Salma Amin
FRO 1000

Blog #2- Career

For my second blog assignment, I went to a Career Fair Preparation workshop. Mamoudou Talibe Diallo led the resume workshop and Mamata Bah was assisting the workshop. There, I was lucky enough to sit with Mamoudou Talibe Dialloat, a Baruch student, who has had several internships already in his life. He spoke in front of everyone who attended the workshop about the appropriate way to write a resume, and showed us his resume. I am glad I went to this workshop because I was able to look at my resume and make edits. At the workshop, I was able to get feedback on my resume from Mamoudou Talibe Diallo and other people there which helped make my resume one-hundred times better than it was. While everyone was getting their own feedback on their resume, one of the people that were in charge of the workshop, was giving out lunch and refreshments, which was cool because it saved me money for lunch that day!
I feel that going to this workshop was very informing and worthwhile. I learned many new things and was able to interact with other students at Baruch other than myself and was able to learn about the key important things that make a resume stand out. For instance, Mamoudou said how a resume needs to include three key subjects: education, work experience, and skills. I learned that you should start your resume with your first and last name. Then your address, phone number, and school email. The first set of information you should give is your education. For example, if you say you attended Baruch College, say what you majored in, your cumulative GPA, relevant coursework, leadership and activities, volunteering, and any honors or awards that you received. For this part of the resume, all locations and dates should be on the right, while all the information about your education should be on the left. In addition, the next part of the resume should include any experience with any other company along with the position you took a role in, the location of the job, and dates of when your position started and ended. For example, Mamoudou said the correct way you would write the date on your resume would be “Sept XXXX ─ May XXXX.” Finally in the resume is the most important part, the skills. In this section, you should discuss any technology that you have experience with and are proficient in. For example, R programing, MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Bloomberg Terminal market concepts (BMC). Another important information that should be included in this part of your resume is any languages that you are fluent in. The next set of information that you should discuss is your interests. This part is important to discuss because it speaks about you. An example he gave for this section was “Strong desire to further my understanding of the Global wealth management business, basketball, movies”. He said that it is important that the first should be something beneficial for the recruiter of a company to know about you. By writing “ Strong desire to further my understanding of the Global wealth management business”, you are letting them know that you have interest in the company so that is the most important information they should know before reading that you have interest in basketball and movies.
Also, in Mamoudou’a presentation, he talked about what to ask and say when you’re talking to a recruiter at a career fair or anywhere. This was very helpful because I learned how to stand out and be noticed by a recruiter. In addition, I learned to research the company that you want to intern at, and when you see a recruiter for that company, shake the recruiter’s hand, introduce yourself, and ask them for a business card. His presentation was very engaging and that is why I learned so much from him. He told everyone that the most important thing is to seek yourself to the recruiter, which I completely agree on because it is important to show you have the skills and potential to be part of the company. Furthermore, he also said to research the values of the company before going to an interview, that way you are prepared and have an understanding of the skills you have to show you have to the recruiter. He said to email the recruiter after meeting with them and thank them for their time. This is beneficial because it will show them that you care and are responsible. By emailing them, they will also remember you and not see you as “one of those people” that they spoke to. Later in the workshop, Mamoudou discussed the appropriate attire for an interview. He said that men should wear a single-breasted suit of gray, navy, or black. The fabric of suit should be wool and the sleeves should extreme to wrist bone. He also said that no jewelry should be showing besides a conservative watch or ring. He also said to carry a professional looking portfolio with extra resumes and a notepad. On the other hand, he said that women should wear a business- type blouse or button-down that looks neat and clean and has a conservative neckline. For accessories, avoid big hoops or bangles. Overall, I think he gave good advice on the appropriate clothing for interviews and it is something that I will keep in mind for any interviews I have in the future.