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Graduate school can bring pressures to follow specific career paths. It doesn’t have to be this way. Melissa Bostrom, Assistant Dean for Graduate Student Professional Development at Duke University, discussed this topic on episode 7 of the Informational Interview 2.0 podcast. Melissa and co-host Heidi Scott Giusto discussed:
- The role of building a digital footprint to generate opportunities.
- Using your referral network to spark career growth.
- The role that Clifton Strengths can play in helping students identify their strengths.
- Fascinating examples of students who took on unique career journeys after graduation.
Related resources:
Duke University Graduate School.
Information about Clifton Strengths.
Connect with Melissa Bostrom on LinkedIn.
The Informational Interview 2.0 Podcast is brought to you by the Global Innovators Academy’s “Interview an Innovator” course experience and by Career Path Writing Solutions.
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ROUGH TRANSCRIPT
Heidi:
Thank you so much for being here today. I’m so excited to speak with you. And I know that we’ve known each other for quite some time since I graduated from Duke and you were a beacon of light for me and the programs that you are putting out at Duke to help graduate students like myself. So Melissa, before I ask you some questions about the work you’re doing now, why don’t you tell our audience, What do you do at Duke in your role as assistant dean for graduate students professional development?
Melissa:
Well, that’s so kind of you, Heidi. And it was so terrific to be able to connect with you right as I was starting my position. So you were you were graduating and I was coming on board and so you’ve been a really important person to help me shape the way that we think about what graduate students in the humanities need in terms of professional development. So this is a really nice way to continue that conversation. So my position was created about seven years ago to make sure that our graduate school students, and those who are research Masters and PhD students, can identify and develop the transferable skills that they need to succeed in the full range of professional opportunities available to them. So one of the fun things about my job is that I get to work with students from our 80 plus programs, and support them as they grow in their sense of what their talents and interests are, and then help them address the gaps they find between where they are in terms of their current skill set, and then the level that they need to be at in order to succeed into professional roles that they’re going to pursue when they graduate.
Heidi:
Wonderful. So tell me a little bit about some of the programs. I’d love to hear a little bit more about what some of the specifics are with those programs.
Melissa:
Sure. So I think the event that you came to, and when I very first started was a half-day professional development symposium, specifically for PhD students in the humanities and social sciences. And when we initially launched that, it was a half-day kind of four or five hour program. And what we’ve done since is try to actually instead of compartmentalizing that opportunity into one half day in a year, try to spread that out. Right, very intensive, try to spread that out and offer those opportunities throughout the year. And so that Humanities and Social Sciences students and then we have also parallel programs for STEM students to really think about what are the range of career opportunities available? And what are the skill sets I’m going to need to develop to compete for those opportunities and to succeed as I start out in those careers? So I think that the event that you came to, which we did in the summer of 2013, has really morphed into a biannual series that we call careers beyond academia. And we host 50 something events. Every time we put on that series, with some of them focused on humanities and social sciences, some of them focused on STEM, and then some that are kind of relevant to everybody in terms of identifying skill sets.
Heidi:
That’s a lot. So it’s really taking that seriously. I love that too. Because professional development ideally, as you know, as a working professional, doesn’t end: it’s ongoing.
Melissa:
That’s one of the things that I tell students, especially when they’re starting out in networking and informational interviewing and they asked me, she’s like, what good does this do once I find a job? And, and often their jaws kind of drop when I say “Well, actually, this is how what you do throughout your career, you’ve just started this process, but it’s going keep going on and on for years and years”. And really, once they kind of sit with that for a few minutes, they start to realize that the value of those networks that they’re building and the values of those conversations that they’re having really might bear fruit, not immediately, maybe not in this first job search out of their PhD program, but they might bear fruit five or 10 years down the road, you never know. And so that’s really kind of an exciting moment, I think.
Heidi:
Yeah, it’s probably an interesting moment to use, I’m guessing you see their faces go from like, horror, maybe to like, I don’t know, enlightenment. So you have a lot of interaction with the students. And as you know, with this podcast, one of the things we’re looking at is communications that sparks innovation and career growth. So I would love to know have you witnessed innovation shape a person’s career path? And if so, can you tell us a little bit about this?
