3 Things Whitworth Should have Taught You About the World Outside the Pinecone Curtain
May 19, 2009 | Contributed by Grady Locklear
Congrats, seniors! Six and a grisly half out of ten of you (65%) will be moving back in with your parents after graduation. Juniors, the clock is ticking. Are you scared?
In the year since I was graduated, I have learned about a trillion times as much about the real world as I learned at Whitworth. So here are three basic tips I’m going to assume they didn’t teach you well enough.
1. Don’t be afraid to ask (for help, for knowledge…)
People will generally like you more if they get to do you a favor. So, ask the career center, professors; counselors. This is self-explanatory, but I didn’t take full advantage of this excellent resource when I was at Whitworth.
Ask your friends: Make it common knowledge on Facebook that you’re looking for a particular kind of work. If your friends, their families, and their families’ connections don’t know anybody looking to hire someone like you, I’ll be surprised. Just don’t beg pathetically or anything.
Ask professionals: Request an interview with a local person who has the job you wish you had. How did they get there? What surprised them along the way? Is it really lonely at the top?
2. Know your strengths: (technology, integrity…)
You are part of Generation Y, and people have assumptions about you.
Some are negative: They think you are not loyal to companies (statistically speaking, you may work 11-14 jobs in your life) and you prefer to ask what your company can do for you; not what you can do for your company.
Some are positive, so know your strengths: They assume you are more tech-savvy than they are (after all, you’ve spent 20,000 hours online already). You can bring new ideas. No more ‘business as usual.’ Stress that you are an ethical person. That is hugely important. These days it’s actually becoming cool to be ethical. So keep your copy of Boondock Saints hidden away.
Don’t believe me about the negative assumptions? Peruse some contributions to Brazen Careerist, the top career site for people our age.
3. Social media is incredibly important to understand. (facebook, twitter, LinkedIn, youtube, flickr, feedburner/google reader…)
Facebook has made recent changes that allow businesses to connect and interact with their fans/followers/potential customers. If you can think of a creative way to make that work for your company, you are a valuable asset.
Twitter is a site you probably don’t understand. If you’re like Daniel Walters and any of a myriad of other people who don’t ‘get it’ yet, don’t feel bad. I can return and write a quick twitter guide, discuss in the comments, or have a facebook conversation about it. I’m happy to advise.
LinkedIn: If you don’t have a professional page on this site (basically an online resume) you’re on a ride into the fail-zone. Get on it!
RSS reader: Check out Feedburner or if you have a Google account, Google Reader. Subscribe to CNN or BBC news, Mashable, The Onion, all your friends’ blogs, Google Alerts for your name etc. The list goes on!
I currently have 49 feeds in my Google Reader. I’d never take the time to visit each site, but with an RSS reader I know any time something new is posted. Then I can read a quick summary and decide whether I want to read the whole thing.
Network, network, network. Join a professional association, find meet ups and events. Stay connected with your college friends. Do these things, O graduate, and leave a comment about how you’re preparing for Life Beyond. Fellow alums – what advice would you add? Did I miss anything?
Comments
17 Responses to “3 Things Whitworth Should have Taught You About the World Outside the Pinecone Curtain”
The Forum strives to maintain academic integrity and as such we expect proper grammar and punctuation at all times. Please avoid colloquial internet memes and emoticons. Additionally, we strongly value accountability for written words and wish to avoid an anonymous environment.
Please use your real first and last name, or your comment will be deleted.
Due to the nature of the comment formatting, please be sure there is a space between paragraphs, or your comment may not display properly.
4. Go back to school!!!
I say that partly in jest, but there is a kernel of truth there. For a lot of Whitworth grads, and especially in an economy like this, your degree won’t add substantially to your professional worth unless you use it as a stepping-stone to something else (internship, grad program, what-have-you.)
Example: I have a Communication Studies degree which I plan to never again use as a major resume point. However, it was an ideal degree to finish early, save some money, and launch into UW Law – which had been my plan when I started. A lot of you English majors may have given cursory thought to grad school – give it some more thought. It’s senseless to waste your money on an extra few years of study if you aren’t passionate about it, but it’s also definitely worth taking the time out now if you ever want to be a professor (and it’s nice to have a few more years of coasting on financial aid).
One thing that’s easy to do is forget that your resume exists to impress people. It’s like a building – gaps ruin the whole thing. Any time you wander aimlessly, you are doing yourself a disservice unless you can sell it. That’s not to say you can’t take time off; rather, that you should have a creative sell or make sure you keep up on volunteer work, internships, or independent study when you aren’t pursuing a career.
