If you haven’t noticed already, as of August 2019, new posts are no longer being made to this site. Don’t fret, though! All of our great writers, student bloggers and the CS Radio Podcast are still posting new content on our new site – https://careerservices.upenn.edu/blog

This site will remain up for some time as an archive. We hope you’ll join us at our new address!

All summer, we have been prepping and planning for when students return in the fall. This semester, we are launching the new Peer Career Advising program which will provide undergraduate students with more advising resources through quick, 15 minute Pop-ins.

What are Pop-ins?

Pop-ins are run by our Peer Career Advisors (PCAs). PCAs can answer all your career related questions in 15 minute meetings. No appointment needed, just pop-in!

Who can use Pop-ins?

We serve all current undergraduate students at Penn.

When are Pop-ins?

Monday-Friday, 1:00PM-5:00PM.

What can I talk about in a Pop-in?

PCAs can help with resumes, cover letters, interviewing skills, Handshake tips, job/internship search and more. They have been extensively trained on these topics all summer. This is a great resource for those quick questions such as “How do I write about my summer experience on my resume?” and “What is this weird part of Handshake?”

What if I want to see an advisor?

That will always be an option! You can still make an appointment via Handshake or stop by advisor walk-in hours. Advisors can help with bigger questions like “I have no idea what I want to do with my life” or “Help! I have an exploding offer.”  

We are excited about the launch of this new program, and we hope to see you popping-in soon!

Summer comes with many pleasures—beach weather, baseball games, ice cream, and in my household…gathering as a family each week to watch America’s Got Talent. We’ve been faithfully watching the show for years, and like the judges, we never cease to be amazed that there are still acts (and talents) the likes of which we have never seen before, including this season a hand balancing act involving an 86 year old man, an impossibly in sync Indian dance troupe featuring human trampolines & acrobatics, or inexplicably incredible close-up magic. What’s more, there seems to be an audience for a wide range of talents. For instance, those acts that involve pushing the limits of human tolerance for pain by swallowing razors, putting a hook through one’s nose, or being hit with a sledgehammer while on a bed of nails may not be my cup of tea, but there is certainly audience somewhere excited to see it.  

Finding career success involves something similar—figuring out the things that you are naturally good at and learning how to best present them to the right audience. So, here are my 5 career lessons from AGT:

1. Understand your (transferable) strengths. In all my years as a career advisor, I’ve never once met someone who didn’t have innate abilities. However, many individuals don’t realize how talented they are. Frequently one’s talents come so naturally to them that they may not even think of them as skills. Take varsity athletes. Sure, they know that they are good at the particular sport that they play but what they often fail to recognize is that the traits that make them successful in athletics (a drive for excellence, good teamwork, endurance, the ability to perform well under pressure) are also attributes that are valuable to employers in almost any professional setting. The trick then, is figuring out the qualities and skills behind the successes in your life.
2. Be personable – it wins over the judges. Simon Cowell tells contestants all the time that presence and personality are just as important as the talent itself. Similarly, in the working world, being seen as a thoughtful, compassionate, respectful (and fun!) colleague will help you win over others in the office. 
3. Find your compelling story. It’s no real surprise that most of the “golden buzzer” moments, when a judge selects an act from auditions to go straight through to the live shows, involve not only spectacular displays of talent but also a human interest story that truly pulls at your heart strings. Now, a sob story is not something that I’m suggesting is needed (or even necessarily appropriate) for professional settings, particularly interviews. However, the ability to successfully package your story (your background, what makes you tick as a professional, and how you can add value to your prospective work environment) is critical to appearing like the ideal fit for the job.  
4. Be open to (and act on) critical feedback. Each season, some of the strongest and most enduring acts are typically ones that heed the critical advice of the judges on the show. In your career, you too will be more successful if you not only seek out critical feedback but demonstrate that you can positively incorporate it into your professional actions. 
5. Stretch yourself (no, not in the AGT human contortionist style way). With each successive round, the AGT judges expect acts to “step up their game.” To achieve long-term career success, one must also continue to adapt over time, to both sharpen their skills and learn new ones to stay nimble on the job market. 

The secret to career success is nurturing your talents through positions ideally situated to work with your strengths. So, even if, like me, there is no way in a million years you could ever be a successful contestant on AGT, it’s still worth asking yourself: What am I really good at?  What is easy for me? What engages, stimulates, and moves me? The answers to these questions may help you on the way to finding a career path that lets you achieve your own “golden buzzer” moments in life. 

