An athlete preparing for the Olympics is similar to how I prepare for SWE conferences.
Now, you might have read that and said, man Elaine, you went a little overboard on that statement, however if you have been to one of these professional conferences you would understand exactly what I mean! At the National SWE conferences they have career fairs with around 150 companies. This automatically triggers me to make my resume as best as it possibly can, make my elevator speech amazing, print out new pictures of my latest projects and start working out as much as possible. See, my major is very unique in the fact that it is less theoretical and more hands on. This can give a much better advantage in some situations or it can be a total pitfall... Either way, I always tried to be the most prepared to my abilities. The next thing I add to my to-do list for Conferences is to make sure my clothes look as professional as possible. It can be very hard to find cute professional clothes that are affordable but here is my biggest hint- Ann Taylor. Ann Taylor has a wonderful range of clothes from petite, to casual to business casual. I have never bought anything full price either. I always wait until I have found good coupons, sales or their clearance section is usually an additional 60% off. In my opinion, if you are going to torture yourself with heels these are my heels of choice. http://www.anntaylor.com/mila-leather-pumps/397108?skuId=20153281&defaultColor=3338&colorExplode=true&catid=cata000020 They are very classy and let's be honest. Ann Taylor has got their heels down to a science. Now here's when those coupons come in handy. You can find 40% off coupons so they become much more affordable. If you laughed at the working out part above here is some more information regarding it. The more confident you are the better you can sell yourself to recruiters and employers!! The other plus side of this is the conferences usually entail lots of walking and carrying career fair swag, notebooks stuffed with information from sessions and at the last conference I went to my suitcase broke so I had to carry my whole suitcase in wedges through the Seattle airport ( pictured below). As you can see, I put incredible amounts of time and effort into these things, but It has slowly paid off. I now have recruiters that remember who I am from the year before, I know how to present myself in such a way that the HR people aren't repulsed by the technical terms that I used but most importantly I have been able to network with other students and professional women from around the nation.
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AuthorMy name is Elaine Cope, I am studying Manufacturing Engineering. I decided to make this blog with hopes to inspire other young female engineers to pursue their dreams. Archives
November 2019
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