With more than 50 semester and academic year programs to choose from, Marist Abroad offers a vast array of study abroad options. The experience of living in a foreign country, speaking a language that isn’t your primary one, and being exposed to unfamiliar customs will expand your horizons and make you a well-rounded student. No matter where you choose to go or how much time you spend out of your home country, studying abroad makes you a highly desirable asset to prospective employers. As a student living in a foreign country, you will be put in situations that you have never experienced before and will have to learn how to adapt to new challenges daily. Traveling around the world requires a lot of self-sufficiency and forces you to make decisions quickly. By choosing paths that minimize risks and optimize benefits, you will naturally become a better decision maker. If you’re traveling with other people, your daily decisions will also have to benefit the group as a whole. Having to compromise on group decisions means making sacrifices that lead to mutually accepted solutions, which will teach you how to collaborate successfully with others. All of these traits are transferable to the workplace. Managers want to hire candidates who have proven problem solving skills and know how to work well individually as well as a member of a team. Studying abroad will also help you develop a global mindset. Working with a variety of people from different cultural backgrounds comes with working or interning abroad. As geographical barriers are being broken down through the use of technology, hiring managers are more often looking for candidates that have developed their cross-cultural intelligence and can work well in a diverse environment. Cross-cultural intelligence refers to your ability to be a culturally sensitive person who is able to understand and empathize well with others. Furthermore, by meeting and working with people around the world, you will develop a global professional network. If you’re studying in a country that speaks a language unknown to you, you’ll also hone your non-verbal communication skills by learning to decipher what someone is saying through their body language and gestures. Cross-cultural intelligence refers to your ability to be a culturally sensitive person who is able to understand and empathize well with others. In addition to taking classes, some students also choose to work or intern while abroad. Mary Vange ‘19, a Marist College student majoring in Finance with a Computer Science minor, completed a full-time internship while she was studying abroad in London during the Fall 2017 semester. Mary worked at the Omerta Group, an executive search firm in the finance industry. The company was in charge of niche head hunting, a form of recruitment that involves searching for candidates that meet specific qualifications for big banks when they had to fill positions with a specific salary requirement.
A typical day for Mary involved performing LinkedIn searches for all of the Private Bankers in Luxembourg who had 10-15 years experience, for example. Throughout her internship, she also worked on research projects such as a presentations about Blockchain and Bitcoin. “My colleagues wanted me to aggregate information and create a presentation so that I could explain some of the industry jargon to them,” Mary said. Mary said she learned a lot about the finance industry through her internship. Her co-workers gave her inside knowledge on the industry, including which companies had the best culture, leadership, salaries, and benefits. They also provided unique insight on the roles within banks and how employees performed tasks beyond their titles. Mary has received a full-time offer from JP Morgan after she graduates this May, and she said her internship abroad was one of the reasons she was able to earn the position back in the States. “The experience really brands you as a well-rounded individual who is adaptable,” she said. “Even little things like commuting to work in a foreign city really shows you more about a country than just vacationing would. Overall, working with (my co-workers) opened my eyes to cultural differences. There were people from about six different countries in our office and it was interesting to see how their cultures and job roles shaped who they were and how they worked. I definitely would recommend interning abroad to anyone.”
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With more than 590 million registered members, LinkedIn has grown into a powerful social networking tool for professional development. LinkedIn is a great resource to make a positive first impression with employees who work in your desired field. You can explore the many features and benefits LinkedIn offers its users at the Marist College Center for Career Services’ workshop with Emily Frankenberry, a University Recruiter from LinkedIn. Frankenberry will give advice and tips on how to market yourself using your LinkedIn profile. The same presentation will be held in two different sessions Wednesday, November 14; one from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m., and another from 1 to 2 p.m. RSVP in FoxQuest now to reserve your spot. Before you come to the event, follow these tips to build an effective networking profile on LinkedIn.