The career exploration and job search processes are very active, fully-conscious experiences. It is important to be intentional, proactive, and to communicate in very direct ways your career goals to yourself (yes, sometimes you still need convincing too) and others. Throughout the process, however, there are some occasions when paying attention to communication happening at a more subconscious level is also important. Sometimes you can use this to your advantage, other times, you want to make sure that it is not putting you at a disadvantage. Here are some examples:

Networking

When you reach out to someone to request an informational interview (an opportunity to learn form them about their job and experiences getting to where they are today so that you can use this information as you possibly apply for similar jobs), there are a handful of reasons why they may say yes to your request to chat:

1. They are an awfully nice person, and love chatting with new people
2. They benefited from someone helping them in a similar way in the past, and are happy to pay it forward with you
3. They are actually looking for a possible candidate for a role that might match your experiences and interests
4. Someone has recommended them to you as a great person to speak with

Points #1-3 are specific to your contact’s needs and interests – you won’t have any influence here. Point #4 involves an external party, however, and this begins to create a situation where you can have an impact. In terms of networking, if I can reach out to a contact and bring in a third party into my introduction (e.g., Julie says that you will be a good person to reach out to with my questions), then I am giving my new contact a good reason to respond to my outreach because they probably don’t want to lose any of the social reputation that they now feel that they have (albeit at a subconscious level). After all, if Julie recommends them as a great person to talk with, she can also change her opinion and feel the opposite if she hears that they don’t actually take the time to chat to people she recommends. Leveraging this type of subconscious social pressure by reaching out to people you know so that you can then reach out to people that they know is an effective networking strategy. This won’t guarantee that people will respond to you, but it certainly increases the likelihood that they will.

Resumes

Most of the resumes you send when applying for jobs will first be “read” by Applicant Tracking Software (ATS) that matches your keywords to those from the job description to determine whether there is a high enough match for your application to be passed on to an actual human. For the time-being, it is likely that these robots are just doing their tasks in an objective manner without too much of a subconscious to worry about (at least I hope so!). However, when your resume makes it through to an actual person (thanks to all of the customizing you did before submitting it), it is time once again to think about how your language and formatting can affect what they think about you.

Small fonts and margins, and a lack of any white space in your resume will make it feel cramped, slightly intimidating, and possibly overwhelming – not concepts you want associated with you. On the other hand, resumes with too much spacing between lines, excessive margins, overly large fonts, all spread out over multiple pages will make it hard for the reader to picture all of your experiences at once. It will feel as if you are communicating too slowly and inefficiently.

Your resume will have an experience section. If you call it “Work Experience”, you may be limiting what you talk about to formal, paid positions. However, if you call it “Relevant Experience”, then not only do you create a subconscious signal to the reader that what they are going to being reading is relevant to them (you still need to make sure it is), but you can also include experiences that are not purely employment related. For example, you can talk about your research as a student or postdoc, or an independent project you worked on with outside collaborators, or the role your played as part of a student group or club. So long as the experience is relevant to the job you are applying to, in terms of the skills you are illustrating, then they can be concentrated together in this one section.

Occasionally, people will create a section in their resume that is called “Other Experience”.  The term “other” doesn’t leave the reader with much in the way of exciting imagery to associate with the experience or skills. Indeed, if the writer doesn’t know what these experiences or skills represent, then the reader is going to have a much harder time deciphering the value of a section that feels a little like a “stuff” section.

When it comes to writing bullet points in the resume, a commonly used phrase to describe experiences is “responsible for…”.

Responsible for coordinating a 300-person professional development event in coordination with 4 local universities

The challenge with this phrasing is that the reader has a couple of options in terms of what they will take away from this. If they, and their subconscious, are feeling generally optimistic, then they may feel that you have successfully taken on lots of responsibility – which is a positive. Alternatively, if they are feeling more pessimistic, they may note that while you were responsible for doing this, you didn’t actually state that you did it. Yes, you were meant to have done it…, but that is not quite the same thing. A more direct approach that minimizes the ability of the reader to take away alternatives meanings from the bullet point will be to focus on the actual skill used, and how successful it is.

Coordinated a 300-person professional development event in collaboration with senior administrators at 4 local universities, bringing in 14 employers and 22 alumni

Overusing verbs such as “helped”, “participated”, and “worked on” will also create a less tangible image of you in the mind of the reader, because it is hard to picture exactly what you may have been doing when you say “worked”. What specific images to these bullets create in your mind?

Worked on key projects that resulted in 20% increase in revenue

Participated in group projects related to research and development

Interviews

Being the most confident version of yourself is a great goal to have during job interviews. One way to communicate confidence at the subconscious level is to ensure that you have strong beginnings and strong endings your answers. This is a common beginning of an answer people give to questions I pose in mock interviews:

“Ummm…., I think…”

Both of these utterances drain the impact that your answer will have. Here are some better responses:

“Yes…, I…”

“That’s a great question…, I…”

“I was actually thinking about this question this morning, and I…”

The questions you will ask during an interview are also important (because you are definitely going to ask some questions, right!?), and should be framed from an optimistic standpoint. Some students are tempted to ask a positive/negative question:

“What are some of the best and worst part of this job/employer?”

This might be a question better suited to an informational interview, rather than a job interview. In a job interview, none of your interviewers are likely to want to paint the job or their company in a negative light, and so you wouldn’t get valid information anyway. However, making people think about the negative aspects of their work life will make them experience a wave of negative emotional states inside, and your interviewer’s subconscious might associate you with these negative states since you were the one who triggered them. As the interviewers gather to discuss the final candidates, any negative feelings associated with you, even at a subconscious level, are not going to help your cause.

I have seen advice that asking the “what does an ideal candidate look like from your perspective?” question at the end of the interview gives you a last chance to convince the interviewer that you can be that candidate. There is certainly some truth to this. There is also a risk that by answering the question out loud, the interviewers create an ideal image in their head that no longer matches you and your skills and experiences. Asking this question may undo some of your hard work from the interview, and leave the interviewer wishing for more – even if they had been happy that you could do the job based on what you had already answered moments before. They wouldn’t be interviewing you if they thought you couldn’t do the job. You should spend the interview providing illustrations of your skills in use so that they can see what value you bring, and then skip this question.

