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Before the first step into adulthood, a lot of thoughts arise. What is a good deal? How should I think about holidays? What happens if I get sick? Calm down, we sort out five things you should think about before your first job.

1. The employment contract

The employment contract is basically a summary of your employment - your duties, salary, obligations and rights. Feel free to get the employment contract already when you are promised the job. The employment contract is a security for both you and the employer. Therefore, be sure to read it carefully before signing.

2. Salary claims

It can be difficult to know what a reasonable salary is. Examine what the average salary is for similar jobs. Wage setting is based on previous experience, but even as a first-time employee, you have the right to negotiate the salary. Keep in mind that the starting salary may play a role in your future salary development.

Holidays and leave

Your right to vacation depends on the type of employment you have. A full-time or part-time job entitles you to 25 days of holiday per year, while the rules for holidays in a project position or in a temporary position vary more. In a fixed-term employment, holiday pay is given, which is an extra supplement to the salary, instead of holiday days.

4. Ob supplement

Working hours during evenings, weekends and nights are called inconvenient working hours and for those times an ob supplement is sometimes paid. The times that are considered inconvenient are stated in the collective agreement. If your employer has not signed a collective agreement, there is no obligation to pay such compensation.

5. Sickness benefit

Find out what applies at your new workplace if you become ill. It is always good to know what applies to sick pay, compensation and how to report sick, even before a possible illness occurs.

The personal letter is your chance to show why you are the right person for a job - but how do you get an interesting introduction? We have spoken with recruitment consultant Maria Stenbäck who suggests some professional introductions to the personal letter!

Writing a good personal letter is not the easiest thing to do. It should describe why you are the right person for the job - at the same time as the recruiter who reads it should get a better idea of who you are as a person. With a good introduction to the personal letter, you arouse the reader's interest early on and give it a good push into the text.

Maria Stenbäck is a recruitment consultant at Manpower and reads personal letters daily for a number of different roles. According to her, a good introduction everything.

- The introduction is the most important part of the personal letter, it is probably your first contact with the recruiter. Here you want to arouse interest in that person by standing out among all the candidates who apply, says Maria.

A common mistake that Maria sees in personal letters is that you start by repeating information from your CV. Here, you should instead use the space to directly show why you are the right person for the job, she says.

- Many people are in the habit of starting their personal letter with the sentence: "Hello! My name is First name Last name, I am 35 years old, live in Gothenburg and am now looking for the job as a receptionist ”. Skip that sentence I would say! I have probably already read your CV, so I already have this information. My tip is to get to the point immediately instead, says Maria.

Three tips for good introductions

Just because you go straight to the point does not mean that you can not be personal and reasoning. According to Maria, the key to a good personal letter is to be concise, while trying to show your future potential.

- Try to find out as briefly and concisely as possible why you are best suited for this position and why you are interested in the company. I like to see personal letters that show the potential of a candidate. Think about the future more than repeating your CV, she says.

Here are three examples that Malin Stenbäck thinks are good introductions to a personal letter:

1. "If you are looking for a dedicated, structured assistant who is passionate about providing world-class service, then you have me here!"

In this example, the introduction is linked to important features that are requested in the job advertisement. Here it is important to further develop this in your personal letter with concrete examples of how you are just engaged and structured.

2. “As a child, I always helped friends and relatives plan parties. Ever since then, I have known that I want to work with events.”

This introduction is an example of how to tell a little about yourself without being too personal. It serves as an entrance where you do not have to further develop how you liked to plan events as a young person.

3. "As a former high-level football player, I know that hard work pays off, which has generated me to succeed well in my previous sales roles."

This is a very effective bridging method where you connect characteristics from a side job with your work. It shows that you are justified in what you claim and that goal-oriented is a quality that permeates all your achievements. 

When was the last time you reviewed your CV? With the onset of spring, it can be a good idea to review your CV and do a proper spring cleaning, regardless of whether you are in a job search or not. These are usually changes that feel small but that make a big difference when it's time to apply for a new job. We go through the most important headlines!

1. Add new jobs and titles

The first and most important point is of course to update your CV if you have a new job. Even if you have not changed jobs, this can still be a good opportunity to update any titles that have changed - maybe your job has been given a new name or a new focus?

2. Tell us about new areas of responsibility

Sometimes it can be easy to forget that one's service is evolving or simply growing in scope. Therefore, take this opportunity to look back on your recent work assignments. How have they been expanded? Have you been given new and greater responsibilities, both officially and unofficially? No area is too small to tell!

