A Newsletter for IABC Student Members
November 2007, Issue #2
Welcome to the second edition of the IABC Student Member Newsletter. This monthly newsletter will provide tips for furthering your career, give you a glimpse of life after graduation and include communication articles from experts.
If you have any suggestions on how to make this newsletter more useful, or if you have information you would like to share with other chapters, please e-mail
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In This Issue:
Features:
Features:
Establish a Lasting Bond: Find a Mentor
“When one teaches, two learn.” —Robert Half, founder of consulting and staffing firm Robert Half International
Mentoring is about teaching and learning. Mentoring pairs an experienced professional with someone who wants to learn more about a certain field, career or life path. The mentor provides insight into an area of interest for the mentee. The two establish a relationship of mutual trust, where the mentee can learn from the mentor’s experience by asking questions and receiving quality answers while the mentor improves his or her leadership and communication skills.
Why should you seek a mentor? Because having a mentor:
- Helps you discover your career potential and aspirations while creating a plan to develop that career.
- Provides you with regular and constructive feedback on your progress toward your career goals.
- Connects you with accessible role models.
- Promotes networking and relationship building while developing your interpersonal skills, especially listening and questioning skills.
- Nurtures your self esteem and builds your confidence by increasing your knowledge.
- Allows you to discuss professional issues and receive advice from knowledgeable individuals.
- Fosters self awareness by helping you identify your strengths and weaknesses.
- Challenges your pre-existing ideas about an area of interest.
- Demonstrates your dedication to personal and professional growth.
- Provides a sense of stability during a time of uncertainty and change.
Once you’ve decided that you want a mentor, you need to decide what characteristics your mentor should have. Ideally, your mentor should do his or her job well, understand the skills needed to perform the job and know about trends in the field. Your mentor should have personal and professional stability, connection to resources, strong interpersonal and communication skills, be flexible, open and willing to listen. A sense of humor and patience would both be added bonuses. Most important than all of these, your mentor should be honest and genuine.
How do you find a mentor? An easy solution is to use IABC’s Student Mentoring Program. The program matches IABC student members with professional members in their field of interest. The simple application process requires that you fill out a mentor request form with your contact information as well as the desired location of your mentor, preferred type of organization for employment, job functions and industries. These details allow IABC staff to pair you with a mentor who complements your interests.
If you prefer to perform your mentor search on your own, you may wish to contact professionals via IABC’s exclusive member database, MemberSearch, or research local companies with employees working in your area of interest. Ask your current supervisor about mentoring possibilities at your present company; you may discover an untapped resource working down the hall.
After you’ve identified who you want to be your mentor, highlight for them how they will benefit from the relationship. Approach your potential mentor with the following ideas.
As a mentor, they will gain:
- Improved communication, leadership, teaching and coaching skills.
- Acknowledgment of their skills and expertise.
- A chance to reflect on their career by sharing their knowledge with someone eager to learn.
- An extended network.
- Access to challenging discussions with someone who is new to the field.
- A look inside the young professional’s world.
- The satisfaction of helping someone less experienced advance through his or her career.
Once your mentor commits to helping you further your professional knowledge, talk to them about the logistics of your relationship. How often will you meet? What kind of activities will you do together? How will you contact each other? What are the goals of your partnership? And how long will the mentoring relationship last?
You should set a date for your formal relationship to end, although you will likely develop a lasting friendship. Establishing a deadline allows you to complete your goals with your mentor and then continue to broaden your perspectives with another source.
Some activities that you may wish to pursue with your mentor include the following:
- Attending professional development activities, such as those put on by your local IABC chapter.
- Shadowing your mentor on the job.
- Reading and researching topics in the field, then discussing your findings.
- Videoconferencing.
- Blogging.
The most important thing to remember about mentoring is that the relationship’s success depends on your ability to learn and be receptive to feedback and coaching, as well as your dedication to your growth and development. Take advantage of this unique partnership and expand your horizons.
Cool Comm Jobs: Kate Bingham at Staging Connections
A 2006 graduate of the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia, Kate Bingham is already putting to work the knowledge she gained while earning her bachelor’s degree in business. As a marketing and international business major, her current position as a marketing executive for Staging Connections complements her degree perfectly.