Melissa:
So, you asked me a question that’s kind of like picking my favorite child. One of the really exciting things and really fun things about my job is that I get to witness the answer to this question almost every day. I get to see our students innovate their career paths forward and use their disciplinary knowledge of their transferable skills to really shape their own paths into what they’re going to do next, professionally. And I’m going ahead and assume that you didn’t want me to pick you as my story of somebody who’s followed a really innovative career path. I feel a little funny of sharing your story to you. So I will I’ll set that aside, but I hope that you will share that at some other time in the podcast.
Heidi:
Thank you. Yes, I’m familiar with mine.
Melissa:
So let me pick another one that I think is a really great example. So Audrey Chang is a PhD biologist, trained at Duke, who, like many other PhDs in the life sciences went on to pursue an academic postdoc after she finished her degree. But, after her postdoc ended, she took a really unusual turn. And she went to work in business development for the American Museum of Natural History in New York.
Heidi:
What’s her training, again?
Melissa:
Biology!
Heidi:
Oh, that’s what I thought you said.
Melissa:
Yes. And so from there, she went on to roles as the Director of Operations for the San Diego Museum, and then as the Chief of Business Planning and Partnerships at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, so she really pursued a fascinating career path. What’s even better is that she brought all that knowledge and skill sets that she developed in the nonprofit museum world and her understanding of Business Development from the museum world, as well as her science background, and now she’s come back to the Triangle. And we were lucky enough to land her back at Duke. So she’s now the inaugural Director of Partnerships and Professional Development for Mathematical Sciences. And she just followed a fascinating career path. And it’s such a wonderful resource to graduate students were so happy to have her back at Duke.
Heidi:
That just puts a smile on your face. I know our listeners can’t see that. But we’re both smiling. We’re both beaming. Because Isn’t that amazing? Now, I’m guessing at the time, when she finished up her postdoc, her thought wasn’t, you know, okay, in seven and a half years, or how many years it’s been, I’m going to be back here. It’s probably one thing, leading to the other that kind of trusting I’m guessing that she’s heading in the right direction with all these really innovative roles, though, that we don’t necessarily associate with biology. I think
Melissa:
Exactly. I will say one more key part of her story was a really supportive advisor. So her advisor Mohamed Noor, who’s wonderful faculty member in biology. Now the chair of the biology department at Duke has always been very supportive of graduate students exploring the full range of career options. And he saw that Audrey had some unique talents and some unique skill sets to contribute. And so he has been, I know, a key part of her story in forging that unique path.
Heidi:
Yes, thank you so much for sharing. So, thinking about what can be uncommon paths, one of the things that I tend to think about is, well, you can choose to do almost anything. And then you might have to get some extra skills, or it may take a little while to get there. But once you complete your degree, you really can choose almost anything that you want. But, the big question is, how do you gain clarity on that? Now, I know my story, I know you’ve heard mine as well where I tried out some different roles and really refined my idea, but can you tell me a little bit about how some of the individuals, the students, you’ve known and worked with how they have gained clarity on that, that goal, that target of what’s next.
Melissa:
I think one of the biggest challenges for students is to uncover the skills they already have. And I think that’s because structurally in academia, we don’t really spend any time talking about transferable skills. in academia, right, kind of the document, the currency of the land is the CV. And on that CV, we just list our accomplishments. And we list those as if it took no skills to achieve this thing. So yeah, those publications, those poster presentations, those grants, right, so those all have quite a number of skill sets that you need to develop in order to be successful and getting to the point of those achievements. And those are, you know, kind of the obvious things like, you know, writing skills, collaboration skills, probably, some conflict resolution skills. Certainly some communication skills, right? But we don’t talk about those and we don’t service them. And so being able to have conversations with graduate students, and to tell them: “Look, you already have this tremendous suite of skills, you just maybe aren’t used to talking about them in that way.”
