Even with the labour market slow down many organisations will be searching for the ‘perfect’ graduate, which is why the graduate unemployment rate is at its lowest point for 5 years - 5.6% compared with 6.1% for the previous year according to the 2008 Annual Higher Education Statistics Agency.

The attractiveness of graduates to organisations, and in particular financial organisations, is well known.

Documented reasons for their popularity include advanced qualifications, proven ability to learn and apply new information and a greater awareness and knowledge of key subject areas.

However, those organisations that recruit graduates with the impression that they will be up and running with little support or development often come unstuck.

Although graduates do have the extended knowledge on academic subjects compared with none graduates they often have very limited work experience and so lack work-based skills.

As a result there is a need for companies to start focusing on how they are going to integrate their new employees - particularly in terms of getting them to 'fit' into the workplace environment and adapt to the very different environment that is the office.

Righttrack Consultancy, a learning and development company has reported an increase in the number of clients requesting a suite of programmes to help support graduates in the workplace.

Kasmin Cooney, Managing Director says, “graduates can be amazing assets to any organisation and, if supported and developed properly, will be the driving force for future success."

Research suggests that a common mistake made by many organisations is that the development needed is further academic qualifications in their chosen subjects and, although this is required for continual professional development, work-based skills that are really needed are neglected and taken for granted.

Cooney says, "the last thing graduates want is to be back in the classroom as they are more than ready to get stuck in and kick-start their careers. It is for this reason why it is imperative that the learning they receive for business skills is impactful, innovative and more importantly fun and engaging.”

Graduate training has moved a long way from lecture-based training and a popular approach is to incorporate experiential learning to help get the graduates out and about, experiencing their learning first hand.

The graduate recruitment cycle is not likely to slow down as more and more young people are entering higher education as the benefits are vast and regularly publicised; the Higher Education Minister Bill Rammell highlighted this by saying that gaining a degree helps individuals increase their earnings capacity to over £100,000 accrued over a life time.