Kate loves her job’s diversity and dreams of traveling and working overseas, possibly in the U.K. Her curiosity about other cultures has inspired her to visit multiple countries and continents. Her most recent vacation was to Thailand where she enjoyed the cultural mix of the small communities. While there, Kate’s adventurous spirit led her to pet tigers and ride an elephant, both of which are prime examples of her desire to experience new things both inside and outside of work.
Unlike most people, Kate enjoys her hour-long commute to work everyday, taking advantage of the time to wake up properly and ease into the day. When work ends, Kate loves to run along the beach to clear her mind, followed by quality time with her friends. Kate balances her demanding work schedule with time for her favorite activities.
Read on to learn about Kate’s personal triumphs, the skills needed to do well in her glamorous career and her “no regrets” attitude.
Q: What does Staging Connections do?
A: Staging Connections is an event staging services company. We provide customers with technical, creative and design services for events. We work on all types of events; whether someone needs to plan a small conference or a black-tie dinner gala for 1,000 people, we can help.
Q: What exactly do you do at Staging Connections as a marketing executive?
A: I was recently promoted to the role of marketing executive after being a communications coordinator for about three years. My current role mixes marketing and communication, covering areas such as internal communication with staff, client communication, advertising, sponsorship, collateral and trade shows. I work on both the strategic and tactical sides of these areas.
Q: What is your favorite part about your job? What is the most difficult aspect of your position?
A: The best part about my job is the variety it gives me. My position combines marketing and communication, and no day is the same. Every day I work on different projects and speak to different people. This is the biggest perk for me—talking to a variety of people, including staff, suppliers, clients or whomever. Constantly working with new people exhilarates me.
The most difficult aspect of my job is trying to juggle multiple projects at the same time. We have a small marketing team right now and the company continues to expand, so my workload never diminishes. I have to be on task everyday.
Q: What is your favorite quote?
A: “No regrets—because everything you have ever done has led to where you are today.”
I don't remember where I heard this quote, but I love it because at this time in my life while I have all of these options available to me, I need to know that whatever I choose will be fantastic. Although I could have chosen another path, everything happens for a reason.
Q: Is there anything you wish you had known coming out of university that you know now?
A: Seeing my classmates study overseas through exchange programs makes me wish I had done so. Studying overseas creates great opportunities to learn about other cultures before you begin working full time. I held myself back from pursuing this adventure because I was already working at Staging Connections and saw opportunities there. I was afraid to let that go. It was a difficult decision to make at the time, but I don’t regret it. I still have opportunities to travel, just through a different angle.
Q: Do you have any recommendations or advice for students thinking about entering the communication field?
A: Get out and speak to as many people as you can. Attend events with people in the communication field, like those put on by IABC. These events provide huge opportunities to meet people in the field and learn about possibilities in the field. Communication encompasses a broad field, so it's important to find your way in and discover what aspect of the industry you like. You gain so much from educational events and networking, so get out and socialize.
Member Benefit Highlight: MyComm
Have you ever wanted an online resource for creating a communication strategy to help you plan a project? Your IABC membership gives you access to such a planning tool.
My Communication (MyComm) is a communication-planning wizard originally developed by and for Cisco Systems’ employees. MyComm leads users through a six-step process to identify and summarize the essential audiences, messages, timing and preferred channels for a communication project.
The detailed procedure used in MyComm keeps users focused on the key elements of a communication strategy, assuring that nothing is overlooked. The online tool helps users define realistic project objectives, outcomes and delivery methods while teaching users about the process of strategic communication.
A unique aspect of MyComm is that it allows you to grant people permission to edit and outline your messages and time frame. MyComm enables users to easily share their plan and collaborate with others, ensuring that everyone involved has a shared understanding of the objectives and strategy and that the project will be completed correctly and efficiently.
Using MyComm produces a comprehensive strategic document to guide your tactical planning. Your MyComm document provides you with a guide for articulating your key messages, selecting your delivery channels and assigning tasks to specific people.
