Smart Moves for Liberal Arts Grads: Finding a Path to Your Perfect Career

by Sheila J. Curran and Suzanne Greenwald

Most people would love to have 20/20 hindsight on their careers. In Smart Moves for Liberal Arts Grads, college career experts Sheila Curran and Suzanne Greenwald have assembled the next best thing:... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1580087094
• ISBN13: 9781580087094
• Release Date: May 2006
• Publisher: Ten Speed Press
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 7.4" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Required Reading For My Students

Smart Moves is a fantastic resource, which I recommend to all my students, especially to the ones who approach me bewildered and anxious about internship, job, career, life mission issues. I worry about the official and unofficial messages they are receiving from a variety of sources inside and outside the university (e.g., advisors, peers, parents, recruiters, employers). I frequently lend out my two copies of Smart Moves, and believe it should be required reading for any student seriously considering career issues. Thanks for writing it! Danny Warshay Professor and Entrepreneur, Brown University

Excellent Book That College Sophmores and Freshman Should Read

This text is excellent, and really gives students an eye-opening perspective on what else is out there. I think this book would be especially useful to students at top universities - students who often assume that the only choices after college are investment banking, consulting, or professional school. The book is very simply an excellent example of calculated risks - a series of stories of graduates who weren't afraid to take their own paths after college. The lessons resonate across wide demographics.

A Career Book That's Truly Different

Unlike the nuts-and-bolts approach you find in the typical career book, Smart Moves for Liberal Arts Grads taps into the detailed stories of real job seekers--namely, 23 relatively recent college graduates who share their career journeys with the reader. As they do, authors Sheila Curran (executive director of the career center at Duke University) and Suzanne Greenwald (an educational advisor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology) point out the "smart moves" the graduates have made along the way, so that you can easily pick up on both the attitudes and behaviors that lead to career success--even when you don't have a plan mapped out ahead of time (which describes the vast majority of those profiled in the book). The authors also devote the first 40 or so pages of the book to the universal "smart moves" made by liberal arts graduates who go on to career success. The most critical is No. 5: "Find Your Hook"--i.e., "a way to differentiate [yourself] from other job seekers"--whether it's a special skill you have or a unique experiential background that you bring to the table. If you love stories--especially stories that will illustrate important career concepts you need to know as a college student or recent grad--buying Smart Moves is, well, a smart move.

Recommendation from a recent Liberal Arts Grad

I'm a recent liberal arts grad. I didn't want to follow my friends to Wall Street or to programs like 'Teach for America.' If you are in the same category as me, I highly recommend "Smart Moves." Why? The careers of accomplished executives and managers make sense in retrospect. But you rarely hear about how these people made it. This is the book where can you learn how - how to build an unorthodox career from unlikely beginnings, how to accumulate the skills you will need for your ultimate job while working in positions only tangential to your dreams, how not to get discouraged when things get rough. For anyone thinking outside the book, especially students at universities where the tide takes you towards Wall Street or law school, check out this book.

From someone on a crazy career path...

I know this book was intended for liberal arts grads, but I'm telling every college student and recent graduate I know to read it because I wish I could have read it when I was in college. (Short story: I studied materials engineering but became a writer. Learn more at www.IanYbarra.com.) If you've ever thought about pursuing a career that isn't exactly the same as your major, the stories in Smart Moves provide just the evidence for convincing yourself (and perhaps your parents) that it is possible to find a cool job, pay the bills, and contribute something meaningful to the world - and that, no matter how uncertain your future may seem, if you follow your dreams, somehow everything will turn out okay.