Webinar: Five Skills to Lead Where You Are

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Alright, so hello everyone. Welcome to the Illinois Wesleyan Titan Talk Series for the class of 2020. As many of you know, I'm Kaylee Rutberg. I'm the senior class president and I'm super excited that you're here today. Um, we're really excited to partner about, uh, about the opportunity to partner with the Young Alumni Council to provide this forum, highlighting some of our young alumni who provide who are going to provide some of their insight and wisdom to the class of 2020. Just a few housekeeping items before I hand it over to our speaker.

There will be a brief Q&A after Jordans remarks, so please send any questions you have in the chat box and then I can moderate it afterwards and you can send questions at any point during the presentation. Also, if you have to leave early or if you want to send this to someone you know or if your friend couldn't come, it will be recorded in the web and R will be recorded and emailed out to everyone afterwards. So now I'm going to introduce our speaker. This is Jordan Man.

And she graduated from Illinois Wesleyan in 2012 with a major in business administration Anna minor in psychology. She currently works in marketing communications, an brand she currently works as a marketing, communications and brand management professional, and is currently the mark associate marketing manager at Spencer Stuart. An executive search and Leadership Advisory Company. She's also a student at Northwestern Kellogg School of Management, the president of the Kellogg evening and weekend women's Business Association, and the brand strategist for her husband startup.

So go ahead and take it away.

Thank you Kelly. Uhm I wanna start first by thanking you all for joining. It's an absolute honor to be here and celebrate your graduation week with you. Um, as mentioned, my name is Jordan man. When I graduated. So First things first, I want you to really reflect on the amazing accomplishment that you have done of completing Illinois Wesleyan and it's such a special time and as much as I wish we could celebrate with you in person.

I hope that you're taking the time to be reflective and celebrate with your friends and family, even if it's from the comfort of your own home.

So uh, before I get started, I wanted to give you just a little bit more information about me. Uhm, I was reminded by my younger sister today who is also a Wesleyan alarm that I graduated from Wesleyan exactly 8 years ago today, which makes me feel really old. But I am still considered a young alumni, so I'm going to ride that as long as I can.

Uhm I love Wesleyan for a lot of different reasons. One of those reasons is I met my husband here and I have a lot of great memories of Wesleyan including getting proposed to on the quad and we also took our wedding photos on the campus as well so will always have a special place in my heart for IW.

Right after graduation from Wesleyan, I started at an event startup called bread frog events. I was doing brand management and marketing communications event production in a very rapidly scaling um company.

Um and um?

No, I hear maybe having hard time speaking's out heat up a little bit after leaving red frog. My husband Jake and I moved to Detroit where I started working at an agency supporting Ford Racing program and performance vehicles. So I spent four years traveling the world as a global project manager for Ford and erasing programs, doing marketing communications and visiting a lot of race tracks and spending.

A lot of time in airports. Uhm, I will talk a little bit more about it later in the presentation, but part of the reason why I decided to go back to school to get my Masters in business is.

I encountered a lot of, um, bad bosses. To put it lightly, so I uhm at the start up. We had a lot of different managerial skills and we were both basically all under 35 and so I sort of chalked it up to where young and inexperienced and you know a big older company will have this figured out and I'm here to tell you that older company is more established companies.

These very similar leadership challenges that startup still, so I realized that I wanted to be a better leader an I wanted to really refine my own skills so that sort of led me to the evening and weekend program at Kellogg at Northwestern School of Management.

Um by day I work at Spencer Stuart as kaylie mentioned, doing marketing for UM leadership advisory. An executive search specifically. I I support human resources executive so chief human resources officer is that companies private and publicly held of all sizes.

And then by night I do go to school at Kellogg and I also a man brand strategy and the voice of my husbands start up. It's an educational media company where we do videos on scientific research and redacted files.

Fortunately for all of us, this presentation is not about me. This presentation is about you, a class of 2012 or 2020. You are no doubt graduating under very unique circumstances, but I want to take a second and really applaud you and reassure you that the skills that you have the experiences you've had are very valuable and you should feel confident that you can achieve whatever it is that you want to after graduation.

