Student activities in administration & management - pointless?

[Jon_Dahl]

I heard a couple of days ago that I was accepted to the executive committee that plans MA programme structures. The committee is comprised of the university's teachers and two student representatives (i.e. me and some other student). That means that I will have to do lots of stuff and attend a lot of meetings and get paid zero. Even my travel expenses won't be covered. I decided to do this just to "decorate" my CV and improve my career prospects. But... does anyone even care? Let's imagine two applicants for a job. Applicant #1 was active in all kind of things at the university while applicant #2 only studied and did nothing else. Why would applicant #1 have any edge over applicant #2?

I guess I'm just trying to (de)motivate myself, but feel free to comment.

[Chen]

Let's imagine two applicants for a job. Applicant #1 was active in all kind of things at the university while applicant #2 only studied and did nothing else. Why would applicant #1 have any edge over applicant #2?

With all other things being equal, clearly Applicant #1 is better just due to extra variety of things done and thus extra experience which could be potentially helpful in a job. Realistically, soft skills (communication, teamwork, initiative etc) are more important than pure technical skills. There's almost certainly going to be on the job learning for the technical stuff anyways. And here I'm talking mainly about the harder sciences, engineering. Sure you need to know your basics and the like, but soft skills are incredibly important. If you're in something like management or business administration or whatever, those extra curriculars are probably even more important. A 4.0 GPA is nice to see on a CV but I'd rather take someone with a 3.5 and a bunch of other experience that shows soft skills.

Taking a job to pad your CV can work, but not if you half-ass it. You need to put the work into it, else when you get asked the questions regarding it at an interview you either need to lie through your teeth or your stories are going to indicate you just did it for padding.

[fire_insideout]

Speaking as someone who does quite a lot of interviews for a medium sized software company:
Most candidates fail on the social part. It's easy to find a skilled developer or engineer, it is hard to find someone who can get along with the team from day one. The people who have done the best in both interviews and after hiring have worked hard on both their hard and soft skills, but the issue is that soft skills are not taught in class. Teamwork and group interaction takes time to learn and the best way to learn it is to interact. You need to learn how to compromise, office diplomacy etc. and that's difficult to do unless you take the time to be part of other activities than just school.

[Merellis]

Applicant 1 would get my interest. They were part of their student council, they joined a committee that was given authority to make their own decisions and then carry them out, with both teachers and students, which shows that the prospective employee has initiative, has experience in working with a team in a professional setting, and also has experience in being part of a project and carrying it out.

That makes a whole lot of difference than someone who's just studious.

Most places don't just want someone who knows the subject, they want people able to work with a team, and able to produce results, and having skills in getting things done.

Edit: Also, experience in administration and management? BONUS.

[Murk]

In my experiences, these things do make a difference - but only if there's nothing else that makes that difference.
In your example, with two otherwise equal applicants, sure, candidate one is slightly better. A committee like this one might be able to just tip the balance slightly. It will never beat actual work experience, or a better suited education, or being good with words, or heck, looking better.

Most people judging your job interview know what you do at student committees: drink a lot of beer, socialize with peers, and essentially be very busy doing things that do not really matter. It shows that you are willing to put in effort, maybe it shows a little ambition and that is nice.
It's nice. It's not great, it's not really relevant, but it's nice. When they really can't choose (or when your resume is so empty they can't talk about anything else) it might just make the difference - but don't expect it to work miracles.

[tomandtish]

The answer, as with so many things in life, is: It depends.

Going for a job with highly technical qualifications and minimal social interaction? Extracurricular activities may not matter that much or at all.

Going for a job where interaction is a critical component? They MAY matter a fair amount depending on the personality of the place you are going to. Some places are goingto be more interested in how well rounded you are than whether you were top of your class. Others won't.

Since our base job and the supervision at our job requires a lot of interaction, when we were hiring supervisor, we always looked at extracurricular activities. Anyone who qualified to be a worker there was technically minimally qualified to supervise, so we were looking for the extras that made someone stand out.

And yes, we actually check up on them whenever possible. Falsify an application? You're getting fired.

[Chen]

Going for a job with highly technical qualifications and minimal social interaction? Extracurricular activities may not matter that much or at all.

Even then really. There's always going to be interaction with your superiors or those asking for things. I'm picturing something like a lab tech or coder, but even those positions there's going to be someone from projects or whatever discussing, at the very least, requirements with you. I'll take someone who personable and slightly worse coder than one who has terrible social skills and may even be slightly better at it.

[Jon_Dahl]

Thank you, friends, I've read the comments so far and I feel a bit more motivated about this board thingy.

[tomandtish]

Even then really. There's always going to be interaction with your superiors or those asking for things. I'm picturing something like a lab tech or coder, but even those positions there's going to be someone from projects or whatever discussing, at the very least, requirements with you. I'll take someone who personable and slightly worse coder than one who has terrible social skills and may even be slightly better at it.

Very true.

Here's a safe answer. Barring doing one that (for some reason) the person hiring you actually hates, they can;t really hurt you unless the time involvement causes your grades to fall a lot. So (barring that), it is at worst a neutral and could be a benefit.

[veti]

Going for a job with highly technical qualifications and minimal social interaction? Extracurricular activities may not matter that much or at all.

To be honest: I've worked in software development for 15 years, manged recruitment for one employer, and I've never heard of that job. There's always some interaction, and even if it starts out minimal, it increases rapidly as you gain seniority.

With my recruitment hat on, I would also say that for an entry-level job, there will likely be lots of applicants who meet the minimum qualifications. Without something to set you apart from the herd, you won't even get an interview.

[Fri]

With my recruitment hat on, I would also say that for an entry-level job, there will likely be lots of applicants who meet the minimum qualifications. Without something to set you apart from the herd, you won't even get an interview.

This. I do lots of screening for entry level job in my company, and since we have like hundreds of applicants per entry, first screening is always cursory scanning of their cv, and if there's nothing really interesting there most of the time I'll just pass them. I'll only read their cv and such in more detail after the cv pass the first filtering to a more manageable number.

[Thinker]

I do a lot of interviews at a good-sized (though, certainly not big) government contracting company that focuses on IT, security, and software development. When it comes to entry-level positions, the more you can put on your resume, the better. After a few years, when you've worked on multiple projects, this sort of thing will drop off, but right now it looks better than a half page covering your education and related skills. Even if you have had internships, all else being equal, this will help. Plus, there's never a bad time to start networking. I've seen a lot of professors who switched back to the private or public sector after not getting into a tenured-track position and they typically end up in mid-to-senior level positions at businesses and government agencies. Your peers you will meet on this committee may be your coworkers in the future. It's a lot easier to get a job at a place with people you know.