3. Update courses and training

Skills development in the form of smaller courses and educations is something many workplaces offer. This should of course be included in the CV, preferably under a separate heading if space allows. One-day courses and online training may feel like "too small" for the CV, but it is an invaluable opportunity to show that you take your personal development seriously and that you actively work to keep your knowledge up to date.

4. Review your LinkedIn profile

Updating your resume also means updating your digital resume - so don't forget to update your LinkedIn profile. This means not only titles and job descriptions, but also the introductory text on your profile and the "Skills & Endorsements" section. Small changes in your LinkedIn profile also mean that you end up further up in recruiters' searches.

5. Do not forget the staffing companies

Once you have done a thorough screening of your CV and your LinkedIn, you can finish by updating your profile if you are registered with various recruitment and staffing companies. New title or extended responsibilities are also a good opportunity to contact a recruiter you have not spoken to in a long time, so that he has you fresh in the memory for relevant services.

LinkedIn is one of the fastest growing social networks in Sweden. Nearly half of the working Swedes today use the platform, according to the report Swedes and the Internet 2020. Among salaried employees, the figure is even higher: here, as many as 2 out of 3 state that they use LinkedIn.

 It is therefore a perfect network for you who are looking for a job as many recruiters, at both companies and recruitment companies, are here to find candidates. By spending time reviewing your profile and activity on LinkedIn, you can make yourself as visible and searchable as possible with a few simple tricks. Here are our top tips!

 Keep the profile updated

The most obvious tip for making your profile visible is also the most important: keep it updated. Whether you have a new job, a new area of responsibility or have just taken a short course, this should always be reflected in your profile, so that it matches your skills. In addition, many recruiters filter their searches based on the most recently updated profiles. Therefore, it may be worthwhile to regularly review details and small formulations in your profile, so that you stay visible in all filters.

 Use keywords

To find the right candidate, a recruiter often searches for specific keywords for the current role. If you want to appoint a position as marketing manager, you often search for words such as "marketing manager", "marketing manager" or perhaps "marketing". Therefore, try to identify which keywords are relevant to you and update your profile accordingly. And do not forget: being searchable on LinkedIn does not only have to be interesting for you who are looking for a job, but also for you who are looking to expand your network with industry colleagues.

 Think of the first impression

See your LinkedIn as your digital CV, where it is important to give a good impression from the first second. Therefore, invest in a professional profile picture - LinkedIn's own figures show that a profile with a profile picture results in 21 times as many profile views than a profile without. Also start the profile with a few heartfelt lines where you tell about yourself. Here it is important to find a balance between being personal and at the same time signaling professional skills. If possible, it is also a perfect opportunity to get the most important keywords in here.

 Specify place of work

It's easy to miss entering a geographical area in your profile. When recruiters search for potential candidates on LinkedIn, they often do a search within a limited area, for example by searching for zip codes or counties. Registering your postcode on Linkedin is thus an easy way to optimize your profile. This also applies if you want to find a job elsewhere.

 Select language by role

Do you want a profile in Swedish or English? Or maybe even in another language, depending on what jobs you are interested in? There are no given answers here, but overall the language choice in your profile depends a lot on your industry and on which language the job titles and competence descriptions most often appear in. Keep in mind that some titles and terms may be unclear in one language or another; therefore, start from the language that most clearly describes your roles and skills, and stick to it throughout your profile.

 Highlight relevant skills

In your LinkedIn profile, you have the opportunity to add the skills you possess. Be sure to really take advantage of this feature! The most important thing is that the skills are on your profile at all, so that you are visible in searches, but it is a clear advantage if you have contacts who have certified them. It raises you another notch in the recruiter's eyes. Therefore, do not hesitate to ask colleagues, both old and present, to verify your knowledge.

 Be active

There are many benefits to being active and engaged on LinkedIn. Show recruiters and potential employers that you are an expert in your field by sharing interesting articles, blog posts or news about your industry or company you work for. With a wise and thoughtful comment on another person's post, you also go a long way. However, do not forget that LinkedIn is a network for career and working life - therefore be careful about which topics you discuss and always keep the tone sane.

There are many factors that come into play both when you have to decide and then thrive in a job. For many, salary is the most important thing of all. Erik Kamp, head of consulting at Manpower in Gothenburg, believes that it is important that the salary feels right in the stomach. However, he wishes that more people weighed in other benefits and aspects that together with the salary provide a good working life. We took the opportunity to ask him some common questions about salary.

