Strategic Guide to Career Success

See the rubric for more information on how your report will be graded. seeing where your interviews fit in, or what advice you're offering to students regarding this career path. Be sure to carefully review the Strategic Guide for Success Template in the Week 6 folder.

STRATEGIC GUIDE FOR SUCCESS This project is designed to give you experience interacting with professionals, delving into their leadership experiences, and working with inductive research methods, including thematic coding. For this project you will speak with 3 real-world professionals about their experience. These will be simple, four question interviews (though some have multiple parts), the answers to which you will document in detail. You will then code your data through a process we refer to as thematic coding, a qualitative research method. Through this process, you will develop a system for describing the types of answers your participants provided. Ultimately, you will present these findings to the class near the end of the term. This project has several different parts, with different due dates. They are as follows: • Professional Interviews (40 points): You will identify and interview 3 professionals who work in careers that stem from the degree you currently pursue. After identifying careers of special interest to you, you will then identify and approach individuals currently employed in those fields, asking if they would be willing to speak with you about their experiences and career. This assignment is designed to have you explore avenues you might pursue with your degree, as well as get advice from seasoned professionals about how you might prepare for such a career. During the interview, you will record (with permission) or take notes. After the interview, you will write up the verbatim transcript of your interview. • Synthesis of Findings (25 points): You will then code the interview transcripts to develop an inclusive categorical system that details every kind of advice or insight offered in these interviews. You will then sort these codes into categories and provide a summary statement describing each category. Lastly, you will provide an overall precis (a concise summary of essential facts) which details what you’ve learned from these interviews and how they may impact you or alter your intentions while preparing for the job market. Taken together, your coding system and precis will serve as the basis for a Strategic Guide to Success you will create for students in your program of study. In short, you are learning from professionals firsthand how best to prepare yourself for the workforce following your degree. • Strategic Guide and Presentation (60 points): Using your precis and four outside sources (journal articles, reputable websites, books, etc.) you will create a report which will be formatted according to guidelines taught in class. Finally, you will present your proposed strategies for success to the class, incorporating evidence from your interviews. STEPS TO COMPLETION Step 1: You will interview 3 professionals using the interview protocol provided. Step 2: After all interviews are completed, you will complete an interview analysis. • You will create codes based on your data, organize those codes into categories, and write up a brief summary of the categories you identified. • You will create a single master list of suggestions based on your codes. • You will write a precis summarizing your findings. Step 3: You will create a how-to manual for how to undertake your program and hit the job market in the best possible shape. The strategic guide will include the following components of a formal document: A. Title Page B. Abstract a. The abstract can be a single paragraph that lists the purpose of the project, how it was compiled, what this produced. This is high-impact and succinct. Do not list all of the categories and recommended strategies for accomplishing them here. Instead, save those for the Text. C. Table of Contents D. Introduction a. Introduce the subject i. This is a review of literature and should integrate no fewer than four outside sources (using APA format) that support your position. Samples of how people frame this document include (a) why it’s important to strategically plan for your career field, (b) the challenges of the job market, (c) academic drift in undergraduate programs, (d) challenges of successful undergraduate completion, etc. b. Detailed methods. i. Explain each of the steps taken to produce your strategic guide, starting with your acquisition of individual interviews. 1. Detail how you went about finding people to interview, the range of jobs and fields they represent, and what you sought to acquire from them (see the lecture on Methodology Section). 2. Detail how you selected your codes and categories. c. Preview what you will be presenting in the Text i. Provide the reader with the titles of the categories you developed, and the fact that you will be advocating for how best to actualize these during a program of undergraduate study. E. Text (be sure to use headings throughout your document) a. Present each of the core categories of advice b. After presenting the advice, present strategies you propose on how to follow that advice. This can be done in one of two ways: F. Conclusion 1. After each piece of advice, suggest your strategies for accomplishing it. 2. Present all the advice, then present a list of strategies that systematically address all of this advice. In a single paragraph of two, summarize what you presented in the text. This can include an overview of the literature review, leading to a summary of the findings and what to do with them. G. Reference Page (APA Format) H. Appendix a. Appendix A is your Master list of codes from the Interviews, which will include both the categories and all the quotes from which you derive your position. Step 4: You will present your strategy guide to the class, making a pitch as though you are trying to convince your audience to pursue this path of preparation. • Speak to them as if they have just started here at UB and are pursuing the same career path as you. • Tell them what you have learned and how you propose they actualize the adviceyou relay to them from the professionals you have interviewed. You may draw from examples in your interview data throughout this speech (e.g., presenting a succinct quote). • You will speak alongside a PowerPoint or Prezi presentation. You will have 10 minutes to get your point across. Understand this is NOT a lot of time for all that you may try to present, so be judicious and practice to make sure it works out, time- wise. Step 5: Turn in the following three things: 1. The PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation; 2. Your video; 3. The Strategic Guide