So for example, your teaching experiences are fantastic examples of project management and leadership skills. And also you’re comfortable giving other people constructive criticism. And that’s another skill set that is highly sought after in many, many employment sectors. So just kind of reassuring students like it’s not as if you can only do one thing when you finish with a graduate degree. You actually have built these skills of resilience and persistence in order to complete a graduate degree. And you are taking those with you to whatever your next chapter is. So helping them just uncover the skills they already have and then thinking about, okay, what are, you know, two or three other things I might need to be competitive to break into this field. But now I see, okay, I have the majority of what I need. And now I have a smaller range of things I need to work on in order to be breaking into that other career path.
Heidi:
Yeah, that’s great. Thank you so much for sharing that and what you said about the CV the way I put it when I was sometimes I teach this material, I put it as the difference between a CV and a resume. One of them, is that a CV is written for what I call the insider audience, meaning they already know what a list of publications or conference presentations. They know what that signifies. So there’s a whole level of assumed knowledge, when you’re using a CV, that in a resume, you don’t assume that oh, this person knows exactly what this means. So you have to synthesize you have to tell them. It’s an act of translation.
Melissa:
Exactly, I tell them, it’s a teachable moment. Use those teaching skills. Yeah, that’s great. I like that insider outsider.
Heidi:
Yeah. And in the feedback part, I also tell people, we tend to be really good at receiving constructive feedback. Because if you don’t have to receive constructive feedback, you didn’t have solid graduate student experience. Because you need to do that just because of the nature of a graduate degree. So, tell me a little bit about networking. I know that’s a term and activity that a lot of people don’t necessarily love. It’s not necessarily taught in colleges and universities. Yet, I think we probably can both agree networking is really important for career growth and even nurturing your innovative ideas because you get to talk to people about it. So what advice would you give on networking strategy? So you know, what do you think someone should deploy to take their career to the next level or to help them develop their maybe beginning of an innovative idea into bearing fruit?
Melissa:
Yeah, definitely. I think, you know, when I talk to graduate students, the idea that they have in their head of networking is going to a ballroom or Convention Center full of people and handing out business cards. And that’s not effective networking for anybody.
Heidi:
No.
Melissa:
Of course, that’s doesn’t work. And of course, it’s not enjoyable, really, for anybody if that’s the model that you’re thinking about. The model that I like to use for networking is reaching out to people that I already know and trust to get some advice. Right, maybe that advice is, who else should I be talking to? Right? And that’s, you know, a way that you start to grow your network is to get some advice from people who have a little bit more knowledge about this area than you do, and then follow through on that path of guidance that they suggest.
Heidi:
Follow through, imagine.
Melissa:
Right, right, right. And that’s important. Always more comfortable to start with the people that you know, and students tell me that they are so surprised at how many referrals they get from just their personal family and friends of people who can be helpful to them in breaking into a career path, you know, that is of interest. They said, you know, I just had somebody tell me last week, I never would have guessed that just by going to kind of my own inner circle of people I know I could get referrals to people who could help me explore these career options that are on my plate for me. And I think the same is true for taking an innovative idea forward. And I’m going to reach out to those people that I already know that I already trust and get their advice and their perspective on how I can move forward productively, that’s going to feel a lot more comfortable and safe to me than reaching out to a whole bunch of strangers, you know, 500 strangers.
Heidi:
I couldn’t agree more. I remember when I was developing my idea for my business, and I had some names, and I heard about focus groups. I went to my Facebook page and just made a post. And people don’t really think about Facebook. Oh, that’s, you know, networking. But that’s it. I reached out to people I knew and said, here’s some names. What do you think of when you see, I forget what it was, you know, career path, right? And what now in my business, Career Path Writing Solutions, that’s what I settled on. But I had things like, I don’t know writing enterprises and who knows. But getting that feedback. And one of my very first clients was a grad student friend, and the second client was from a grad student friend, and I still remember that feeling of, you know, okay, I’m going tell people I’m doing this. But that sure feels a lot better than standing up in a room full of strangers saying “Hey, everybody, this is what I do!”.
