The Director of the University’s Career Development Office (CDO), Domniki Diamantopoulou, has just wound up a marathon round of calls to recent graduates to gather information on the employment profile of the Class of 2023. In the end, she managed to speak to 55% of recent graduates; information on the employment status on the remaining graduates was gathered through LinkedIn research and the directors of the alumni’s degree program. Overall, the CDO was able to confirm the employment profile of 87% of the graduating class of 2023.
The findings for these alumni are encouraging. More than 90% are working or pursuing graduate studies or internships. Specifically, 64% are employed in companies or organizations and an additional 17% are self-employed. About 9% of graduates are pursuing full-time studies or internships.
Behind these summary numbers, however, is a more nuanced picture of graduates’ diverse career paths. Some found work soon after graduation, as in the case of Alzahraa Muneer Sabri Al-Haddad (BSE ’20, MSI ’23), who began work as a Youth Analyst for the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Iraq in August 2023. Others had been working before graduation but found new employment opportunities, such as Christos Anestis Moraitis (BSI ’23), who took up a new position in September 2023 as a software developer for cybersecurity for the Secura Bureau Veritas in the Netherlands, and Konstantinos Topintzis (MBA ’23, MSSM ’23), who has continued his work as a medical sales representative but in a new company this year with ISOPLUS. Still other graduates secured a promotion from their current employer shortly before or after graduation. Christos Pavlogiannis (MSSM ’23), for example, was promoted in March 2023 to Sales Manager and Head of Non-Delivered Trade at Diversey Hellas. Still other alumni/ae are working in positions they had before their studies, or like Konstantinos Sarantos (MBA ’23), a senior account executive at the IBM spinoff Kyndryl, after starting their degree program at the University.
Other graduates finished up an internship or job assignment and went on to pursue graduate studies, like Sidra Ashgar (BAELL ’23), who left her position as an interpreter for the National Center for Social Solidarity to begin an MA in Criminal Justice and Intelligence at the University of Portsmouth this January. Another success story is Eleni Barmpouni (BSBA ’23), who has just completed the internship she began after graduation as a junior marketeer for Karamolegos Bakery and will begin studies this January for an MA in Marketing Management at the University of Bologna.
The CDO Director’s phone calls allowed her to check in with the new alumni/ae individually and remind them of the career counseling and job placement services that they have free access to as graduates, such as guidance in career planning, help in writing their resume, and the newsletter with job postings and internship opportunities. It is also an opportunity to gain insight into graduates’ plans to seek recognition of professional equivalence of their degree by the Greek Ministry of Education, Religious Affairs and Sports, another area in which the CDO can help alumni navigate. Information was also gathered on graduates’ civil and community engagement; about 10% of recent graduates do volunteer work in addition to their work or studies.
In addition to the phone survey, which is done each year with the new graduating class, the University also updates biannually the employment profile of alumni from previous years through online questionnaires and LinkedIn research. During the last update in 2022 the CDO was able to confirm the employment status of 74% of all alumni. Of these, 94% were employed, self-employed, or pursuing graduate studies.
Image: Captured by Edmond Dantès, downloaded from Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/el-gr/photo/4342496/