Build Your Professional Brand LinkedIn provides a unique opportunity to increase your online visibility and develop your professional credibility. You can list the skills you have obtained and members of your network can endorse them. Uploading blog posts, articles, awards, and more media to your LinkedIn profile is encouraged, as these work samples will provide a wider range of your abilities and interests than you can convey on your resume. According to a LinkedIn representative, profiles with a photo are 11 times more likely to be viewed. Make sure your photo is making a positive first impression. A profile picture of yourself wearing professional business attire is considered best practice. Make sure your face takes up at least 60 percent of the photo and the background is not too distracting. Join Marist Resident Assistant Emma Stark ’20 from 9-9:45 PM Wednesday, November 14 in the Upper West Marketplace to get your headshot taken for your LinkedIn profile. Find Job Postings A recent LinkedIn report stated there are over 30 million companies represented and more than 20 million open job postings on its site. LinkedIn provides a concentrated place to find positions that best fit your skills and qualifications. Even the top companies post job listings and use LinkedIn to search for suitable candidates for available jobs and internships. If you’re looking for an opportunity, you can simply search through the listings and refine your search by many filters including job title, industry, location, company, and experience level. Get Connected As you can tell by the name, LinkedIn allows users to connect with professionals within their industry and beyond. If you would like to view a specific person’s profile, you can utilize the search feature to find people with a certain name or job title, or discover employees within a certain company. By adding connections to your profile, you can build important relationships and strategically network with professionals using the messaging tool. Do Your Research Whether you’re going on a job interview or simply want to know more about an organization, conducting researching on LinkedIn can prove very beneficial. LinkedIn provides searchable data on alumni from certain schools, company employees, and workers in various industries. By checking the profiles of target companies and their recruiters, LinkedIn users can learn more about the hiring process as well as the professional backgrounds of their interviewers. When I interviewed for a summer internship last April, I searched the recruiter that I was going to be speaking with on LinkedIn prior to my appointment. I saw that, before she graduated college, she was an intern for the company she currently worked for. So during the interview I asked the recruiter about her internship experience and why she decided to continue working for the organization. I also saw that she went to a high school near my hometown, which gave us a common connection. The recruiter told me she was very impressed that I had done my background research on her, and it showed I was prepared for and interested in the position. These are just some tips to navigate the basic features of LinkedIn. The platform is constantly growing and evolving. Some users also decide to pay for a LinkedIn Premium subscription in order to make better use of both the existing and exclusive features the social networking site has to offer. But whether you have a free or a Premium account, LinkedIn offers a wide array of benefits for its users. If you haven’t already, consider making an account today. Networking gives you an opportunity to interact with other professionals, learn about their businesses, and share information about your work. Developing contacts by reaching out to someone you do not know can be intimidating. But networking effectively is an important part of professional development. In fact, a recent study revealed that almost 85 percent of all jobs are filled via networking.
There are many Marist College alumni who are ready and willing to share their insight and experiences in the workplace with Marist students. The Marist College Office of Alumni Relations and Center for Career Services have collaborated to create an online, searchable Alumni Career Network. This database contains hundreds of Marist alumni across different professional fields. Students can refine their searches by specific employers, graduation years, city, occupation, major, and type of assistance offered. Many alumni offer one-on-one mentorship, email and telephone advice correspondence, workplace shadow opportunities, practice interviews, and even full-time job referrals. Students do not need to join the network in order to search it. They can simply log in using their MyMarist account. Chances are that some of the contacts in the Alumni Career Network took similar classes and participated in the same clubs and extra-curricular activities that you do now at Marist. By building off these commonalities you will be able to make a meaningful introduction and cultivate strong relationships with professionals in your desired field. Marist alumni can provide invaluable guidance on how to translate your experiences at Marist into a long-term career and help steer you in the direction of the field you want to work in. Even if some of the alumni are not in a recruiting role, hiring managers that are looking to fill a position generally look to their own employees and co-workers’ contacts for recommendations to fill positions rather than hire an outside applicant. Remaining in the inner circles of Marist College alumni can prove valuable, even at unexpected times. Danielle Markus ’19 landed her Fall 2017 Archive Internship with OTTO and AUGUST, two photography syndication agencies in New York City, by networking with an alumna of Marist College. Danielle’s friend put her in touch with Vicky Saperstein ’14 who worked at both agencies and Danielle kept in touch with Vicky via phone and email. Vicky then put Danielle in contact with one of her supervisors, who eventually made Danielle the internship offer. During her internship, Danielle reviewed hundreds of image submissions from some of the top celebrity, fashion, architecture, and design photography studios. She also recorded the metadata and keywords for the photo archives of both syndication agencies. “I would suggest to students that are looking for possible internships or jobs to not be afraid to put themselves out there, reach out to alumni, and even check on different Facebook pages,” Danielle said. “A lot of the time Marist alumni love hearing from current students and networking can lead to great connections.” There is also a Marist College Alumni Association group in LinkedIn where you can find and connect with alumni who are working in your desired field. Danielle and Vicky were both members of the same sorority at Marist, Kappa Kappa Gamma, which helped them facilitate conversation and develop a common connection. Whether you’re looking for a job or simply seeking professional development advice from a professional in your field, networking with Marist alumni can help you determine goals for your own career path. For further assistance navigating the Alumni Career Network please make an appointment with a career coach in FoxQuest and select Employer and Alumni Connections for Current Students in the appointment type field. |
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