I’ve been in my current position for six months now, and haven’t had an event happen without something go wrong. I’m not talking about the little events, such as regular guest speakers, I’m talking the large events that everyone attends. By “large event” I mean school-wide auctions that benefit student groups or non-profits, foreign guest lecturers and artists, exhibition openings, and field trips.

I planned my own wedding and I learned a lot about events planning from that experience. With 150 guests attending, I had to learn quickly that if mistakes happen, no one will notice. If I run out of invitations and have to buy different ones to complete the batch, no one will care. If we cut the ice cream cake with a boning knife, and threw the first piece because it wasn’t thawed enough, no one would know. If we were missing an entire table’s worth of chairs, it could be fixed, and then no one cared. Working in restaurants helped with this theory, what the guests don’t know, won’t hurt them. They don’t know that we’re running short staffed, and (quite frankly) they don’t care, they want what they ordered.

Most of the people I work with have never worked in retail or food service. They’ve only ever been a customer. My different perspective comes out during these moments when events go wrong. Sometimes it’s a small thing, such as a meat tray not arriving with the catering. Sometimes it’s a larger thing, running late to our destination because my small team is attempting to get everyone in a 200-person auditorium to sign a release.  Not only is it important for those involved in the event to realize that whatever it is that went wrong is usually not as bad as we imagine, I believe it is important to show compassion and understanding, especially with students watching.

So when my events go wrong, I just go with the flow. Sometimes when things go wrong other people react negatively, and suggest something like, “Yell at them! What happened isn’t acceptable!” I thank them for their advice, and then go on with my day. No amount of yelling at caterers will fix the mistakes from last night. Asking to speak to supervisors may do nothing more than put someone’s job on the line. If I can make the event work, with or without the meat tray, then that’s what I’m going to do. It is important we remember that we can choose our attitude, and no one’s job is worth a missing meat tray.

1.  Call it “College Student Development.”

I don’t know what your graduate program is called but mine is “Higher Education and Student Affairs.”  That is a pretty vague title and keeps you guessing at “What does he do everyday?” So for all of my peers whose programs were not easily decipherable, I would just go with “College Student Development.”  Its basically Goldie Lock’s porridge: its not too vague, easy to understand, and specific enough. The first time I referred to my area of study as College Student Development things became much clearer.

2.  Have the “I know the salary is low but thats normal for entry level in this field” conversation early.

Parents are concerned and only want the best for you.  Parents also believe that you are the greatest thing since pretzel M&Ms so you should be paid as such.  This wasn’t an epic battle for me or anything, my parents are supportive of my choices no matter the pay, but for some parents… this can be quite the shock.  Give your parents a headsup early on what starting salaries look like in Student Affairs and ensure there won’t be any huge surprises later in the process.

3.  Remind your parents how many colleges and universities there are across the country.

This is especially true for us non-geographically-bound job seekers.  Some parents struggle with their children being far away (mine). I remember sharing that I would be job searching all across the country and the collective gasp that followed.  I made sure I knew how far away each job was and all information about nearby airports. Luckily, you can get anywhere in the country under 8 hours (thanks Wright Brothers for easing parent’s concerns nationwide).

4. Tell some stories about the students you’ve worked with and their growth

Parents want to be proud of you, so they love hearing stories about the lives you’ve affected.  Our profession is one of the few who get that chance everyday.  Telling your mother you’ve made someones life better is like eating a fresh Krispy Kreme doughnut – it warms the soul. It also brings everything into perspective: no matter where you go or what you do, the work done will help others, and any Mother or Father can be proud of that.  Even if its done 14 hours away.

5.  Be prepared to repeat all of this to any siblings or extended family.

Self-explanatory.

I wan’t to take this chance to thank my family for their support and love throughout this entire process.  I am lucky to have a wonderful group of people who support my ambitions. I’m happy to announce that my parents and I escaped my Job search process without any major, or even minor, fights and I’m not employed.  It’s a bedtime story that I can get used to.

Thanks to everyone who participated in our #SAchat focused on Summer #AltProDev Ideas. This week’s topic produced 588 tweets from 10 student affairs professionals, graduate students and undergraduates interested or working in the Student Affairs field!

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I’m sure the title of this blog will throw readers considering that I recently just graduated with my own Masters in Counseling. However, when I say my first commencement, I mean the very first commencement that I helped organize and run for the students at my current job.

