Networking in 7 simple steps

The thought of networking can be scary and you may not know where to start. The good news is that networking does not mean calling an endless list of people you don't know, but it does take effort.  This article breaks it down into 7 steps that you can take right now:

http://workbloom.com/articles/networking/networking-for-college-students-and-recent-graduates.aspx

Manage Your Online Brand

By now we all know that our internet activity is not private; in fact, most of it is just a quick Google search away. Add to that the increased use of the internet for connecting with others on a professional level and there is an obvious need to be more aware of your online brand.

MyWebCareer.com is a free service that helps you to discover, evaluate, and manage online data that may help your career prospects.  They use sophisticated link analysis, visualization, and semantics technologies to enable you to evaluate and explore data that may relate to you making it easy to assess your Professional Online Brand and stay on top of any changes to it.

In addition to these services, they also have an informative blog related to making the most of your online presence.  Check it out today!

Proactive Summer

The summer is such a great time of year! There's festivals, family gathering, vacations, and hopefully, plenty of time for some well deserved R&R (rest and relaxation).  The worse thing about the summer, in my opinion, is that it simply goes by way too fast.  Recently glancing at my calendar, I've realized that the Fall 2012 school year is quickly approaching. Not something you want to necessarily think about right now but being proactive has it's benefits; trust me on this one.

The 2012 academic year brings with it career fairs, employer visits, and of course on-campus and off-campus interviews.  The Fall Career Fair and the Post-Grad Service Fair are both scheduled to take place in September.  There are already approximately 24 employers signed-up for Fall on-campus interviews!  Corporations and agencies are setting their calendars to recruit on Marquette's campus for the best and brightest just weeks after the beginning of the school year.  In preparation for the Fall Career Fair, Post-Grad Service Fair, and internship and full-time position interviews, professional documents need to be in tip-top shape.  The saying is that your résumé gets you the interview and the interview potentially gets you the job.  Don't wait until mere days before the fair to get your documents together, put your best foot forward - and decrease your stress level - by starting now.

There's a few avenues to choose from when working on your professional documents.  One, do it yourself; you may not need additional assistance, you just need to buckle down and get it done.  Two, explore our Online Library for awesome resources available to you 24/7.  Three, and always most recommended, set up an appointment with a career counselor to go over your professional documents.  Even if you've completed options one and two, option three is available to students and alumni five days a week from 8am until 5pm :-)

Your Resume: Be You, Not Someone Else

It seems like such an easy thing to do; just list out what you’ve done in your career thus far on some paper, and abracadabra, you have yourself a resume!  But we all know it is not that simple.  Building your resume can be a time consuming process, and one where every single word matters.  So, logically, you want to make sure that you have the best possible words, right?

Well, not necessarily, because those best possible words might not always describe your actual experience.  Now, I know that you hear to build up your resume and spin things to accentuate what you can bring to the table.  All that is true, but you still have to have actually done what you claim!  Resume fraud is one of the easiest ways to get yourself removed from consideration for a position, or even get fired if you’ve already landed the job.  It’s not just college students that are prone to this either.

Ever heard of Scott Thompson?  No?  You’re probably not alone.  Well, he was the President of PayPal until earlier this year, when he left to become CEO at Yahoo.  Pretty impressive if you ask me.  His main problem though was that his resume had been falsified.  It wasn’t even anything egregious, just adding a degree he didn’t have.  Yet within a week of this being unearthed, he was gone from Yahoo despite all his success in the business world. 

Let’s think about this.  If a company like Yahoo is willing to move along from the person they selected as CEO over a falsified resume, do you think you’re going to stand much of a chance when (because it is when, not if) your employer finds out that you lied?  My money is on NO!  Be yourself, whether on paper, in person, over the phone, or any other media.  That’s the truest way to success.  Let your real skills shine through rather than taking the temptation to make something a little better than it really should be.