And asking questions that force your interviewer to do some of your work for you will also leave them feeling a little deflated about the experience. For example:

“What questions haven’t I asked that you think it would be important for me to ask?”

The job search process is a great time for you to market the best, most confident version of yourself with dynamic examples, lots of energy, and good dose of optimism. Doing this in the right way will ensure that you are leaving the best impression on the conscious and subconscious of your future employers.

Penn alum Harold Prince (COL ’48) passed away today at age 91. Prince was a legendary theater producer and director, responsible for such classics as West Side Story, Cabaret, Company, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Evita, The Phantom of the Opera, Parade and many many others.

I had the great pleasure of meeting Harold Prince about ten years ago right here on campus. He had come, as he did on more than one occasion, to speak to the Penn community about his career and take questions from students. I had the additional luck of attending a reception after and I recall the twinkle in his eye as he reunited with some of his fellow classmates, by then all in their mid-80s, but giggling in the way that only friends from undergrad do.

During his Q&A session, I asked him what made a good book to a musical, since he had previously said it was the most important ingredient. “I don’t know,” he said, “I just know that if you don’t have a good one, you’re dead.” Back at the reception, I introduced myself as the person who asked about books, explaining that I had just been published as playwright for the first time by Samuel French, Inc. His eyes lit up and he suddenly seemed ten years younger, throwing his arm around me: “ME TOO! I wrote one play and it’s with Sam French! Keep it up. Don’t stop!”

I could have lived in that moment forever. Here was a living legend, tossing his arm around me as if we were absolute peers. I’ve carried that gratitude with me since then and I hope that I’ve been able to pass that on. I’m no Hal Prince, but I’ve been lucky in my career and I feel I owe it to those striking out on a similar path to make them feel welcome and encourage them, as Mr. Prince did for me, to not stop.

No matter what your career path, I ask today that you follow in the steps of Harold Prince. Be bold in your ventures, be kind in their execution and be supportive of those who want to follow in your footsteps.

It’s peak summertime! One of my favorite parts of summer is having the time to start new habits I’ve been putting off, and building the momentum to continue them into the school year. Something that has positively influenced my life recently is listening to more podcasts, specifically podcasts that help me develop more self-awareness or teach me something new. Here is a small selection of the podcasts that have inspired me the most over the last few years!

(Of course, these are all in addition to our own CS Radio – which returns for its fifth season in September!)

Oprah’s Master Class
Do you want to learn from some of the world’s most impactful people? Would you like an autobiography distilled into something you can consume during a workout or during your lunch? Oprah Winfrey’s Master Class features powerful stories from iconic entertainers, musicians, actors, and more as they guide us through key turning points and difficult decisions they made on their personal journeys. At times when I’m feeling unmotivated or am simply looking for a moving story, I find tremendous inspiration in learning about the lives of others, all of which keeps Master Class in heavy rotation on my phone.

The Marie Forleo Podcast
Marie Forleo is a businesswoman, life coach, author, and former dancer, and combines her many talents and bubbling personality to host a fun, energetic podcast on building a business for aspiring entrepreneurs. Forleo and her team interview top businesspeople and create a radiant show atmosphere that seamlessly weaves sketch comedy into professional advice and is sure to make you spit out your coffee laughing. (The show is even better on YouTube where you can watch her hilarious skits).

With topics like “Networking Basics: 8 Tips to Networking Without Being Fake” and “How to Use Social Media so it Doesn’t Overwhelm Your Life,” Forleo brings positivity and personable professionalism to entrepreneurship that is a welcome addition to the typical alpha-male, hustle-and-grind entrepreneur mentality broadcasted on most platforms.

On Purpose with Jay Shetty
Jay Shetty is a former monk who is making wisdom go viral. I first learned about him from his captivating interview on Impact Theory. In his podcast, On Purpose, Shetty hosts thoughtful and vulnerable conversations with CEO’s, actors, artists, doctors, and public figures including Lilly Singh, Charlamagne tha God, Arianna Huffington, and Gary Vaynerchuk.

I especially like the show’s shorter podcasts focused on practical life skills in topics ranging from mental health to communication, which you can start implementing to immediately experience positive results. Some titles include “7 Ways to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others” and “4 Types of Negative People & 3 Ways to Deal With Them.” For those looking to develop more self-awareness, I highly recommend this podcast.

TED Radio Hour
Anytime I listen to TED Radio Hour, I feel like I read a book. For anyone who enjoys Ted Talks but wishes they were even longer, this is a great choice! Each episode finds common themes across different Ted Talks and ties them into larger pieces about concepts such as “Future Consequences,” “Prevention,” and “Jumpstarting Creativity.” Episodes run close to an hour long and are jam packed with interesting stories and information—TED Radio Hour is a great substitute to watching TV at night.

