Megan Riksen:

Hello and welcome to the Work Like a Laker podcast. I'm your host, Megan Riksen, and I'm here today with my co-host Grace Pushman. And Grace to start things off today, let's start with a question. What is the most unique job you've had and what's a skill that you gained from it?

Grace Joaquin:

Well a fun fact about me that I like to give during icebreakers is that one of my first jobs was at a taxidermy animal museum. Oh my gosh. <Laugh>. It's Call of the Wild Up up in Gaylord. I've mentioned it before. And it's a great place. I would highly recommend we're not sponsored by them, but it's a, it's a nice place to visit. Yeah. Should we be, I dunno, <laugh>, we should call 'em after. Yeah. But I was the head fudge maker there for a couple of summers and, you know, that's kind of a unique position. But in that role, I learned how to take initiative because since I was the head fudge maker, I was tasked with making sure that everything was how it should be in the kitchen. So if we were running out of a fudge, that was my problem. Like, I had to make sure that we had all of the most popular flavors that were gonna last us for the weekend. And if I wasn't gonna be there for a couple of days, I had to think ahead of time and delegate and think, who can make this while I'm gone? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So as a 15 year old, that was a lot of responsibility and it really taught me that skill of initiative to really think on my own independently what needs to be done and then do it. Yeah. And I know in my current role, I had to do that all the time because, you know, we work independently here. If I have a couple hours free, I need to figure out what to do with those hours. Yeah. So, Megan, do you have an interesting job that you've found?

Megan Riksen:

I do. Mine is so random. When I lived abroad, I was asked by my husband's company to record PowerPoint audio, like the audio for these presentations they were presenting globally, but they needed a native English speaker. Oh my goodness. So I was the person recording this audio, basically reading from a script of this extremely complicated accounting tax jargon. So I literally did not know what I was talking about, but I had to make it sound good because these were like professional presentations. So yeah. What skill did I learn from that? I mean, it actually came in handy, I think, for this podcast job now, because it was making the audio. Yeah. Sound great. Um I had to do some of the editing just to make sure like the, the P's and things like that weren't popping too much in my audio. So there you go. So you're, that's why I'm doing podcasting today.

Grace Joaquin:

You're telling me that your, your career as a voice actor Right. Started a long time Exactly. Before this podcast. Exactly. And who knows where I'll go after this. Yeah. I mean, I'm glad I knew you when, right? <Laugh>, right.

Megan Riksen:

So, awesome. So today we are going to be talking about how to use your experience in part-time jobs to get that next job to either, you know, get that job when you graduate, or hopefully get you on your way to your dream job. So Grace, how many times do you think we've heard something from a student like, Ugh, all I did, I just worked at the cash register.

Grace Joaquin:

I hear that all the time. It's really common for us advisors to hear students speak about their part-time work in a dep like a, like self-deprecating Thank you <laugh>. Yeah. <laugh>, is that the word you're going for? Yes. It was manner and that like really downplays the skills that they gained because in any job you have, just like Megan and I gave examples of you are going to gain some skills, even if they seem at the time like pretty, maybe like everybody's had that job. Yeah. What's, what's unique about it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, totally.

Megan Riksen:

So so today we want to share some strategies for how to use those experiences to showcase what an asset you would be to an organization. So we'll have tips we'll talk about that can be used, you know, maybe when writing your cover letters, when you are at networking events, talking to other professionals and definitely that you can use throughout the interview process.

Grace Joaquin:

So Grace, do you wanna get us started? Yes, thank you. So the first thing we want to do is reflect on your role and really think about what you learned from it. So for example, I was a server on and off for over 12 years and I learned a ton from that job. I started when I was 17. I was too young to even run my own alcohol. I'd have to call someone over to get it for me. Yeah. And I was super shy. I was a really shy teenager. Yeah. And I was like really terrible at small talk. I avoided it. Like the, like I just never wanted to be in any situation where I was gonna have to chit chat with someone I didn't know very well.

Megan Riksen:

So you'd rather hang out with taxidermied animals.

Grace Joaquin:

Well, that's why that job was, that's, it was a perfect job for me at the time. Um and you know, especially like approaching people that was also very terrifying to me as a 17 year old. So, you know, working in a restaurant for just a short while really taught me so many valuable interpersonal skills where I really came outta my shell. I think I grew a lot more confident in my ability to speak with people who I didn't know very well. And even now, I think a lot of people would describe me as someone who's outgoing, which Yeah. Is such a, you know, flip from what I used to be. And I think a lot of that is from my experience as a server. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>. Megan, can you think of a skill you gained from a part-time job?

