In this episode we discuss the UK labour market, AI and where to get the best pie in Wigan with our guest Charlie Ball who is a Public-facing expert on graduate employment.

00:00 Welcome to the podcast and introductions01:09 Charlie can you give us one sentence overview of the graduate labour market in summer 202501:35 How long do you think that's going to continue? 03:10 While we are waiting for the economy to become unstuck what can an international graduate do to get a step ahead? 04:25 Other big cities that have good strong labour markets05:00 Belfast IT labour market06:30 AI has not yet had a big impact on the jobs people do in the UK07:15 AI has seriously affected recruitment because everyone is using it to write applications. 08:42 My advice for international student is to go to your careers service and learn to write a CV without AI, and then learn to write one with AI that is still authentically you09:45 The third thing is you still have to be able to do interviews10:05 Employers are being more strict at the interview stage 10:25 Our candidate used AI to write the application but we couldn't tell because she'd done it well, she was great at interview11:05 Questions we have had raised recently is around the use of paid for AI vs free AI11:40 If you are going to use AI at all your skill needs to be in prompt writing and then curating of the content12:31 The interview stage is the point at which you show face to face that you have done the work13:50 The other thing is don't over estimate how much businesses are using AI right now15:00 What do you think International Students can do for themselves in talking about their expertise, previous work experience, qualifications, skills etc17:00 Some rejections International students receive are due to lack of UK experience, how do they tackle this specific issue?18:20 Do you think that's an excuse some employers use because they don't want to sponsor...?18:50 What do you think about student society activity, volunteering, virtual internships...? 19:28 Our weird British cultural ways20:01 Their pies are all wrong...20:15 A brief introduction to Wigan 20:45 Student Societies serve duel purpose for international students22:00 What are the main frustrations for employers in finding and keeping international students? 24:28 Just be really clear that you are really keen on the job and you will give 100% while doing it. 26:00 The mobility of international students is a bonus and show a wide breadth of experience27:15 The question we need to tackle with this change from 2 years to 18 months what do you think the impacts are going to be for the students and employers? 29:00 Goodbyes and go to Wigan and get a pie from Galloways piesWarwick student societies https://www.warwicksu.com/societies-sports/societies/Warwick Careers https://warwick.ac.uk/services/careers Podcast ep white paper https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhT_8qVYz4wWigan https://www.visitwigan.com/ Galloways: https://www.gallowaysbakers.co.uk/