Ask HN: How to find job as Maths graduate with little other qualifications?
I’m a student of Mathematics in Germany, at the very end of my Master’s (thesis submitted & defended, awaiting gradation) but have not managed to secure any job offer up till now, in spite of having tried for quite some time now. At this point I feel somewhat at a loss, so I was hoping that anybody on here knowledgeable about the job market in Germany would perhaps have an idea as to what (if anything) I might be doing wrong or what other avenues I could consider that I’ve missed so far.
My main problem is likely that I have almost nothing to show in the way of “hard” skills and practical qualification besides the Maths degree. I did work part-time for most of my studies, but mostly stuff like generic office work or watching kids at an after-school care.
When my graduation neared, I first thought hat it might be possible to find a job in an industrial context (e.g. in Automotive/Aviation, Pharma, Chemical), which would require only data science or mathematical modelling and no industry-specific knowledge beyond what could be taught on the job, but this seems to have been a fairly naive hope, as such jobs don’t exist from what I’ve seen.
Next, I had high hopes for IT as I had done a fair bit of MATLAB programming at university (and liked it a lot) and even taken Computer Science as an elective subject. However, it appeared that to get into programming as an “outsider”, one would need substantial practical experience, either from part-time jobs or as a private hobby.
Finally, I thought I could at least get into Banking, as especially risk management positions often didn’t demand finance knowledge and sometimes were even addressed specifically to Maths graduates. But here too I received only rejections; in the rare cases where a reason was given, I believe it was something to the effect of “lack of discernible motivation”.
At this point, I’m in a bind as it seems to me like the only options left are to try Insurance (in a sense the most obvious career for a mathematician, but from previous internship experience deeply uninteresting to me) or Consulting (I actually got some job offers here, but backed out once I realized that working in this field basically means working overtime constantly, which is a deal-breaker for me).
So, is it really that difficult for someone like me to get into the above mentioned fields? And are there other avenues I might not have thought of? My reservations about Insurance notwithstanding, I’m not particularly averse to trying any job that would have me at this point, as long as I don’t have to work overtime. I fear spending more time on additional formal education or training would be tough however, as I’ve already taken a lot of time to finish my degree and am graduating now at nearly 30 years old.