PR Start by Nick Lucido

Molly Fletcher, President of Career Sports and Entertainment

This week, I attended a lecture given by Molly Fletcher, MSU alumna and President of Career Sports and Entertainment. While I’m not particularly interested in sports, her perspective and advice on careers is invaluable no matter what your major is.

As part of her book, she described the five steps to getting your dream job:

1. Passionate style – if you care about what you do, you will be successful. Make sure the “wow” factor is there with your work.
2. Fearlessness – take a chance. Don’t stick to the rules if you think you can do something outside the box. When you do take a chance, follow through with it.
3. Game Plan – don’t improvise your career. Make a plan with your mentors and colleagues and set reachable goals for yourself.
4. Execution – follow through with your plan. If something isn’t working, change it up and don’t be afraid to take a risk.
5. Create choices for yourself – if you follow the above steps, you will end up with multiple career choices. Even in today’s economy, you don’t have to pick the first job offer you get upon graduation. If you have followed through with your own career plan and put yourself in the right position, you should be able to choose where you want to work. It might sound crazy, but that’s my plan and I’m sticking to it.

Besides these steps, Molly had some general advice that I thought was pretty important:

I never thought of it this way, but it’s important to remember that you are your own brand. Your personality, your resume, your business cards… they all are part of your own brand. Make sure they convey the message that you want to be displayed.

Use relationships, not just resumes. It may or may not be true that the best jobs are the ones that are not posted. But no matter the case, networking with your peers and seasoned professionals is key. If you want a job, do more than just Google it. Talk to those in your network that you trust and get their input. Even better is getting multiple people on the hunt.

Finally, she had two questions for the audience. Who are you? What do you want to be? I’ll be honest, if someone asked me this in an interview, I would probably fumble over an answer – for now. I have an idea, but when Molly asked those questions, it got me thinking. This helps when you make your career game plan.

One last tidbit: you work more than 100,000 hours in your life. Do what you love and love what you do.

Her book, Your Dream Job Game Plan, is now on sale. Needless to say, I already ordered it. I recommend checking it out. Her career site with more info can be found here.

So, what do you think? Are these steps already part of your career plan?