Catherine Maybrey, PhD, CDP
Owner www.cmcoachingservices.com
Alumni Career Coach at McMaster University
Comments & questions are welcome at [email protected]
When I was little, I used to dream of becoming a teacher, a writer, and Wonder Woman. It’s true, but I gave up on the super hero fantasies when my lasso of truth never came in the mail. I didn’t give up on teaching and writing, though, and when I was in high school I discovered that those were the two main components for a career as a professor.
My undergraduate and Master’s degrees seemed to pass all too quickly, and when I applied to PhD programs in the US (American History) in 1998, I was turned down by all my prospects despite graduating with honours and holding scholarships. In my post-grad desperation, I applied to any job I thought I could possibly do, never asking myself if I wanted to do it, and landed an interview with a staffing agency for a management training program. I still remember that interview, and how badly I answered the questions, but the recruiter must have seen something in me because she called a few months later with a temporary position in the financial sector. It was a two week assignment that turned into 18-months as a Sales Associate handling a client base of over 3000. Talking with so many people about investing, retirement savings, and financial literacy helped me to quickly realize that our customers didn’t understand how the accounts worked, what tax implications they could expect, or what questions they should ask. I decided that they needed someone (me) to teach them about investing, and I pitched a monthly newsletter to my manager. In the first month, we had an increase in calls asking specific questions about the tools and services that had been explained, and business increased. I enjoyed this aspect of my job very much – reading industry articles, identifying trends in client concerns, and translating that knowledge through writing. In hindsight, I can see that I could have pursued a career in financial literacy, education, or even credit counseling, but at that point in my life I didn’t know how to explore careers or what questions to ask. Instead of making the 25% of my job that I loved become my focus, I let the 75% that bored me drive me out of the industry and back to grad school to pursue my PhD.
I entered Loyola University Chicago in 2000, and for the next five years I researched and wrote my dissertation, but I also had the opportunity to engage in curriculum development for the courses I taught. I learned how to write lectures, break information into digestible bits, present in front of large and small audiences, and teach my students how to develop skills in writing and critical thinking. Teaching was all that I hoped and dreamed it could be, but I read The Chronicle, and knew that the academic market for American Historians wasn’t great.
I decided to hedge my employment bets by pursuing a dual designation PhD in both American and Public History. Purely by chance, in my first year, one of my professors asked me if I would be interested in coordinating a cultural program that he managed. The program included large events at the Field Museum of Natural History and the Art Institute of Chicago in the fall, and internships in the summer. As an international student, I jumped at the chance for extra income. I managed the New Frontiers Program for four years, and discovered a deep love for guiding our students through the internship process. From selecting applicants and assigning placements to evaluating their learning experiences and helping them to use their summer job as a career stepping-stone, I discovered that I was using the same skills that I used in teaching, and it was just as satisfying.
I returned to Canada in 2005, excited about where my career would take me and hoping to find an education-related position outside the academy. And then nothing. I applied for hundreds of jobs, scoured the boards, wrote resumes and cover letters, and had 2 interviews and a few temporary placements from a staffing agency in the first year of my search. The second year wasn’t much better, and in a fit of frustration I contacted the Alumni Career Coach at McMaster University, not sure if I was even eligible to use the service. She was amazing, and helped me to define what I wanted from my career. I learned how to network, interview, research career paths and employers. Again, I was using all of the skills that I had spent years of graduate school developing, and it felt good to take charge of my search, even if I still had no clue what I wanted. A few months into working with my coach, she observed me offering advice to another alumni job seeker, and she told me that I would be really good at her job.
For the first time in my life, I had the right timing and the right tools. I started conducting informational interviews about career development, enrolled in a recommended diploma program, and began concentrating my search on my new field. Within a few months I had several interviews and received an offer from a non-profit organization as the Education and Training Advisor working with newcomer (immigrant) youth and contributing to a study for Citizenship & Immigration Canada.
At the end of my contract in 2009, I was ready to return to higher education on the administrative side, and I was fortunate that the Alumni Career Coach was leaving for a post at another university. I hit my network hard, connected with the decision makers related to the role, and officially joined McMaster University in 2010. In 2013 I opened my private coaching practice (www.cmcoachingservices.com) in addition to my role at the university, to allow me to focus on my specialties in post-academic and mid-level career transitions.
If you’ve read my entire post, you’ll see that there are so many times in my career history where I could have made a slight move to embrace my skills and interests, but I lacked sufficient understanding of how to make that happen, and who to ask for help. I included most of my missteps so that anyone who reads this will hopefully see that there are numerous paths you can take that will lead you in a direction you find satisfying and that pay the bills. In every role I’ve had, I have incorporated some aspect of teaching, writing, and helping others. My career may not be linear, strictly speaking, but I have definitely managed to keep the spirit of my original intent. You can do that, too.
