LinkedIn is a powerful resource for building relationships, expanding your industry profile and getting ahead. For students and young professionals, it’s an indispensable tool for tapping into the increasingly competitive job market.
The social network for professionals is growing exponentially. With 238 million members globally, LinkedIn has become a talent pool for savvy employers looking to fill a spectrum of roles.
Here are three ways you can use LinkedIn to supercharge your job-seeking efforts:
- Setting up your LinkedIn profile
Your LinkedIn profile is like an online resume where you’re marketing yourself to prospective employers and associates. So think carefully about how you want to appear and keep that in mind when writing your profile.
One of the great things about LinkedIn is that it’s totally customisable, so if you don’t have extensive work experience, don’t worry. You can display your education, skills and expertise prominently by bringing those sections to the top.
Get started by writing an informative profile headline including suitable keywords so that it’s easy for prospective employers to find you. For example, “student at National University seeking taxation role” or “Tax, accounting and law honours student”. Next, write a concise professional summary including your relevant experience to date, skills and career aspirations. Include any awards, honours and professional memberships, but keep it under 200 words for easy reading.
If you’re already working or have completed internships, ask your supervisors for recommendations and endorsements of your skills and experience. These can go a long way to making you stand out from the crowd.
Don’t forget to upload a professional profile photo – usually a headshot against a blank background. If you don’t have a suitable image, ask a friend to take a fresh one. Profiles with a photo are viewed more often than those without.
- Research your industry
Once you have a professional profile in place, you can start networking. LinkedIn industry groups function as communities where you can network with potential colleagues and peers, get valuable advice and stay up to date with industry news and developments. These groups are a powerful source of information and insight into your industry. You can also follow company pages of organisations you’d like to work for. For example, check out The Tax Institute’s LinkedIn group and company page.
To get started, identify a few groups that line up with your career interests and apply to join them. Follow the conversation, comment on discussions and share interesting content that you come across online. LinkedIn pushes a highly relevant stream of articles and job advertisements to your news feed based on your interests and connections, so don’t be afraid to share content within LinkedIn or from outside the network.
- Connect with your dream employers
Research shows that around 44 per cent of jobs are found and filled by networking, creating a huge hidden job market. In fact it’s estimated that over half (58 per cent) of candidates actively seeking new roles found them this way, and that was even higher for passive candidates (81%). Employers count LinkedIn as a serious recruitment channel and use it to headhunt emerging talent.
Take advantage of this by creating a list of your ideal employers and following them on LinkedIn. Sign up for job alerts (under the Jobs tab) so you are notified about roles as they come up.
Remember that LinkedIn isn’t Facebook or Twitter, so don’t bombard your connections with constant updates. That said, try to update your status with something of interest or value regularly, at least once a week, and take part in conversations more often.
Do be selective about who you connect with on LinkedIn. You’re cultivating your future professional network, so think about quality not quantity. LinkedIn is a powerful ally for jobseekers willing to invest some time and effort – and a must for young professionals.
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If you want to take your professional life to new heights, obtaining a Chartered Tax Adviser (CTA) designation could transform your work prospects and see your career take off. Conceived by the UK’s Chartered Institute of Taxation, a CTA designation serves as the ultimate accreditation for taxation professionals around the world.
The qualification spans professional and postgraduate levels of tax education and is tailored to varying levels of expertise. Here are three compelling ways a CTA designation can help you achieve more.
Industry recognition
Whether you dream of working for a multinational finance firm or a humble not-for-profit, a CTA designation will supercharge your employability and set you apart from other candidates. Chartered Tax Advisers are required to absorb complex technical knowledge and develop a nuanced understanding of taxation issues – attributes that equip them to deal with a spectrum of business challenges. In many ways, a CTA signifies that a tax professional is at the top of their game. In a tight job market, it serves as a powerful asset that can help secure competitive edge.
Going global
Country-specific regulations might make it difficult for taxation professionals to launch global careers, but a CTA designation is a passport to international success. CTA students learn how to manage international tax risks and comply with cross-border reporting duties – powerful knowledge that will put you head and shoulders above the rest. Tax practitioners who attain CTA status are sought after in job markets across the UK, Europe and Ireland. This means greater access to hard-to-find international roles and can fast-track your career growth.
Future-proofing your career
A CTA designation can often attract high-profile clients who want to invest in the industry’s best. It also cultivates leadership abilities and sharp analytical skills – paving the way for greater remuneration, professional stability and the chance to get your career one step ahead.
Designed by industry leaders and taxation experts, The Chartered Tax Adviser Program is rigorous but also flexible and fair. It represents the ultimate step towards your dream taxation career. If you decide to embrace it, you’ll never look back.
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If you are a tertiary education student, The Tax Institute can help you progress in your career journey.
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In keeping with our mission to equip tax professionals – including aspiring professionals like yourself – with everything you need to be work ready, we are proud to launch the new Careers in Tax Week.
