BACKGROUND

The Office of students Career Services (OSCS) is located Sakagwa Academic Block ground floor in the former SG5. The department started its official operations on October 2018 as a support system for students in their career journey. Since its establishment, the department has greatly impacted the career lives of our students as well as those the institutions in our surrounding.

The department is committed to helping students(both in the university as well those in secondary schools) explore their career options, identify and prepare adequately for the opportunities in the job market, update  students on the new job market trends , access to opportunities like internships , jobs and volunteer with partner organizations

VISION

To be a globally recognized institutionalized career development Centre of excellence in the provision of career guidance mentorship and growth.

The Office offers the following services.   

  1. Career Advising and Counselling
  • One- on – one career guidance
  • Career counselling
  • Group career advising
  • Professional talks- talks by industry professionals
  • Peer career advising
  1. Training
  • Training programs to effectively prepare students for job market
  • CV, Resume and Cover letter workshops
  • Mock interviews
  • Kisii university/ career students ambassadors
  1. Linkages
  • Linking students to the industry.
  • Organizing recruitment drives and annual career/ job fair
  • Identifying internships and job opportunities for our students
  • Mentorship programs with industry and Alumni
  1. Intra- institutional exchanges
  2. Entrepreneurial incubation

Why Kisii University and OSCS?

TO Employers

Why Kisii university;

  • Kisii University Gives meaning to a world class University.
  • Hiring/ Employing Kisii University graduates assures you not on a world class graduate but an all rounded human resources that is nothing less of a mark of quality in quality services delivery.
  • Kisii University students and graduates possess attributes such as professionalism, self-discipline, flexibility, and resilience necessary to excel in work environment.

What Sets Kisii University students Apart.

  • The university’s mission in its entirety is all about churning out competent human resource fit the world market. The training the students are offered is therefore that befitting the university mission.
  • Our students are technologically trained and equipped to meet the ever changing market demands especially on how to handle technological challenges at the work place.
  • Our students are highly motivated and self-driven with an emphasis put on self- confidence and team work. Students’ thorough research work makes them competent in critical, creative and quantitative thinking, writing and speaking.
  • Through our Student Affairs activities we ensure students shave opportunities to enhance leadership ability while participating in sports, club activities, clubs and society’s office bearers and leadership retreats for our student leaders.

Partner with OSCS

At the Office of Students Career Services (OSCS), we are focused on engaging our industry partners in the following areas.

  • Recruitment
  • Mentorship
  • Entrepreneurship training
  • Networking workshops
  • Annual career fair/ job fair
  • Guest speakers
  • job search strategies
  • discussion panels on topical issues
  • networking and etiquette
  • Pre Career fair
  • Exhibitions
  • Annual career corporate breakfast, luncheon, and dinner

Recruitment

Recruiting is an employer direct link to reaching our students for employment and internship opportunities. We will find a time that best fits both your schedule and Kisii University academic calendar to allow talk and recruit our students.

On Campus

Kisii University also invites you to share your expertise with students at Career- focused events on campus. This offers you an extensive recruitment strategy designed to enhance your hiring efforts on campus. This will allow you communicate information about skills needed in the workplace and different career paths within your company or organization. Participating in an event or workshop on campus helps build your organization’s brand among the students. This opportunity will also allow you to share your company’s success and why students should work for you, help students understand the skills and abilities that you are seeking to help increase student interest in your positions and start one- on- one relationship with students interested in working for your organization.

Annual Career Fair/ Job fair

Our annual Career Fair is an excellent recruiting opportunity, as it exposes you to a wide variety of students, providing additional visibility for your organization.

On- Campus interview

On- campus interviews allow you to meet with many Kisii University students in one day. We are flexible, allowing for half or full day schedules.

For information on upcoming career fairs or requiring making a visit at our campus:

-let us help you develop and maintain your job or internship posting.

-use our conference at Kisii University as interview rooms.

Kindly reach us on careerservices@kisiiuniversity.ac.ke

Resume, cover letter and CVs–

A resume and a cover letter are your first opportunity to sell yourself to an employer. OSCS provides advising and resources to make your resume and cover letter as effective and professionals as possible.