1. How do I get my salary claim through an employment?

When you are a candidate in a recruitment process, it is good to raise your salary expectations at an early stage of the process. It is common for both employers and employees to paw around the subject and it is perceived as sensitive, really for no reason. An employment can be seen as an important deal or a long-term collaboration, something that requires an agreement that both parties feel satisfied with. Therefore, it is never wrong to be clear with your expectations - but at the same time you must not forget that it is a dialogue.

2. When I worked for a while then - how do I increase my salary?

There is a notion that you raise your salary by changing jobs, something that is true to some extent. But this is something you could probably get away with by, for example, having a continuous dialogue about salary and goals with your employer.

It is important to enjoy your job and feel satisfied with your salary. Otherwise you have a responsibility to bring it up, and you do not have to wait for the annual salary interview. Tell your employer what your salary target is and talk about how you can get there over time.

3. How do I know what a reasonable salary is?

Try not to stare blindly at statistics and comparisons with colleagues and friends. Start from yourself and what you think would feel good for you. If the workplace has a collective agreement, there are agreements that ensure that wages are at reasonable levels. Try to trust your gut feeling and remember that it is also in the employer's interest that you have a reasonable salary and enjoy your job.

4. What should I think about before the salary interview?

Before the salary interview, it is good to prepare. Read about the company's salary policy, find out what criteria are the basis for the salary. At Manpower, for example, we start from a number of focus areas; responsibility, flexibility and quality awareness. If you want to argue for a higher salary, it is good to do so by starting from yourself and formulating concrete examples of the development you have made and what responsibility you have taken.

One way to make the salary conversation less charged is to make it a more lively and ongoing dialogue. But when it's time for salary talks, it is good to keep a pleasant tone of conversation and avoid harsh demands and threats. It is in both your and the employer's interest that all parties are satisfied.

5. What can I do if I do not get the salary I hope for?

First, it is important to remember that it does not have to mean that you are not appreciated in the workplace. There are budgets and policies that employers need to adhere to and over time, the company or organization may have more or less room for salary increases.

If you enjoy your job and see opportunities to develop but do not feel satisfied with your salary, the best thing you can do is be patient and continue the dialogue with your employer about your goals and how you can get there in the long run. A general advice is also not to stare blindly at the salary issue but also to weigh in other benefits that may be important to one and how they can supplement the salary. This can, for example, be an occupational pension, skills development, wellness or flexitime. 

The personal letter is your chance to show why you are the right person for a job - but how do you get an interesting introduction? We have spoken with recruitment consultant Maria Stenbäck who suggests some professional introductions to the personal letter!

Writing a good personal letter is not the easiest thing to do. It should describe why you are the right person for the job - at the same time as the recruiter who reads it should get a better idea of who you are as a person. With a good introduction to the personal letter, you arouse the reader's interest early on and give it a good push into the text.

Maria Stenbäck is a recruitment consultant at Manpower and reads personal letters daily for a number of different roles. According to her, a good introduction everything.

- The introduction is the most important part of the personal letter, it is probably your first contact with the recruiter. Here you want to arouse interest in that person by standing out among all the candidates who apply, says Maria.

A common mistake that Maria sees in personal letters is that you start by repeating information from your CV. Here, you should instead use the space to directly show why you are the right person for the job, she says.

- Many people are in the habit of starting their personal letter with the sentence: "Hello! My name is First name Last name, I am 35 years old, live in Gothenburg and am now looking for the job as a receptionist ”. Skip that sentence I would say! I have probably already read your CV, so I already have this information. My tip is to get to the point immediately instead, says Maria.

Three tips for good introductions

Just because you go straight to the point does not mean that you can not be personal and reasoning. According to Maria, the key to a good personal letter is to be concise, while trying to show your future potential.

- Try to find out as briefly and concisely as possible why you are best suited for this position and why you are interested in the company. I like to see personal letters that show the potential of a candidate. Think about the future more than repeating your CV, she says.

Here are three examples that Malin Stenbäck thinks are good introductions to a personal letter:

1. "If you are looking for a dedicated, structured assistant who is passionate about providing world-class service, then you have me here!"

In this example, the introduction is linked to important features that are requested in the job advertisement. Here it is important to further develop this in your personal letter with concrete examples of how you are just engaged and structured.

2. “As a child, I always helped friends and relatives plan parties. Ever since then, I have known that I want to work with events.”

This introduction is an example of how to tell a little about yourself without being too personal. It serves as an entrance where you do not have to further develop how you liked to plan events as a young person.

3. "As a former high-level football player, I know that hard work pays off, which has generated me to succeed well in my previous sales roles."

This is a very effective bridging method where you connect characteristics from a side job with your work. It shows that you are justified in what you claim and that goal-oriented is a quality that permeates all your achievements.