How to establish your career in tax session – FREE session for you
If you want to be a leader in the tax, who better to learn from than the professionals who are the recognised leaders of the tax profession?
Held in September, the Careers in Tax Week features a free online session specifically for students and graduates of tax – How to establish your career in tax.
The session is designed to give you the big picture on working in tax, and will provide an overview of the tax profession, the different types of careers that are available to you, and practical advice on getting your career started.
And you can enjoy these free online webinars from a location that suits you.
Give yourself the edge with free Student Membership
If you are a tertiary education student, The Tax Institute can help you progress in your career journey.
Find out about Student Membership.
If you think a taxation career is tailor-made for detail-oriented perfectionists, it may be time to reconsider. To excel in tax, you need a strong blend of commercial acumen and creative vision – qualities that work as catalysts for taking a business to new heights. And from high-powered politicians to global CFOs, these former tax professionals boast the kind of career trajectories that prove taxation is about more than just crunching numbers.
Peter Costello – Chairman of the Independent Advisory Board, World Bank
It’s hard to find a figure that demonstrates the way taxation knowledge can fuel success as powerfully as Peter Costello. The former Liberal Party Treasurer, who honed his legal expertise working as a solicitor at law firm Mallesons Stephens Jacques in the 1980s, abolished seven taxes and minimised company, income and capital gains tax in what is widely considered Australia’s most influential tax reform.
Since leaving the Liberal Party, Costello founded boutique corporate advisory firm BKK Partners, heads up lobbying firm EGC and was appointed as chairperson of the Independent Advisory Board – an anti-corruption body established by the World Bank in Washington.
Joycelyn Morton – Snowy Hydro Limited, Non-Executive Director
If you’re sceptical about the relationship between a taxation background and leadership talent, just ask Joycelyn Morton. An early career role working in audit and tax at PricewaterhouseCoopers served as a powerful foundation for a series of professional milestones, culminating in her appointment as Vice President Accounting Services for Netherlands-based petroleum giant Shell. She was earlier appointed Group Taxation Manager for Woolworths and has held non-executive directorships at fashion retailer Noni B, wealth management firm Count Financial and the Crane Group.
Morton’s combination of industry expertise and vision also saw her appointed National President of accounting body CPA Australia in 2000 – proof of how taxation expertise can cultivate the big-picture thinking that’s central to effective leadership.
Chris Jordan – Commissioner of Taxation, ATO
When Chris Jordan started working at financial services firm KPMG, he had no idea that his career would see him advising John Howard on taxation matters or designing systems to enable the smooth implementation of the GST. Jordan, who was previously chairman of KPMG NSW and partner in charge of the NSW Tax and Legal Division, has seen his taxation prowess take him from strength to strength – he’s steered the country’s biggest businesses through tricky financial matters and was recently named Commissioner of Taxation, a move that sees him heading up the ATO.
A background in taxation is a springboard that can take your career further than you ever dreamed possible. So the only question is: where do you want to go?
Give yourself the edge with free Student Membership
If you are a tertiary education student, The Tax Institute can help you progress in your career journey.
Find out about Student Membership.
Resume
When writing a resume for a tax position, it is important that the information disclosed is written in a concise and logical manner.
A summary of your work experience and the use of bullet points within a resume can help recruiters easily determine whether candidates are suitable for a position e.g. where candidates are applying for a graduate position, there may be numerous applications, so it is best to present your resume in a manner which is convenient for the person reviewing it.
Further, where a cover letter is required, it is important that it is tailored to the individual position being applied for, and the company/firm which the application is being made to. Whilst your resume will generally not vary too much, the cover letter should be very specific and gives you the opportunity to distinguish yourself from other candidates.
Tax job search tips (where and when to look)
For students currently at University, careers fairs are usually the best place to start looking for tax positions. Most firms attend University careers fairs in order to promote upcoming opportunities they have such as graduate positions etc.
However, if students know the type of organisations/firms they want to work for, they should go to their websites and search for current and upcoming opportunities there. Although most organisations/firms recruit at different times throughout the year, candidates should be looking to apply for positions such as graduate positions in their penultimate year of study.
Further, many organisations/firms offer vacation/clerkship opportunities, which can also lead to graduate positions.
What to expect in an entry-level position
A tax graduate can expect all types of things in an entry-level position/graduate position. In a professional services environment, this can range from having to do various tasks, attending various meetings, on the job training, formal class room technical training, mentoring and coaching from senior staff, and attending social events just to name a few.
Generally, when you start as a graduate in tax, you will spend a lot of time initially doing research, which helps candidates become familiar with tax law concepts. This is usually followed up with assisting with tax compliance (such as income tax returns, business activity statements and fringe benefits tax) and providing assistance with tax consulting pieces.
Graduates may also get the opportunity to attend client meetings, and/or internal meetings with other business divisions.
Contributed by Pitcher Partners of NSW.
Give yourself the edge with free Student Membership
If you are a tertiary education student, The Tax Institute can help you progress in your career journey.
Find out about Student Membership.
