How to build experience when you’re struggling to land your first job

Starting out in your career or shifting to a new field often feels like a catch-22: you need experience to get a job, but you need a job to get experience. How are you supposed to enter a career if the entry-level positions already require experience in the career?

Here’s the thing: when a job description lists a requirement like “2-3 years of relevant experience”, this isn’t always as rigid as it sounds. For a hiring manager, length of experience is a helpful rubric; it tells them you’ll likely have picked up the skills and knowledge they need for the role. But if you can show that you have these capabilities, the exact number of years of experience under your belt becomes far less important.

This is good news. By strategically building relevant experience through the approaches outlined here, you can bypass the experience paradox and position yourself as a compelling candidate for roles that require some experience. What’s more, you can do this in all sorts of ways other than landing a conventional job. Let’s start by assessing where you are now and what you’ll need to bridge the gap.

This guide covers four ways to build real experience without needing to get that elusive entry-level job:

• Courses, qualifications, and accreditations – Opportunities to develop knowledge and skills needed for the roles you want.
• Internships and fellowships – Structured programs that will develop your skills and look good on your resume.
• Volunteering – Unpaid work within organizations that closely resembles “proper” work.
• Independent projects – Projects you can undertake by yourself, and that can impress potential employers and give you more professional presence.

The underlying process here is simple. It’s about finding the things you can do now that most closely resemble concrete work experience, and to pursue these until you can demonstrate you’ve got what’s needed to be worth considering for those entry-level roles.

This guide primarily focuses on people seeking their first professional role, but much of the advice applies equally to career changers. If you’re an established professional looking to pivot fields, you’ll find the same core principle applies: demonstrating you can do the work matters more than your exact background. The key difference is that you likely already have transferable skills and professional credibility; you just need to make the connections explicit and potentially fill specific knowledge gaps. 

Building up for career development

Before diving into specific opportunities it’s important to assess where you currently stand in relation to the roles that you want, and ensure you have the baseline knowledge and skills needed to participate in the kinds of development opportunities that will let you step up for those entry-level roles. 

Identify requirements for jobs you want

The first step is to work out exactly what’s needed for the kinds of roles you want. This will help you understand exactly what kind of additional experience you need. To do this, browse job boards and collect 5-10 job descriptions of the kind of entry-level or junior roles you’re targeting. Look for patterns in the requirements; what skills, experiences, and knowledge appear repeatedly? Do they require a degree in a specific subject? A number of years’ working with a particular software or coding language? Note down the most common requirements–these are ones that will likely be necessary 

When you’re looking through these job descriptions, bear in mind that so-called ‘requirements’ often aren’t as strict as they sound. When listing requirements for candidates, employers often list their ideal candidate, but are in fact open to a wider range of backgrounds. What the hiring manager cares about is whether your resume indicates you can do the job, not that you’re ticking boxes for the sake of it. If you don’t meet every requirement, try to be creative in working out what equivalent experience might look like, using the experience types covered in this guide as a starting point. 

From this analysis, you can estimate how much additional experience you need to become competitive for entry-level positions. This becomes your target—the experience gap you need to close before you can be a competitive candidate for the roles you’re interested in.

Next steps: Research job descriptions for your target roles and create a list of the most commonly required skills and experiences. 

Assess your current experience

The next step is to honestly assess how much experience you already have that’s relevant to the roles you’re interested in.

Start by cataloging all the experience you have. This includes paid work, education, volunteering, personal projects, university coursework, and even significant hobbies. Don’t filter too much at this stage; include anything that involves some level of responsibility, skill development, or achievement that could plausibly count as relevant experience.The experience you catalogue here might not look exactly like the job descriptions you compiled, but what matters is whether you’ve done anything that can show employers you’ve done something similar enough to count in your favor, even if it’s not precisely what they had in mind. 

Then, start mapping your current experience onto the roles you identified. The goal here is to find out where you’re meeting the bar, and where you need to develop further. Be realistic about the relevance of your experience; if you ran a student society for two years, don’t count this the same as 2 years of full-time operations experience, but it may still demonstrate a bunch of core skills needed for the jobs you’re interested in, narrowing the gap from where you are now to ultimately getting these jobs.

This step is even more important if you’re an established professional changing careers, as you’ll have a wealth of experience behind you. If you can wring out as much relevant experience from your previous work as you can (even if it’s not immediately obvious), you can greatly accelerate the pace you’re able to enter this new path.

