Entering the job market for the first time? Our 2022 Guide to Kickstarting Your Career can help you land that dream job.

Great news, recent grads! Your skills are in high demand. Employers plan to hire almost 30% more new graduates this year vs. 2021. And we’ve seen close to a 17% increase in entry-level job postings on LinkedIn compared with the same time last year.

The upshot: It’s an ideal time for anyone entering the workforce to kickstart their job search.

To help you navigate the plethora of opportunities, we’ve created a go-to resource: LinkedIn’s 2022 Guide to Kickstarting Your Career. This guide is jam-packed with valuable insights, including which entry-level jobs and industries are most in-demand right now, the best cities and industries for those just starting out and more. For example, the staffing and recruiting industry, led the pack as the fastest-growing for entry-level workers, with a 50% uptick in year-over-year hiring.

You can access the full report here. 

We want to make your job search process as smooth, successful—and, yes, even enjoyable!—as possible. In addition to the Career Starter Guide, here are some other new tools and resources that will get you ahead with ease.

Free LinkedIn Learning courses

To support you, we’re making LinkedIn Learning courses related to entry-level job searching free for a limited time. They include:

•  Job Search Tips with Jonathan Javier
•  Professional Networking for Career Starters with Jayla Hill
•  Nano Tips for Landing Your Dream Job with Austin Belcak
• Nano Tips for Finding a Job with Jerry Lee

You can also attend a #GetHired live event this week on Kickstarting Your Career with Austin Belcak, founder of Cultivated Culture. That event is on May 20 at 12:30pm ET.

Additional ways to spotlight your skills

You worked hard to learn new skills—be it through an internship, bartending, or working at your college coffee shop— so we’re giving you new ways to show them off to employers.  

For example, if you gleaned exceptional customer service skills working at the super-busy school bookshop, you can add those skills right into the experience description of your profile, clearly showing that you have the experience needed to excel in your desired position. This will make it a lot easier for recruiters to find you - and we know at least 40% of recruiters rely specifically on skills when searching for candidates.

Not sure what skills to add to your profile? One way to identify the skills needed in your dream job or industry is to look through what’s listed in related job posts. And, if you want to learn new skills that apply to your career goals, check out LinkedIn Learning Pathfinder. It generates a custom list of LinkedIn Learning courses based on what you want to achieve.

Show you’re “Open to Work”

Consider adding an #OpentoWork photo frame to your profile picture. This way, anyone who sees your profile will realize you are seeking job opportunities and can potentially assist you in your journey. Using this feature can supercharge your success: you’re 40% more likely to get a recruiter message and 20% more likely to get a member message if you use this Open to Work.

In addition to the resources above, here are some bonus tips to help you stand out in your job search.

• Embrace Authenticity: Customize your LinkedIn Profile to reflect who you truly are. That can be done by listing your pronouns, using our name pronunciation feature, and creating a Profile Video to introduce yourself to recruiters and others with personalized video content.
• Act Quickly: Applying within the first ten minutes of receiving a relevant job notification increases your odds of hearing back by four times. So, get those job alerts set up ASAP. In setting up an alert, you can add in your ideal criteria, including type of role sought and if you’d like to work remote, hybrid, or on-site.
• Grow your community: Here’s an achievable goal that will pay off big-time: Each week, reach out to another LinkedIn user. These can be friends, family members, teachers, and colleagues from any internships. You can simply connect with them—be sure to add in a personal note—or take it a step further by asking if they’d be willing to introduce you to others who could help you with your job search. While you’re networking, don’t overlook people outside of your desired field. You never know who could have a connection to a target company or know of a relevant job opening.

Our LinkedIn creator community is constantly providing tips on how you can grow your network and make valuable connections. Gen Z and career-starter creators, such as Ziad Ahmed, Kelsey Davis, Jerry Lee, and Jonathan Javier, can become your trusted guides.

While you're launching your career, we encourage you to help those around you to get ahead as well. Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn shares some wisdom in his commencement speech,  “If you’re graduating this month you probably have big questions about what’s next. What should I do if I’m not really sure what direction I want to go in? And, how do I connect a long term plan when everything is changing so quickly. For me connecting directly with people is the most productive way to aggregate this information and perspectives.” In his video he shares four simple rules for building the kind of powerful networks that compound in value over the course of your life and career.

We want to help you flourish now and throughout your professional life. And as you enter this new work chapter, check out the full guide to kickstarting your career from our LinkedIn News Editors to learn more.

Hiring managers, we’ve got your back too. If you’re looking to recruit those starting out in their career, you can find actionable advice for attracting and retaining talent here. We’ve also made the LinkedIn Learning courses Attracting, Hiring and Working with Gen Z with Sophie Wade and Managing Generation Z with David and Jonah Stillman free until the end of the month.

To keep up with the latest on hiring early-career workers, also tune into our live event on Insider Tips to Attract & Retain Gen Z Talent with Sophie Wade and AJ Eckstein. It takes place on May 19 at 3:00pm ET.