Man Up
In an era where we are slowly learning not to place celebrities and leaders on pedestals, especially powerful men, and are holding more public figures accountable for their actions, we also need a broader, more inclusive, conversation on American masculinity and an understanding of how we can raise children to grow up to be better adults. Man Up is a podcast from Slate Writer Aymann Ismail who hosts conversations about where we as a culture get our ideas of masculinity. Ismail examines the intersections of race, class, gender (including trans perspectives), sexuality, faith, and tradition and the impacts these have on our understandings of masculinity. He explores these conceptions within the backdrop of modern topics including parenting, workplace culture, health, and sex education as well as pressing and historic issues like Islamophobia, transphobia, anti-blackness, and police brutality. These conversations are both insightful and accessible, and since they clock in under 30 minutes, they are perfect for commuting and mealtimes.

Can you believe it’s already late July? I hope you’ve been having an incredible summer, whether you’re working, traveling, or just relaxing! While there’s still plenty of time left to enjoy your summer days and activities, now is the time to slowly begin thinking about returning to campus and all that Fall 2019 will have to offer. August 27th, the first day of classes (sorry to remind you!), will be here before you know it, so how can you start to prepare for your return? Here’s a quick list of things to consider (while still enjoying whatever it is you’re doing this summer):

1. Classes: Make sure you review the classes you chose for Fall 2019 and look up any others that may be of interest to you incase you decide to switch any. Always have some back-ups in case you aren’t yet ready, or have a change of heart, for any of the original classes you picked out.
   
2. Housing: I’m sure (or at least hope!) that you have your housing situated since you’ll be returning in about a month. Make sure all loose ends are tied up, questions for landlords are prepared, bills/rent money is situated. Additionally, create a list of things you need to bring back with you/purchase for your place to make move-in weekend easier for you!
   
3. Resumes/Cover Letters: Have you updated your resume and cover letter yet with any jobs/internships you have/had this summer? I highly suggest doing that ASAP and then submitting your resume (and cover letter if you have one) to Career Services for review. You can always wait until you’re back on campus, however, September is a very busy month, especially the first 2-3 weeks of the semester! If you want to make sure that you have your resume and/or cover letter ready to go for September, take some time to update it now and email it or schedule an appointment to meet or talk with Career Services. Once you have that all reviewed and edited, you can focus other things that will come your way at the start of the semester!
   
4. Study Abroad: Thinking you’ll want to study abroad Spring 20202? Be sure to do some research and look into programs that interest you before chatting with Penn Abroad. Then, schedule an appointment to talk with the appropriate Penn Abroad advisor. Typically, application deadlines are September 15, with some being October 1 (however, deadline dates vary, so check out their website!).
   
5. Career Fairs/Campus Events: Take an hour or so to do some research before classes begin as to when career fairs and important campus events that interest you will take place. Knowing these dates and having a plan will make your semester go a lot smoother!
   
6. Work-Study: Returning in the Fall with a work-study position? Now is the time to start thinking of your schedule, including your class schedule, to figure out what hours you’ll be able to work. Looking at future dates will be helpful to note which days you might need to take off work for important events, such as an interview, career fair, etc.
   
7. Advisor Meeting: Check in with your advisor to see if there are any outstanding items you need to take care of or be aware of for Fall 2019.

Have a wonderful rest of your summer! Career Services looks forward to seeing you in September!

Last semester, a graduate student who I had advised asked as she was leaving, if I knew any information about parenting resources for graduate students on Penn campus. As I spoke to the student, it occurred to me that in order for the student to progress in their career search or development, they had a great need for other important resources to help them along in their journey to function as a successful student at Penn. As a former Penn graduate student, who also had a family by the time I defended my dissertation, I empathized greatly with this student. I knew very well the struggle of balancing parenthood and graduate student life, particularly on Penn campus, and remembered the feeling of wanting to be connected to a network of Penn parents. For graduate students who may also be juggling parenthood, this post is dedicated to you! Since I was a graduate student, many new resources have come to existence and there are excellent opportunities and communities you can become a part of so that you don’t feel that you’re journeying alone. Not only did you embark on learning and “mastering” subject matters, but you have the privilege and adventure of parenting another life. It IS possible to do both with some help. I commend you for seeking resources that can improve your graduate student life as a parent. Here are some resources that may be of help:

The Family Resource Center at Penn: https://familycenter.upenn.edu/about-us

Join their email list learn about resources that Penn has to offer. The site can connect you to Penn parent networks, neighborhood networks, as well as national sites that can direct you to parenting resources. It’s also a hub for knowing what benefits you have as a parent while studying at Penn. There are also amenities such as a lactation room, a family lounge, a reading room, as well as nap space for kids, and books and toys. It is a wealth of information and resources and this should be your first stop at Penn for parenting resources!

Emergency Backup Childcare: https://familycenter.upenn.edu/resources-support/child-care

Every parent wants to know what childcare help they can get when an emergency occurs. Who can take care of your children should they have a snow day and you have an important meeting to attend? Penn has a resource that can cover you for backup care should you need it.

Care.com Free Resource through Penn https://pennfamilycenter.care.com/

Penn also has a wonderful Care.com resource where families can sign up to find childcare for their home. This resource can be customized for local care and Penn helps with a free membership to Care.com while you are a student.