When writing a cover letter remember the following:

  • -The exact title of the position you are seeking. If that’s not possible, then the general type of work for which you are applying.
  • -Why you want to work for the company. Remember the company wants to know what you can do for them.
  • -A dazzling sample of what you know about the company: product lines, marketing strategies, their quality and quantity of clientele and where they stand among their competitors. For example, “I understand you will be introducing your new robotic CNC widget assembly system in the Australian market this fall. I have several ideas that may help you compete with Intel’s established line”.
  • -Personal attributes, or “soft” skills- just don’t overdo it. One or two lines is enough, and keep it as objectives as possible: “my peers would tell you I’m self-motivated and energetic, with a sharp eye for details, “or, “ I feel certain my skills in personal client relations, networking and communications will expand your client base and develop strong repeat business, as demonstrated in my position with XYZ company.”
  • -Whether you’re willing to travel or relocate. Omit this if it’s not requested or if are not willing to travel or relocate.
  • -Other specifics about yourself or the job. If the posting say: “include salary requirements “and not salary history, give them a desired salary range and avoid a specific number. For example: “Upper Ksh.40, 000, negotiable, depending on benefits. “ You may include this in a letter, but if they ask for salary requirements and salary history, include them on a separate salary history sheet and end the page with salary requirements are to negotiation.”

Link to Electronic Resumes

Of course, nothing is perfect, and document scanners can make mistakes.  If your resume is scanned from paper into a computer system, letters and sometimes entire words may be read incorrectly. Underlining, italics, and certain type faces can be misinterpreted, and essential keywords may not be picked up. That’s why emailing has become the most popular way to send your resume to employers, recruiters and large job boards, such as nsoko.com and brightermonday.com depending on the requirements of the website, you can send your resume as a fully formatted, MS word attachment or as part of an email. However, if you’re on a site that asks you to complete an online form, then save your resume in stripped- down text format (that is plain text), with no graphics excerpt asterisks (*) for bullets, and all the copy flush left. That way, there’s very little chance of words being misread.

Describe characteristics and industry-specific experience in keywords to accommodate the electronic/ computer search process. Use these guidelines to enhance the processing of text-formatted, keyword resumes through the electronic system:

  • -Left-justify the entire document
  • -Utilize a basic, courier font, about 10 or 11 points. Most software will default to courier when you save a file in text format-it’s the most basic, generic typeface.
  • -avoid use of tabs.
  • -avoid italics, script, underlining, graphics, bold, or shading.
  • -avoid parentheses and brackets.
  • -avoid compressed lines of print. (Typesetting and proportional spacing may cram too much into one line if there’s long word near the end of the sentence.)
  • -avoid faxed copies, which become fuzzy.

Internships

Internships and industrial attachments are key and very essential as part of the college experience. Kisii University encourages you to complete at least one internship before graduating. This industrial engagements provide an opportunity to test – drive a career field, make contacts, build marketable skills and figure out your likes and dislikes within specific industries. Students with internship experience have better success with their job search or graduate school application process.

Interviews

Interviews are a critical part of the job search, and it is important that you be prepared for an interview with an employer. The Office of Students Career Services has tips, resources, mock interviews, and workshops to help you get ready for interviews.

Examples of questions during interviews:

Answering the question tell me about yourself?

The medium is the message. The interviewer cares less about your answer to this question and more about the confidence, enthusiasm and passion with which you answer it.

The speed of the response is the response. The biggest mistake you make is pausing, stalling or fumbling at the onset of your answer, thus demonstrating a lack of self-awareness and self-esteem. Next time you’re faced with the dreaded, “tell me about yourself…” question, and try use these:

  1. “I can summarize who I am in three words. “Grabs their attention immediately. Demonstrates your ability to be concise, creative and compelling.
  2. “The quotation I live my life by is…” Proves that personal development is an essential part of your growth plan. Also shows your ability to motivate yourself.
  3. “My personal philosophy is…” Companies hire athletes-not shortstops. This line indicates your position as a thinker, not just an employee.
  4. “People who know me best say that I’m…” This response offers insight into your own levelof self-awareness.
  5. “Well, I googled myself this morning, and here’s what I found…” Tech-savvy, fun, cool people would say this. Unexpected and memorable.
  6. “My passion is…” People don’t care what you do-people care that you are. And what you’re passionate about is who you are. Plus, passion unearths enthusiasm.
  7. “When I was seven years old, I always wanted to be…” An answer like this shows that you’ve been preparing for this job your whole life, not just the night before.
  8. “If Hollywood made a move about my life, it would be called…” Engaging, interesting and entertaining.
  9. “Can I show you, instead of telling you?” Then, pull something out of your pocket that represents who you are. Who could resist this answer? Who could forget this answer?
  10. “The compliment people give me most frequently is …” Almost like a testimonial, this response also indicates self-awareness and openness to feedback.

