I'm just about to complete my bachelor of electrical engineering in Australia and was unsuccessful in gaining graduate employment. All I'm looking for is to break into the job market somewhere above unskilled labour.
As I'll have finished studying soon, I'll have a lot of time to dedicate to improving my chances of gaining employment and these are the options I see available to me, though don't know which would be more valuable to a perspective employer.
-enrol in a masters or PhD(I don't want to work in academia but I could use it to make up for my average grades in my bachelor)
-keep working in my hospitality job and start some projects at home using the knowledge I've learnt from my course(automate the house I'm living in, build a bycicle generator etc.things that won't make me money but....)
-Go to China and learn chinese(I'm already at an upper-intermediate level and after 6-12 months I think I'm capable of becoming semi-fluent)
-Work for free( I would like to do this for a short period of time if it would increase my employability though the companies I've called don't let people do it(legalities) and I don't know any professionals in the field)
Which is best for my employability, or is there something else I should be doing?
After calling back the companies I was unsuccessful with, one of the companies gave me feedback as to why I didn't make the cut:
-My grades(they said I would of made it last year, though this year they were flooded with applicants-bit of a grad glut atm)
-My cover letter (didn't sell myself well enough)
Its too late to do anything about my grades(I shouldn't of been so lazy in my first two years) and I've booked an appointment with my universities careers centre to help further improve my CV and cover letter writing.