One of your best tools at a career fair: the Elevator Speech

It happens.  You go to the career fair dressed in your slightly uncomfortable yet professional outfit, you’re greeted by one of the many company representatives trying to bring in a passerby, and you find yourself at a loss of words.  Time slows down to a crawl as the sweat starts to build on your forehead, your outfit starts to feel ten times stiffer than ever before, and you’re racking your brain for something, anything to come out.  Whatever jumble of words you manage to get out, you instantly regret.

Stage fright doesn’t just happen on stage; it comes in all shapes and sizes.  It can happen when you have to give a speech in front of a group of people, when a professor asks you a question you don’t know the answer to in front of the entire class, or when it’s time to talk to companies about internships, co-ops, and jobs.  Yes, stage fright is a very real problem for more than just actors.

Despite this, you don’t want stage fright to hold you back from letting companies know how awesome you are and why you should be hired.  Although my only acting experience comes from school musicals and theatre classes in high school, I did learn a few tricks to deal with stage fright.  One of the best tips I learned has really helped me with career fairs: know your script inside and out.

When you meet a company representative, your first impression is an important and could be the deciding factor in whether or not they take your resume and recommend you for an interview.  To make your best first impression, you can give the representatives what is called an elevator speech.  An elevator speech is in essence a pitch where you are both the pitcher and the product you’re trying to sell.  In this pitch, you have about thirty seconds to share important information such as:

•  Your name
• Your class and major
•  What you’re looking for (ie, an internship, a co-op, a full time job) 
•  When you’re looking to work (are you looking for an internship for summer? A co-op for the spring semester?) 
•  Any relevant activities or accomplishments 
•   Relevant personal strengths
• Useful information showing that you’ve researched the company (if you have done so)

Remember, this is an elevator speech.  The name comes from the idea that this speech should only be so long that if you were in an elevator with the recruiter, you would be able to give your whole spiel by the time the elevator door opens back up.  Thus, you don’t want to overwhelm the person you’re speaking to with irrelevant details or your life story.  So keep it short, clean, and to the point.

Here’s an example:

“Hi, my name is Ariel Cohen and I’m a senior in computer science.  Right now I’m looking for a full time offer when I graduate this May.  I’ve always had an interest in helping people, leading me to become both the president of the Association of Women in Computing club here at Virginia Tech as well as create a mentoring system for our computer science department.  I read on your website that you have a software development position for new graduates.  As someone who both wants to help build things that will help people and to get a chance to be creative, I was interested in your position and wondering if you could tell me more about it.”

Short, clean, and to the point.  I start with the basic information such as my name, class, and major, then move on to the more personal details that gives the recruiter a better idea of why I specifically chose to talk to them.  Of course, if you did not research the company ahead of time, don’t be afraid to ask about what opportunities they have available. Recruiters talk to students to recruit, so they’ll be more than happy to provide you with information.

So before you go to your next career fair, take the time to create an elevator speech for yourself.  Not only will you have a conversation starter, but the recruiters will get a better idea of what you’d like to talk about.  Good luck and remember- stage fright happens to everyone. Give it a little practice and you’ll make it through.

ROCK your resume! Be ready for career fairs and fall interview season

September is always a busy time for career fairs and the start of the fall interviewing season on our campus. To gear up for these events, it's critical to have your resume ready to hand out to employers. So, how can U ROCK your resume? 

U

se this 4-step formula for your experience descriptions:

Skill: What did you get out of performing this duty?

Structure: Put result into a statement.

Verb: Start with action verbs.

Clarify: Ask yourself who, what, where, when, why, and how many. Using this formula, take your description from “greeted customers” to “developed communication skills by greeting an average of 15 customers per shift.”

R

esults sell! As you describe your work experiences, volunteer positions or projects, be sure to share what you accomplished. Don’t let your resume just read like a job description.

 

O

rganize your resume sections from most important to least important as you go down the page. For now, list your education section before experience since you are spending most of your time working on your education.

C

ount! Numbers add impact in your resume. If you trained new employees, share that you trained 5 new employees. If you lead the fundraising efforts of your organization, share that you raised $500. Even if you think the numbers are small, they still paint a clearer picture.

 

K

eep it brief. Rather than sentences or paragraphs, use bullets, list items in columns and write descriptions in phrases. Try to keep to a page if you are an undergraduate. Those with extensive experience or advanced degrees may need to go past one page.

