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It will soon be a year since The Oprah Winfrey Show went off of the air. Like clockwork my TiVo was set to record Oprah on a daily basis, and sometimes it would accidentally record an episode twice as though it wanted to make sure that I watched it. Oprah was my go to person for information on a topic, for advice on how to deal with a certain situation, or even the place I went to for an ugly cry. I can honestly say I’ve probably seen every episode of Oprah in my adult years and in vulnerable times have been known to sometimes ask, WWOD – “What would Oprah do?” I must also confess that I have not watched the final week of the show. It has been sitting on my TiVo for the last year as my hope was to watch it when the time was right. I think the time is finally right. The last couple of weeks have been challenging for me, as well as others, as we focus on our professional futures. If you’re a recent grad you may still be looking for that perfect job. If you’ve been in the field for a while as a new professional you’re probably looking for a mid-level or a different position. So when you’re going through a difficult moment when it comes to the job search, all you need to do is ask yourself, “What would Oprah do?!”

You’ve submitted about 20 cover letters and resumes in the last couple of weeks and no responses?

What would Oprah do? The reality is that sometimes it may take submitting applications for many, many, many jobs before you land the one. While we may hope that every job we apply for we automatically receive an interview, that’s just not the case. For some, you will think that you’re 100% qualified while the organization may think you’re not the right fit. You’re feeling anxious and you might even feel like you’re reaching a breaking point. Oprah would tell you to hang in there and keep submitting applications but that you might need to consider revamping your search technique.

You keep getting interviews but don’t get the job!

What would Oprah do? If you’re getting interviews, then you’re definitely doing something right! If you’re not landing the job, that doesn’t mean that you blew it or were not good enough. Ultimately, it probably means that you made their short list of candidates but someone else might have been a better fit for the position. If this is constantly occurring, Oprah would ask you to review your interview style and approach. Are you prepared? Are you able to elaborate on questions with concrete examples of experiences?

You didn’t get the job that you thought was your dream job?

What would Oprah do? When you think you’ve found the job for you and your interview blew everyone out of the water BUT you still end up not getting the job, Oprah would say: “You didn’t get that job because it wasn’t the job for you!” In addition to Oprah, you will probably have a lot of people telling you this and that there is something better on the horizon. Sometimes you won’t believe it but you have to believe it. You will not always get what you think you want. The universe has its own plan and sometimes you just have to be okay with that.

(Questions based on comments on #saschat and #sasearch.)

Nekesa Straker is a Residence Hall Director at New York University.

“When all think alike, then no one is thinking.” – Walter Lippman.

I really enjoy attending conferences.  I hear some interesting talks and chat with some impressive professionals.  At the same time I recognize how outdated their structure and format are.  Apparently other professionals have been feeling the same way (Check out Erika Thompson‘s delicious Stack with links to most of the conversation).  I might be a little late to this party but I  I wanted to throw a thought into the ring.

The conversation’s I read centered around reconstructing conferences to make them more nimble, up-to-date, relevant, thought provoking, and so on – all valid points.  For this post I want to focus on conference content disruption.  Joe Ginese remarked that sessions are not so much about innovation, rather repurposed ideas that are offered as “possibly” applicable to your campus.  I agree with that but I see it going a step further.  The session content itself may not be traditionally innovative but what professionals do with the content is meant to be innovative.  The content we offer attendees become the tools for future program growth, but if we offer sessions lacking depth and richness, then the outcomes will mimic.

I was an Interdiscplinary Studies major as an undergraduate – which I am pretty sure is the technical term for an academic mashup.  One belief that was hammered home that I still believe deeply in:  Innovation sparks when multiple disciplines are brought together to see what can be created. HigherEd conferences probably can’t be considered a mashup of discplines. This is not to say that innovation and great ideas aren’t created at these meetings of the minds, but when you bring folks within the same profession together every year… the outcome isn’t going to shift much. There needs to be a spark that brings a little disruption to our conferences.

Let’s tentatively call it the National Professional Exchange. I picture the system looking like this:  A HigherEd professional organization makes a connection with another professional organization, one outside of higher education but that represents applicable professions.  These two organizations strike an accord that allows 5 or so professionals to attend the other associations conference at discount price.  Think of it as an investment in the group and their ability to come back with applicable fresh and innovative ideas for their peers. The professional would be enrolled as a NPE Fellow and tasked to engage with participants, present, and then bring back new ideas to the conference and discussed in an unconference setting.

This type of AltProDev is burgeoning as can be seen with the BIGIdeas conference in New Jersey. The conference organizers are having professionals in outside industries lead presentations and discussions.  Simply put, I LOVE that. You can also find live streaming conferences andor twitter backchannels that can give a similar experience.  All in all there are a number of ways professionals can find accessible professional development.  Would a National Professional Exchange be a viable option for AltProDev?

Do you think this system could work? Would it add to the conference experience?

The impetus for this post is a gripe I have about student organization constitutions. Many universities require student groups to generate a constitution as a prerequisite for recognition. Yet how many of our offices have constitutions? How many of our campuses have constitutions? Does any group you belong to anywhere–besides the United States of America and maybe the Rotary Club–have a constitution? (Do an Internet search on “organizations with constitutions” and you’ll get a slew of university “how to” pages for their student groups.)

My primary concern: relevance.

Leadership/followership education is challenging, messy, complicated work. There’s no manual, no surefire way to guarantee success. But because it’s so important—so vital—this work can also be very rewarding. We must approach leadership education thoughtfully by creating relevant and meaningful ways for students to learn and engage. We need to help them see connections between all of their leadership/followership experiences–class projects, part-time jobs, families, student organizations, future careers, and more.