Even if you have less-than-perfect computer skills, you can easily navigate MyComm’s various links. Guidance from renowned communication consultant and author Roger D’Aprix, ABC, is also available at each step.
When Cisco’s Karen Horn, creator of MyComm, was asked if this tool could be used by anyone, she replied, “Yes. It can be used in a very sophisticated communications situation, and it could be used to ask someone to dinner.”
So don’t be afraid to use MyComm for any project you are tackling. If you’re trying to communicate the value of belonging to your chapter or coordinating a group assignment for class, use IABC’s exclusive online resource, MyComm, to outline your strategy, involve all parties and stay on task.
Managing your Time: How to Juggle Multiple Responsibilities
by Wilma Mathews, ABC
How do you juggle a full university course load, a part-time job, visits with your family, a social life, keeping up with your friends and the occasional “don’t bother me!” day?
I asked a group of experts this question and they gave me the best answers yet on how to make it all happen.
In this case, the experts are students like you. They attend class, have lots of homework and work-study assignments, work part time (and, in a few cases, full time), are active in student groups and stay close to their families. Here is their advice for time-crunched students:
Balancing school, work and a social life
- Make good use of calendars and planners. Get a large wall calendar or white board and plot out a month at a time or more.
- Don't procrastinate! The longer you delay working on a project, the bigger it becomes in your mind. Even if you don’t finish the entire project in one setting, you’ll have made some progress.
- If you hold a job while in school, be up front with your supervisor about your needs for study time, commuting time and the occasional change in schedule to accommodate a special project.
- Use a timer. Select a project or task. Set a timer for one hour and work only on that project or task until the timer rings. Stop what you’re doing and move on to another task and set the timer again. This way you’ll build in rest periods while still making progress.
How to keep track of tasks
- Prioritize! Each morning and at the beginning of each week, prioritize your tasks. From doing laundry to spending an hour researching a paper, each item needs to be considered in importance with all the other items. Most important: Stick to the priority order!
- Do a little bit every day. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you can accomplish all your to-do items at one time. If you can’t complete the full task or project in one day, just do as much as you can.
- Write all your assignments down in one place. Most college bookstores have assignment sheets or you can make your own.
- Use the electronic calendar on your Blackberry or other device and make sure it's always fully charged!
- Leave yourself a voice mail reminder of meetings or tasks.
- When desperate, use sticky notes—everywhere!
Wilma Mathews, ABC, IABC Fellow is a faculty associate at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism & Mass Communication at Arizona State University.
Student Spotlight: Sheng Huang and Charles Zhuang
The IABC student chapter at the University of California, Berkeley (UCB) is comprised of an extremely involved and passionate group of students. Two of this chapter’s members stand out: Sheng Huang, chapter president, and Charles Zhuang, a first-year student and member.
Both students came to the U.S. from China—Sheng from Shanghai at the age of seven and Charles from Chengdu, first at age seven and then again at age 11 after a return to China to reestablish his Chinese traditions. Sheng chose to attend UCB because of its proximity to his hometown of Milpitas, California, only a 45-minute drive away. This short distance resulted in a surprise visit from his mother during his first year at school.
Charles selected UCB for the opposite reason. He wanted to distance himself from his Southern Californian home, which he felt would enable him to make life decisions on his own, away from direct parental influence. New York University was too far, and the University of California, Los Angeles was too close. At UCB, Charles lives far enough away to feel independent, yet can go home when he needs some extra money.
Sheng, a business administration and legal studies double major, spends his leisure time working out at the gym, visiting with friends, drawing with colored pencils, pastels or watercolors, riding his motorcycle and listening to music. This year, he hopes to practice yongmudo, a form of Korean martial arts.
Charles, finding that the modern world is too hectic, escapes into the world of art. Just a few years ago, Charles dreamed of becoming a concert pianist. He continues to play as a way to wind down, performing improvisational tunes as well as romantic pieces. Charles also enjoys analyzing stocks with his friends.
Read the following interview with these spirited students who are striving to succeed in the business world, and find out how being a member of an IABC student chapter can help you achieve your goals.
Q: Do you currently have a job and/or internship?