My number one revelation, though? Don’t worry. You live in a first-world country with a generous welfare system and an awful lot of nice people. What’s the worst that could happen? It’s a cliche to ask, but think it through. The actual worst that could happen in a lot of situations is cutting back on the standard of living and maybe turning off the heat for a little while. In other words, it’s a lot like being a college student.
Some of the most brilliant and most productive thinkers of the modern era lived in squalor, for two reasons: brilliant people are lazy, and part of real wisdom consists of throwing off materialism. I’ll confess to loving shiny toys and fast cars and new computers and good food – but it’s always a comfort to remember that I was totally happy living in a cold house with five dudes on an inflatable mattress and ramen noodles. No, it’s not an aspirational goal, but even a job at McDonalds is going to keep you alive.
Aim high, and work hard to get there. But never forget the admonition in Ecclesiastes: All is vanity and chasing after the wind. Don’t get too caught up in the games and the memes that we style our entire social structure around; life is about the people around you and the things you place your faith and hope in, and un[der]employment won’t take those away from you.
Also, let me expand Grady’s final point a bit – social media means more than having a facebook account. Email professionals and ask to meet them for coffee after a conference or to talk about some issue.
One thing that you learn to obsess about in law school and I think all job-hunters should try is injecting yourself uninvited into the lives of people with hiring power. I’ve you’ve taken the initiative to go to an M’s game or have Starbucks with a potential employer from, say, a newspaper, who do you think they will pay more attention to when they see your name in an otherwise undifferentiated pile of resumes?
Networking can start online, but take it into the real world. Show people your face, call to follow up on interviews, have a strong handshake. These things will get you more jobs than a 4.0, I promise. The guy interviewing you probably doesn’t have a 4.0.
[disclaimer: the previous advice was given by a currently unemployed law student]
Kyle – you lived on ramen noodles? Hope you changed the sheets every now and then [Emoticon playfully sticking its tongue at the reader]
Just because I don’t have a Twitter account, doesn’t mean I don’t “get” Twitter, Grady.
Twitter can be an invaluable tool for diseminating ideas, opinions or news– like Facebook or a blog.
Also like Facebook or a blog, it can be a source of self-absorbed meaningless blathering.
Hi Kyle.
How courageous of you – to comment on Grady’s article. Commenting is a privilege, you know. Not all blogs allow it.
Oh, and google “Kyle Pflug Spokane,” if you haven’t done so recently. Hope you didn’t want to work at a law firm this side of Seattle anytime soon.
Daniel –
Yes, but does that mean it can be ONLY a source of meaningless blathering?
I think not.
Fie upon you, sir, for even SUGGESTING such a silly idea.
Daniel – I know. But how often to I get to imply your lack of omniscience? Not often enough.
Gabrielle – I have to agree with Kyle’s message as copy/pasted in your blog. The key to gaining meaningful attention, especially in the long run, is providing excellent content.
Cheap attention-getting content comes across as A) Cheap and B) Trying to get your attention – like everybody else. There is no substitute for excellent content and if this forum seeks worthwhile attention I strongly encourage avoiding the cheap stuff.
Daniel – oh wait, Grady said what I wanted to say.
Grady – Yep. Which is why any meaningful law firm will hire him. There are few in Spokane.
To answer your and Kyle’s second point: but it gets attention. If I scream at someone, does it get attention? Yes. The wrong kind. If I yell – “Hey, come look at this awesome thing!” – does it inspire negative attention? Maybe in a negative environment, yes…
And, as anyone who drinks vodka knows, the cheap stuff tastes better in the long run.
I’ll enjoy my Ketel One and Chopin, then, and leave the cheap stuff for you, ha.
And… well actually that about sums it up.
I hate Chopin. Unless I’m playing the piano.
I love chopsticks when I’m eating Panda Express.
And I don’t know if I like good sushi.
Never tried it.
Gabrielle:
Kyle’s comment to you was well-written, polite, and — as it should be — not public. It reflects well on how he handles conflict, and any law firm — in Seattle or otherwise — would be proud to hire him.
(Disclaimer: I’m only two days an alumna and am by no means savvy about this real world. In fact, I’m entering a discipline in which the meaning of the term “real world” has nothing to with paying your own water bill. So take this with some hefty grains of salt.)
This point was hit on a little when Grady mentioned talking with people who have the job you want, but it strikes me as very important to know the standards for your field—what’s important, what’s impressive, what will improve the skills you’re going to need, what “problems” on your resume/cv you don’t need to worry about. For example, I was on the faculty search committee for this year’s philosophy search, and none of us could have cared less whether or not an applicant made use of Twitter or any other online tool. In philosophy, the jobs are advertised in “Jobs for Philosophers” and people apply by mail, online, or at the APA meeting. Sure, there’s some amount of networking, and having letters of recommendation from philosophy-famous people is immensely important. But Ernest Sosa doesn’t tweet.