How to Showcase Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn: 8 Tips

Our favorite LinkedIn expert, Lindsey Pollak, just posted 8 tips on how to show off your personal brand on LinkedIn. You may be thinking...why should I care? LinkedIn is a great resource for anyone who is looking for an internship or job. If you are looking for a position, you should be using LinkedIn to network (connect with people you know, would like to know and join professoinal groups). Below is an excerpt from Lindsey's blog entry. For more information on how to use LinkedIn for your search, check out our online library

Showcase Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn: 8 Tips

Like professional athletes, we now live in a time of career free agency, where we must regularly prove our unique value in a competitive and frequently changing marketplace. This means that it’s no longer enough to have a good reputation in one’s current position. We need to think about how we’re perceived in the broader marketplace by potential future employers. Even if you intend to stay in your current job forever, clarifying your unique value is something you need to attend to. Clients, conference planners, awards committees and other professionals may be checking you out — primarily online — and you want to make sure that they find the best representation of you. We’re talking about personal branding, a key element of success in the Internet Age. A term first coined by Tom Peters in 1997, personal branding includes your professional reputation, online image and personal characteristics such as your work style, community engagement and worldview. It incorporates the particular skills, talents and areas of expertise you’ve cultivated. When I host workshops on personal branding, I ask participants the following questions to help determine the elements of their personal brands:

• How would your colleagues describe your strengths?

• On what issues are you the go-to person in your organization?

• What do you know more about (web design, compensation plans, marketing to baby boomers) than most people? Once you’ve defined your personal brand, it’s time to showcase it to recruiters, bosses, customers and others who may be assessing you. Here’s how LinkedIn can help:

1. Be authentic. The best personal brands are genuine and honest both in person and online. It can be tricky to showcase your personality on the web (you might love puns, but those don’t go over well on a professional profile), but it’s possible with a bit of effort. For instance, if your personal brand includes a balance between your detailed accounting skills and your friendly personality, your LinkedIn profile can include both your technical credentials and the fact that you belong to several networking groups. You can also ask former and current colleagues to write LinkedIn recommendations highlighting this combination.

Read the rest of this post on the LinkedIn Blog

Questions? Contact our office anytime. We are here to help!

Personal Branding….whats that?

Have you ever heard the term "personal branding” and thought…”what the heck is that??” If so, or you would just like to know more, www.studentbranding.com is a great resource.  There is a wealth of information on branding tailored to both undergraduate and graduate students from experts on the topic.

Happy branding,

-Jeremy Eudaly, Career Counselor

Summer Internship Search

"Now that the summer has arrived and I have free time, I'm ready to begin my summer internship search." Oddly enough, we in Career Services hear that phrase more often than you could imagine.  The academic year is definitely full of more hustle and bustle than the summer months, which leads students to put off their internship search until things have "calmed down."  The issue is that the hustle and bustle of the academic year also includes various career fairs, networking events, career development programs, and most notably on-campus interviews.  The majority of employers begin their hiring process for summer interns during the Fall semester; though some do hold off until Spring semester.

Don't worry though, all hope isn't lost.  Even though there may not be a significant amount of internships to pick from, there are definitely still a few available.  Kick your search into gear by getting organized!  Set a schedule for yourself - one hour each day of the week dedicated to your internship search. Step one, make sure your resume and cover letter are in tip-top shape.  If you would like for a counselor to look over your professional documents, you can set up an appointment by calling 414-288-7423.  Next step, look through those online search engines to see what's being posted online.  In conjunction with the previous step, network, network, network.  LinkedIn is still live and active during the summer months and the Marquette University Alumni Association grows in membership daily.

If it so happens that you can't seem to find an internship for this summer, do keep in mind that there are other options; career development takes place in many different forms.  Consider volunteering at a corporation/hospital/institution that aligns with your career field interest.  Even though you won't be getting paid, you'll still be gaining experience and environmental exposure.  Another option would be to shadow a professional in your industry of interest.  Spending a half day observing what someone in your industry of interest does, could answer a lot of questions you may have in regards to their daily functions and responsibilities.  If you're not necessarily looking to volunteer or shadow a professional, the other option would be to conduct an informational interview.  For at least 45 minutes, you could pick the brain of someone who is doing what it is you'd like to do.  Don't think of not getting an internship this summer as you being behind, think of it as getting an early start for next summer :-)

Hiring "Secrets"

From time to time in the Career Services Center we do some hiring of our own. As I review applications for various positions, I find that I approach applications with a critical eye looking for ways to distinguish the potential candidates from the applicants who will not be considered. It is a much different approach than I take in my daily work life. As a Career Counselor, I thrive on bringing out the best in the resumes of MU students and alumni; as a person looking to hire a new staff member, I scrutinize the applicants' materials looking not only at the information he or she has provided, but also the overall impression of the submission.