Lactation and Baby Changing Stations

https://familycenter.upenn.edu/resources-support/lactation-resources

Are you always searching for a place to nurse or feed your baby? What about a place to change their diaper? It’s always a struggle for parents of babies and toddlers to find a safe, clean place to do what is already a tough job: nursing and changing a wiggling baby. Not only does the Family Resource Center at Penn have a lactation room, but Penn is a very lactation friendly campus with rooms located all around campus. Many of bathrooms in several of the buildings on campus also have baby friendly changing spaces.

Grants for Ph.D. Students with Dependents: https://familycenter.upenn.edu/grants

Penn also has a couple l funded family grants, specifically for PhD students. One is a Family Grant and the other Is a Dependent Health Insurance Grant. Read about the guidelines and see if you might be able to qualify. The grant cycle opens on August 27^th to submit applications. If you think that these might be of interest, you will need to get in gear with all submission materials ready very soon!

PennCard & Campus Services:

https://familycenter.upenn.edu/resources-support/penncard-and-campus-services

Did you know the PennCard enables your spouse and children to access several amenities on campus? However, they each need to obtain their OWN Penn Card, which can easily be done through the PennCard Center: http://cms.business-services.upenn.edu/penncard/. The PennCard will give your spouse and children access to museums, Penn transit services, and recreational facilities.

I hope that helps with navigating family life as a graduate student! It’s not an easy road, but it’s a fun one when you have the right resources at your fingertips. Happy parenting!

As you think ahead to the fall semester, one of the ways we can assist you with your job search is conducting a mock interview with us.  It takes practice to interview well and Career Services offers mock interviews.  We will provide feedback (both positive and negative) to help you with your interviewing skills. Interviewing skills are a continuous work in progress for people at all stages of their career from undergraduates to seasoned professionals.  Depending on your preference, you can have the mock interview video recorded in which we play it back for feedback or you can have a mock interview without the video recording. 

To prepare for a mock interview we recommend viewing potential questions on our website.  Additionally, be sure to send your application materials (cover letter and resume) to your advisor in Career Services prior to your scheduled mock interview.  You will also want to conduct your research on the company/organization/institution.  This means not only searching their website but also if anything has been mentioned in the news about the particular employer.  Have a wonderful summer and we look forward to practicing your interview skills with you!   

Creating a resume can be an intimidating process. It’s hard to know how to highlight your skills and strengths in a way that makes you stand out. Your descriptions of your jobs/internships/extracurriculars experiences are the best way to show off what you would bring to a role.

Start by focusing on what you’ve done in each experience. What skills did you use? What were your accomplishments? What were the outcomes related to your work? Start your sentence with a strong action verb (created, managed, researched); we have a whole list of examples on our website. Next, try to add a little more detail about the scope of your role. Adding quantifiable details is a great way to provide context to your experience. For example: how many people attended that event? How many students did you teach or tutor? How much did that social media campaign increase engagement? Finally, always pay attention to the job description. One of the best ways to stand out as a candidate is to highlight the skills and qualifications they’re looking for on your resume through your experiences.

Here are a few examples of how to flesh-out details on your resume, to help illustrate why this is so effective:

Alpaca Groomer’s Club, Member

• Coordinated social events for the Alpaca Groomer’s Club.

Alpaca Groomer’s Club, Member

• Coordinated 4 events, each with 25+ attendees. Managed pre-event logistics, including securing venue, food, and alpaca-themed decorations. Maintained a fun experience for attendees while staying under budget.

The Teacup Factory, Waitstaff

• Waited tables/served food. Handled customer complaints.

The Teacup Factory, Waitstaff

• Managed the largest serving section while ensuring prompt and accurate food delivery. Received positive feedback for remaining calm and friendly while finding fast resolutions to challenging customer complaints.

Jester Inventory Co., Intern

• I processed inventory in Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word.

Jester Inventory Co., Intern

• Created an excel spreadsheet to streamline inventory calculations and tracking which were previously done manually, increasing productivity and cutting down on the number of errors made by 25%.

Showing your skills and strengths, rather than just telling them, will help you stand out as a candidate.

If you’re struggling with cover letters or resumes, or if you just want a second pair of eyes to look them over, you can submit them for review and we’ll be happy to help.

Hurray for summer! It’s finally time for a break from classes, meetings, exams and projects. I usually have a running list of books I keep meaning to read, and my favorite part of summer is that I’m able to finally check off a few. I wanted to share with you some of my favorite career related picks that will help you discover your passions and ways to achieve success.

Design thinking is a hot topic these days, and this book gives practical advice on how to find a fulfilling, meaningful life using design thinking principles. It’s not about achieving success in the traditional sense, and instead focuses on what you can do to find joy in your career.

This book is a great guide for how to handle networking in the social media age. The best part is it includes templates on how to email a recruiter, follow up with a contact and even tips on how to use Twitter and Facebook for your job search.

As a freshman in college, Alex Banayan started on a seven year quest to interview leaders in all different industries and find out what made them successful. His book details those conversations and both the similarities and differences in their experiences. This is a great read not only because of the key insights from these huge names, but also because of the adventure Alex went through to get access.

And if these images weren’t enough to help you through the working day, we’re still open over the summer and happy to talk through any career questions or plans for what might come after the summer.

Career Services will be closed today, Friday, June 14th while a technology project is completed in our office. This includes the front desk and library lounge.

Staff will be unavailable today, but we look forward to seeing you again on Monday! Have a great weekend.

