Week 1: Building your Professional Communication Skills and Teamwork in Preparation for your Graduate Career

Hi Everyone, 

I’m an ICAEW Campus Ambassador currently studying English and Drama at the University of Kent. I’m doing a series of weekly blogs for 6 weeks about the skills I learned studying Business Administration and Mandarin at the University of California Berkeley’s Haas Business School. These blogs cover what skills employees look for and how you can foster these in yourself to help you get the graduate job you want.

UC Berkeley Campus

In my blog this week, I’m talking about how my personal experiences during my year aboard helped me improve my skills as a team player; a quality highly prized by graduate employers across all professions. I also want to talk about how my experiences improved my communication skills and the importance of having these skills in the workplace.

Increasingly, employers from all professions are looking for evidence of your extracurricular activities that show communication skills and team work. Employers want to see that you have a ‘life outside of work’. A great way of doing this is to get involved in sports teams or societies at your university. On your CV and in interviews you can then highlight how you built the essential skills of teamwork and communication that employers are looking for.

For example on my year abroad, I got involved as an actor for three different plays that were being directed by students at the university. These kinds of activities not only show you have an active life outside studying, but offer an opportunity to improve teamwork.

When working in a small group, communication skills become very important. Especially when performing in Macbeth on an almost pitch black stage! We had to really listen to the director, take on board their constructive criticism and be ready to put forward our own ideas as well. It was also important to build genuine friendly relationships with the cast members with whom I so closely worked with.

One important lesson that I learned is never to criticise your fellow actors, even if you’re trying to help. Statements like ‘I would have done it like this…’ don’t go down well. In the workplace it is important to understand that everyone has their own way of doing things. It is the boss’s place to nudge people in the right direction. I learned that it is very important be positive and supportive, especially when people are about to perform in front of hundreds of people! If you’re going to give advice to fellow employees, it should be given in a helpful and positive light.

I will take forward the respect of everyone’s differences, as that’s what makes a good team so diverse.

One of the most desired core competencies that the world’s largest professional services firm PwC looks for is being able to communicate with impact and empathy. So if you want to build your professional communication skills and teamwork in preparation for your graduate career, here’s your excuse to take a break from revision. Get involved in your universities extra-curricular activities and make sure to tell your dream employer about it!

If you have any comments or questions at all please go ahead and I’ll be sure to get help any way I can.

In my next two blogs, I will be giving tips on one of the most important, but also one of the most potentially terrifying skills of all: presenting. So be sure to join me next week!





If you want to check PwC’s other recommended Core Competencies then take a look at their online employability booklet for graduates:

http://www.pwc.co.uk/careers/webadmin/documents/student/2013/employability.pdf

If you’ve been inspired by reading this blog, it may surprise you that all of these skills are used in a graduate career as an ICAEW Chartered Accountant.

Discover how you can become an ICAEW Chartered Accountant at http://www.icaew.com/careers

See when the ICAEW Student Recruitment Team (UK) will be on your campus this autumn and message them at https://www.facebook.com/icaewcareers