Graduation Blues: Nailing the Career of Your Dreams

May 19, 2004

Graduating from college should have been one of the high points of my life. Instead, it felt like jumping off a cliff with a very frayed bunji cord, not knowing if my lifeline to the future was going to snap, followed by a spine-tingling plunge into the pit of career nothingness.
For starters, I had done everything wrong. After six years of living dirt poor as an undergrad (my extended college stay was a consequence of spending too much time partying), I graduated with the realization that:
a.) my degree was in a popular field that thousands of other college grads wanted a piece of;
b.) I hadn’t gotten any degree-related experience in school to make me stand out from the herd; and
c.) I had made the dumb move of getting engaged before I had a job nailed down -- much less a career.

REALITY SINKS IN
I was desperate for a job -- any job. Did I mention I was dirt poor? And living in a basement room just past the dusty furnace in an ugly part of inner city Chicago? Even the rats didn’t much care for the place, but it was all I could afford. Dinner ran along the lines of fried potatoes and onions or a peanut butter sandwich. I was a college graduate from a four-year university, but as broke as Raskolnikov, the starving student killer in Doestoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment.”
My undergrad degree in social work wasn’t opening any doors (at least it wasn’t political science!), but I was under tremendous pressure to get a job to hold up my end of a forthcoming marriage.
One by one, almost all of my friends had gotten engaged or married in their early 20s. It wasn’t peer pressure exactly, it was more in the spirit of gentle idealism that I got engaged too at the age of 24 before I’d even graduated. I was looking forward to the domestic benefits of being married to the woman I loved, but my timing was way off. I didn’t have any idea as to how tough it was going to be launching a career that related to my degree, but with the wedding looming just a few months down the road, I had to find a job -- any job -- fast.
I went through the motions. I cleaned up my act, put on a tie, got my resumè together (a joke) and saw the campus recruiters. Most tried to interest me in a career selling life insurance.
I applied for every social work position I could find in the state, rummaging through the want ads in multiple papers. Every response was the same: you need experience under your belt to land a job.
Like every college grad I wondered, how do you get the experience if no one will take a chance on you?

GET A JOB
So it was that I found myself wearing a paper hat and black polyester slacks, working as the manager of a fast food restaurant in a bad part of town far down Michigan Ave. My first day on the job, I was presented with one of the tools of my new career: a baseball bat to use on anyone who demanded the cash register proceeds from our french fry and burger sales. It was possibility which seemed quite likely, given the neighborhood.
As the months went by, my dream of a position related to my degree began to evaporate, slowly replaced with the notion of a future in restaurant management. It was 180 degrees opposite of what I wanted to do with my life.
When you’re depressed, you get that dark, tunnelvision thing going where it’s all you can do to keep looking straight ahead and doing your little bit. The black high-pressure clouds swirl all around, bearing down on your thoughts and the periphery of your vision. That’s how it was for me -- my private hell was the realization that I was a college grad working in a fast food joint. It was honorable work -- I wasn’t out rolling bums to feed a crack habit -- but it wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life.
Since that time, after talking to many other college grads, I’ve come to realize that those depressed feelings and dark visions are a common thing. Most of us don’t get our dream jobs handed to us on platinum platters the day we graduate; instead, it slowly dawns on us that there aren’t many ledges to rest on as you claw your way up the cliffs of ambition. Or to use another metaphor, you find yourself slogging through the same old swamp after graduation, and unbelievably, the muck gets deeper and thicker to trudge through.

MAKIN’ IT
Gradually, it dawned on me that to get any reasonable job in the field of social work, I’d need as masters degree. I began laying plans for returning to school part-time.
I also began volunteering one night a week as a recreation therapist at a mental health facility. It was simple stuff involving playing cards and other games, but it added a small notch of experience to my nonexistent resumè. I also volunteered on a crisis hotline -- another feather for my resumè nest. A few months later, I was thrilled to quit my restaurant job for a new gig as a night manager at a home for substance abusers. It was a big step down in pay, but the night job allowed me to pursue my masters and added more firepower to my resumè.
Today, it’s been years since I landed a humble social work gig halfway through my masters program. Like many young idealists, I eventually became disillusioned with my “calling” and went into a completely different midlife career as a writer. I don’t claim to be any expert in mastering the “graduation blues,” but I’ve done a lot of thinking through the years on what I did wrong and what it takes to succeed. So, for what it’s worth, considering the following tips as advice grounded in reality from one who’s “been there.”

Get a Job:

• You often need experience as well as a degree to get the job you dream of after college. If you’re still in school, knock yourself out with intern opportunities or part-time jobs that relate to your future career. Work on the school paper, join the campus investment club, haunt the computer lab or student broadcast stations or help out at the extension farm bureau -- the main thing is to come out of school with a smokin’ track record already on your resumè.
If you’re out of school and are spinning your wheels in a job that has nothing to do with your degree, then volunteer your time in the field of your dreams. Or, take a part-time job in your chosen field, even if it means holding down two jobs at once. The main thing is to rev up your resumè with some experience postings. Many times, a volunteer or internship posting leads to a job offer or a referral once an employer gets to know and trust your abilities.

• Your portfolio has to hit home runs instead of base hits. Many jobs, such as journalism or graphic design, require portfolios for potential employers to review. Unfortunately, many of us serve up the bare minimum we were required to produce in school. Make it clear to employers that this job is your passion with a portfolio that buries all other contenders, even if you have to stay up until 3 a.m. for months working on it.

• Defer marriage. If it’s true love, then your beloved will wait a year until you’ve got your feet set in the concrete of your future career. The first year of marriage is tough enough without sharing the pressure of finding a job with your sweetheart, who could end up resenting having to pull the load while you pull your hair out.

• Have options. These days, many students graduate with two or even three majors. Besides making you more marketable to employers (you majored in French, business and international trade, for instance), multiple majors give you the flexibility to pursue different options. A friend landed his job at a magazine by having a dual degree in English and photography that put him a notch above the rest in usability. Another landed a job in graphic design by having advanced skills in troubleshooting computers.
Make yourself desirable to employers by having multiple cost-saving talents.

• Remember it’s not the money that matters. Many times in my career search, I accepted less money at each successive job. More important was the fact that I was working towards a career in a profession I enjoyed.
When it comes to a career, the old clichè is true: money doesn’t buy happiness. One study claims that 60% of of all Americans aren’t happy with what they do for a living: they’ve got a “job” instead of a career. Accept the idea that anything worth doing requires paying some dues and take on low-paying entry-level jobs in your chosen field if you must. The money will come as your experience grows.

• Remember that there are no rules. If these don’t work, chuck ‘em. Don’t pin all your hopes and self-worth on achieving a career goal (major rock star, Broadway actress). Establishing a career isn’t a do-or-die proposition. If you’re beating your head against a wall, you should reappraise your situation periodically to consider another direction. I’ve got friends who vowed to be rock & roll superstars in high school and spent 10 years flogging the dream (and their girlfriends’ paychecks) before they came to their senses and went on to college and new directions.