The principle behind the Scheme is that people will learn about our business most quickly and effectively by doing a real job, with real responsibilities - it is not the kind of rotational scheme where you will spend a few months in a variety of departments. Neither is it the kind of scheme for aspiring literary editors! The aim of the scheme is not to place you in an imprint as editorial assistant. You are far more likely to be offered a job in an aspect of publishing you didn’t know existed, be it raising Nature’s profile on Second Life or negotiating royalty rates for the e-serialisation of an experimental science-fiction debut! Once we have identified the people we want (usually by the end of April) we start to look for suitable vacancies to offer them. Although these jobs vary enormously in their nature, they have a few key things in common:
They are real jobs - not supernumerary positions invented for the Scheme.
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| They will, by their nature, give you some wider insight into how the business works and allow you to immerse yourself in the challenges facing the future of the publishing industry. This tends to mean that jobs in digital and new media (e-books, websites and strategy) are often offered, as are sales and marketing ones. |
| They will stretch your abilities and allow you to demonstrate your potential - typically they will be more responsible jobs than those normally offered to new graduates. |
| The job offered to you will be governed by the actual vacancies available at the time. Given the current climate, it is likely that most vacancies available will appeal to highly-skilled and techno-savvy graduates. |
| You should expect to spend your first two years with us learning about the business and discovering, for yourself, in which direction your ambitions lie. There is no inherent career advantage, within Macmillan, in being a Graduate Recruit - the Scheme is primarily aimed at offering a first chance to a few talented people - but we are a meritocracy and, if our judgment of you turns out to be correct, we will want to make the best use of your abilities. |