The same goes for what jobs the person has held in the past, and for how long (teaching appointments aside). We responded only with mild intrigue when one of our applicants told us he’d made a living for a short time selling Ferbies. His success or failure therein was totally irrelevant to his capabilities as a philosopher and professor. Committees expect applicants in philosophy to have had strange non-academic jobs to get by on, and the market’s so bad that having a couple short teaching stints on your resume is nothing to frown at. But having straight A’s in grad school did make an applicant stand out at least a little. (A’s and B’s weren’t enough to make one stand out, because most programs require a B or better in all classes, if they’re going to count for distribution requirements–again, something that may be unknown to people starting out in the field.)
All that is to say: know the standards for your field. Find out what exceptional looks like and go do that, if your goal is to be ambitious. Kyle gives us a good reminder about perspective here. There is more to life than a career, and more to a career than climbing ladders. For those of us fresh out of Whitworth, now might be a good time to evaluate what it is we want out of our vocational aspirations, so we don’t end up playing a game we wouldn’t want to win.
Daniel –
Yes.
His Facebook message to me was well written, polite, masculine – and utterly childish.
People have been saying to me for years not to say anything on Facebook that I wouldn’t want plastered all over the Internet.
I’m teaching Kyle a lesson – Reepicheep style.
Kelly –
Perspective depends on where one is standing.
Much like Reepicheep, AKA C.S. Lewis’ Mouse Chara. That Never, Ever, EVER Shut Up (remarkably similar to Wesley’s ROUS’s) – I have none.
I’m both nearsighted and every short.
If people throw rocks at me, they generally aim for the back of my head.
And they generally hit.
Those particular disagreements with Kyle, Gabrielle, do not belong in the comment section of this article, as they have absolutely nothing to do with the topic at hand.
To contribute to something actually on topic: I would encourage a bit of real-world experience before grad school. The things you learn in the field are far more quickly valuable than things you learn in theory class.
And, at least with many jobs, it’s better looking on a resume as well.
Of course, what an employer wants varies drastically, as has been noted, between jobs.
Kelly – Ernest Sosa and other philosophers may not tweet, but some established rules should be broken! Am I wrong in saying that even philosophical ideas need an audience? Otherwise, in a sort of metaphysical sense, what is the point of their existing?
There are standards, and then there are creative ways to exceed the standards and set yourself apart from the standardized competition.
Grady, you’re right that philosophical ideas need an audience if they’re going to have an impact and be a part of the discourse of the discipline. Twitter just isn’t the right forum for that, on an academic level. That’s nothing against Twitter. I believe you that it can be a great tool for social networking, etc., in one’s search for a job. My point was more the fact that disciplines vary as far as what the means are for advancement. There are some internet resources that are hugely helpful for people wanting to go into philosophy (most notably the Leiter Report), and many grad students have professional webpages and philosophy blogs. Discussion on the blogs might help them clarify their ideas, but the way to get a job in philosophy is still to have a great cv, strong recommendations, good teaching evaluations, marketable areas of specialization and competence, etc.
Gabrielle -
I’ll happily discuss in private any complaints you have with the style or content of my messages. This is not the appropriate forum for those discussions. I’d like that to be the end of the discussion of this issue in the comments here.
Daniel –
Hey, I just asked you out on Twitter. Go look.
Actually, as a pre-lawyer, Kyle Pflug had no business sending me a cease and desist letter anywhere except Facebook. I’m surprised, nay, shocked that you think otherwise.
I know you’re a History major, Daniel, but, honestly I had expected a little more foresight than this.
Furthermore, despite many literary and otherwise warnings, which I would have expected Kyle to understand (mostly because I’m an ex-English Lit. major – whereas he actually graduated with the degree) – Kyle, or you, went ahead and deleted one of my two accounts on the Forum.
One was given with the title of Contributor, which meant I could edit my own articles as I chose, and read those of others who chose to leave theirs open to the public eye.
The other was nicknam’d Gvaughn11 (I’m sure I need not lay out the subtext for you), and has webadmin privileges.
I shan’t tell the entire Forum what the passwords for both accounts where, mostly because there are some degrees of transparency that even I will not bow to.
I am not crabgrass, Sir DanWalters. I am wheat.
I bend with the wind – I don’t break.
And both you and Kyle apparently don’t understand that.
I don’t shrive to cheap tricks…unless the cheap men respond to such vain attention getting techniques.
And any girl on Sprague will tell you the same [sincerely meant word]ed thing.