Written By: Elizabeth Lam
At this year’s FIMS Career Conference, MIT graduates from various backgrounds and fields gave their tips and tricks that will calm your nerves for after graduation and to land your dream job.
As soon as your university journey begins, one of the most recurring questions at every family reunion, job interview, date, or friendly get-together is, “So, what do you want to do after you graduate?”
To that, most of us have a pre-rehearsed response in our back pocket that has become a habit to answer with whenever our brains are triggered by that question, “Oh, you know, I plan on doing [insert vague job title/field],” or “I plan on going to [insert a random yet notable graduate school for a random yet notable graduate program].”
Don’t worry, I see the steam coming from your ears. Believe me when I say that absolutely none of us have got it all figured out. But here are some tips from a few MIT graduates at the FIMS Career Conference 2020 about the daunting post-grad life:
Antonia McGuire, Digital Communications Advisor, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
Western University, 2004
- When you feel like you’re on the right path, lean in and surrender–follow your gut
- Follow your inner voice
- Have meaning in your work
Howard Fremeth, Director of Communications, Business Council of Canada
Western University
- There is always value in working hard
- Be a team player
- Hone your skills–whatever they may be
- Be confident, clear, and compelling
- Make your first job matter
- Network, network, network
- Utilize Western’s Career Services while you have them
- Find mentors wherever you are
- Find your passion and follow it
Thaly Tapia, Manager, Corporate Partnerships, Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)
Western University, 2012
- Employers can tell when you’re willing to learn
- Apply to everything and anything–no job is too small
- Put anything into your portfolio–let employers see what you’re about
- Be memorable
- Be enthusiastic
- Be effective
- Be needed
- Roll with changes
- Don’t settle for being comfortable
- Have a good attitude
- Don’t have tunnel vision
- Network–don’t be scared to reach out to others
- Don’t burn bridges–we work in a small industry
- You’ll see your coworkers more than your family–make your job worth it
Maximilian Specht, Associate Creative Director, Artifakt Digital
Western University, 2015
- If the job doesn’t feel right, it’s not right–ditch it if you get bad vibes
- If you’re not getting back what you deserve, leave
- Your classes mean everything, grades mean nothing–don’t let your grades define your -passion
- The biggest pro and con to being in MIT is that your skillset is very flexible
- Skills that you didn’t know you had from MIT:
- Crisis management
- Communicating ideas
- Explaining yourself concisely
- Asserting yourself amongst the competition
- Don’t feel like you need to pay your dues
- Don’t use a semicolon if you don’t know how to
- Leverage your personality into your next interview/job–”Vibe attracts tribe!”
- Be your own advocate
- Make your resume and cover letter true to you–job applications are non-formulaic, you should stand out
- Understand your value, worth, and what you bring. If others don’t see it, move on
MIT is a one-of-a-kind program that teaches and shapes one-of-a-kind students. You may feel discouraged by comparing yourself to the success of your peers, but remember that once you graduate Western and enter the pool of other job-hungry and eager journalism and communications graduates from around the world, your degree makes you stand out. Your way of thinking is so different from others because of all the obscure and nontraditional courses our program has to offer. When you graduate with your combined skill sets of theory and production for journalism, communications, marketing, graphics, digital media, and pretty much any other field you could want to immerse yourself in, it makes you unique to competitors. Trust in yourself, you’ve got this!