As an Alumni Career Advisor at the University of Waterloo, I have worked with alumni representing various years of graduation – from ‘fresh’ grads to those who long ago walked our campus as students. In the past couple of years, especially, many have sought assistance to try to understand and navigate an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) world, heightened by the pandemic.
Although alumni from a wide range of graduation years have reached out in these uncertain times, there are essentially two groups who have been more highly represented:
- Those who have just graduated and are feeling lost and stressed, after spending the latter part of their degree program working from home, taking virtual classes and feeling disconnected. Some were not able to have all the work experiences – either co-op or placements – that would enable them to commence a confident job search. Their university experience was not what they had envisioned or hoped for.
- Those who graduated within the past 3-5 years and have lost their jobs due to the pandemic and are also feeling lost as to their next steps. Because they were either downsized or their company shut down, they believe the job market is stacked against them and don’t know how to find new meaningful work.
So, how can we support these former students?
Let’s begin by stressing the importance of keeping our alumni connected: just because their time as a student has ended, this does not have to mean that they have lost the community of their alma mater. And that community can be powerful in a variety of ways as they navigate their life path. Here are some ways in which we can support our alumni and foster a sense of belonging and connection:
- Provide individual appointments: A limited or wide array of topics could be offered, potentially by dedicated alumni career advisors. Topics might include support in career planning for first careers or re-careering, which, beyond aiding alumni to reflect on what’s important to them in finding satisfying work, might also encompass teaching them how to be resilient so that they can recover from any setbacks and confidently move forward. Others could be focused on the job search: resumes, cover letters, interview practice, enhancing their online presence, support for applications to graduate/professional schools – and more. Such a service could be offered over a lifetime, without limit, or by placing a cap on the number of appointments and/or length of time following graduation. A nominal fee could be charged after reaching this cap.
- Open access to existing workshops for students: Workshops offered to current students on all things career-related could also be extended to alumni. With today’s shift to hosting more virtual events and workshops, it would ease access for those alumni living farther afield.
- Offer information sessions for graduating students: Topics could focus on letting them know about employment opportunities, services, resources, events, benefits and other perks that will be provided to them following graduation.
- Organize alumni-specific events and workshops virtually or in-person: These could be merely opportunities to socialize with other alumni or could have a networking focus. If you have alumni chapters located in other cities, provinces or countries, hold these events there, where your alumni live. Make it easy for them to attend!
- LinkedIn: If your campus provides free access to LinkedIn Learning for students, consider extending this benefit to alumni. Your institution could place a time limit on this or provide open access for life.
- Ten Thousand Coffees: This is another professional networking site that could be provided free of charge to alumni as well as to your current students. 10K Coffees works with academic institutions, enterprises and communities from around the world and can provide rich development opportunities between students, recent grads, alumni and employers.
- Job boards: Make job postings for graduates available to alumni via a job board dedicated to alumni jobs, or a combination of graduating students and alumni.
- Alumni newsletters: Provided annually, quarterly or whatever timeframe is feasible to keep alumni updated on campus news and events as well as on graduation year classes and alumni profiles.
- Discounts: Consider offering company and organization discounts and special offers. These partnerships offer alumni a special perk for being an alumnus and can add to that sense of connection to your institution – and may also help them in some small way through difficult financial times.
These are just some ideas to consider to help our alumni through these difficult times – and beyond. Not only will the payoff be knowing we helped these former students rebound from their current situations and find success on their career journeys, but we will also develop allies for future partnerships, who are – hopefully! – eager to give back to their alma mater.
