Conversations on Careers and Professional Life Gregory Heller

I speak with Class of 2022 Foster MBA grad, Xiajin "XJ" Cai. XJ is originally from China, and started her MBA at Foster in the Fall of 2020, while classes and most activities were being conducted remotely.  I was impressed with the way she engaged not only in the Foster community, through clubs, and recruiting activities, but also participated in case competitions beyond Foster. I wanted to have her on the show to talk about her experiences as an international student, how she handled internship and full time recruiting, and the experience and skills she gained through case competitions.
 
Learn SQL or other programming languages with online education sites like Coursera, EdX, or OpenCourseWare from MIT The After Hours podcast from the Ted Radio Collective Look for resources on mock interviews, case interviews, google mock interviews + consulting firm name, find videos about how they are conducted. AT&T She Counts case competition, read about XJ and her teammate on the Foster Blog MyVisaJobs.com and H1BGrader.com to find companies that have sponsored H1B Visas previously.

In late 2022, I had the opportunity to speak with four Foster School of Business MBA Alumni who are now on the other side of the interview table about what they are listening for from candidates in behavioral interviews. 
This episode features:
Adam Schmidt at Accenture Sam Ead at Google Claire Herting at Walmart Skyler Brown at Goldman Sachs I talked to each one separately, but as you will hear, in this compilation of their answers -- across industries and roles, there are some very clear trends: authenticity, enthusiasm, preparation. 
For more advice on preparing for internship interviews and job interviews, check out more episodes with interview tips.

On this episode, recorded in March of 2022, I spoke with two Foster MBA students, Connor Almon-Griffin (MBA 2023) and Doug Beach (MBA 2022) about their experience attending the ClimateCap -- The Global MBA Summit on Climate, Capital and Business in February of that year. ClimateCap, as you'll hear, brings together MBA students from around the world with corporate leaders in sustainability to discuss the 21st century's biggest business issue.
The past year has seen the passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs act and the Inflation Reduction Act, two pieces of legislation that will pump billions of dollars into renewable energy, decarbonization and other solutions to the climate crisis. IN the last few months, as headlines have covered layoffs in big tech, other headlines have told a different story of hiring by companies focused on climate tech, and sustainability. The Foster School has also rolled out an ESG Concentration within the MBA program. Interest in climate jobs is hot inside and outside of business schools.
Connor and Doug shared so much great advice in this episode, but the thing I want to underscore the most is the importance of networking, both within the program -- as Connor said, find your people -- and as Doug said, even after you have secured your internship or job. The economy has changed since we recorded the episode a year ago, and having a strong professional network is critically important to personal and professional resilience in times of economic uncertainty.
 
ClimateCapSummit.org MBA-Edge.com Insights on the most important issues for today’s MBAs from Duke's Fuqua School of Business @Katie_Kross on Twitter and her Sustainability Jobs Twitter List  
WorkOnClimate.org an online community with over 16k members ClimateTechCareers.com Resources for learning about and finding climate jobs. Terra.do for information on climate jobs and education on climate issues  
Business Schools Must Do More To Address The Climate Crisis Full Time and Evening MBA Programs Introduce ESG Concentration (UW Foster Blog) Wind Power Eclipses Coal and Nuclear For First Time (NPR) Solar Power Podcast Clean Tech Talk ReCharge podcast At Scale Zero from Bloomberg How We Survive Podcast from Marketplace

