Whisky Jobs  

What is a “whisky job”? Well, the more that I welcome new vacancies on to the Spirited Careers site, the more I realise that a “whisky job” is almost anything!

The latest Scotch Whisky Economic Impact Report tells us that the Scotch Whisky industry supports over 66,000 jobs in the UK, 41,000 of them being in Scotland. So what do all these people do?

To date, Spirited Careers has advertised over 150 jobs since it was launched in the middle of last year and the site has everything from a physiotherapist role to a reward assistant role.

The majority of roles advertised centre around the production side of this fascinating industry, with engineering and science based roles currently dominating the availability vacancies. This, obviously, demonstrates the need for a STEM focus in candidates.

But I have been noticing that there are some key soft skills that job seekers need to employ to get the most out of their search.

Here are my top tips for your Scotch Whisky industry new year job search.

1. Allow yourself to be surprised.

There are lots of jobs that you might not even know existed. Quite often I find myself trying to find out more about the vacancies because it’s hard to understand where they fit in the world of Scotch Whisky. One which piqued my interest which came in, for example, was “Boutique Assistant”, a role for The Glenturret Distillery which is the location of the Lalique Boutique. Along with the elements of tourism, retail and whisky, this role perfectly illustrated the significance of the luxury market.

2. Don’t write yourself off.

Make sure you don’t judge yourself on the name of the job alone. Our SWA members take time and effort to be specific in the job spec about the kinds of candidates they are looking for. Quite often this means taking time to do a analysis of the role against all of your skills. And remember that once you have a skill, you never lose it (however dormant it’s become!). Take this Quality Systems Lead role with Chivas Brothers for example, and note the emphasis on collaboration. Consider how your skills and experience can be applied.

3. Think about the future too.

It’s ok to consider what you might want to do in the future and use the job adverts as research into this. If you remember one of my earlier blogs, about Steven Morris, the power of research and creating a vision for your future is more powerful than you might believe.  With many of the vacancies you see on Spirited Careers, you’ll find a little bit of inspiration for a future career. For example SWA’s own COO, Liz Gibb, began her education in music. But as she progressed in the world of work, she realised that qualifying as an accountant would (and has) open a lot of doors for career development. Being open to ideas and taking into consideration the whole life aspect of a job can pay dividends.

4. Be mindful of new things.

We all know that the jobs of the future don’t exit yet. There have been perfect examples of these jobs on Spirited Careers. The Glenmorangie Company, not long ago, was looking for a Climate Manager. Ten, even five, years ago, I think I would have been hard pushed to believe this kind of thing would be a role. But here we are with a steady stream of jobs which fit neatly under the term “sustainability”. It’s probably unrealistic for everyone to be an early adopter, but when you’re looking for jobs, do think about what might be around the corner, because you may just find you’re in the right place at the right time.

So, what is a whisky job? At the moment, it’s a lot of things, as demonstrated by me, below, in front of the Spirited Careers banner. I have a whisky job. All my colleagues have whisky jobs… I just have to change the way I look at it.