means that you are working on your career! So congratulations 🙂 If you follow all the advice you will soon be entering this industry.
- Do your research and start acting
May is the month in which your plans needs to be turned into actions. Doing a summer internship in the fashion industry is a wise choice not only because it is your easiest way to enter the fashion industry, but because it’s the period of the year when fashion companies open even more positions precisely because they know that there are so many graduates who are about to enter the market. Therefore, if you have decided to do a summer fashion internship that starts in July, this is the time to apply and prepare for a possible transfer if your internship will be away from home (finding an apartment, preparing a move …) Everything will be great!
Almost all the fashion companies have already published their summer internship offer at this point. Before applying, however, you need to make sure your CV is on point. Take a look at our CV templates and work on yours making sure your design is nice and everything looks clear (PS email me at [email protected] and I will send you your favorite template for free). Then make sure you change it a bit when applying for a new job. If you are attending a fashion school, it’s time to collect everything in your portfolio: your designs, your photographs, all the work you did during school because especially if you apply for jobs in design, they will ask you.
The first thing you need to do to get a job in fashion straight out of university is researching what are the most interesting career options for you. Check all the websites that publish job offers and keep an eye on the pages “Work with us” “Careers”, which you find at the bottom of the page on all the sites of your favorite brands. Analyze all the internship offers and read all the job descriptions carefully. Don’t rule out anything. Even if you know that you would like to work as a buyer, reading the job descriptions of all the other jobs will help you better understand how the fashion industry works, what activities are involved and what the various careers are. You could discover positions you never thought of. Create an excel sheet (so you also begin to practice with it since all the jobs in fashion, internships included, require the use of Excel) with all the internships that you like and study what they require in the application phase: the CV, the portfolio, a link to your work, your social profiles, a video application, a presentation…. Write down in the Excel sheet everything you need when applying for each job so you can work on it later. Do not forget to check also if there is a starting date of the internship and above all the last day you can apply so that you do not miss any opportunity. Remember that the sooner you apply for a job, the better, but it is better to prepare for a perfect application than rushing to be one of the first to apply.
2.Work on your image
Before you even apply, start working on your image online. All the recruiters will check out your LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook profile before calling you for an interview. And some use them directly to hire. If you don’t have one yet, you need to create your LinkedIn profile before graduating. I recommend you pay attention to these things:
- use of a professional photo of yourself, the one you would use for your CV, so no photos on vacation or with friends.
- Start by adding your studies and skills (photoshop, excel, fashion marketing…)
- Gradually add your connections starting from your classmates
Then go on Instagram and Facebook which you surely won’t have to create from scratch, and make sure you delete the photos you don’t want the recruiters to see. You can keep photos of your dog, but avoid photos where you have a bottle of beer in your hand or those in which you are wearing inappropriate clothes. It’s time to delete the photo you took in underwear one day as a joke. Unless you want to be an underwear model.
3. Fashion Internships are the answer
I know that once you graduate you would like to leave school and start earning money to be able to immediately buy a house, your favorite designer bag and have a dream closet and make 2-3 trips a year. But apart from a few fortunate exceptions, 90% of people just out of school, even after a Master’s degree, begin their career in fashion with an internship (on average at least 2). This is because internships are jobs that do not require years of experience or specific skills. Here is the answer to your question: How to get a job in fashion straight out of university without experience? Fashion Internships.
So now that you’re about to graduate, start looking for internships instead of full-time jobs. To find your first job in fashion, start at your university. Generally, all universities, whether they are specialized in fashion or not, have a career service in which they support students to get their first job. Universities have relationships with some companies and many times, schools and companies organize career days, where companies go to the classroom to interview and present their job offers to the students. However, don’t wait for the university to find you a job, but be active with the research online.
4. Start building your name out there
It’s time to come out and build your name in the fashion industry. Attend networking events, panels, industry conferences and expand your network. You could just find your first job at events.
5. Be flexible
I explained why you don’t have to be too selective with your first internship. Not that you have to accept every job offer just because you’re at the beginning of your career, but don’t wait months and months for your favorite company to open your ideal position. There are lots of other people like you who will apply for the same job. So be flexible and take a look also at positions that are relevant to the one you want. The acquired experiences will then be useful to you when you have to change jobs and in any case, you can learn from any experience. As soon as you’re out of school, when you are looking for your first job in fashion, you will be looking for opportunities at large companies in the sector. But look on Instagram for new cool brands that are just as interesting and you will have a better chance of finding work faster because the number of candidates is certainly lower.
6. Keep studying
Even if you have just graduated, you cannot stop studying, especially in a constantly changing sector such as fashion. Thanks to your smartphone, staying up to date on what’s happening in the industry every day is no longer a problem. It’s enough 20 minutes in the morning or evening to read a couple of websites that publish industry news: Business of Fashion, Vogue, WWD … Being updated on the sector will also help you in the interview phase, you will be like to reply or comment on anything. Above all, do not forget to study carefully the companies for which you are applying even before submitting your application because potentially, from the moment you upload your resume and press the enter button, you may receive the first phone interview call and you must be ready and show the company you did some research BEFORE applying and that you are not only passionate about the industry but in particular about that company.
The transition from student to