The secret is thinking how you will follow up each answer with relevant, interesting and concise explanations that make the already bored interviewer look up from his stale coffee and think, “Wow! That’s the best answer I’ve heard all day!”

Networking and Outreach

Networking is talking to people to gain insight and information into career fields. OSCS has tips and information on how to network effectively.

Remember the number- one way to get that new position is through networking. How you present yourself on paper, on the phone and in- person should be clear, strong and most of all, consistent. People are drawn to consistency your job search, and for that matter, your entire career.

According to Ivan Misner, PhD the following traits will make you a “master networker.”

  1. Follow up on referrals. This was ranked as the No. 1 trait of successful networkers. If you present an opportunity, whether it’s a simple piece of information, a special contact or a qualified business referral, to someone who consistently fails to follow up successfully, it’s no secret that you’ll eventually stop wasting your time with this person.
  2. Positive attitude. A consistently negative attitude makes dislike being around you and drives away referrals; a positive attitude makes people want to associate and cooperate with you. Positive business professionals are like magnets. Others want to be around them and will send their friends, family and associates to them.
  3. Enthusiastic/ motivated. It’s been said that the best sales characteristics is enthusiasm. To be respected within our networks, we at least need to sell ourselves with enthusiasm. Once we’ve done an effective job of selling ourselves, we’ll be able to reap the reward of seeing our contacts sell us to others!
  4. When you refer one person to another, you’re putting your reputation on the line. You have to be able to trust your referral partner and be trusted in return. Neither you nor anyone else will refer a contact or valuable information to someone who can’t be trusted to handle it well.
  5. Good listening skills. Our success as networkers depends on how well can listen and learn. The faster you and your networking partner learn what you need to know about each other, the faster you’ll establish a valuable relationship. Communicate well and listen well.
  6. Network always. Master networkers are never off duty. Networking is so natural to them that they can be found networking in the grocery-store line, at the doctor’s office and while picking the kids up from school, as well as at chamber mixers and networking meetings.
  7. Thank people. Expressing gratitude to business associates and clients is just another building block in the cultivation of relationships that will lead to increased referrals. People like to refer others to business professionals who go above and beyond. Thanking others at every opportunity will help you stand out from crowd.
  8. Enjoy helping. Helping others can be done in a variety of ways, from literally showing up to help with an office move to clipping a helpful and interesting article and mailing it to an associate or client. Master networkers keep their eyes and ears open for opportunities to advance other people’s interests whenever they can.
  9. Insincerity is like a cake without frosting! You can offer the help, the thanks, the listening ear, but if you aren’t sincerely interested in other person, he’ll know it! Those who have developed successful networking skills convey their sincerity at every turn.
  10. Work your network. It’s not net-sit or net-eat, its net-work, and master networkers don’t let any opportunity to work their networks pass them by. They manage their contacts with contact- management software, organize their email address files and carry their referral partners’ business cards as well as their own. Setting up appointments makes them be acquainted with new contacts so as to learn as much as they possibly can in order for them to part of each other’s network.

Do you see the trend with these 10 points? They all tie into long-term relationship building, not to stalking the prey for the big kill. People who take the time to build their social capital are the ones who will have new business referred to them over and over. The key is to build mutually beneficial business relationships. Only then will you succeed as a master networker.

Search Skills

Find out how to hone your job search skills with workshops, information sessions, career advising, and other resources at Office of Students Career Services.

  • -will the career’s job duties capitalize on my strengths?
  • -How successful will I be performing specific job tasks?
  • -will I enjoy doing the tasks?
  • -will I be happy?

Four yeah plan

OSCS is here to help you in your career process from the moment you enroll at the university. See what steps you should take during each year of your term at Kisii University to land a job or start up your own business before/ as you graduate.