Next steps: List all your experiences including paid work, education, volunteering, projects, and even significant hobbies. Try not to filter–what’s important is getting down as much as you can that could plausibly help you in your applications. You can always ignore parts of this list later.

Building the experience you need

Once you’ve evaluated your existing background and worked out what you might need to work on, you can start pursuing concrete experience. Here, we’ll outline some of the most valuable sources of knowledge and practical experience to help you fill the gap towards your target roles. Importantly, these steps all require little-to-no prior experience; they’re ways to start advancing towards the jobs you want right now.

Courses, qualifications, and accreditations

Getting any needed baseline education and credentials is often the first thing to look at when building experience for a first role in a field, whether it’s a degree, training program, or even a short online course. In general, courses and qualifications are particularly important when the roles you’re interested in explicitly list educational requirements; it can be hard to get around these through other means, so getting the right education might be a needed step. 

Having significant background knowledge is also needed (or at least very helpful) for your further attempts to gain experience. Even if you’re applying for volunteer positions, internships, or starting independent projects, you’ll want a solid foundational set of skills and knowledge. Without this, it’ll be hard to find opportunities worth highlighting on your CV or to start independent projects worth sharing publicly.

Broadly speaking, the most important type of qualification is a degree. A huge proportion of jobs require candidates to have an undergraduate degree, with many jobs requiring specific subjects or majors. If you’ve yet to complete a degree, this might play an important part in which subject you choose to study.

If you already have a degree but it’s not relevant for the jobs you’re interested in, extra study can be invaluable. Generally speaking, the further away your current academic background is from your target roles, the more time you’ll need to invest getting up to speed. One of the best routes is a postgraduate course designed for people from unrelated backgrounds, often called “conversion” courses. These are a significant investment, usually taking one or two years of full-time study. A less intensive option is “bootcamps”, which provide training in a new area over several weeks or months. 

Most of the time, however, you won’t be looking for roles that require an entirely different degree to the one you have. Instead, you’ll be looking to fill out your existing knowledge or plug specific gaps that disqualify you from the jobs you want. This is where taking courses (mostly online) can be hugely helpful.

Online platforms like Coursera, edX, and LinkedIn Learning offer courses in virtually every field, many of which are free to audit, though certificates usually cost extra. It’s hard to go too wrong when choosing a course (so long as it’s relevant to what you need to learn), but some courses can be much better than others, both in quality, and how they’re perceived by employers. For instance, Google’s career certifications are often particularly respected. The ultimate goal is to build enough competency to meet the requirements employers are looking for and show it to them in ways they can recognise, both on your CV, but also in any interviews or work tests. 

Next steps: If you identified significant knowledge gaps in the previous step, research the most respected courses and certifications in your target field. If you’re taking on a course or reading list, set a realistic study schedule that you can maintain alongside other commitments. If you need a degree, explore whether postgraduate conversion courses or intensive bootcamps might be viable options for your situation.

Internships and fellowships

Internships and fellowships are specifically designed for people entering or transitioning into new fields, making them one of the most important avenues into a career you don’t have much prior experience in. They’re also credible to employers. Because internships and fellowships involve competitive applications, having one on your resume signals that someone else has already vetted your potential. It’s a vote of confidence that goes beyond the specific experience you’ll get from one. They also tend to be structured to help you develop, often including mentorship opportunities, something that’s harder to get in both volunteering and independent projects.

Internships and fellowships vary a lot in their scope. Some are short, several-week introductions to a field, while others are essentially entry-level jobs, lasting one or two years with a salary. Naturally, the closer the internship or fellowship is to a proper role, the more the experience will help fill that 2-3 year experience gap, but don’t underestimate the value of shorter internships. These can still provide important development and networking opportunities, and they’re also a lower-commitment way to try out a field or organization you’re interested in.

These opportunities may be particularly valuable for students. Many are available exclusively to students, and college gives you the flexibility to take on commitments without needing to take time out of an established career.

Next steps: Identify as many internships and fellowships as you can that are relevant to your target profession, then organize them by how good they’d be for your development. Work out whether it’s worth applying to them already, or whether you need to develop more baseline knowledge first. 

Volunteering

Volunteering is another great way to get experience. Though you won’t usually be treated quite the same as a full employee, volunteering can offer an experience that’s very similar to a conventional role. Volunteering arrangements vary widely. Some involve ongoing commitments where you contribute a few hours per week over an extended period, while others are structured around completing a specific project. Whatever form your volunteering takes, it’ll demonstrate investment in the career path–a good signal to send potential employers. If the volunteering is relevant enough, you should also develop some skills and knowledge during the volunteering you can highlight when applying for a paid position.

