But it could be that while the opportunities in Edinburgh are more diverse than in many other areas the competition has also become ferocious, if only because it’s very much an employer’s market and nobody- usually - needs to look hard to find talented workers.

However as a consolation there are complementary seams of endeavour too, which can help somebody find the “right” job in the end.

Edinburgh offers many opportunities. A part time job in some form of festival administration - as just one glaring local example - could be excellent cv material for a different kind of job using the same skills, and there are innumerable other part-time possibilities which aren’t just career cul-de-sacs capable of delivering little more than a living wage.

The obvious place to start looking for jobs in Edinburgh is a reliable online resource of the sort likely to carry information from reliable firms and agencies that helps the applicant understand what’s really on offer.

If it is a fixed term post it could be worth reading in detail to find how likely it is to be renewed, and whether it could lead to other similar posts in the same operation - or even a job.

The idea of full time career is still the mainstay of the jobs market, but within that - and this is maybe particularly true of Edinburgh - there is a welter of short-term opportunity, offering work which may be short term but also useful in the long term.

People no longer have to be students working in relatively low-scale jobs in order to explore the concept of work and study at the same time, and the sort of offers currently available in and around Edinburgh tend the bear this out - there’s a national trend towards part-employment and self employment, and also plenty of examples of people who (through some fiscal alchemy only accountants understand) can be simultaneously part time employed on a regular contract but also self-employed for some other kind of work elsewhere.

What seems to be developing is a growing pool of “asymmetric” workers who rely on being useful to derive a living from a series of employers able to use their skills on a part time or fixed term basis.

Get the deal right, and everyone can win, particularly as the employee or self-employee can continually add skills and experience from every new post completed.

Even supposedly “casual” posts can be valuable if the worker is making a real contribution to the employer concerned, and can be used to gain very specific forms of expertise that might not be fully covered in a generic college course - for example it could be something specialised but eminently career-useful, such as sound engineering.

This sort of thinking is a world away from the old concept of “just get a job”, and if handled intelligently and energetically can help talented people get the best result of all - well paid work they actually enjoy doing.