Melissa:
And having people that you trust, give you feedback just gives you a level of confidence in what that feedback is, instead of, you know, 500 strangers, you don’t really know how to judge the responses that they’re giving to you.
Heidi:
Exactly. So I brought up Facebook. I’m not on it all that much anymore. But that leads me to another question about digital footprint. So, what do you see the role of the digital footprint playing in career development or nurturing new ideas?
Melissa:
So, one of the challenges that I see when I talk to our students is that cultivating an online presence, maybe that’s LinkedIn, for example. That’s something that they know they need to do, but it’s also not something that their advisor is telling them they need to do. And so understandably, it’s, you know, farther down on the priority list. But you kind of never know how other people might be using that information that you put up online. So I’ll give you an example. A couple of years ago, we had the president of a major University Press coming to campus to give a series of talks. It turned out I was able to attend quite a couple of students to come have lunch with him. And I had a really quick turnaround to pull together these invitations. And so I was thinking “Okay, I’ve got two hours, I got to find two students out of a student body of 3500, who will be interested in scholarly publishing, you know, GO”.
Heidi:
No pressure!
Melissa:
Right! And so what I ended up doing was doing a LinkedIn search of students who had done an internship at University Press nearby. And I thought that’s probably a good proxy for students who’d be interested in this opportunity to learn more about scholarly publishing. And it worked. I was able to come up with a couple of students, one of whom I didn’t even know personally, but was able to find her through LinkedIn. And she said, you know, “How did you find me, this is such an amazing opportunity”. And I said, “You had this information in your LinkedIn profile that I used to find you”. So you never know, as a professional, you know how other people might be using that information that you put out there to open up opportunities for you, and so that would be the thing that I would say that’s so important to make that a priority.
Heidi:
Yeah, I love that perspective. Because it’s so much with LinkedIn. And even when I talk about it a lot, I always start with the user, their own profile, and then how you use it. And it’s you know, and then this helps people find you. I like you’re sharing an example that is starting with “Oh, my gosh, I had this big problem I needed to solve and LinkedIn was part of my solution”. It’s the flip side of what I talked about a lot like this helps people find you, and you’re like: “Thank goodness, I found this, I found people.” So, yeah, thank you for sharing that. So, tell me a little bit more, now, for some background, you have also innovated in your career a bit because I know you have done some consulting and everything. So whether you want to talk about consulting or something else, but how have you innovated in your own career, and do you have plans for the future?
Melissa:
That is a great question. So let me back up and talk just a little bit about my own training and path. I did my PhD in contemporary American literature. And as you can see, that directly translates straight into graduate student professional development in a straight line.
Heidi:
Of course, just like a history PhD is for interview prep in LinkedIn consulting.
Melissa:
Exactly. So, you know, I had the chance to reinvent myself a little bit. And I was able to do that I happen to have some experiences working in human resources and technical recruiting in between undergrad and grad school, I had the opportunity to teach management communication in a business school environment. And so I was able to bring some of those pieces together when I shifted into graduate school administration. And so one of the really fun things that I get to do and have been doing for I think, 11 years now, I’ve been directing leadership development program for graduate students and postdocs called the Emerging Leaders Institute. And as part of that program, I’ve gotten to pursue certifications in self assessments. I like the Myers Briggs and emotional intelligence. The EQ assessment and another assessment, called human patterns. So, getting to learn how people learn about themselves has been really fascinating and something that I’ve really enjoyed. And sometimes I also get the opportunity to do that outside of my day job in a consulting role. That’s been really fun! In terms of innovation for my career, looking ahead, I have to say I really enjoy using the Gallup Clifton strengths assessment with graduate students. It’s such a nice way to just reposition and help them think about what their strengths are. That’s completely apart from disciplinary jargon and just communicate with other humans, like human to human, instead of getting caught up in what their training or their discipline is. And so one of mine is I’m an activator. So I realized over time, I love to get new things started.
Heidi:
And that’s why you can do 50 plus events a year?
