Career Development

**Schedule**
Monday to Friday; 8:30am-4:30pm

**Education Level**
Bachelor's degree in a related field

**Career Level**
Requires 4 years of relevant experience

**Unit/Project Description**
As the largest Faculty, with approximatley 8,000 undergraduate student, enrolled in 100+ undergraduate programs and 215+ faculty members, the Faculty of Science is an integral part of McMaster University.

Structured around three core service pillars (career, cooperative education and experiential education), we empower students to gain professional experience, understand labour market trends, develop viable career plans and successfully transition from education to career.

We deliver a range of programming including a range of career workshops and industry events, a career preparation course, Skills for Career Success in Science, and provide one-on-one appointments.

Committed to ensuring our science students are career ready on graduation, we are highly innovative in our approach and are in the midst of several new initiatives to better serve our students, including Design Your Science Career, inspired by the highly successful Stanford Design Your Life model and The Science Career Competency Framework project.

**Job Summary**
Responsible for planning, organizing and coordinating career development placements. Promotes student development, success and retention, and encourages career achievement by conducting interviews with students dealing with career choice, educational direction and goal progress.

**Purpose and Key Functions**
- Identify, develop, and cultivate strategic employer relationships in the business community.
- Interview students to assess suitability and make decisions on admittance to the program.
- Interview employer partners to understand recruitment needs.
- Provide individual coaching services and guidance in developing self-marketing and branding tools including, but not limited to, job search strategies, resume critiques, preparation of cover letters and personal statements, interview skills, networking, portfolio development, and negotiation skills.
- Conduct mock interviews by creating specific questions that are relevant to the field of employment students are pursuing, and then provide constructive feedback to students.
- Conduct post-work placement interviews with students to discuss experiences and future goals.
- Write career and skill development materials, and design interview tools.
- Write a variety of documents including, but not limited to, reference letters, correspondence and workshop plans.
- Create, implement and maintain policies and procedures related to the program and career services offered.
- Facilitate or lead career development workshops.
- Coordinate and accompany students on site visits and discuss work objectives.
- Create promotional materials to market program to potential applicants, visitors, and representatives from other institutions at fairs and open house events.
- Plan and coordinate costs, logistics and resources, including catering and audio visual equipment, for career events, information sessions, workshops and speaker presentations.
- Calculate travel expenses for attendance at site visits, seminars, conferences and professional development.
- Track attendance of students using services and compare statistics from previous years.
- Gather, compile, and analyze information identifying labour market data, trends, and job opportunities.
- Review current labour markets and research current trends within professional careers and employment requirements including skill level and comparable salaries offered.
- Request participation and invite employers to post-employment opportunities within the department.
- Act as a liaison between faculty, staff and students to ensure the timely communication of information and adherence to policies and procedures.
- Participate in meetings with students to discuss and provide guidance regarding individual career options.
- Assemble and distribute materials and packages.
- Understand and stay current on employment legislation and government mandates.

**Suprvision**
- Provide direction to others in how to carry out work tasks,
- Ensures adherence to quality standards and procedures for short-term staff ans volunteers.

**Requirements**:

- Bachelor’s degree in a related field.
- Requires 4 years of relevant experience.

**Assets**

The following are considered assets and may be given preference:

- Educational background in Science
- Experience in providing career education or preparation services in a post-secondary context
- Detailed understanding of career options in the various disciplines within Science is highly desirable
- Prior experience in instructing career preparation courses or workshops is desired
- Career Development Practitioner (CDP) or equivalent certification
- Knowledge of the ORBIS/OSCARPlus database system and Microsoft Office

**Additional Information**
- Some evening and weekend work required.

**