Uttkarsha Kapoor

• Year of graduation: 2026
• Course: BSc (Hons) Artificial Intelligence and Data Science
• Coaching year: 2025–26

Meet Uttkarsha, an Artificial Intelligence and Data Science student who has developed her confidence, communication skills and understanding of employability through her experience as a Career Coach with Student Futures. Supporting students with CVs, job searches and interview preparation, Uttkarsha particularly enjoyed helping students feel more confident about their career journey and leave sessions with a clear next step. The role also gave her valuable insight into different applicant experiences and strengthened her ability to communicate, listen and empower others. Alongside supporting fellow students, her experience as a Career Coach has helped Uttkarsha recognise the value of her own knowledge and develop the confidence to apply her skills to her future career.

Can you tell us about your role as a Career Coach and what a typical day looked like?

My role as a Career Coach was really interesting and fun for me. Throughout, my role as a Career Coach, I interacted with diverse students and gave them advice related to their CV and helped them with their job search. A typical day as a Career Coach for me was really interesting, I used to start my shift by checking the daily mail inbox of the Career Coaches, usually there used to be an email regarding CV help that would need a reply so I used to reply to that. During the shift usually there used to be different student drop-ins who would need help with either their CV or job search. So, I used to attend the student as drop-ins are priority. I used to try my best to make the student feel comfortable, have a friendly and light-hearted conversation to show them that they do not have to stress too much about this interaction and that they can be informal and relax and talk about their situation to me as a friend, who is there to help and support them, I feel that is one major part of the job. I was really fortunate to have a wonderful team working with me, so if I had any free time with me, I used to talk to my colleagues and manager and we would discuss ideas on how we can improve our services and would spend our free time learning about the services also while trying our best to tell more people about this service.

What did you enjoy most about working with students at the University of Northampton?

I love interacting with people and having meaningful conversations and I feel the different way the students presented their thoughts and how each student was capable of understanding their tasks related to career was something that I really enjoyed while working with students at the University of Northampton. There were so many students with diverse backgrounds with such creative ideas and ready to explore attitude that was so fun to interact with. There were also few students who used to come worrying about their career but would end up leaving a bit more motivated after the session as they would feel positive and would have a next step ready, so to see that confidence boost in a student was one of the most favourite parts of working as a CC.

What were the most common challenges students came to you with, and how did you help them overcome them?

There were two most common challenges that came to me as a CC which were help with their CV and the other was job search. During my training for CC, we were trained regarding CVs and job search and we were also provided with resources to help students with these queries, so for the start of my days as a CC, I relied solely on those support materials. With each student, I gained experience of how to interact and for example with different CVs, I started to understand more about a job’s requirements, student abilities and keeping my support material knowledge as a baseline I built on that and helped each student with their CVs. So similar to that, I worked with different queries of job search too. I feel throughout I kept learning and understanding and broadening my knowledge, which I really feel helped me setup as a CC and overcome the challenges.

What’s the one piece of advice you think every student should hear when it comes to their career or employability?

Honestly, saying this from my personal experience as well, I feel that that one piece of advice every student should hear when it comes to their career or employability is to have patience and determination. I Know this sounds like an obvious answer, but it truly means much more. I struggle with job search too, but the moments where I have been patient and let life take its course, I have been rewarded. For example, when I was searching for part-time roles, everyone around me was working part-time, I felt like I was the only one who wasn’t, it wasn’t like I was not applying. That made me feel really demotivated and made me overthink a lot in terms of my abilities, but I was determined and patient and kept applying which eventually turned out to be fruitful for me as I ended up working in different part-time jobs at the university in the last 1 and half year of my student life. I am currently in that job search phase as a graduate, but even though I have days of demotivation, I know and believe there is a job out there for me, I just have to be patient and determined and wait fro the right opportunity at the right time.

What would you say to a student who’s unsure whether they should drop in to see a Career Coach?

I would suggest do not think about it, just go for that drop-in. All that anxiety and overthinking and worrying is in your head, the people as CC and the SF team, CEPs are there to help you. They would understand your query and try their best in resolving that issue, which would help you and make you feel a bit less stressed. There would be some solution through that drop-in session that might resonate with you positively and if you already know everything but still unsure, that session might act as an assurance and a go ahead that you gotta start working on that path. Me being a CC, I sometimes felt unsure to talk about my future but whenever I did a drop-in with a CEP I always learnt something whether be it in terms of my CV , job search or just general overall change in perspective related to career or employability.

What’s been your proudest moment as a Career Coach?

I feel working as a CC, you are helping students with their career path so that involves help with CV or job search or interview preparation. And whilst working on these duties as a CC, I was able to fulfil my responsibilities and that was reflected in terms of feedback I got from the students that had a drop-in session with me, those evidences of me doing my job nicely were the proud moments I had. These gave me a sense of realisation, that I was able to give back to the society by using the knowledge I had gained throughout whilst learning the responsibilities. And after those sessions, those students dropping in again to tell me that they were successful in their paths and were ready for the next steps made me really happy. Incidents where students came to me for help and advice for their interviews and having sessions with them to practice more about their interviews, and them returning after a while to mention, they got the job, these moments happening a few times really made me feel proud and grateful that I was able to play my part of guiding them through their journey. These moments gave me that confidence boost and a sense of belongingness in the university.

How do you feel you developed your own skills, experience and confidence whilst in this role, and what did this enable you to go on to do yourself?

Looking back, I really enjoyed this whole experience, and I did develop my confidence, skills and experience whilst in the role. Being a CC, helped me give that sense of belonging, made me believe that my knowledge can help others and how everything you say is valued by a person. I gained a lot of confidence in myself. I would not say I was shy at public speaking rather I wasn’t that confident, but while working in this job I became very comfortable with initiating conversations and presenting my views confidently and enhancing my people skills. I realised how with the right attitude you can help others and yourself achieve your goals and take things step by step and it would eventually lead you to the path of success. The job helped me navigate through different perspectives of applicant mindsets whether it would be an experienced applicant or a novice. This not only helped me to understand their mindset but also helped me in presenting my thoughts using right words to empower individuals. I feel this is a very valuable skill in life as your thoughts and how you present them are a vital part of your existence and would definitely be a useful skill in my career.