Here are some tips to keep in mind...

1. Length - Too short and I don't think you have the qualifications/experience we are looking for; too long and I question your ability to communicate concisely and effectively.
2. Typos - If you can't submit an application, cover letter, resume, etc., free of typing, grammar, and/or spelling errors, I wonder if you lack attention to detail or if you simply don't care about the position you are applying for.
3. Relevance - Unless you manage to convince me that you are qualified for the position, your application will be overlooked. Don't tell me about everything you have ever done; rather, tell me about the things you have done that will help you perform well in the position I have available. Some of this information may be directly correlated to the position (accounting intern applying for an accounting job) and some will be transferable skills (restaurant server with multitasking ability applying for a nursing position).
4. Professionalism - A job application is no place for a conversational tone. Being professional does not mean you have to be stuffy and cold; it just entails proper formatting (even if you know the person you are sending a cover letter to, you will address the person as Mr./Ms. ____), being courteous, and staying on point.
5. Contact - Knowing someone who is employed at the place you have applied continues to be a huge help in getting your foot in the door.  If you do have a contact, make sure you are in touch with the person prior to applying for a job to ask some questions (knowing more about the company helps you write a better cover letter) and for any application advice. After you have submitted your application, follow-up to let the person know and consider attaching your application materials as a courtesy.
6. But not too much contact - Have you ever been repeatedly contacted by a company trying to get your business?  How did that make you feel?  Don't make the recruiter feel that way.

These are just a few tips to help ensure your application materials get you to the interview, so come visit us for many more - we are open all summer!

Staying Connected

The summer is finally here. For most, at least for a while, that means no more homework, no more group projects, no more research, no more sitting through classes. Of course the professionals of Career Services Center are though urging you to take advantage of your summer. That could mean getting a jump start on those graduate school applications, touching up your resume, doing some career exploration, or meeting up with a few professionals in your desired career field.

"My summer isn't focused on those things, it's focused on vacationing," you utter. Of course the summer is about relaxing, having fun, recouping for next year, and regenerating energy BUT don't let it slip by without being at least somewhat productive. We don't want  you to miss out on all of your favorite summer activities, we just want to help prepare you for your future career. That's one of the main reasons the Career Services has tapped into the virtual. Allow us to help you stay up-to-date on the latest career development information through our social media outlets.

We're tweeting! Follow the Career Services Center on Twitter to stay up to date on the latest job search articles, highlights and Career Services Center happenings.
- Get short, timely messages from MU Career Services @MU_CSC
- Get job postings, interview information, and tips @MUCSCJobs

We're blogging! Be sure to visit the Career Services Center’s new blog, Career Chatter, regularly to get all the latest information and advice from our office. It's the Career Services Center... UNPLUGGED

We’re on Facebook!
Become a fan of the MU Career Services Center on Facebook.  You're on there anyway.

We’re LinkedIn!
Network with professionals in our MUCSC Group on LinkedIn. If you don’t already have an account - here is one good excuse to get one! To find us just search in groups for MUCSC and join.

Employer Research: A great summer project

Researching employers over summer break …..really???  Okay, so it may not be as awesome as going to the beach, but if you are on a job search or even thinking about a job search, employer research is critical.  

Every employer expects you to know how to research as a result of your education.  Therefore it is expected that you know as much as possible about his/her company.  Research coupled with being able to ask pertinent questions and discuss the organization and field with some degree of familiarity will reflect your ability to be a self-starter.

Areas you could research include

• History of the organization
• Types of products/services offered
• Reputation
• Locations
• Size and organizational structure
• Financial stability
• Philosophy or mission
• Prospects for growth or change
• Major competitors
• Promotional activities
• Current industry trends/issues

 Here are some ideas to get you started

LinkedIn: Companies have profiles on LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com), just like people do. You can find out plenty of information on organizations through the statistics section on the right hand side of a company profile. Look for where it says “Check out insightful statistics about….” And click the link.

Vault: Login at www.mu.edu/gateway using your emarq username and password

Don't forget about the company web site. Annual reports, brochures and internal publications can be helpful to.

Recent business magazines, trade magazines often have recent article or information on current trends in your industry.

Happy Researching!,

-Jeremy