Organizations will usually have lower bars for volunteers than paid positions, making this a slightly more accessible entry point than internships and fellowships, at least on average. Although, on the other hand, the lack of wage may make volunteering more difficult for many people to pursue. Unless you’re already financially secure, you’ll need to do this alongside your job or studies.

Also keep in mind that, even though you’re volunteering, organizations are still taking a risk on you. They’ll need to invest time in training and supervising your work, and they’re hoping you’ll be genuinely useful. If you’re applying for an advertised volunteering opportunity, take it seriously and treat it like a proper job application. But if you’re reaching out to an organization not already seeking volunteers, it’s particularly important to make your request clear and compelling. They probably weren’t already planning to take on volunteers, so you want to make it as easy for them to say yes as possible. Here’s a rough example email you can build from:

• First, explain why you’re reaching out: ‘I hope this email finds you well! I’m emailing to express my interest in volunteering at Animals First’.
• Explain why you’re reaching out to this organization specifically, and show that you’ve done your homework: ‘I’m looking to build a career in animal advocacy research, and I’ve recently been really excited by the research published by Animals First. Your report on caged hen welfare significantly changed my perspective on how important it is, and I regularly share your work with others I know interested in animal welfare’.
• Explain the kind of work you’d like to do: ‘I’d be looking to assist in research and content editing, helping to support the existing researchers at the organization.’
• Highlight your existing skills and knowledge: ‘During college, I wrote two papers on animal welfare policy in the US. I was also part of my college’s animal welfare society, where I helped organize over 20 visiting speakers and developed a broad knowledge base.’
• Make any further practical constraints clear: ‘I’d be looking to spend 5-10 hours per week volunteering for 4-5 months, and would be working from the US Eastern time zone. I’d be happy to be flexible with my working hours in order to attend meetings, if needed. I’m happy to work autonomously, depending on your team’s preferences and capacity’.
• Finally, sign off with a friendly conclusion. ‘Please let me know if you’d like any further information! Thank you for your time either way, and keep up the great work.’

Finally, one particularly accessible form of volunteering, especially for students, is running or getting involved with interest groups and student societies. These offer hands-on experience in all sorts of skills, like leadership, operations, event planning, communication, and marketing, making them good options for a host of different careers. Societies are also quite a safe way to be given genuine responsibility; universities often provide funding and administrative support, meaning you’ll take on little financial or reputational risk.

Next steps: First, search job boards and organization pages to find advertised volunteering opportunities; these will be the easiest to apply to, and will (often) offer the most structure. Then, make a list of organizations that don’t advertise volunteering opportunities, but that you’d be keen to work with. Prioritize this list by organizations you think would offer the best or most relevant experience. Then, start reaching out and applying, making clear what kinds of work you’d be looking for, and how you could help them. 

Independent projects

If structured positions aren’t available or don’t fit your schedule, completing a relevant project yourself is often a great strategy, and there are lots of ways to go about it. You can start to narrow down the projects you consider by thinking of ones that are as relevant as you can for the jobs you ultimately want. Prioritize projects where you’ll end up with a ‘deliverable’, something tangible you can show people or write about. Here are some examples of independent projects that can build genuine career capital:

• Tech: Consider building an app, website, or contributing to open-source projects. We’d recommend building in public, documenting the development process publicly for others to see.
• Design: Develop an online portfolio with your best work. Highlight the work that most resembles the work you want to do.
• Policy/Research: Read and summarize policy or research papers, or offer your own policy proposals. Find a way to make these public, whether through blogs or forum posts. If the work is developed enough, also consider whether you could get it published by an existing outlet, such as a magazine (or even an academic journal).
• Operations: Consider running an event, like a fundraiser or conference. Then, write a case study, detailing how you managed the logistics and dealt with challenges. 
• Writing/Communications: Start a blog or newsletter on a topic that’s relevant to the jobs you’re after. If you keep this up regularly, note 1-3 of your strongest pieces that you can highlight to employers.

As a general rule, the more serious and professional your project looks, the more prospective employers will interpret it as relevant experience for their open roles. You’re also demonstrating initiative, which can go a long way to addressing the experience gap. You’re showing that you can deliver results without someone holding your hand through the process.

Additionally, projects give you concrete examples to discuss when networking as well as applying for future jobs. If you link to something impressive you’ve done in your cover letter, there’s a good chance the hiring manager will see it. Public projects can also make you much more visible to potential employers and referrers.