Megan Riksen:

Sure. So I don't know if it's necessarily a skill, I guess it is, but I worked in the study abroad office when I was in undergrad and sometimes they would have me doing a lot of things and being very busy, but then there were just stretches of time where I just didn't have anything to do. Um like I wasn't assigned any sort of task. And so I feel like it was in that job where I really learned how to I guess, be productive when not given something. Yeah. Yes. So I would take initiative even to do small things like clean up the copy room mm-hmm. <Affirmative> or go around to the full-time staff who worked there and ask what they needed from me. So kind of that I guess the skill would be like taking initiative to kind of fill in the gaps, especially at a job where, you know, I wasn't the one in charge at all. Yeah. but I still wanted to use that time in a productive way.

Grace Joaquin:

I wanna point out that's the second time Megan and I have talked about initiative. That's a really big skill. Yeah. Yeah. because, you know, employers want to know that you're someone who doesn't constantly need direction. And of course you do wanna obviously be available for them mm-hmm. <Affirmative> to ask things of you, but there in any job you're going to have downtime. So initiative is a huge skill to keep in mind mm-hmm. <Affirmative> for, you know, when you're reflecting on some of your experiences. Okay. So to recap that strategy, you want to reflect on all of your experiences you've had, even that like two month long job you had the summer after your freshman year. And really think about the skills you gained in those positions. And so that, this brings us to our next tip. So Megan, you wanna share that?

Megan Riksen:

Yeah. Yeah. So that tip is just write them down, like get started writing down a list of skills you have and the corresponding experience or job that goes with it. Maybe it even works for you to do it the opposite way. I feel like my brain would be like, here's all the jobs I had now, what skills do I think I gained through that? But you could, you could do it either way. Yeah, totally. Yeah. And then once you've done that, you really do wanna think a little more deeply then about how it connects to what you wanna do next. So if you're applying to graduate school next, the skillsets you think about might be a little bit different than if you're applying to a full-time job, for example.

Grace Joaquin:

Okay. Can you give an example of that?

Megan Riksen:

Sure. So you know, let's say you worked a job in retail mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. So you worked at a clothing store and you eventually want to enter the field of social work and you might think, yeah, there's not a lot that aligns there kind of on a surface level mm-hmm. <Affirmative> When you're thinking about it. And that's, I know that's what we have students come and say to us all the time, yes, but I only did this mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, right? I was folding clothes, I was checking people out. But you know, if you, if you think a little more, you know, broadly in terms of the full scope of what you were doing in that retail store I would say the customer service element is gonna translate really nicely over to social work. Especially if you can think about those times when you had frustrated customers. Yes. Right. Conflict, people were, you know, they were upset about something mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, you know and you had to work at maybe even if their complaints seemed very silly to you, that you needed to be empathetic Yeah. Because they were the customer and you wanted them to come back. So in a similar way, you know, on a totally different level and in a totally different way, someone in social work is gonna obviously need to have empathy and be able to deal with conflict.

Grace Joaquin:

Yeah, exactly. Being able to handle it when someone is upset and maybe not take it as personally. Yes. That's tough. Yes. And that happens in really any job, but social work is a very big one where mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, you know, you need to be able to keep your cool and stay professional regardless of the situation. So yeah. Customer service will do that for you too. <Laugh> Sure will. Sure will. All right. And if you're feeling unsure about what transferrable skills to focus on NACE, which is the National Association of Colleges and Employers, surveyed employers about what they're looking for on resumes, one interesting result from that study is that only 56.6% of employers are using GPA to screen candidates, compared to 75% two years ago. So this indicates that they're really focusing more on skills now to determine eligibility.

Megan Riksen:

Right. So that it does seem like a move in the right direction. But what are those skills?

Grace Joaquin:

So there, there are quite a few I just listed here, the top five that NACE found, and those are the ability to work in a team problem solve. They're looking for analytical skills, verbal communication skills, and then also written communication skills. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. So, you know, when you're kind of looking at that list, I notice at least none of them are saying like a super job specific skill. Right, exactly. Yeah. These are things you can really learn in any setting mm-hmm. <Affirmative> just like the examples we've already given, you know, I can think of you know, the problem solving skills, like I said with the, the example of a head fudge maker. If I was like running low on something, I might need a problem solve and figure out how to help the customer so that they're not upset. Absolutely. So really you can just Right. Look at any job you've had. Yeah.

Megan Riksen:

That transferability can be really found anywhere for sure. All right. So should we play a game? Yes. Okay. So for this game, we are going to bring in a guest, a fellow coworker of ours. So, hello Katie. Can you just start by introducing yourself for us?