I was sorting through some old boxes at home the other night when I stumbled across a copy of a book I was given when I worked as a Research Fellow at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. The book is called “Don’t Shoot the Dog”, and it focuses on how you can use positive reinforcement as a tool to train animals. Zoos and aquariums engage in lots of animal training, and much of this is done to help improve the welfare of the animals, and so there were plenty of opportunities for keepers to train animals at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. Here are some examples of training in a zoo setting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2a3UIu3lJc.

At home, if you have ever given your dog a treat when it sits down on command then you are using positive reinforcement. In fact, if you have ever enthusiastically and immediately thanked a faculty member for writing a reference letter for a job application at short notice, then you have also used positive reinforcement. When it comes to animal training, humans are just as animaly as all the other animals out there. Positively reinforcing a behaviour increases the likelihood that the behaviour will occur more frequently in the future. Effective positive reinforcement increases the energy in the room when you are working with other people or animals, and creates a more positive environment for whatever project you are working on. If you can find the right reinforcer, and can provide it immediately after the behaviour you want to promote has been performed, then you on your way to being able to improve your relationships with peers, advisors, students in your classrooms, bosses, family, and your various companion animals.

When thinking about career exploration and the job search, there are many situations where positive reinforcement can be helpful. There are also many times where people miss opportunities to use this approach. Here are some common issues:

• You speak with an alum at a networking event, but don’t send a brief thank email within 24 hours.
• Your advisor rushes to write a reference letter for you, but you don’t acknowledge the extra work they did, thank them, or let them know when you got the job.
• A recruiter emails you with an update on a position you are applying to, but you don’t respond to their email promptly.

A positive reinforcer tells the recipient that the behaviour they just performed is good. The more you reinforce the behaviour, the more often it will occur. However, not providing any reinforcement, or providing it too long after the behaviour is performed, gives the recipient no information, provides no positive energy, and so there is no impetus for them to do more of the behaviour in the future. When you are looking for jobs or internships, this means thanking people often and quickly, and being prompt with your upbeat responses when you see people working on your behalf at any point in the job search process.

If you are looking for an easy summer read, then take a look at this book, and see how you might be able to take proactive steps towards maximizing the many benefits that positive reinforcement can have as you engage with your network.

Now that summer is finally here and you are starting the internships you have worked so hard to secure, it’s the perfect time to consider ways you can make the most of this opportunity and build your leadership skills. Focusing on your professional development while you are in entry-level roles will help you gain skills that not only help your current team, but could also position for opportunities in the future, whether with your current organization or a new one. Just as athletes train throughout the year to improve their performance during the season, you can use this summer to design your leadership strategy.

It’s helpful to consider the qualities that make a strong leader: emotional intelligence, strategic risk taking, effective communication, relationship building, flexibility, problem solving, resilience, vision, and the ability to listen and take purposeful action. Great leaders possess a solid grasp of fundamentals in their field, yet they also surround themselves with people who make up for what they lack. They are constantly learning and envisioning what could be, but not ignoring current realities and historical context. They excel at conceptualizing a path and empowering a team to bring that vision to life.

Reading a list like that sounds like a tall order, especially when you’re in your first internship, but you have been building many of these skills for years through coursework, activities, sports, volunteer work, summer jobs, and more. Here are ways to cultivate your leadership skills. Notice that many of them do not involve an actual leadership title right now – instead, it’s about focusing on what you are learning.

• Leading/Contributing to projects: Volunteer for more responsibilities. Seek out opportunities for impact and ones that may not seem glorious, but are important for building the foundational knowledge.

• Build your network: Look for opportunities to work across your company; look into affinity groups or other ways to become involved in your company’s community beyond your own department.
  
  
• Learning opportunities: Does your office host lunch and learns, webinars, or speaker series? Attend these both for the content and to meet more people.
  
  
• Seek out mentors: Express genuine interest in colleagues and what they do. These initial conversations can turn into regular coffee chats and may help you find a mentor within the company or new work friends.

• Leadership within professional associations: Become involved with your industry’s professional associations. The rates for student memberships are usually reasonable. Volunteer to help plan an upcoming event or help with the next conference. This will greatly expand your professional circle, can be a lot of fun, and a perfect way to learn from others in the field.

• Network with alumni: Use QuakerNet and LinkedIn to identify alumni for informational interviews. Ask their advice on how to position yourself for a leadership track in your field. https://www.vpul.upenn.edu/careerservices/networking/InfoInterviews.php

• Learn as much as possible about your field and leadership in general: Read industry publications and remain informed on current events. Look at the syllabi from top MBA programs like Wharton and see which books their students are reading about leadership – check those out and discuss what you learn in your networking.

Taking these steps will help you build valuable skills to benefit you throughout your career. Enjoy your summer and remember that Career Services is here to help you with this process.

Recently, I attended an event and had a conversation about networking. We talked about different approaches and tactics – one idea that emerged from that discussion focused on asking for introductions from mutual acquaintances to connect with other professionals you may not know.

You may be familiar with the term “cold-call” or “cold-email” – basically an effort to contact someone you don’t know, commonly used in the context of networking or inquiring about job or internship opportunities.

