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Never Too Early: Guiding Your Student Toward Employability Open article as .pdf
Parenting Strategies February 2011
Copyright © 2011 by Kay Kimball Gruder, SuccessfulCollegeParenting.com
One of my ongoing concerns when I advised students was that most students waited far too late to adequately prepare themselves to stand out in the candidate pools for internships, summer jobs, or full-time employment beyond college. As a parent you can play an instrumental role throughout the college years, guiding your student toward opportunities and experiences that will maximize his or her employability, encouraging your student to fully utilize the career and internship resources at his or her institution, and having conversations with your student that grow his or her ability to effectively communicate all that he or she has to offer.
Most students acquire a range of academic knowledge, gain leadership and personal development skills, gather global and community perspectives, and participate in career-related internships while attending college. What might have once been exceptional is now the norm and when employers interview candidates they often feel like they are comparing apples to apples. Your student definitely needs to acquire some baseline experiences that place him or her in the bushel basket, and throughout college you should encourage your student to engage in:
- internships, research, and career-based part-time and summer jobs each year;
- campus organizations and/or athletics, ideally showing a progression of responsibility or leadership within one;
- travel or study abroad – even for a short-term summer experience (many scholarships exist);
- community or global issues that are truly of interest – not just for the sake of adding the involvement to one’s resume;
- learning another language – enough to feel comfortable with basic conversations;
- visiting different parts of the country – too many times students only consider jobs in one geographic location and severely limit their opportunities;
- taking a public speaking or introduction to acting class – a great way to improve one’s sense of confidence and communication skills;
- frequent conversations with academic and career advisors to clarify goals, to talk about skills and competencies gained, and to explore ongoing options for internships, jobs, and graduate school;
- accessing counseling or support services to talk with a counselor about stress, transitions, feelings of anxiety, etc. – working through doubts and insecurities in advance of an interview often bolsters confidence;
- conversations with a favorite faculty member about the skills and perspectives that are inherent to the study of your student’s major;
- discussions with lots of different people about academic and career interests, because you never know who knows whom and networking is central to the success of any job search;
- acquiring a solid ability to use various software programs central to businesses and organizations e.g., knowing how to use Excel vs. using it once for a project;
- social networking in strategic ways to expand one’s network of people who can be part of the job or internship search.
Now to complicate things, many interview processes require that a set of questions be asked in exactly the same way to each candidate, allowing for very little casual conversation. The single skill that will enable your student to stand out among other candidates is the ability to effectively communicate academic and job skills, personal qualities, and his or her value to the organization or company. This is true whether the interview is for a summer position or a full-time job. In my experience, both parents and campus career offices spend hours upon hours helping the student to craft and fine-tune application materials and spend far fewer hours helping students to effectively communicate with a sense of confidence and purpose. It takes far more than a few practice interviews to feel competent in expressing one’s value. The candidates who stand out are the students who can communicate convincingly. Consider your student extremely lucky if his or her institution offers a “how to effectively communicate” program. Most schools do not, and you can play an important role in providing your student with opportunities to think out loud and to talk about what he or she has gained or learned. Students typically share that when they are called upon to talk about themselves it feels like they are bragging or boasting – this is in part because they aren’t used to speaking in this way. Consider some of the following strategies to continuously grow your student’s communication skills:
- give your student the gift of a few sessions with a communication coach;
- don’t only ask your student how something was, he or she will likely respond with “good”, “bad”, “fun”, etc., but rather ask your student to tell you about something that he or she learned or gained from a class or experience – if this doesn’t come easily to your student think out loud together;
- talk about your own experiences by sharing what you learned or gained – when a student sees this modeled it becomes second nature to him or her;
- make “I don’t know” an unacceptable response – it is great if you can instill this early on in a child’s development;
- avoid using the phrase “I don’t know” in your conversations, but rather respond by saying, “You know, I haven’t thought about that, let me give it some thought and share a bit more later.” Then really share a bit more later – “Remember when you asked me about…well this is what I… ”;
- provide your student with opportunities to meet and speak with other adults. Don’t be your student’s voice;
- model that gathering one’s thoughts and then speaking is valued;
- share some of the surprising connections that you have made as a result of talking with people.
Many student-parent relationships get reduced to conversations where the parent is telling the student what to do. This is especially true when it comes to jobs and internships. It is understandable why this pattern emerges, but it is an approach that is often counterproductive. Instead, actively seek to model the very qualities you desire your son or daughter to have, and consider sharing stories to support and illustrate the information or messages that you seek to convey. Often students just need to hear that we are in favor of them doing and experiencing different things, which then prompts them to explore options and to take action. We can help our student to keep in motion by taking the “What would my parent think?” or “How will my parent react?” mystery out of the equation. Your student benefits when you help him or her to recognize opportunities to expand a portfolio of skills, experiences and knowledge, and when you can engage your son or daughter in ways that build confidence in expressing all that he or she has to offer.
“Success always comes when preparation meets opportunity” – Henry Hartman
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Kay Kimball Gruder