Melissa:
Well, I have fabulous campus partners, I do want to make it clear. It’s not just me. I have great campus partners that we work together to do that. But, I find that I really need that new challenge and that new opportunity to energize me and to keep me going. So, I think that’s one thing that I’ve learned about myself training and in English, where I was really interested in contemporary literature that hasn’t already been written about, or kind of inaugurating this new role at Duke because I was the first person to inhabit it. I think that’s something that I’ll be looking forward in my career as I move ahead.
Heidi:
That’s wonderful. And listeners, I think already know, I feel like every time I do a podcast somehow Clifton Strengths comes up. So I’m a big fan, as well. And it’s amazing when you can look back or evaluate now of like, well, what is it that I love? Like why do I love what I do or why do I not love what I do, which can give students a lot of clarity as well. And what I think I love, maybe the most about that is they make the point, everybody has one through five with that assessment because there’s 34 strengths and you get them ranked one to 34. Everyone has the one to five, everybody has 29 to 34. And that can be very validating, I think and realizing like to when you’re saying I forget how you said it, but kind of like as people as humans, like we all have, the things are really good at and we all have things that we’re not so good at, and focusing on those things that you’re good at, I feel like that can empower you to get those, I think when you’re working in those strengths, maybe you’re more able to be open to innovating. I don’t know. Does that make sense? Because you’re not bogged down with stuff you hate.
Melissa:
I think that’s exactly right. And just it’s a great way for students to think about the future. I think there are lots of things you have to do to get through graduate school and do get the degree that might not be things that you’re interested in doing long-term. And so to think about the fact that you’re going to be able to shape that environment, that next environment that you go to, you know, what are you going to look for in that environment? And what’s going to help you be successful and feel fulfilled? That’s actually really exciting. It’s a little scary, but it’s also really exciting.
Heidi:
Yeah, yeah. I love it. I think it’s great when they see something I’m writing like, so this is why I love this or hate this, you know, and it’s, oh, it’s this kind of it is what it is because of who you are as a person. Not necessarily good or bad in and of itself. It’s just you really like this, this is what energizes you so you need more of that. So, speaking from perspective, in your role, but as an educator and you have been an educator in a classroom setting and given what you know now, what advice would you give to educators on how to help students find their purpose, to develop curiosity, or improve their communication skills.
Melissa:
So, I will say the students that I work with are already plenty curious. I think the challenge is extending that curiosity that they use to drive their research to that career development professional development realm. Because sometimes I think I understand graduate school is really challenging. It’s tough. And in some ways, maybe you wish there would be one thing that would be easy, and maybe that would be what your next step is. And so I think sometimes that’s a place that you there, we just need to sit for a little while and just let that sink in a little bit that you’ll need to take ownership of this piece just as you had to take ownership of driving your own research project in your master’s thesis or your dissertation. And so yes, there is some more work to be done. So being understanding and empathetic that it does seem like work because it is work. It is a big load, but I also Think that curiosity about oneself is a terrific driver. And that’s a new area for lots of students to look at. And so just trying to shift that research, curious lens that they have toward themselves, and what might be really fulfilling and interesting for them to do.
Heidi:
Thank you. So I have one last question for you. Anything else, any parting words you have to share about innovation and career growth?
Melissa:
Oh, that’s a great question. I would say, don’t let that word innovation scare you off thinking that innovation is something that other people do in their careers, that maybe you look around and you say “Oh, gosh, that person is so innovative, I could never do that”. It’s almost 100% chance that you have been innovative in your own career in some way. But you just may not have that outsider perspective on it. And so I’d say you know, “People, think about what your interests are and how those could help you drive innovation in your own career development and just figuring out what your path forward is.
Heidi:
Very wise words, thank you so much. This has been such a pleasure speaking with you and getting to hear your insights and all the wonderful things that you and your colleagues at Duke are doing toward Graduate Student Professional Development. I know I felt fortunate to be a part of Duke and I still have that sentiment seven years, seven, eight years later. And it’s wonderful to see the great work that I was able to benefit from is continuing. Sounds like it’s just continuing to grow even more. So thank you so much for spending some time with me today and chatting.