Education gets you in the door, but connections get you the job, career advisors say.

Everyone goes to college with the same goal in mind: Get the degree and get the job. But the degree might not be enough anymore. Networking is becoming more important than ever before, especially in industries that have limited openings.

For new graduates, starting their job search in Nashville would be in their favor, being that Nashville has the lowest unemployment rate among Tennessee’s metro areas. It makes the most sense to create lasting connections with alumni in the area. The data on the interactive map can detail which cities are similar to Nashville in unemployment.

Joe Tucibat, who works in the Career Development Center at MTSU as a career advisor in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, said using social media platforms like LinkedIn can pay big dividends. 

“If we are on LinkedIn, that means we are open to professional networking, so you get your contacts.” 

Gaining contacts in the industries that interest you can be the difference between being a candidate for a job and an actual hire. Networking is building a mutually beneficial and healthy professional relationship that can later be called upon in reciprocity regarding the job market. Who you know has become the nature of the job game.

Networking also helps to improve your credibility because it improves your reputation when you have people that you’ve created these professionally beneficial relationships with vouch for you. Networking is simply talking and maintaining the relationships you already have with peers, professors and possibly alumni that could later in life get you the job of your dreams.

Laura Brown, director of operations in Nashville, Tennessee, advises maintaining every connection you make, even those with people you don’t like.

“Never burn bridges,” Brown said. “It feels good in the moment but can never benefit you in the long run. It is important to maintain contacts even after you’ve left the company.”

Connections, connections, connections: Keeping them healthy and working is the main goal of networking and ensuring that everyone you interact with has something good to remember you by.

In the interactive graphs you can observe industries that may require networking to break into, being that they have so few openings. Networking is not the brown nosing that many people tend to look at it as. Rather, it is simply talking and information sharing. Having this wide network of people allows people to grasp opportunities that they may not ordinarily have without the proper connections.