Great portfolios greatly improve job-seekers’ chances

Gone are the days when a CV was the only way to showcase your candidacy to prospective employers. Increasingly, job applicants are required to submit a portfolio of work which is used to pit them against their peers.

“Students must start compiling professional portfolios during their last few years of study, as these documents provide a valuable way for them to demonstrate their unique skill and proficiency,” says Dr Felicity Coughlan, , SA’s largest and most accredited private higher education institution.

She says that a CV and cover letter, while providing all the essential information about a person’s education and past work, are often no longer sufficient in today’s competitive job market.

“One needs to go the extra mile to market yourself, and a portfolio is a valuable tool for boosting your personal brand,” she says.

Coughlan says that public and private higher education institutions should assist students in putting together such portfolios of work, by providing opportunities to do assignments that don’t stay in the lecture room, but can translate to the working place.

“Too often there remains a gap between what is taught in higher education, and the demands of the workplace. That is why, at The IIE, we place such a strong emphasis on work-integrated learning, and the importance of producing stellar portfolios before leaving for the world of work,” she says.

Because of this strong emphasis on being able to showcase work and accomplishments, students from The IIE’s campuses continue to excel on the wider stage.

At the recent Portfolio Night, an annual event hosted by McCann where students from across SA present their work to a panel of the country’s leading creative directors, Katlego Phatlane from The IIE’s Vega School of Brand Leadership, took top honours. This achievement will see him jet off to New York in August, where he will be able to show his mettle in front of a global audience.

Phatlane, a third-year student from Pretoria, will be competing against the winners from other international Portfolio Night finalists at the Portfolio Night All-Stars creative challenge. The week-long event sees All-Stars working on a real brief from a real client, while being mentored and coached by the heavy hitters of the international advertising world.

“Higher education institutions have a duty to build work-specific skills, in a way that students can later demonstrate to their benefit. They need to be able to show what they have done, and what they have learned from what they have done,” says Coughlan.

She says students must be able to apply and test their knowledge in practical situations, and be given opportunities to build the skills and experience that make them work-ready, she says.

And because students will often not have the time and resources to spend too much time gaining work experience and building their portfolios post-graduation, while doing no- or low-paid internships, it is essential that they start considering the body of work they will present to prospective employers while they are still studying, she says.

“Unlike in the past, students can no longer wait for the workplace to start building their personal brand. They have to be able to demonstrate their distinctive offering as soon as they graduate,” she says.

Furthermore, such portfolios are not just applicable to design students.

“Whether students are graduating in IT, business, the arts or human sciences, there will always be ways in which they can turn what they have learned into a portfolio of evidence,” she says.