Looking back at our 2022 career fair visits

Metis regularly attends local engineering and science career fairs at universities across the country to meet with budding engineers and help them plan their future careers.

This year, members of the Metis team made it to five career fairs in total and gave two industry talks. If you’d like to learn more about these career fairs and what we made of our experience talking with budding engineering and environmental professionals, just keep reading!

Selecting our ambassadors

At Metis, we boast one of the youngest and most diverse engineering and environmental teams in the UK, so we made sure the students at these careers fairs could see that.

We had colleagues from a range of teams attend, including graduates, seniors, directors, and apprentices, to show students what the Metis experience is like at every stage.

Presenting at industry talks

Metis gave two industry talks at these career fairs, which were very well attended. For each talk, we tailored the content to focus on subjects we know the students would find relevant to them, interesting, and care the most about.

The Metis team gave the students and others in the industry education on our work, from carbon accounting and our design process to how we manage flood risks.

Opening up the floor for Q&A

After each of our talks, we held space for some questions and answers with the students for about half an hour.

This was a great networking opportunity for the students, helping them learn more about the many paths they can take in the civil and environmental engineering industry and meet potential employers.

Common questions among students

Having attended five careers fairs and given two industry talks, we talked to our fair share of engineering and science students. Interestingly, there were a few common questions that kept coming up.

Does a lack of experience matter?

Many students asked us about the kind of experience they would need to secure a job after finishing their degree, as many of them could not attend internships due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

We made sure they knew that a lack of experience isn’t as important to recruiters as they may think. For Metis, at least, if someone has the right attitude, interest, and ambition to succeed in this industry, we will, of course, consider them.

How genuine is your sustainability stance?

Another topic that came up a lot was questions surrounding how sustainable we are as a company and whether it’s genuine. Authentic sustainability is a value shared among most students, and something we, as a company, are proud to confirm is a value of ours too.

We informed the students that everything we do as a company is grounded in sustainability, and we have the numbers, projects, and real-life impact to show for it.

The outcome

The Metis team spoke to hundreds of students over the past few career fairs and industry talks, helping to give them a flavour of the types of projects we work on, what we get involved in day-to-day, and our wider impact in the UK and local communities.

By giving them an insight into the industry and what it’s really like to work within an environmental and civil engineering team, we helped the students to reflect on what path feels best suited for them.

Extending our gratitude for all those who attended

We want to say a massive thank you to every person who took the time to come and speak with us at these careers fairs or attended one of our industry talks.

We hope that many of you walked away with a new perspective, more clarity, and, most importantly, excitement for your future career.

Our team here at Metis can’t wait to connect with the engineers and environmental consultants of tomorrow, ready to help us pave the way for a more sustainable future. Are you one of them? If so, we’d love to hear from you!

Keep an eye on our graduate opportunities page to apply for one of our open engineering apprenticeship, internship, or graduate roles.