Here are a few things for us to ponder:

1) Effective groups have a shared purpose. In his TED Talk on “How great leaders inspire action,” Simon Sinek discusses the power of people who connect around mutual beliefs and dreams. How do we help students identify and articulate purpose and then use purpose to form and ground groups? Would developing a statement of purpose be more centering than hammering away at a constitution?

2) Effective groups have active participants. How do we help student groups establish organization norms–member-generated and mutually agreed upon standards for participation? And then, how do we work with students to identify and address unsatisfactory performance in their groups and to confront, coach, and even “fire” when appropriate? Some faculty members are now allowing groups to remove project-team members who fail to meet agreed-upon standards. Students generally appreciate this option (and use it), and it teaches a valuable skill (and lesson).

3) Effective groups understand that problem solving is a process. Simply saying that food service or parking sucks isn’t enough. How do we coach students to explore why something is the way it is, first? Our campus library houses our University’s archives, where students can learn things like why our institution once had a child-care center and now doesn’t. Many colleges have well-known “historians,” faculty and staff members who have lived through years of changes and enjoy talking about them. Solutions that show a grasp of the past have a better chance of gaining approval.

4) Do we overuse the term “student leader” when we could/should be saying “students when they’re leading”? When we speak about “student leaders,” we are often referring to students with titles–Resident Assistants, Student Government officers, etc. These students are certainly leading in this single capacity; however, they are also participating in groups led by others. They are following. When non-titled students hear us speak about our “student leaders,” they often don’t see themselves, even though they may, in fact, be leading without a title.

5) How are we learning about leading and following? We have access to much wisdom through TED Talks, blogs, and other resources (all of which can be used with students, too). Are we practicing what we teach? Students are watching us. They see how we are leading and following, both in terms of actual behaviors and skills and in terms of the quality of decisions being made.

What are your experiences with leadership and followership? What initiatives and tools are having the most impact? How have your leadership programs evolved? What work still needs to be done?

Lisa Tetzloff is the Director of the Office of Student Life at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

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What are some other topics you would like to see us cover? Please let us know your ideas and feedback to keep #sachat growing strong. Until next week, (if you haven’t already done so) please make sure to LIKE our Facebook Page. Thanks for your continued support!

I am the son of two deaf parents. Calling, or as E.T would say phoning, home has never really been an option for me. Thanks to technology there are wonderful ways that I can stay in communication with my family (Skype is a wonderful way for anyone to communicate with home). Yet this idea had me going in two directions, 1) our word choices are extremely powerful when relaying messages and 2) there are so many invisible aspects that may make up our students that we would never know unless they told us. How then do we serve our students? How do we serve a student population we have never worked with, who we have never learned a theory for, or don’t even really know are on our campus?

For me coming to college was eye-opening, it was the first time in my life that not everyone in town knew me as, “Ryan, he has deaf parents”, it was something that I had to disclose to people. Of course I shared, it’s a part of who I am, a part of what makes me, me! Now that I am in a Higher Ed/Student Affairs masters program and learning about theories for various student populations, I reflect back to my own development and am curious how much of my background affected my development. I had a great experience in my undergrad, and my mentors, advisors, and supervisors were able to help me exactly the way I needed, but I’m just one person – I wonder if there are other students like me and if we as a collective population have some special needs. This has had me thinking lately, what can we do to help those hidden populations of students? How can we bring awareness to them?

Our field places a huge focus on word choice and being sensitive to those words that may be offensive to populations. We have created buzzwords. Realizing that when I heard “E.T phone home” I immediately thought of the fact that I could not “phone” home in the traditional sense. I of course laughed that this is where my thoughts went because it is not a sad situation nor is it a difficult situation for me. Yet it highlighted the power of words. One simple word can influence thoughts, emotions, and actions. How then can we educate our students on the power of words? My opinion and philosophy is to correct them when appropriate, kindly explain to them how those words are impactful, and to be proactive and have the conversations that lead students to realize that what they say carries power. How do you educate your students on the power of words?

Ryan Bye is a graduate hall coordinator at Texas Tech University.

Upon my return from the conference I purchased the book for myself and began to read it. Certainly, the author illustrates various issues that plague the current student population, and cause these students to accept the responsibilities of adulthood at later and later ages. One such issue centers in career development. Indeed, as written in this book, many students that we currently work with have grown up with the notion that they are entitled to a wonderful, fulfilling, and high income job based primarily on wants rather than the skills it takes to get to the career of their dreams. It should be noted that this sense of entitlement spreads across the generation and does not exclude based upon gender. Undoubtedly, in my opinion male and female students both feel this entitlement with regards to their future careers.

It seems students today have no real knowledge of the grunt work one needs to take on in order to reach a job which provides the level of success they desire and feel they deserve. Have our students truly become this entitled with regards to job? If so, then what can we as practitioners do to help them recognize what it takes to make it “big”? I often worry that my students will face a certain situation in their lives which will cause them to recognize their unrealistic expectations with regards to career that will leave them feeling disillusioned about career development. I know I try to work with this sense of entitlement by educating my students into recognizing the hard work, dedication, motivation, perseverance and education jobs in this day and age require, but I often feel as though I hit a brick wall.

I then have to ask myself what else can be done to help these students. Do we as practitioner’s need to just watch them make their mistakes in order to recognize what it takes to make it “big”? Furthermore, as students did we have these same unrealistic expectations about careers and believe in instant gratification therefore determining that this is a normal stage in their development as adolescents? As can be noted there are many questions left to be answered but ultimately it all begins with educating ourselves in the hopes of educating our students.

Juhi Bhatt works as a Career/Transfer Counselor and Coordinator of Judicial Affairs at Bergen Community College.