Blog

Listra Lubis and her husband, Sulis, and their daughter, Pembayun.

CHALLENGE: Lack of understanding the U.S. job search.

Talking about one’s failures is not an easy thing to do.  In fact, you would probably prefer to leave it out of almost any conversation.  When it comes to telling your story as a job seeker, showcasing your failure may not be all that bad. Now, does this mean you dump your failures into the conversation without purpose or meaning?  Absolutely not.  There’s a time and a place for everything and the interview is most likely the best place for it.  Typically, in the interview, you are likely to get the question about weaknesses, which would seem the most obvious place to insert failures however, what if you don’t get the question?  Do you still want to talk about failure?  I say yes!

How employers are finding talent through experience based interviews

It was one of those mornings. The C-1 was running late and I had forgotten to print out my resume before my appointment at the Career Center. I sat down across from Anita completely empty handed and although I don’t remember the exact words I used, it was probably something along the lines of—help me.

From the very moment we enter kindergarten our next thirteen or seventeen years are no longer up to us. Sure we can rebel, choose to drop out of school, or elect not to attend college. But we’re all at Duke, so I’m going to go out on limb and say we allowed our lives to be dictated by a cultural hegemony. Our immediate goal was decided for us – do well and move on to the next level of education. Of course we had opportunities to define our interests and seek complementary ventures, but the key word is complementary. With few exceptions we never chose to substitute our end game.

By Anna Koelsch, Write(H)ers participant

Does Facebook’s COO Sheryl Sandberg have the answer for how women can finally break the glass ceiling? Probably not. 

Sandberg has attracted a lot of attention in the past few years. She’s delivered TED Talks and a Barnard College commencement speech, and those speeches brim with facts describing the dire situation of female leadership. As she said at Barnard, “Of 190 heads of 2 state, nine are women.  Of all the parliaments around the world, 13% of those seats are held by women. Corporate America top jobs, 15% are women; numbers which have not moved at all in the past nine years.  Nine years.  Of full professors around the United States, only 24% are women.”

By Write(H)ers participant Flora Muglia, T'14

When I imagine the glass ceiling, I envision a tall building with many stories. It is difficult to climb but has a view that is worth it in the end, and on the final floor the ceiling is a sunroof that tauntingly allows in beautiful rays of sunlight. People attempt to find a latter or set of stairs in order to get on the roof and actually see the sky from high up, some go as far as to push on it or try and find a weak spot, but alas there is no entry. All you can do is stare up and wish for a breath of fresh air.

by Alex Shapanka

College is one giant crossroads. Every decision we make has far-reaching consequences, developing our interests, habits and personalities. Not every choice is easy, so we seek counsel. We talk to seniors about worthwhile courses and professors. We speak to the Career Center and professionals about our intended career path. But why are we asking in the first place?

Fear of failure. We as Duke students like to do well and hate it when we don’t. We take every precaution to guarantee we achieve. We solicit advice from others to confirm our decisions, as if third party validation were a guarantor of success.