New Graduate Opportunities on the Gold Coast

For the first time in its history the City of Gold Coast has launched a program which aims to attract more university graduates to help shape the city’s future. There are 25 positions available across a wide variety of streams, including engineering; digital and data; business and management; environment; sustainability; and planning.

The City’s Graduate Academy is a 12-month structured early career development program providing professional development and on-the-job experience opportunities for enthusiastic university graduates. 

Real world experience

Chemical engineering graduate Kayla Zipf recently began working with Council and has relished the opportunities she’s been given as a member of the City’s engineering team.

“Coming out of uni you understand theoretical principles, but you don’t understand how things work in the real world. I really like this job because it covers such a broad spectrum, like landfill, waste recycling centres, and then all your water infrastructure, including fresh and saltwater systems, as well as sewerage treatment plants. There’s so many processes involved and so much to learn! It’s such a good introduction to industry and how things work in the real world,” she says.

Prior to joining the City of Gold Coast team Kayla had worked as an engineer with other organisations, but was left unsatisfied by the lack of hands on experience in those roles.

“In my previous jobs there was a lot of report writing with very little practical experience. In this job I’m not chained to a desk - I get to rotate into different modules every three months. I’m currently in the environmental team and I get to spend a lot of time on site, which is what I really like.”

Kayla enjoys spending time in the field, although occasionally still works from her desk.

Future leaders

The City of Gold Coast’s objective with this program is to invest in developing the next generation of talent and future leaders by supporting early career professionals to gain the skills, knowledge and personal attributes required in the initial stages of their career and that’s certainly been Kayla’s experience.

“All of my bosses have gone out of their way to ensure I had learning opportunities and personal development training. I also have a mentor here who’s been helping me with long term career goals and answering any questions I may have, which is great because I don’t report to her for any of my jobs, so it gives me a great outside perspective.”

Flexibility and opportunity

As the second largest council in Australia the City of Gold Coast is one of the largest employers in the region with over 4000 staff currently employed. This provides staff with a greater choice of flexibility in how they work and ultimately a wider range of career opportunities, attributes not lost on Kayla.

“This is the place to come if you really want work-life balance. I go to exercise classes almost every day in my lunch break, I get to work from home a couple of days a week and I also get RDO’s. I’ve worked for other companies where work-life balance is definitely not a priority,” she explains.

“To any graduates thinking of joining the Graduate Academy I’d say make the most of your opportunities and take advantage of all the extracurricular activities you can do here, because there’s a lot. For instance, we’ve just engaged in a nationwide competition for water aid. We’re working together as a team to organise fundraising activities while developing technology to treat waste in rural medical centres in East Timor. If you dig deep there’s so many cool opportunities here.”

*Applications for the City of Gold Coast’s Graduate Academy close on 3 October, 2023. Graduates can apply here.