A—S: Right now, I work in the UCB student government as an accountant and an intern. The accountant position is in the auxiliary department, where I manage numerous on-campus organizations’ finances. The intern position in the educational opportunities department is unpaid, but provides me with excellent experience writing documents and planning events. Currently, I am writing a grant proposal for a networking event bringing undergraduate and graduate students together. When the events go well, the work is definitely worth it.
C: I am currently working part-time for the UCB Center for Executive Development in Haas School of Business as a database analyst. The Center recruits CEOs from Fortune 500 companies to help the school. We even have the contact information for Microsoft chairman Bill Gates in case we want to invite him to visit the university. The challenge of my position is to communicate concepts and data trends in a simplified and concise manner to people with different backgrounds and experiences, which requires polished communication skills.
Q: What skills do you think are most important to do your job well?
A—S: For my accounting position, I definitely need to be focused and pay attention to detail. Knowing accounting software is essential, as well as speedy number processing, both of which I learned on the job. For my internship, strong writing and organizational skills are important, especially for meeting deadlines. These skills come from years of schoolwork.
C: Communication skills are key. I need to be economical and concise with words, while adding my own personal flavor to prevent the text from being dry and to imprint my personality in my contacts’ minds. I need to create customized messages for multiple audiences so cultural knowledge and sensitivity are important as well. These messages have to cut across age groups, interests and distant geographic locations. My technology skills need to be excellent as well.
Q: What do you think is the best benefit of being an IABC student member?
A—S: Networking. You are connected to a network of over 15,000 people, which provides so much potential for productive relationships. IABC also has so many chapters all across the world and you can communicate with people internationally through the association.
C: The international business aspect. Other associations are more domestic; IABC provides you with a global perspective. Our chapter is a medium-sized group with subcommittees. This set-up facilitates intimate relationships. Other clubs don’t allow members to speak to the president of the club, but I get to spend time with our president, Sheng, all the time. We talk about marketing and other issues, as well as spend our free time together. It’s great being able to talk to him on a peer level. Going to a university with such a large campus, you’re not sure who you can trust. By joining with fellow student members of IABC, you are connected to people with similar interests.
Q: What would you say to other students who are thinking of joining IABC or starting a chapter?
A—S: Definitely go for it. Learn about communication and get ahead with networking and experience. If you start in your fourth year or after, you’ll still be in an internship when you graduate. Boost your experience while you’re still at university. Joining IABC is a great way to get started. It’s hard work to start a chapter, but the rewards more than compensate for the initial cost. You bond with your fellow members, which is really special, as well as improve your communication, organizational and leadership skills.
C: Sheng said it pretty well. Join IABC because every career involves communication.
Name the Student Newsletter and Win a US$100 Amazon.com Gift Certificate Just for Using Your Brain
That’s right, you can win a US$100 Amazon.com gift certificate just for putting your creative mind to work. The contest to name the student member newsletter has been extended to allow more people to submit their innovative ideas.
We’re looking for something catchy that reflects the values of IABC, appeals to the student member audience and grabs readers’ attention.
Have any suggestions? Send them to
. The winning title will headline the next edition of the student member newsletter and the winner will receive a US$100 gift certificate to Amazon.com. Share your creative talents and submit a prospective title today. Deadline for submissions is 7 December 2007.
Get Published—Write a Piece for the Newsletter
As always, we want to hear from you. Now's your chance to see your byline in an internationally-distributed newsletter.
Sections to submit to include:
- Member Benefit Highlight: Explain how using a member benefit helped you and why other students should take advantage of it.
- Advice: Articles with practical tips on what to do while in school and after school to find a job (interviewing recommendations, internship insight, etc.).
- Cool Comm Jobs: Interviews with young professionals working at interesting jobs in the communication field.
- Student Spotlight: Interview an IABC student member you admire.
- Miscellaneous: Discuss your past event or current job. Recommend classes or books. Write about any other issue relevant to students.
You can submit any original article you think would interest your fellow IABC student members. You will be notified if we decide to use your piece.
Submit your original work to
and gain bragging rights about being published in an official newsletter.
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