Leadership

The purpose of this project is to provide you with apractical and meaningful opportunity tospark (or advance) your career. To accomplish this purpose, you will: (1) research a potential career or internship within an industry (or specific company); (2) engage in a meaningful networking activity; and (3) write up some reflections about the whole process. More information for each part is found below, as well as in various documents on D2L.

Part 1 – Research

• Selecting a career, industry, and/or company
  • The purpose of this project is to provide you with a practical and meaningful professional development opportunity, therefore…
    • This is not necessarily about a dream job, position, profession, etc.
      • Although it can be
    • You will select a career, an industry, and/or a specific company with which you might reasonably:
      • Land an internship in an upcoming semester
      • Pursue a job to begin right after you graduate
    • Note that you are not looking for job openings, but rather are seeking a broader picture of the career, industry, and/or company
  • Research the career, industry, and/or company
    • MTSU Career Center (https://www.mtsu.edu/career/index.php)
      • Has information career paths of specific majors
      • You can also connect with a career adviser
    • Lightening Career Link (https://www.mtsu.edu/career/LCL.php)
      • MTSU’s recruiting software platform for professional positions requiring a college degree
      • Also has info on internships
    • MTSU Access to CareerShift (http://www.careershift.com/?sc=mtsu)
      • Research companies, contacts, and job titles
      • Also has a job board
    • O*Net Online (onetonline.org)
      • A repository of information for over 900 jobs
      • You will need to visit this site to do a portion of this project detailed below
    • Occupational Outlook Handbook (bls.gov/ooh)
      • Hundreds of occupations and descriptions of pay, job growth, responsibilities, and more
    • Vault (vault.com)
      • Find information on companies, jobs, rankings, graduate schools, and internships
    • Writing up Part 1
      • Discuss the following in your written assignment:
        • Job challenges and salary trends
        • The knowledge, skills, and abilities needed
        • Education and experience required or desired for this position
        • Typical career path and work environment
        • How this new information affects your career planning
        • Discuss how you used the above resources to gather this information

Part 2 – Networking

This portion will require you to engage in a networking activity. Specifically, you will conduct an Informational Interview with a working professional from the industry or company for which you would like to work or intern.

• Locate the document on D2L called ‘Informational Interview’
  • Review the document and make plans according to its content
  • The main steps for this process that will be expounded on in the document are:
    1. Identify someone to interview
    2. Prepare for the interview
    3. Initiate contact
    4. Conduct the informational interview
       • Either face-to-face or via teleconferencing (e.g., Zoom)
    5. Follow-Up
  • Writing up Part 2
    • Discuss who you interviewed and how you went about contacting them
      • State their job title, their main responsibilities, their educational background and work experience, etc.
      • Discuss what it was like for you to set up this interview
        • Were you nervous? Did it go better than expected? Was the person receptive to meeting with a student?
      • Discuss the actual interview
        • What are some things you learned?
        • Did anything surprise you?
        • How did what you learned from the interview compare with what you learned from Part 1?
        • Include the list of questions you asked as Appendix A in your final draft
      • Discuss the steps you took to follow-up
        • Did you send an email or hand-written note to this contact?
        • Were you able to connect on LinkedIn?
        • Do you have any future plans to interact with this person?
        • Include your follow-up note as Appendix B in your final draft
          • Take a picture of the hand-written note you sent and include the picture in Appendix B
          • Take a screen shot of the follow-up email you sent and include it in Appendix B

Part 3 – Reflections

In this section, you will discuss the things you learned from this project.

• Reflections on the process
  • What are the main takeaways you have from going about conducting this project?
    • What it easier or more difficult than you thought? Was it more or less rewarding than you thought it’d be?
    • What did you learn about the importance of networking?
    • What did you learn about the importance of professionalism?
    • Did anything surprise you?
  • Reflections on leadership
    • Through your research (e.g., data gathered from O*Net Online) and interview, you should have a decent understanding about what it means to be a leader in this industry, career, and/or company
      • What skills do you already possess that would make you a good leader in this industry, career, and/or company?
      • What skills do you need to improve and/or develop to become a good leader in this industry, career, and/or company?
        • What can you do to develop them?
      • What leadership concept(s) from class would be applicable to this industry, career, and/or company?

Part 4 – Preparing to Submit

This step is all about reading, rereading, and proofing your paper. I am a big stickler on grammar, spelling, etc., so you will want to ensure that you paper reads well before you submit it.

• You MUST run your paper through Grammarly
  • JCB students have access to Grammarly Premium
    • Should have received an email at beginning of semester
  • Do this well before final draft is due
  • Submit screenshot of Grammarly confirmation as APPENDIX C

Miscellaneous Stuff

• Please check Teams/D2L for resources (underneath the “Professional Development Project” module)
  • Steps to the informational interview
  • Potential interview questions
  • A template for how your report should be organized
• Please cite your sources properly, which includes using quotes for verbatim phrases of 4+ words
  • Remember that quotes require a page or paragraph number in the citation
  • Include a reference page if you have paraphrased or quoted a source
    • Format the references following APA style
  • Use Times New Roman, 12-point font, 1” margins, single spacing, and MS Word