Katie Cwiakala:

Yeah, absolutely. So my name is Katie. I am a graduate student at Grand Valley in the College Student Affairs Leadership program, and I work for the Career Center.

Grace Joaquin:

Oh, thank you for being here. Katie. I have a question for you. What is a unique job that you've held and what is the skill that you've gained from it?

Katie Cwiakala:

So I would say the most unique job I've had was working at a zoo. So everybody always thinks that's a lot more interesting than it probably was <laugh>. I worked in food service at the zoo. Okay. So we often got a lot of customers coming in tired kids, you know. One time I had somebody who came in and they had dropped their hat into the wolf exhibit. So, Ooh. Something I learned from that job was definitely problem solving. Yeah. I don't know how to get a hat out of a wolf exhibit <laugh> but just kind of safely,

Megan Riksen:

Right? Yes, exactly. That's the, that's gotta be the number one. Exactly. Exactly.

Katie Cwiakala:

So that definitely tested my problem solving skills while you're trying, you know, not to burn popcorn while also helping customers <laugh>. So that would be the weirdest job I think I've had.

Grace Joaquin:

And that was the one of the skills listed by NACE as one of the top most valuable. Look at that. You're right on track there. Yeah.

Megan Riksen:

Perfect. Okay. So Katie, you are gonna help us play a brand new game called "Transfer That Skill". Wow. Think we need to work on that Grace. Sorry, <laugh>, not your fault. So what we're gonna do for our game is we are gonna have Katie begin and she's gonna draw from two separate buckets. One bucket that contains a list of random unique jobs. And these positions, these jobs we actually polled our Instagram followers for. So these are many of our students who submitted some of their most unique jobs. So that's kind of one bucket. And then the other is more of a professional type career that a Grand Valley student might be seeking after receiving their degree. And so we're gonna try we're gonna make Katie start, but then Grace and I will do it too to kind of how are we going to find something, you know, a skill that's transferrable between them. Okay. Okay. So Grace, you have the, the little mug. Yes.

Grace Joaquin:

I'm gonna hand these to Katie. So Katie, you're gonna choose one from each mug and then you're going to try to transfer a skill from one job to the next. Okay.

Katie Cwiakala:

All right. Sounds good.

Grace Joaquin:

Go ahead and draw.

Katie Cwiakala:

All right. I got Attractions at Lego Land.

Grace Joaquin:

Okay. Go to the next one

Katie Cwiakala:

And teacher.

Grace Joaquin:

Ooh. Okay. Okay.

Katie Cwiakala:

All right. So attractions at Lego Land Teacher, no. There's Legos in a lot of classrooms, but I'm not gonna go that route.

Megan Riksen:

Kids love legos.

Katie Cwiakala:

Legos. Yes. So I would say working attractions at Lego Land, you have to have a lot of time management skills, I'm assuming. Mm-Hmm. Got a lot of customers coming through. Oh yeah. Have to pace them out, make sure they're not running each other over. And then teachers obviously have to use time management as well, so making sure that lessons are on track. Yeah. making sure kids are where they need to be, things like that. So time management I think is a skill that kind of connects those two.

Grace Joaquin:

I think you got a pretty good one too, because like both involve kids potentially. Yeah. Right. Adults can go to Lego Land too, but, right. Yeah. Great job Katie. That's awesome. Good. Cool.

Grace Joaquin:

You wanna go next? Grace? You want me to, okay. Okay. I'm scared, but I'll try <laugh>. Right. Okay. Do it. Okay. I got custodian at a waterpark. Ooh. And a nurse. Nice. Woo. Okay, let me think here. All right. I think as a custodian you really need to have a great attitude because, you know, some of the work you're doing might be a little bit tough, I would imagine. I know sometimes bathrooms are involved from what I've heard. So I think that, you know, to do that job and do it well, well you need to have a great attitude. And I think as a nurse, the same can be said because not only might you also be working with some things that could be tough or difficult, you are also going to be a rock for the patient who's there. So you really need to have a positive attitude. So I think that having a great attitude working as a custodian at a place like a water park mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, you might gain a skill like that. Yeah.