I am not an expert on all things leadership, but having been out of Wesleyan for eight years and having a variety of experience both in privately held companies and startups and agencies and all of the above, I want to sort of give you a few skills that I've observed as good things. Too rich, fine as a leader.

So my first point is.

Leading yourself is as important as leading others.

Uhm, I.

Have seen a ton of people be good leaders an more than I would like to share. Be bad leaders and one of the things that I have noticed similar across all of those, is there.

They're a little bit out of tune with themselves, and they are not really living their life as an authentic person, and I really encourage you to spend this time that you have post graduation before grad school before your career starts thinking about.

What you value?

What your skills are? Um, Watt are areas of opportunity.

And you can get that sort of information from feedback from your professors, from friends, from any boss. That or manager that you've had.

But also, um, I want you to spend time thinking about what energizes you. What do you like to do? What do you not like to do? Um, when I was graduating Wesley and I spent a lot of time thinking about what I should do. What made sense? What was most logical? And those are definitely thoughts that are good to have. But I also want you to take some time while you have it to think about what makes you uniquely energize and what makes what is unique about you that you bring to the table.

I guarantee without meeting any of you, but I know that you have a unique skill and something that is very interesting to bring to the table.

When was on time thinking about your story? Your experience is your values. It's easier to bring those things forward, and it's easier to articulate those and differentiate yourself from other people.

So it sounds sort of like hokey, but I want you to really think about it because you are Wesleyan graduates.

You are a smart. You are hard working. I know that about you, um, but there's definitely more to you than that.

And I want to also just sort of, you know, put a fine point on this that it's not easy. It is not a quick process. I am in the process of evolving. We're all evolving and we're all growing and I'm certainly not the same person I was when I graduated Wesleyan or started Wesleyan Ann. I hope I'm not the same person 10 years from now, so thinking about what that it looks like for you is super important. So that is first and foremost. Leading yourself is critical to leading others.

Stop to find opportunities to distinguish herself in challenging times.

I am not going to lie to you. We have challenging times. I had all of us do uhm, and I hope that we don't have that again, I hope it's never this bad again, but the reality is leaders faced tough choices no matter what stage of life you're in. What stage of what's happening in your career?

So, uhm, resiliency is a word that's tossed around so much, but it's almost cliche at this point, but it it really is important because there always will be a challenge. And seeing opportunities and being able to distinguish yourself in those challenges will set you apart.

So I wanted to give a contextual example for this one that's a little less depressing than our current pandemic. When I started my most recent position at Spencer Stuart, the company was going through an acquisition they had just acquired a group of consultants which sounds sort of weird to say, but we were setting them up as their own company, and so we were completely starting from the beginning, sort of as a 6 year old privately held company starting a startup.

Um, with these people that we had hired.

And I came in at a pretty hectic time for the company as the youngest, or at least tenured person there, and I knew what I knew about myself, something that I know about myself is in times of chaos. I bring calm and I tried to be very organized, and I know sort of project management just from my experience with the global project for Dan, the startup, it takes a lot to get me like super stressed.

So I was able to come in and really distinguish myself because the rest of the team was pretty stressed around this. So knowing yourself, knowing your skills will help you take these opportunities to distinguish yourself.

And I wanted to add on this a lot of people, especially those who are older and have been in the workforce alittle bit longer, are going to say that college graduates are entitled.

And I have definitely seen my share of entitled College graduates, but I really urge you to follow in the path of the many Wesleyan alumni that I've worked with that are willing to put in hard work that are willing to stay humble and face challenges. An really seize the day.

And I know that you're capable of doing that because you graduated from Wesleyan and you clearly been able to pass academic rigor. That's not going to be a challenge for you, so I wanted to just.

Plug that a little bit as well.

At #3, learn how to ask for help.

I promised you.

No one has all the answers. We are all figuring it out as we go. We are all sort of basing our own challenges and.

I think this is important as third because you won't be able to know how to ask for help if you don't know what areas you need help and you don't put yourself in challenging positions so once you sort of figure it out what areas you need to take stretch assignments on and you put yourself in that position you'll be able to ask for help.

Um.

At this point I really wanna also stress the importance of mental health uhm.

