Connecting students with potential employers
Undergraduate and graduate students are encouraged to work with our Business Career Services professional staff members to prepare for internships, co-ops, and full-time careers after graduation. These highly talented professionals offer a variety of support for students at no additional charge.
As seen in the spring 2024 Ivy magazine.
Students in the Ivy College of Business have an advantage when it comes to connecting with potential employers, thanks to the work of Business Career Services staff. There are two physical offices in the Gerdin Business Building for career services:
- Undergraduate Business Career Services led by Kathy Wieland.
- Graduate Business Career Services led by Tabatha Carney.
For undergraduates, Wieland said the charge of her office is to prepare students to work as professionals through customized coaching, experience-based learning, and connectivity with industry. The emphasis in recent years has been on helping students increase their social capital, which is the practical outcome of informal interactions between people – an area that the pandemic deeply impacted. This led Wieland’s staff to create new events like InternChips & Queso, Mocktails and Mock Interviews.
They also created the Ivy Seminar Series for Emerging Leaders, a four-week, not-for-credit program co-directed by Wieland, Carney, and Wei Zhang, Kingland Faculty Fellow in Business Analytics and professor of marketing. Each week, a business or nonprofit executive shares their thoughts on a particular aspect of leadership with a select group of Ivy students during a one-hour, live Zoom meeting.
“What I have found from most of these leaders’ talks is that they are not only teaching students how to be good leaders, but they are also teaching them how to be better individuals,” said Zhang. “As Dean David Spalding mentioned at one point, to be a leader, the first person you should lead is yourself. Therefore, I hope students will take what they have learned from these conversations and incorporate it into their daily lives.”
One of the Emerging Leaders program speakers was Kurt Tjaden, former president and CEO of HNI International and a professor of practice.
“This was a unique opportunity to engage with top Ivy students and make a positive impact on their Iowa State experience and provide real-world business perspective,” he said. “It was, in a word, energizing. The students were engaged and asked great questions. It was clear they were fully invested in the program.”
Wieland shared that undergraduate Business Career Services is also trying to incorporate more celebratory events, like CYning Day. This event offers students who’ve signed an internship or job offer a chance to celebrate by sharing the news with Business Career Services, snapping a photo for social media, similar to student-athlete signing days, and enjoying treats.
Underpinning all these events, Wieland said, is a required professional development course through which all students develop competencies that are aligned with the National Association of Colleges and Employers in terms of what students are asked to demonstrate by employers.
“We are training and coaching students to help themselves gain a position,” Wieland said. “They are their own agents, and that’s a fundamental life skill we want our students to have before they leave.”
When it comes to graduate business students, the focus has been on delivering opportunities that create professional connections.
“We know that our students have options when it comes to choosing a college, so we want to add even more value to their degree by complementing their academic experience with career-focused events,” Carney says. “That value can be found in connecting students to professionals in their field and starting a long-lasting impression on their career.”
The Graduate Business Career Services office intentionally connects students to industry leaders through corporate and executive networking events, employer speaker series, and mock interviews. Graduate students also take a professional development course designed and taught by Carney’s team. All residential programs are required to take the course, and the hybrid and online degrees have it as an elective option.
“In this course, we are able to prepare students on how to put their best foot forward when it comes to preparing application materials, professional networking, and their next career steps,” Carney says.
For Carney, who has a long history of working in business and higher education, helping students and employers is rewarding.
Wieland feels she’s doing work that matters, too. “We get a chance to see students holistically,” she said. “We see a beginning, a middle, and an end, and we probably still have a relationship with that student as a recruiter.”
Working with students at the Ivy College of Business is the icing on the cake.
“I think the Ivy student is unique,” Wieland said. “They’re so hardworking and care so much about being engaged. They know that we’re here to help them.”