 
If you need help rockin' your resume, come see us in Career Services. For walk-in assistance, visit us Monday through Friday, 12 - 3. On Wednesdays in September, we're extending our walk-in resume help during Resumania where you can stop by 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. without an appointment. If you want some additional help as you prepare for the career fairs and fall recruiting, call 540-231-6241 to make an appointment with a career advisor.

What's your biggest question you still have about your resume that we didn't address above?

Why You Should Make Sure to Stop by Gobblerfest

As awesome as Virginia Tech is, joining a large college can be overwhelming.  Maybe you weren’t prepared for that chemistry class held in Hahn’s big lecture hall with three hundred other students.  Maybe having to write your student ID on the top of your tests makes you feel like as far as the school is concerned, your entire being is summed up in a number.

If the first week of school has you feeling like a little fish thrust into the big blue, fear not.  Virginia Tech is very welcoming, and the best way to feel right at home is to find your niche in the community.  But how do you find that niche in such a big school?

It’s so easy that it only takes one word to sum it up. Gobblerfest.

For new students, one of the best resources Virginia Tech has to offer in the first few weeks of school is Gobblerfest.  Since 2008, Gobblerfest has acted as a welcoming festival for students, faculty, and people of the Blacksburg community.  Here you’ll find a fun and relaxed environment to meet all sorts of people and organizations, eat free food, play games, and socialize with new people.

One of the best parts of Gobblerfest is finding clubs to join that really interest you.  With over two hundred booths featuring student organizations, businesses, and non-profit organizations, you might not even know where to begin.  However, here within lies the beauty.  There’s no pressure, so you’re free to mosey around and see what captures your interest.  Pet the dogs near the Pre-Veterinary Medical Association booth.  Start a conversation with the Philosophy Club.  Gawk at the giant metal hokie bird towering over you.  Check out the Greek community.  Hug a furry.  Just have fun.

Feel free to join as many listservs (email subscriptions) as you want, but try not to go overboard.  From both professor suggestions and personal experience, I suggest that in the long run, you stick it out with two organizations: one that has to do with your major and one for fun.  Joining a club for your major is a great way to not only socialize with professors and students you’ll be seeing through your college career, but you’ll find out about great opportunities and events you might not have known about otherwise.  Then when you’re feeling burnt out from classes and ready to scream at your computer, you have your fun club to de-stress and socialize.  Of course, it might take a while to find the clubs right for you, so don’t be afraid to go to the introductory meetings.  The clubs know not to expect everyone who shows up to the first meeting to stay forever, so this is a great time for you to get a feel for things before making a commitment.  Then once you have an idea what clubs you like, you can start becoming more involved.  Who knows?  Maybe you’ll even become an officer. 

Even when you aren’t looking for organizations to join, Gobblerfest can still be a lot of fun.  Between the live music, the pep rally, and other scheduled events, there should be plenty to do.

So, in conclusion, you should stop by the drillfield on September 6th between 4pm and 8pm.  Gobblerfest is a great opportunity and you should totally get your tail feathers down there for the festivities.

Finish off your first week with FUN! Career Services Tailgate Party FRIDAY!

Welcome back, Hokies! Career Services and FUN? Do those 2 words really go together? Stop by our office on Friday, August 30, from 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. to find out!

Across the street from McComas Hall in the Smith Career Center, you will find a team of Career Services staff ready to show you how to play tailgate games and give you a chance to meet the friendly people who work behind our walls of Hokie Stone.

 What games will we play?

*Corn Hole

*Hokie Bird PuttPutt

*Ladder Golf

*"Poleish" (Frisbee game)

Come grab some FREE pizza and register to win door prizes like an Apple TV, Beats pill portable stereo speaker with Bluetooth, Beats solo HD headphones, 16 GB iPod Nano, 8GB Kindle Fire with 7" display and more!

Several employers will be on hand to meet you as well. Representatives from Tennessee Valley Authority, Norfolk Southern Corporation, Kohl’s, Eastman Chemical, and FedBid will be on campus to visit with students at the event. Never too early to find out about a job or internship!

Get your Hokie On with us on Friday and get pumped up for the VT-Alabama game! Let's go, Hokies! Stop by Smith Career Center on Friday! Check out this clip for more about the tailgate. Let us know if you have another tailgate game you think we should add next year.