Next steps: Spend some time drafting ideas for projects you could take on. Use the job descriptions of roles you’re interested in to guide this–the closer you can make your project to the sort of work you’d do in these jobs, the better. To help, work out whether (and how) you can make your project public, for instance through a blog, social media, or professional community.

A practical example

Let’s make everything we’ve discussed more concrete. Here, we’ll take you through the requirements for a genuine ‘junior economist’ role advertised on our job board at the time of writing (with a few details changed). For each requirement, we’ll show you how to interpret what the employer really wants, assess whether your existing experience counts, and identify how you could go about filling any gaps.

“Undergraduate degree in economics, statistics, political science, or public policy. Strong quantitative and critical thinking skills.”

Though this may look like a strict requirement to have a specific degree under your belt, the employer is really showing they value the baseline knowledge and skills that these degrees confer—not the titles themselves. Though having a degree is likely necessary here, the employer will almost certainly consider other degree subjects, provided they demonstrate similar skills. For instance, a mathematics degree could likely qualify, provided you can supplement this with some experience in the social sciences. Similarly, a sociology degree might also work, particularly if it involved a significant research component. 

If your degree is far away from these subjects, then this still isn’t a lost cause. Postgraduate study (especially a conversion course) may be sufficient. But failing this, a substantial amount of independent learning, volunteer work, and other projects can also demonstrate background knowledge equivalent to a degree–though you may need to invest a significant amount of time into these to get to the right level.

“Self-starter who will thrive in a start-up setting by taking ownership and initiative.”

This requirement is a little more ambiguous, but there are all sorts of experiences you could point to in order to demonstrate this quality. Think about projects you’ve run, student societies you’ve helped with, or any times you’ve worked in small teams. What they care about is the environments you’ve worked in and whether they demonstrate your autonomy and agency. Importantly, this doesn’t need to be work that’s closely related to the role itself, meaning you can be liberal with the experiences you draw from.

“2+ years of relevant work experience preferred, including working on empirical evaluations and research.”

This is the dreaded “x years of experience” that many fresh job-seekers struggle with. Here, it’s listed as a preference rather than a requirement, but it’s likely you’ll need some genuine work experience to be a competitive candidate. The closer this experience is to the intended role, the less the amount of experience will matter. In this case, an internship or volunteering experience at a similar organization would be invaluable, though independent research and evaluation projects would also go a long way. It’s also possible that experiences in your degree could suffice, particularly if you did any significant coursework involving research and empirical evaluation (and did well on it).

“Significant experience with Stata or R required. Experience with additional programming languages is a bonus.”

This requirement is fairly easy to interpret: there’s no getting around the need for competency in one of these specific statistics languages. If you used one of these extensively during your degree, for several significant pieces of coursework, for instance, this might already be enough. If you didn’t, then this is where online courses and accreditations in Stata or R would be helpful. It’s worth finding out if there are any industry standard accreditations that employers are likely to recognize. If you want to be an even more compelling candidate, also consider conducting an independent piece of data analysis where you can put these skills to use, especially if you can produce something tangible to show.

Summary

Now you’ve read about the strategies for building experience, it’s time to put it into action. Distilling all the advice we’ve covered here, these are some helpful next steps to take:

Assess where you’re at right now. Collect 5-10 job descriptions for your target entry-level roles and identify the most commonly required skills and experiences (you can use our job board). Then honestly assess your current background against these requirements. Where are the biggest gaps? Which requirements can you already partially meet by reframing your existing experience? This diagnostic will guide your focus towards the most helpful next steps.

Identify and pursue opportunities. Now’s the time to start plugging these gaps, whether through courses, qualifications, volunteering, internships, or even better, a mix of these. Do some research and make a prioritized list: which 2-3 opportunities would be most valuable for your development? Apply for competitive positions like internships and fellowships while also doing things you control, like independent study or projects. 

Start building connections. Throughout all of these steps, don’t underestimate the importance of networking for landing entry-level jobs. If you have a relationship with someone in a hiring organization, they can be more willing to look past ways in which your CV might diverge from their requirements. Remember, the job requirements are just a broad brush to whittle down applications; if someone already knows you, your experience on paper matters less (though this varies a lot between organizations). In this way, personal connections can provide a shortcut through formal requirements.

Finally, continue searching for genuine entry-level positions that require experience you already have–provided your background is relevant enough. Though these might seem few and far between, some are likely to crop up eventually. Fortunately, all the things you’re doing in the meantime, whether that be volunteering, starting a project, or completing internships, will make you an even more competitive candidate when one does arrive.