Cambridge Guild releases Michaelmas term card to ‘shake-up’ the careers scene at Cambridge

The termcard features over a dozen companies, socials and even a ball.

Cambridge’s half-century-old student-run business and careers society (formerly known as ‘Cambridge Futures’) has spent the last year rebranding itself to ‘The Cambridge Guild’ in a bold attempt to shake-up the careers scene.

Andy Quach, Co-President of the Guild told The Tab about the new vision: “Careers are an undeniable part of uni-life at Cambridge, but less so than at other unis where business, careers and other such societies are bigger and more active.”

That grad recruitment conveyor belt, amirite?

“Their whole point is to offer something the careers service can’t – to add careers to the Cambridge social scene; run by students for students. So we’re all about lunches, debates, socials and workshops – much less so corporate presentations, as there already lots of those.

“And because we cover a real range of careers, we’re able to go beyond the careers societies currently on the scene in Cambridge. We’re a single home for exploring not just law and finance but also consulting, FMCG, technology, education and the public sector, and more.”

While the Guild is attempting to change the way careers events are run in Cambridge, there are the usual corporate presentations. All the same, some events are indeed of a more social bent.

Garden party: the Guild joined forces with RAG in taking to the Grantchester Meadows in June

To kickstart the term the Guild has put together a lunch with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), open to both final and penultimate year students. This will be followed by another less conventional careers event with Accenture at the start of November. A panel of partners from Accenture will debate The Economist’s “to the brainy, the riches” article, which contends that in an increasingly complicated world, demand for clever consultants is booming.

The Guild has also tapped into law firms in an attempt to steal Law-Soc’s monopoly over them. Bird & Bird, a non magic-circle law firm will speak in Mid November so that you can consider if a smaller, almost as highly-paid organisation will work for you culturally.

Food giant Mars will be coming along in November too, so expect confectionary to mix with careers. The full roster of companies includes finance firms BlackRock and Citigroup, education groups Teach First and Education First, among others.

So many logos, so little time

An array of socials will spice up the Guild’s careers series. Tickets are being released today for the Guild’s Masquerade Ball, held in London at Porchester Hall on Friday 18 November. Members of its sister societies – the LSE and Oxford Guilds – are all invited, so tickets will go fast.

Guild committee members say it will be a unique opportunity for freshers (and other years) to compare notes with their counterparts at the Other Place.

The London Ball

Quach told The Tab: “Social events, social media and so on are small things that will help engage students.

“Engagement is a huge problem in Cambridge. With packed timetables, it takes more than just mailing lists to get Cantabs to go to careers events, however important they might be.”

The Careers Service has even said it is most used after midnight; Cantabs have less time to take pesky preliminary tests and prepare for job interviews than students at other unis.

According to its director, Gordon Chesterman, “Cambridge graduates perform very well in job interviews, however they are often turned down in the initial due to applications which are full of errors.”

The Guild claims that it will thoroughly “shake-up” the careers scene at Cambridge and has lined-up ‘career’ events that are more interesting..