On this episode, I speak with Gabriel Sheer, Director of Inovation and manager of the energy and mobility portfolios at Elemental Excelerator, a nonprofit startup accelerator about the current state of the climate tech/climate solutions startup space at the beginning of 2023. Gabriel is also a good friend. We first became acquainted through his work organizing Seattle Green Drinks in the bid '00s, we later worked together at a sustainability tech startup in Seattle.  Gabriel has had an interesting career leading up to where he is now, from the early days of car share working at Flex Car (and then Zip Car), independent consulting, product and strategy consulting, helping launch Lime Bike, and now working with Elemental Excelerator.
Gabriel shares advice for job seekers interested in working in climate solutions startups: build your network, do your research, find a team that you feel like you can trust. Working in a startup can be like riding a rollercoaster and you want to feel like everyone is all-in.
Gabriel shared some resources, and I've added a few more to the list below.
ClimateTech VC - CTVC.Co WorkOnClimate.org Slack Community CanaryMedia.com for coverage of sustainability issues and businesses I've compiled a list of job boards for sustainability and impact jobs and will keep adding to it.
Here are a few of my favorites, and I know Gabriel would endorse many of them because we have traded links and episodes from these sources:
InsideClimateNews.org which also has a number of great newsletters CleanTechnica.com Grist.org Bloomberg Green Climate Forward from the NYT Spark from MIT Technology Review The Impact – Website, newsletter and podcasts about sustainability startups and VC Volts Podcast and newsletter with Dave Roberts Zero Podcast from Bloomberg If you are looking for a few books to help you get up to speed on topics related to the climate crisis, solutions and decarbonization:
Speed and Scale Regeneration Drawdown IPCC reports

Photo by Blondinrikard Fröberg on Flickr under CC by/2.0 As a job candidate, it’s up to you to shine the spotlight on the skills and experiences you've had that are relevant to the job or company you are interviewing for. Too often, candidates prepare scripted answers and don't adapt them to the specific interview questions, company or interviewer. On this episode, I share some advice on effectively communicating during job interviews.
Take a moment It is not enough to have a dozen well-rehearsed stories that illustrate examples in response to the interview questions you anticipate. Invariably, you will get asked a question that you haven’t prepared for. In a few seconds you will have to decide which story fits the question best and start your answer. The danger is that you will tell the story as you've prepared it without tailoring it to your audience or the exact question. Interviewers remember when a response doesn't answer their question. But they don’t remember that you took an extra few seconds before starting your response.
Focus on what your audience wants to hear The AIM framework from Lynn Russell and Mary Munter is a great tool to employ when preparing any communication, including job interview responses. The acronym stands for Audience, Intent, Message. The audience is the person or people receiving the communication. The intent is both your intent: what you want to happen, and the intent you want to create in your audience. The message is both the delivery mechanism and the content.
When preparing for any interview, take the time to really think about your audience. Are you speaking with the recruiter, or the hiring manager? These are two different audiences, and your intent will be different. For the recruiter, your intent is to communicate that you are a strong candidate with relevant skills; you want to advance to the next round of interviews. The recruiter needs to believe that you are the right choice for the role she is trying to fill. For the hiring manager, your intent is to communicate that you have the relevant skills, right fit with the team, and ability to do the job; in this case, you want to get the offer. The hiring manager needs to believe that you are capable of doing the job, fitting in with the team, and growing to be a valuable asset to the company.
Start with “the end in mind” Reminding yourself of your intent before preparing, and before your actual performance (the interview) will help you shine the spotlight on the right facets of your experiences and respond appropriately to questions that you did not expect.
This starts with the most common interview question: Tell me about yourself. The interviewer wants to know just the relevant details about what you've done that led you to this company and this role at this moment. For example, the fact that you used to build Contact Relationship Management systems for nonprofit organizations may have nothing to do with the work you do today. Your ability to analyze voter data and cut turf for political canvassers? Irrelevant. Scrum Master and Scrum Product Owner certifications? Who cares. But throughout your career, maybe you’ve always been committed to helping the people around you and your clients communicate more effectively. BINGO. I might be talking about myself here...
When answering behavioral interview questions ("Tell me about a time when…") don't get sucked into the trap of sharing a very procedural (and generic) explanation of the situation, and what you did filled with every detail you can think of.  Think about your intent: why are you telling this story? What does it demonstrate about how you think and work? What skill or competency does it demonstrate that is relevant to the role or company you are interviewing for?
It’s all about structure and focus And remember that the human you are talking to is hardwired to look for structure. Stories have a beginning, middle and end. Gustav Freytag mapped out the c

Leadership Coach Melissa Schneider graduated from the Sloan School of Management at MIT with her MBA during the Global Financial Crisis. On this episode, she talks about the power of her network in charting her career path from Product Manager to Marketing Executive at Intuit, LinkedIn and GoDaddy before changing careers into coaching. Learn more about Melissa Schneider and her coaching practice at https://melissaschneider.co/