The entire experience is so different. As a graduate you come to the location excited, anxious, overwhelmed, and overjoyed. But you as the student do not notice the amount of work which goes into planning, organizing, and implementing the ceremony which lasts no more than 2 or 3 hours at most. Here’s the secret of it all. If you, the graduate, do not notice the labor that goes into the ceremony itself then the ceremony was a great success. Indeed, the graduates are not supposed to know how much work is involved but rather get on the stage to get their diploma while smiling for copious amounts of pictures.

If everything is done correctly then the graduates do not know that you, the staff, have spent months planning the ceremony. They will never know that you arrived at the facility numerous times to discuss the details for the event. The students do not know that you, the staff along with student workers, arrived at the location the night before to set up for the big day. They do not know that you arrived at the location at 6 am the day of to finish setting up while running on maybe 3 hours of sleep which to most is a cat nap. They do not know that during the event you, the staff, are running around trying to look calm while solving every possible problem before it occurs. They never know that when it ends this overwhelming sense of relief hits you and you feel the great weight of how tired you really are both physically and emotionally.

Instead, they, the students, come to you right after to hug you, thank you and take pictures with you because they regard you with respect and admiration. In those pictures you feel as though you look so tired even though you are smiling from ear to ear. You congratulate those students and then set off to clean up. The irony being that planning the event takes months while cleaning up takes about a 1/2 hour. Ultimately, during that clean up time you, the staff, begin to plan for the next commencement ceremony by going over what could have gone better and thus developing a new plan then and there for the following year.

Yes, the students never see you sweat. Instead, they bask in the glory of their big day with no complications and you the staff let them have their day.

I am proud to say that, that was exactly how my first commencement went, and I was especially proud of my team that day.

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It will soon be a year since The Oprah Winfrey Show went off of the air. Like clockwork my TiVo was set to record Oprah on a daily basis, and sometimes it would accidentally record an episode twice as though it wanted to make sure that I watched it. Oprah was my go to person for information on a topic, for advice on how to deal with a certain situation, or even the place I went to for an ugly cry. I can honestly say I’ve probably seen every episode of Oprah in my adult years and in vulnerable times have been known to sometimes ask, WWOD – “What would Oprah do?” I must also confess that I have not watched the final week of the show. It has been sitting on my TiVo for the last year as my hope was to watch it when the time was right. I think the time is finally right. The last couple of weeks have been challenging for me, as well as others, as we focus on our professional futures. If you’re a recent grad you may still be looking for that perfect job. If you’ve been in the field for a while as a new professional you’re probably looking for a mid-level or a different position. So when you’re going through a difficult moment when it comes to the job search, all you need to do is ask yourself, “What would Oprah do?!”

You’ve submitted about 20 cover letters and resumes in the last couple of weeks and no responses?

What would Oprah do? The reality is that sometimes it may take submitting applications for many, many, many jobs before you land the one. While we may hope that every job we apply for we automatically receive an interview, that’s just not the case. For some, you will think that you’re 100% qualified while the organization may think you’re not the right fit. You’re feeling anxious and you might even feel like you’re reaching a breaking point. Oprah would tell you to hang in there and keep submitting applications but that you might need to consider revamping your search technique.

You keep getting interviews but don’t get the job!

What would Oprah do? If you’re getting interviews, then you’re definitely doing something right! If you’re not landing the job, that doesn’t mean that you blew it or were not good enough. Ultimately, it probably means that you made their short list of candidates but someone else might have been a better fit for the position. If this is constantly occurring, Oprah would ask you to review your interview style and approach. Are you prepared? Are you able to elaborate on questions with concrete examples of experiences?

You didn’t get the job that you thought was your dream job?

What would Oprah do? When you think you’ve found the job for you and your interview blew everyone out of the water BUT you still end up not getting the job, Oprah would say: “You didn’t get that job because it wasn’t the job for you!” In addition to Oprah, you will probably have a lot of people telling you this and that there is something better on the horizon. Sometimes you won’t believe it but you have to believe it. You will not always get what you think you want. The universe has its own plan and sometimes you just have to be okay with that.

(Questions based on comments on #saschat and #sasearch.)

Nekesa Straker is a Residence Hall Director at New York University.