Megan Riksen:

Great job. Thank you. Nice, great star for you. Oh, thank. Well thank you. You get one too, Katie. I said that. Well, thank you. Are you ready to get one? Yes, am hopeful. We'll see. Pass me that mug. Okay. Ready? Yes. Okay. Working at a bingo hall. Okay. And accountant. Hmm. Okay. So first of all, I just think numbers <laugh>, oh, there we go. That's the first thing that comes to mind. And like the term audit comes to mind as well, because you could go into auditing within the accounting profession and working at a bingo hall, I'm assuming you need to audit the person who wins. Ooh. Oh, look at, make sure that they actually did cover up the right numbers. So I would find probably a more eloquent way of saying that in an interview. But I think you could also go to like the organization or even the public speaking. You know, I, I'm assuming the student who submitted this maybe was the caller or something like that. Right, right. Yeah. and that's definitely a skill you can take in into a professional workplace as well.

Grace Joaquin:

Can I point something out? I feel like, you know, since I don't have a accounting background Yeah. I would not have, I immediately thought of auditing. Right? Yes. Because that's just, you know, I don't really, my brain is not working that way. But I think that, you know, Megan does, she doesn't have a background in accounting, but she was the advisor for accounting students for a long time. So she has some background knowledge. So just remember too, if this sounds difficult. That you will be, you know, applying for a job that you have or you'll be like interviewing for a job that you've applied for, so mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, you know, you'll know about it, it'll be in your field. So if you're feeling panicky, like I don't know how to describe to be an accountant. Right. That's okay. I mean, it, it's depends on your field and you'll probably know some of that lingo.

Grace Joaquin:

Yes. I know every job has their own like acronyms and lingo and all of that, so. Exactly. keep that in mind and we can also help with that. Yes. I actually thought that's what though, where you were going with that, that you can ask your career advisor. Oh yeah. For come in and sit in CareerLab and brainstorm, you know, what transferable skills, you know, that's, that's a pretty fun exercise to do with somebody else, because you probably will think of new things. Yeah. Good point, Megan. Thanks <laugh>. All right, Katie? Yeah, I think we need one more. Yes. I, you ready?

New Speaker:

Am I up <laugh>? Yes. All right, here's the bucket. Okay. I got pasta maker in a chef's basement. Ooh. Ooh. I'm want that job. Who, who? Yeah. Like, yeah. Who are these people submitting these jobs? These pretty cool. It's amazing. All right. Ready for the next, a financial advisor. Oh, ouch.

Grace Joaquin:

A little bit of a tough one, maybe.

Katie Cwiakala:

This one is very tricky. All right, so pasta maker in a chef's basement financial advisor. The detail <laugh> I know. As opposed to the kitchen. Right. Alright. I think a transferrable skill for this one is definitely like preparation. Ooh. Yeah. So like a pasta maker has to prepare all the ingredients. You have to be on time, you have to, you know, I mean, I don't cook, but I'm assuming that you have to just put a lot of preparation into this dish that you're making. And then a financial advisor obviously has to prepare to meet with clients do their background research mm-hmm. <Affirmative> make sure that the client is kind of what they need for that meeting that they're having. And if you're not prepared, I mean the meeting's not probably gonna go as well as you

Megan Riksen:

Would look at that.

Grace Joaquin:

That. I'm, I dunno, excited. I honestly, like I was stumped.

Grace Joaquin:

That's so good. I need to do like snaps. Yeah. <Laugh>. Yeah. There we go. <Laugh>. Nice. Katie. Okay. So students out there listening, if you need help with transferable skills, come and ask for our graduate assistant, Katie. Yes. Because she's

Katie Cwiakala:

Happy to help. Yeah. <Laugh>, she's

Grace Joaquin:

She's available. <Laugh>.

Megan Riksen:

Awesome. Well, Katie, thank you so much for joining us Yeah. For our weird little game.

Katie Cwiakala:

Thanks for having me. It was fun. Yeah.

Megan Riksen:

Awesome. So yeah, hopefully kind of hearing us do some of that practicing helps with that formula. Right. And, you know, grace, can you just reiterate that formula again?

Grace Joaquin:

Yes. So the magic formula for, you know, ta talking about your skills is you wanna think of the skill that you gained from a previous experience, have an example ready of you doing that skill in your previous experience, and then talk about how it connects to your future job.

Megan Riksen:

Right. Perfect. So yeah, again, these can be used when you're writing cover letters, when you're having conversations with people during an interview, you know, especially with a question like, why should we hire you? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, having some of these ready to go is really gonna be impactful. So thanks so much. Hopefully all of you were playing along as well, <laugh> as, as you were listening. And I think we'll have to do that game again.

Grace Joaquin:

Yeah, it was kind of fun. What do you think, Katie.

Katie Cwiakala:

Absolutely. <laugh>.

Megan Riksen:

Awesome. All right, well thank you so much to everyone for listening, and we hope you tune in to a future episode soon.