The UK’s top investment banks, law firms and consultancies have cited The University of Nottingham as one of the best universities for finding graduate recruits.

According to a new study by High Flier Research, the University is one of only a small handful of universities which are first choice for graduates amongst the UK’s leading 100 graduate employers.

The report is based on research conducted during December 2012 with the UK’s 100 leading graduate employers, including BP, the Civil Service, IBM, Goldman Sachs, PwC, Google and HSBC.

The University of Nottingham was second in the list of universities targeted by the most top employers in 2012-13. Warwick was first, with Cambridge fourth and Oxford the seventh-most targeted. Other highly rated academic institutions including St Andrews did not appear in the top 20.

The majority of the UK’s top 100 graduate employers will target students at 20 or fewer universities, with one-in-five firms having scaled back funding for their graduate recruitment programmes compared with last year.

Dr Paul Greatrix, Registrar at Nottingham, said: “At Nottingham our graduates do exceptionally well and we have some of the highest employment rates in the UK, with our average salary levels for Nottingham graduates is above the UK average.

“More importantly, students studying with us will not only receive a first-rate academic experience, both in the UK and internationally, but they will also have a well-rounded and rich experience during their time here, which will enable them to acquire skills and additional learning from extra-curricular activities.

“We are particularly proud of our Nottingham Advantage Award, which is a scheme specifically run to enhance our students’ skills while studying their degree.”

The Nottingham Advantage Award enables students to take extra-curricular modules alongside their academic studies, which build skills and experience in areas such as PR, finance and career planning through activities with the University’s Centre for Career Development, Widening Participation and the Students’ Union.

Dr Greatrix adds: “The results of this study show that this combination of skills and education makes them even more attractive to potential employers.”

Managing director of High Fliers Research, Martin Birchall, said: “People outside of the recruitment industry may think that the main priority for employers is academic results when in actual fact, the reality is that the academic results achieved by students are only about a fifth of the equation of what it takes to get a good graduate job.

“Work experience is top of the list and a set of well-rounded business skills is important. The top three universities — Warwick, Nottingham and Manchester — have a diverse output of graduates, many of whom have the experiences employers are looking for.

“The sort of experience that students at these top universities get is a rich student life — they have leadership skills and can bring benefits above and beyond just academic achievement to employers.”

The firms surveyed by the report said they were more likely to use social media to promote their graduate schemes than in previous years; 71% said they planned to increase their emphasis on this approach but one-in-four said they would be putting fewer resources into traditional university career fairs.

The Graduate Market in 2013 report also showed students are being approached earlier in their university careers, with 42 of the top 100 firms saying they were more likely to promote graduate roles to first-year students than in previous years. Twenty-eight of the top firms said they were targeting penultimate year students more than they had done in the past.