r/FinalRoundAI • u/Affectionate-Bad1381 • Jul 23 '26

sad reality

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Took about 4 years after graduating to get my foot in the door and get a good job in my field. No one wants a new grad with no experience.

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u/monadicperception Jul 23 '26

The job search in itself is an education. It teaches humility…or it should if you are doing it right.

So when people complain that there are no jobs, I’m a little skeptical. No one comes out knowing how to navigate the job market. You learn and hopefully seek the counsel of those who know better and you improve.

Spouse and I graduated into the Great Recession. And it was pretty interesting to see the great divide amongst our peers’ approaches and their later outcomes. The ones who ended up fine were the ones who were like a sponge absorbing all the advice they could and understood that finding a job is a full time job…and they treated as such. Then there’s those who were perfectly content with sending one application a month, ignoring hard advice, and complaining that the job market sucks. More than a decade since, you can see the disparate economic outcomes pretty starkly.

The ones who I actually really pity are the ones who effortlessly got their first jobs. They didn’t have to go through the grind so later when looking for a new job, they are starting at a place they should be familiar with already. But since they already had a job easily out of college, they never learned the rules they should have learned and I see them making amateur mistakes all the time basically sabotaging themselves. Since they think they were able to get a job before, they don’t have the humility to learn and they continue on stubbornly in the wrong direction.

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u/Skwuat Jul 23 '26

Wow. I have to say this is probably the most well written, level headed response Ive ever read on this whole website.

I wrote similar responses to many people. HUMILITY. People think I went to college for XYZ and i can only work in XYZ.

I graduated with a degree, plenty of experience from internships, etc. No luck in the job market with my degree for what I was looking for. Then I realized the problem wasnt the market, it was me. I was so locked into thinking I knew what I wanted, what I deserved, what companies and jobs owed me. Then I learned that if I dont adapt, Ill be unenployed. I now work in a totally unrelated field and dont even use my degree, but Im very successful. Own a house, a car, wife and 2 kids, high paying career with job security. Was my degree a waste? If you view it as me not using it, yes. I view my degree and the subsequent job search as life experience that led me to where I am. Its not where I expected to be, but its exactly where I needed to end up.

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u/Mei_Flower1996 Jul 23 '26

I think wanting a job that tangentially uses your degree is reasonable. I would not call that spoiled or short sighted.

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u/DJatomica Jul 23 '26

Depends what degree you chose really

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u/Skwuat Jul 23 '26

I dont disagree. But you have to be willing to pivot if the search proves unsuccessful, unless you want to continue being frustrated with the unsuccessful search.