The ABCs of Great Career Conversations
Students and alumni network during Talk with Hawks event at Kinney Center.
The Cardinal Foley Center was bustling with students Monday night as students and alumni came together for Talk with Hawks — the first event in the Career Development Center’s Career Conversations Week and an opportunity to learn and teach networking tactics in a professional setting.
Students were instructed, step-by-step, how to start, engage in, and close a conversation in a room full of people they may not know. After a series of exercises, students and alumni were able to engage in uninterrupted networking to close the evening. Participants were encouraged to ask alumni for business cards, and to follow up within 48 hours of the event.
Surprisingly, a large number of the students who participated in this event were freshmen – many of them looking for guidance concerning their career paths as well as how to best navigate a professional setting.
“Networking like this is so important. Our college transcript and GPA can only get us so far,” says Kristen Paniscotti ‘22, an undecided business major. “I think, especially in the business world, it’s all based on who you know — post-college is based on where you have connections to get jobs. I think starting earlier rather than later is a good way to develop those connections and possibly get an internship opportunity so after college you have those connections.”
Some of the alumni were surprised, and ultimately impressed, by the number of freshmen in the room.
“This is not easy to do and I think it is so courageous that a ton of freshmen were willing to come to this tonight,” said Jennifer Rizzo, an executive team leader at Target. “They can sign up, but they still have all the opportunity in the world to turn around and leave. To actually open the door and come in, I was so impressed to see that happen.”
After the event, students said they were relieved and thankful to gain insight into the world of networking. “It was a lot less nerve-wracking than I thought it would be,” explained Kally Pachuta ‘22. “They broke it all down a lot more than I expected, so it was a lot less scary than I anticipated.”
Talk with Hawks was one of 13 events held over the course of the week. Some of the events focused on individual industries or careers — branding, media, marketing, finance, real estate, insurance, technology and data analytics.
On Thursday (5:30 p.m., Foley Center), students could participate in “What Are You Going to Do with THAT major?”, a networking game in which students will ask alumni questions aimed at guessing their original major.