Weather that is therapy whether that is religion rather that is talking to friends and family UM there's that old cliche like you can't take care of you know put your mask on before you put someone else is on.

Taking care of yourself is is really critical and however you choose to do that so I just wanted to give a little bit of context for you on this one as I mentioned they started my career out of startup and I was wearing a ton of pads and honestly event weeks was working 20 hours a day for a very long time and eventually I reached a point where I it was not sustainable for my health my mental health.

And so I made the decision to to really face that and really put myself and my health um as a Top priority and it's something that I continue to work on an I think that.

It's something that a lot of people are afraid of talking about a little bit but I want you to know that it's it's just such a critical thing and there's nothing to be embarrassed about as I mentioned if it's their counseling or or religion or however you find that meditation I just want you to think about that and know that it's absolutely not only good it's necessary because there's a lot of challenges in the world there's a lot of scary things but we're all in this together and we're all sort of feeling it.

And on that note of feeling it.

There is something called the impostor syndrome which is sort of this feeling that you can have where you're like am I good enough to do this do I have enough to say um and.

I want you to know that absolutely every human being feels like that at one point in their life and it's super common so for example even when the young alumni council reached out to me today I was sort of like Oh my gosh what do I have to say but I sorted took a step back and thought about it and I do have good experience and I know that and just as I know that there's something really interesting for each of you to site and you could host your own web and are about so.

That's something that is absolutely a real and don't just take it from me, I. I actually got to speak to the new president, Nugent about that. When I was back at Westland for the women's council and even she gets impostor syndrome. I made her confirm with me and and it's real an we all deal with it, but it's totally fine to be vulnerable an ask for help when you need it.

It's really, uhm, I could see how it might be sort of using for me to sit here and tell you this up and you might be thinking like, well, I'm I'm going to be at an entry level job or I will be the youngest person where I'm working. There's a lot of different reasons why you might feel as if you don't have the agency to be a leader and I just wanted to tell you that that is absolutely not true.

You have agency now um and authority is not necessarily leadership.

So, uhm.

Think about.

Somebody who has influenced you lately.

You might think about your friend. You might think about your siblings. You might think about an influencer on Instagram.

And a lot of times leadership. That's really all it is. Is influencing others for behaviors that you want or that are desirable for the organization.

To be clear, I'm not recommending that you go started. Pick talking Instagram and become an influencer. That's definitely not what I'm saying. But I am saying that that person on line has absolutely no authority over you, but you. You listen. Then you maybe change your behavior because of that. So um, it's again. Sort of a cliche like lead by example, but you definitely can, and you should. And how you show up. Knowing your skills and being authentic in yourself.

He really gives you the opportunity to do that.

Um?

I all.

I don't want you to think about as you progress through your career. Your leadership style might change, and so you should think about now and throughout your career. Who is the leader that I admire? An what skills do they exhibit that are admirable to me?

So, uh, when I think about that, a leader of that. I admire the characteristics of a leader I admire is someone who is communicative, someone who is flexible and someone who is empathetic. I am very fortunate to be surrounding myself with a lot of those leaders now and I'm I feel very grateful for that.

Equally as important or maybe even more important is what do I not like in a leader? What is this? What is the characteristic that I do not want to embody when I show up in my day-to-day personal life professional life?

So for me that looks like someone who is micromanaging someone who is not authentic in themselves and is not confident in what he or she brings to the table.

Or someone who is not empathetic. UM, I. I don't really do well with those sorts of leaders.

So I keep that in my back of my mind as I'm leading projects or leading teams of people. I think if I were them.

What would I want? How would I want to be treated? Uhm and.

The value of communication which you are all excellent at because Wesleyan requires you to write so much Wesleyan writing skills are far and above beyond any other school that I've encountered. So be confident in that because we have that going for you. But communicating in these sorts of environments is super important, so.

Use those skills well because they they will absolutely serve you.

I also wanted to talk about.

The pressure that you may be feeling, uhm.

Your careers long and.

I um, can empathize with how you may be feeling like you need to do the perfect thing right away. You need to get the perfect job and then do all these transitions. You might have sort of a road map in your head.

But I also want you to know that.

It's gonna be OK and if you work hard and you know what success looks like to you.