While there are different opinions on the success of cold-calling and cold-emailing, I encourage you to try asking for introductions to people you want to meet from individuals you already know as part of the networking process.

Think about individuals you know and their existing contacts – one way to explore this could be through LinkedIn 2nd or 3rd degree connections. If you want to connect with someone else that shares a mutual connection with you, consider asking the mutual connection for an introduction. In some cases, introductions from individuals that are trusted can lead to a higher volume of responses and initiate meaningful conversations.

That being said, always be mindful of quality over quantity. Don’t simply focus on the number of conversations you have – the quality of your conversations is most important. And always be authentic with your introduction requests and conversations. Think carefully why you want to be introduced to someone and how a conversation with that particular individual would be helpful.

Let me know how you fare with asking for introductions from mutual contacts as you attempt to expand your network.

Do you have any examples of situations where an introduction from a mutual contact was beneficial for networking purposes?  Feel free to share them below.

Looking for more tips on networking?  Check out a few online videos and social media networking tips here: https://www.vpul.upenn.edu/careerservices//networking/howto.php

This final entry is by Heather Finnegan, COL ’19

The opportunity to devote the summer to my creative work helped me to explore new styles as a poet and solidify my decision to continue perusing writing as a career. Working one-on-one with Jason Zuzga, a professor I met during Queer Theory, pushed me to consider new forms for my work, including the sestina, the epic, and the modified sonnet. The feature poem of my summer collection, On Average, is a twelve-part chronicle about a young gender non-conforming person, Ave, who miraculously grows gills during puberty. With Jason’s guidance, I was able to push the narrative form I learned so intensely during my studies at the South Carolina Governor’s School for Arts and Humanities into queerer, post-modern territory and create a feeling of mystical awkwardness that could touch any person coming off age or struggling with gender identity. 

Many of my new poems have a dream like quality to them. During my sophomore year at Penn, I was diagnosed with major depression. I slept excessively and felt distant and fuzzy most days. My body of work reflects that headspace, focusing not only on the difficulties of mental illness, but also the resilience and nuance of those in the recovery process. Much of this body of work derives its energy from that process, as well as the restorative powers of engaging with the natural world. The unknown is abundant in wilderness. The unknown, too, is a core element of my queerness and my struggles with mental health. At times, this can be absolutely horrifying. And at times, the wonderful potential of these mysteries is exhilarating.

The following poem engages nature as it can be found in Philadelphia. Homing in on the foliage of West Philly as well as the crawling creatures of Center City shows that even in an urban environment, nature can be found by an observant onlooker. Likewise, even when depression leaves one feeling numb and stuck in a mundane and oppressive system, hope can be found in celebrating the sensation and liberation of the body. This is the uplifting nature of giving oneself over to the queer, the volatile, and the feral parts of our everyday lives.

Two Things Worth Living For

One:

The heat

In the east, the garbage standing in line

Behind the Ritz Carleton hotel, rich

And maggot loved. This city, full

Of life, recycled, re-claimed.

From the Center where a prostitute

Shakes her straight shoulders at me,

Sideways, as if she’d get a dime only for dancing

The chacha up the sidewalk. Her kudzu bush

Creeping out the edge of cotton shorts. I smile.

Almost stop to ask what she’s selling and

How much—as if this block with the rainbowed

Crosswalks could be a farmer’s market for sex.

Peaches, sweet corn.

Two:

Back west

The blocks become pines, oaks,

Peonies trembling for a taste of breeze.

The kinked, glistening garden snakes in my garden

Make love knots together behind Mexican heather.

When the sun pounds us like this

All afternoon, demanding every last drop of egg

White fluid we can fathom from under our skin.

Sweating like this, we have not felt so deathly

Dehydrated, nor absolutely alive since last year.

And you with your ball cap. And I with my dirt soaked

Denim would beg her fuck us breathless

With her stone rays

All day.

This entry is by Shea Tarnow, COL ’19

Through Penn, I received funding which allowed me the ability to pursue an internship that has only sparked my motivation to work in a community which is not my own as well provided me with an opportunity to get up close and personal with a history I had only ever read about.

I spent the summer working an internship at Pennsylvania School for the Deaf (PSD) in Germantown Pennsylvania through their Deaf Culture Heritage Center (DCHC). PSD is the second oldest Deaf school in the nation and is a location of which I have learned much about through my classes in the Sign Language department at Penn. While I have been on their campus prior and gone to events hosted by organizations involved with this school, I was provided a unique opportunity working in the DCHC that allowed me to see primary sources and firsthand examples of events and concepts I had only ever discussed and learned about in the academic setting.

The Deaf Culture Heritage Center at PSD is somewhat of a museum of artifacts and document donations provided by alumni and collected throughout the history of the school. They hold and show these pieces and keep a record of the institution’s past in a way that works to provide people who are interested in access to these resources. An exciting piece of this, personally, is that they are currently in a developmental stage in which they are working to alter their presentation as well as start digitizing their collection to provide an online resource as well as better conserve the documents. This internship allowed me to personally handle incredibly old documents and school memorabilia as well as interact with alumni, administration, and preservation experts.