Experience Matters and Other Things I Wish I Knew when I Turned 20

August 20 is a special day in our house. Why? It’s the day that the baby of our family arrived, even though it took her several hours to decide to join us. As we celebrate that we’ve had our youngest with us now for two decades, it makes me think about things I wish I knew when I turned 20. So read on, all you 20 somethings, here’s my list.

Things I Wish I Knew when I Turned 20

Raise your hand in class. It doesn’t matter if what you say sounds stupid. Better to get your question answered than look stupid for just one minute. Had I done this more often when I was 20, my GPA might have been even better than it was. And, raising your hand to share an idea you have might be just the answer to a problem classmates or colleagues at work are trying to solve. Speak up. Your questions, ideas and opinions matter.

Men and women are wired differently and don’t think about relationships the same (if you don't think so, read Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus). Just because a significant other doesn’t contact you for a few days doesn’t necessarily mean she/he doesn't want to have anything to do with you. If you want to spend time with someone special in your life, reach out to them. I finally realized this in my mid-twenties and am married to the man I called when I hadn’t heard from him for a while.

Being chicken doesn’t get you anywhere. Get out of your comfort zone and try new things and meet new people. When I was 20, I was shy when I got around people I didn’t know. I missed out on so much because I hung back. If you get past your shyness, you will encounter some of the most interesting people and have some of the most engaging conversations. I know I now have.

You have more skills than you think you do. As I was looking for my first job and fine tuning my resume, I had a difficult time. What skills did I have? Zero, then, in my opinion. I had been a server at a conference center, an economics tutor, an intern for the local Legal Aid, an international student at a British university for a year, and a leader in several organizations, but I still didn’t think I had any skills. Boy, was I wrong. Need help figuring out what you should showcase to employers? Come see us in Career Services - we can help!

Experience matters. Get as much as you can whether the experience is gained from work, leadership, travel, research, a clinic, athletics, a volunteer role or a combination thereof. Pursue experience whenever you can. Relevant experience and leadership experience are two of the top items employers look for when they review candidates’ resumes. The more experience you have, the better! Advisors at Career Services can help you in your search for experience.

Watch your language. Just because you are in an interview with a recruiter close to your age, don't get too comfortable and let the F-bomb fly during your conversation. Refrain from using slang and cuss words in such a professional setting, and if you're not sure if it's a professional setting, err on the side of caution and use a better word. I cuss as much as the next person (maybe more), but I try to avoid doing so at work, with students, in meetings, and other settings. I learned this lesson early on from my dear mother when I got my mouth washed out with soap at age 13 for saying a four letter word after I lost a card game.

And finally, although I was well aware of this when I was 20, again thanks to my mother’s teaching, many 20 somethings are not, so…Say THANK YOU whenever you can. Being shy is not an excuse. Being scared of the person to whom you should show appreciation is not an excuse. People who did something for you deserve to receive your praise. Thank the parent, guardian or other person who helped you get settled in for fall classes; thank the family who took you on vacation with them this summer; thank all the people who gave you graduation gifts; thank anyone who lets you crash at their house; thank a faculty member when she writes you a recommendation; thank a co-worker when he covers a shift; thank a host as you leave an event. You get the picture. And, never feel like you can thank someone too much. Thank her/him again.

In closing, thank you to the woman who made this blog post possible and who has brought such joy to our lives, my daughter, Maggie. Oh yeah, and Happy Birthday to my new favorite 20 year old Hokie.

Make it a habit to tell people thank you. To express your appreciation, sincerely and without the expectation of anything in return. Truly appreciate those around you, and you'll soon find many others around you. Truly appreciate life, and you'll find that you have more of it.  Ralph Marston

Time to Review Your Summer Internship!

As the beginning of the next academic year is creeping closer and closer, summer internships are drawing to a close. Some people might happily be receiving full time offers, some people might be leaving knowing what they do not want to do with their life, and hopefully all of us are leaving with a better understanding of what to look forward to when we graduate.

A great way to wrap up your internship is to reflect on the various things you learned throughout the summer. Not only will you (hopefully) have a better appreciation for your new experience, but you'll be set to go when you're asked about it during future career fairs and internships.

So here is what I learned this summer! Maybe it'll help you organize your thoughts about your internship.

What I Like

One of the best lessons you can walk away with is knowing what you like in your work, your workspace, and your coworkers. Do you like to be surrounded by people? Would you prefer a job where you can work from home? Can you see yourself doing the work you've done this summer for a lifetime? Internships are great in that you can figure this out before applying for a full time job.