Well, you'll be great and I know that you've been prepared because of Wesleyan Wesleyan academic curriculum. I know you have.

The only thing I wanted to say for sure, uhm about your career and your agency that you have now is authority is not. Leadership is not the same thing and the only thing I know for sure is Directives which is basically like hey do this, do that, don't work so.

Don't use that as a strategy, you can just just about anything else to figure out your own style. Uhm, and see what works for you, but I would definitely discourage you from using directives which I know you wouldn't anyway. 'cause you're Wesleyan alums now.

And then I just wanted to close here, because um, above all else, I cannot stress enough how important relationships are two career and like success.

I feel like I'm just full of cliches tonight, but treating people how you wanna be treated is is really important and there's a couple of different reasons for that. One because we're human beings and we want to be nice people. But secondarily, you do not know where people are going to be after graduation.

10 years after graduation. 20 years after graduation, the startup that I worked for, uh, we had tons of interns, hundreds of interns that I managed and.

Those interns have gone on to work in places where I've interviewed and someone might say, Oh, you know that person, just an intern? Let's not spend time getting to know them or forming a relationship because I'm a full time employee, but I'm really glad that I did. Because you know that person ended up having a positive impression of me. We had a good relationship and I was able to use them as a resource later.

And keeping resources and things in mind. Um, you have amazing resources at your disposal right now. Your classmates, people who are in your classes right now will be your network for a long time. Hopefully, if you cultivate those, your professors, Wesleyan staff truly genuinely cares about your development and wants to help you, so don't.

She is thank you so much.

I'm alright so now will move to Q&A so if anybody has any questions you can send them in the chat and I can moderate them up just to start up. So how did your education at Illinois Wesleyan prepare you for your work, especially in this challenging time where we're all working on line and from home, and that kind of crazy situation?

Thank you, So what experience our relationship had a major impact on your years at Wesleyan. I know you talked about a couple of minutes if you could.

Yeah.

Yeah, thank you, um. So if you had to give like top three top five qualities of the most successful employees that you've worked with.

Would those be?

No.

Call

Earlier you mentioned the importance of taking care of your mental health. I think part of that is having a good work life balance, which is something I know I could improve on, and I think most people probably could. Uhm, So what are some tips that you have for balancing a busy career with living a life outside of?

No.

And then so you talked a lot about different things that you learn at Wesleyan. You mentioned like writing abilities and written communication. Are there any other skills that you learned at Wesleyan, either in or out of the classroom that you found to be?

Beneficial that you think are unique to Wesleyan students.

On so.

I think that's all the questions that I have. I'll give people a second if anyone wants to put any in the chat.

I never know how long to give.

Hum.

Alright, well.

I am not see anymore questions so I would just like to thank you so much for giving us your time tonight. I know I really appreciate it and the other people who attended I think appreciated as well. Um were extremely impressed and inspired by your expertise and encouragement. I'd also like to thank everyone who spent their time with us tonight for the class of 2020. Addition of the Titan talks webinar series will be sending out an email with the survey tomorrow and we'd love to get your feedback.

Um, tomorrow is our last web in art in the class of 2020 Titan talk webinar series and will have Casey, Aaron Clark and Julia fog presenting high stakes conversation skills for interviews, digital meetings and using your virtual voice, and that will be tomorrow at 12:00 PM central time. We really hope that you will join us for that relevant topic. An if you are looking for additional information about upcoming Titan talks, they're all on the alumni relations website.

We also encourage you all to check out the Young Alumni Council page at the link that will also be in the email. Uh, we, I know we've we are, I guess young alumni now, which sounds really weird to say. Uh, but there will be a we're joining a really robust group of Wesleyan alarms that are really warm, warm and welcoming and inviting us to the Alumni Association. Even though our time is a student has come to an abrupt end, it doesn't diminish our celebration and becoming an alumni.

I know I'm very proud of all of us, um, an I wish that we could all be together at this time. But I understand that.

We cannot, so I wou will be sending out an email to encourage you to stay involved and show you some ways and how you do that wherever you end up going. Alright so I hope to see you all tomorrow and stay safe and thank you so much Jordan.

Thank you.