Working under two women who were so incredibly passionate about their work and involved, one even personally, with this history allowed me to gain an experience I would not have otherwise. It provided many conversations revolving around the goals for the future of DCHC as well as the various features they had noticed when visiting different museums and archives allowing our end goal for the project to be very much an ever-changing and impressionable concept. Given this fact, it also meant that my thoughts and opinions were greatly considered

Currently, one thing that much of their focus is on is the upcoming Bicentennial Celebration of Pennsylvania School for the Deaf happening in 2020. This is a weekend-long event inviting alumni and supporters of PSD to Philadelphia to celebrate 200 years of education. Because they expect a great number of people to be on the campus during this time, there is a large effort to make sure the DCHC is at its most organized and modernized version in order to allow a greater immersion into the institution’s history.

What I gained from this experience is one that I am grateful for and that sparked my curiosity and interest in a community I had only, up until then, been sitting outside of. I learned a more extensive history of an amazing institution and the past political ins and outs of the campus as well as was able to see firsthand how the history of the time affected the school and students it held the responsibility of educating.

This entry is by Katrina Arman, WH ’20

This summer I had the opportunity to intern at a real estate technology startup called Steignet in Philadelphia. I was inspired to work there by the CEO, AJ Steigman, a man who possesses great passion, drive and belief in his business, and someone who thinks on his feet at all times. The startup describes itself as a ‘Bloomberg terminal’ for the residential real estate market, and in brief is an arbitrage program that uses machine learning to scan millions of housing units to identify real time mispricing’s in the single family residential real estate market. Steignet developed this program in order to make more effective investments in the real estate market to generate superior alpha for its investors. It plans to investment its own capital in projects using the program, as well as lease the program to private real estate firms.  

When I first started the job, I was put onto the Business Development team whose main goal was to work on investment pitches, market research as well as outreach. There were about 20 interns and we each worked individually, but met with the CEO once every few days for a large group meeting.

Working so directly with the CEO of such an up and coming startup was what really stood out in this internship for me, as at larger firms you wouldn’t get to work so directly with senior management. Additionally, the amount of responsibility I was given was more than I could have asked for. The CEO made me responsible for all of the interns after a few weeks on the job, and so I had to effectively delegate tasks to the teams, track their progress and be the point of contact if they had any issues.  The learning curve was extremely steep and every time I met the CEO he would have a new task for me that expanded on the previous one, with an added amount of importance and responsibility. His insight was also very valuable to me and triggered an interest in technology and real estate I didn’t know I had.

I truly felt, within the first few weeks, that I was an integral member of the company, and every one of my actions was making a difference.

About a month in to the internship, the CEO had to leave for a business trip abroad and the team had to keep on running operations whilst he was gone. I was at the forefront of this as the intern manager, and so I laid out expectations and delegated tasks in terms of importance, created deadlines and timelines and worked productively. I had the biggest responsibility, and ended up speaking to various company directors and negotiated an important deal for the firm. The fact that the CEO trusted me so much as to leave the negotiation of this deal in my hands was very exciting and I worked very hard to do it well.

In general, the progress that our intern team had made over the course of the summer was extraordinary and the sense of teamwork in the firm was also something special that I haven’t seen anywhere else.

Overall, this internship showed me the inner workings of a startup that will help me understand how much blood, sweat and tears really goes into building a successful company from the ground up, and gave me valuable communication, negotiation, management (both team and time management) skills, as well as leadership experience that I can carry through to any endeavor I pursue next.

This entry is by Johany Dubon, COL ’20

Applying to internships entails a whirlwind of emotions. One of those is the constant feeling of comparison to your peers. Everybody wants to secure the perfect summer internship – educational and challenging, yet exciting and flexible. However, the search for the perfect internship becomes increasingly difficult when you realize the monetary barriers that may prevent you from finding such an internship. You realize that money is not a barrier for everyone, and it is easy to get frustrated when it feels like you will not be able to pursue your passion because it is too expensive. In this way, securing funding can be quite competitive and is a stressor in and of itself.

            I was so thankful to find out that I was granted funding by VPUL for my summer in Washington, D.C. As a Political Science major, I hoped to have a political summer internship in D.C. to start preparing myself for a career in politics. When I began the housing search, I quickly realized how expensive living in D.C. was. Soon, the possibility of interning in D.C. started to feel like less of a reality. Costs of rent, food, and transportation started to pile up faster than I had expected. I seeked funding resources through a few means but my internship either did not fit the description or I was not selected due to the number of applicants. In the end, I was selected for funding. The money I received was invaluable to me and my ability to intern at The Raben Group this past summer. Without it, I would not have had the ability to meet the amazing professionals that work at Raben, and I would not have been able to explore and network in D.C.

            This past summer, I was an intern in Raben’s Issue Campaigns practice area. I had the chance to participate in the planning and execution of various campaigns and learn how campaigns are started and maintained. One of these campaigns was the campaign by the Friends of the American Latino museum, which aims to build a new Smithsonian museum dedicated to American Latinos. To my excitement, when my supervisors noticed how intrigued I was by this campaign, they offered me 2 tickets to the Smithsonian African American History and Culture Museum. I had been trying to secure tickets all summer, but had no such luck until a fellow Raben surprised me with tickets!

            During my internship, I bettered my writing abilities, worked with clients that are bettering the world, and most importantly, I interacted with a variety of people who inspire me everyday. I am so appreciative for this opportunity!