My junior and senior years in undergrad, I had to take “professional development” courses. These were courses aimed at helping us get jobs within the scope of our major once we were out in the real world. The one put together by the theatre department was a full semester, involving research about good theatre cities and how to put together an appropriate headshot and resume. The class for English majors was half a semester and focused on putting together a website to showcase your writing skills.
Neither of these has been helpful.
Don’t get me wrong. What little coding I learned for the website inspired me to learn more, and I got some ideas about what cities I would and would not want to live in. However, these courses have left me woefully unprepared for what kind of things the job market actually expects. I didn’t know how to format a resume until I googled it. I didn’t know what to put in a cover letter until my roommate showed me hers. I’m still not sure how to write a personal statement. And working in the Write Site, I get the sense that these are things that are often under-taught. Because of all this, I would love to set up a series of workshops about what I’m terming “professional storytelling.”
Professional storytelling is the kind of narrative that most people are expected to be able to communicate in order to get around in the professional world. The most common form of this is the resume, which is the series of events that comprise your education and work history, along with details about how these events are relevant to the job you’re applying to. Cover letters are also a big part of this, covering the story of how you found out about a specific job and what you have done that makes you qualified, but in an even more traditionally narrative form than the resume. These two form the backbone of the professional narrative, the full story of your work laid out in two well-formatted sheets of paper.
The personal statement is another form of professional storytelling. These crop up more often with graduate schools, but some jobs also require a variation on this. The requirements are different from application to application, but they all involve talking about yourself, your skills and goals and how you ended up where you have. And as much as people like to post about their life on social media or tell stories around the dinner table, it’s very different to write everything up in paragraphs with a formal tone. Nobody seems to know how to do it, and everybody seems at least a little uncomfortable. And branching off the personal statement is other, similar kinds of writing, like scholarship essays for students or grant writing in the professional world. They all revolve around storytelling but no one wants to talk about how to do it.
In an ideal world, this workshop would not be taught by people who teach writing, but by people who read these kinds of writing for a living. Hiring managers, scholarship committees, grant committees, and admissions boards would be prime examples of instructors for these sessions. After all, no one knows what to look for in this kind of professional storytelling like the people who read the stories.
For structure, each session would contain both instruction and feedback. Knowing that some people may only be able to come to a single session, they would be encouraged to bring what they have related to the subject (e.g., a draft resume), listen to a lesson, then revise their draft based on what they have learned. People could get live feedback from the instructors and/or other workshop attendees about how to make adjustments. There would also be an online feedback option, for those who may need more time. Uploading a revised version of their professional story by a certain time, like before the next session, would provide an opportunity for feedback before the workshop moves on. It would also help those who can only attend or only feel the need to attend one workshop.
These workshops would be advertised many places. Colleges and public libraries would be good, but also public notice boards or outside temp agencies. If there’s enough money, buying online adspace on job hunting sites would be ideal. This has the potential to be a nationwide series of workshops, helping anyone trying to get a foothold in the job market to hone their skills at professional storytelling.
Neither of these has been helpful.
Don’t get me wrong. What little coding I learned for the website inspired me to learn more, and I got some ideas about what cities I would and would not want to live in. However, these courses have left me woefully unprepared for what kind of things the job market actually expects. I didn’t know how to format a resume until I googled it. I didn’t know what to put in a cover letter until my roommate showed me hers. I’m still not sure how to write a personal statement. And working in the Write Site, I get the sense that these are things that are often under-taught. Because of all this, I would love to set up a series of workshops about what I’m terming “professional storytelling.”
Professional storytelling is the kind of narrative that most people are expected to be able to communicate in order to get around in the professional world. The most common form of this is the resume, which is the series of events that comprise your education and work history, along with details about how these events are relevant to the job you’re applying to. Cover letters are also a big part of this, covering the story of how you found out about a specific job and what you have done that makes you qualified, but in an even more traditionally narrative form than the resume. These two form the backbone of the professional narrative, the full story of your work laid out in two well-formatted sheets of paper.
The personal statement is another form of professional storytelling. These crop up more often with graduate schools, but some jobs also require a variation on this. The requirements are different from application to application, but they all involve talking about yourself, your skills and goals and how you ended up where you have. And as much as people like to post about their life on social media or tell stories around the dinner table, it’s very different to write everything up in paragraphs with a formal tone. Nobody seems to know how to do it, and everybody seems at least a little uncomfortable. And branching off the personal statement is other, similar kinds of writing, like scholarship essays for students or grant writing in the professional world. They all revolve around storytelling but no one wants to talk about how to do it.
In an ideal world, this workshop would not be taught by people who teach writing, but by people who read these kinds of writing for a living. Hiring managers, scholarship committees, grant committees, and admissions boards would be prime examples of instructors for these sessions. After all, no one knows what to look for in this kind of professional storytelling like the people who read the stories.
For structure, each session would contain both instruction and feedback. Knowing that some people may only be able to come to a single session, they would be encouraged to bring what they have related to the subject (e.g., a draft resume), listen to a lesson, then revise their draft based on what they have learned. People could get live feedback from the instructors and/or other workshop attendees about how to make adjustments. There would also be an online feedback option, for those who may need more time. Uploading a revised version of their professional story by a certain time, like before the next session, would provide an opportunity for feedback before the workshop moves on. It would also help those who can only attend or only feel the need to attend one workshop.
These workshops would be advertised many places. Colleges and public libraries would be good, but also public notice boards or outside temp agencies. If there’s enough money, buying online adspace on job hunting sites would be ideal. This has the potential to be a nationwide series of workshops, helping anyone trying to get a foothold in the job market to hone their skills at professional storytelling.
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