I spent my last ten weeks testing software - i.e., playing and working with the software to make sure all of the functionality works properly before it's deployed. I came into this internship with little experience in software testing, and am leaving having learned that I absolutely love this aspect of the software development life cycle. Beyond the jokes of how I'm getting paid to crush the hopes, dreams, and egos of developers, I've found out a few things about software development that isn't really taught in class. Developers are given a piece of the software that they are in charge of coding. Testers have to not only understand how all of the pieces work together, but how it fits into the business that the software is providing for. Testers need to understand the bigger picture. I absolutely love that. I love understanding the ins and outs of everything and why aspects might have to be adjusted or completely redone.

And yes, I did rather enjoy getting to break things.

What I Don't Like

Just as important as knowing what you like is knowing what you don't like. Maybe you've realized you can't handle working in a cubicle. Maybe you now know that you don't want to work in the city or town your internship was in. This is good to know! It will help you narrow down your choices for applying for full time careers.

After spending a summer where my manager, mentor, teammates, and I were all located in different states, I learned that I don't like being completely on my own. Not only was it a little lonely having no one in my office that could help me with my work, but I had a couple of "fun" experiences trying to figure things out. Sure, I was able to ask around to get help working the fax machine for the first time, but trying to figure out how to join a telepresence on my own when everyone has already left for the day was an experience I'd rather not repeat. However, the experience taught me to look for jobs where the teams are all located together. I also have a few funny stories added to my arsenal, so that's something.

Learning the Business

Learning about the business you're working for can go beyond knowing whether or not you "like" or "dislike" the business, although that too is important otherwise I wouldn't have made the first two sections. When you work for a company, especially a big one, you're not working in a vacuum. Everything you do is going to affect the company. That's why it's important to learn what business issues you are solving, what competing companies are doing to solve those same issues, and keeping in mind issues that your new solution might be causing in turn. Having a great understanding of these aspects and being able to express them in a comprehensible manner is a great skill to have, and interviewers will appreciate that you think about the bigger picture. Just make sure not to share information you're not supposed to!

I unfortunately can't share too many details here, but I can say I've learned more about dispatching and legacy companies than I could have ever imagined ten weeks ago. As I mentioned earlier, I love learning the bigger picture, so I really enjoyed learning all of this!

Getting Responses: "Politely Pestering"

There are a lot of little nuances about working in an office and/or with other people that you don't really learn until you've been thrown into the center of it. One of the most important little skills I learned this summer was how to "politely pester".

Let's be honest- sometimes it's really hard to get the responses you need. Especially when you're only way of contacting someone is through email and instant messaging, it can sometimes feel like you're talking to a brick wall when you need answers or something done. I use the term politely pestering to refer to that balance between overly persisting for an answer to the point of coming across as rude or annoying (which can often make people less likely to respond) and not persisting enough.

Since most of my contact with people was through instant messaging, I found what worked best for me was waiting about twenty minutes. If I got no response, I would explain again what I needed and why it was important to get a response as soon as possible (usually because my work was on hold until this situation was resolved). I made sure to reread my message two or three times to make sure I came across as polite and not passive aggressive, and always thanked them for any help they could provide. Most of the time, it turned out my receiver got distracted and forgot to respond to me, and immediately apologized for taking so long. If they were too busy to work with me, they were almost always happy to refer another person or two who could possibly help me.

In short, don't offend or provoke the people you work with. It reflects poorly on you, and you're just making it harder for yourself to get the help you need. Remember coworkers might have different priorities in their day's work than you do, so you need to respect that your problems do not always come first.

Things Happen. Just Breathe.

I had a technological black cloud following me around this summer. I got kicked out of the HR system my second week, my hard drive was fried my third week, I was given the wrong telephone number so no one was able to contact me for a few weeks. The list goes on. Things happen. Things go wrong. It's not an "if"; it's a "when". One of the biggest lessons you can learn is that not everything that happens is within your realm of control. Sometimes, you just need to learn to go with the flow. So take a deep breath, accept it for what it is, and do what you can. However, taking it out on the helpdesk is only going to reflect poorly on you. Take a walk, get a stress ball, do what you need to. Just remember to breathe!


Hopefully this list of mine has helped you think about what you learned during your internship.  Enjoy your two weeks before the semester starts, and I hope you had a great summer!

Back to School: Are you CAREER ready? An infographic