Speakers & Topics
Connect and learn with us!
Sessions will be dynamic, with a focus on relevancy and engagement. Check back often as more information is confirmed.
Keynote Speaker, Liz Nead
The 6 Voices
Each of us has different priorities and choices that cannot be characterized as right or wrong. However, our success is not solely achieved in isolation. It’s achieved through effective collaboration and a celebration of milestones reached. During this session, Liz Nead, an adventure speaker who specializes in common language, race and cultural differences in the workplace will explore:
- how graduate business school teams and employers can unlock, understand, and utilize their differences to promote success
- ways to build new partnerships and enhance current ones
- where collective wins exists and how we can chart a course for continued success
Nead is a television host and author, writing several Amazon best sellers, most recently “The 1440 Principle.” She also won a regional Emmy for her television show, “Life Dare.” Liz balances her passionate work with a thriving family of seven, and husband of 20 years, a retired army major.
Panel Discussion: Job Market Trends & Economic Signals
Staying ahead of the curve is paramount. In this discussion, panelists will explore the latest trends shaping the job market, highlight economic indicators and their implications, and discuss evolving expectations from candidates and employers. Attendees will gain insights on how to prepare and recruit students through an ever-changing recruiting landscape and ways business schools and employers can foster proactive collaboration.
Round Tables by Functional Area
Make plans to join us for our kick-off round tables, which are divided by functional area to allow attendees to connect with others who have similar roles.
- Career Center Leaders (Pre-conference session by invitation only - for the senior most person responsible for MBA/masters career services at each institution. If you didn't receive an invitation, contact us).
- Employers (closed session for employers only)
- MBA Career Coaches
- Specialty Masters
- Employer Relations
- Operations (closed session for schools only)
Concurrent Breakout Sessions
Connect with peers for learning and sharing! Check back often as more sessions are confirmed and added.
Session Title |
Speaker(s) |
Session Description |
Audiences |
AI-Enhance Career Services, Beyond the Basics: Advanced Techniques for 2024 and Beyond |
Gregory Heller
Sr. Assoc. Dir. MBA Career Management
UW Foster School of Business
Jeremy Schifeling
Founder
The Job Insiders
|
Explore the potential of generative AI in career services and recruitment. In this session, an experienced career coach and thought leader in Generative AI for career development will share practical strategies for leveraging generative AI in career planning, job search optimization, and interview preparation. Attendees will learn how (and how not) to us AI for crafting cover letters, reviewing resumes, brainstorming career pathways, and conducting mock interviews. Corporate recruiting partners will gain insights into how generative AI can be used in their hiring processes, from candidate sourcing and screening to evaluating applicant materials crafted with AI assistance. |
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Aligning Employer and Student Career Programing Through Strategic Design Structures |
Olivia Del Viscio
Associate Director, Career Management
W. P. Carey Career Services Center
Natalie Dillon
Director, Employer Engagement
W. P. Carey Career Services Center
|
Learn from W. P. Carey Career Services Center how to follow the structure of 1. Analysis, 2. Design and 3. Operation to create data-driven programming for MS students and employer partners. Explore how to leverage outcome and feedback data to craft objectives and prototype a career program. Learn to leverage a “studio time” discussion model to collaborate with key stakeholders (faculty and employers) and create alternative programming (pre-fair events) to diversify student engagement strategies for employers and better connect with students. Employers will walk away with new ways to understand and engage with specialty masters student populations through examples from our pre-career fair events. |
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Attracting Employers through a Multischool Partnership |
Antoine Broustra
Senior Director, Career Development and Corporate Relations
UC Davis
Chris Kovitz
Senior Associate Director, Employer Relations
The Paul Merage School of Business, UC Irvine
|
Companies are reducing their on-campus presence, the number of recruiting activities, and are looking for ways to engage with candidates through more specialized and focused events. Over the last 2 years, members from UCI, UCLA, UC San Diego, UC Davis and UC Riverside have partnered together on employer and alumni focused events. With a shared vision to expand reach to key employers, create more networking and hiring opportunities for students and help employers diversify their talent pool with ever declining recruiting budgets, this approach has been a win-win for all stakeholders. Whether you are a part of a school system like UC or not, you’ll uncover ways to partner together by geography, student interests, class size, or similarly ranked programs. |
|
Best Practices for Connecting with Students and Student Organizations |
Craig Petrus
Assistant Dean of Career Services, Warrington College of Business
Hough Graduate School of Business, University of Florida
|
Students are at the center of all graduate recruiting! How to capture their attention and keep them engaged in your recruiting activities is a challenge for all recruiters This session will highlight the importance of and some best practices for establishing your brand, review creative ways to build effective student relationships and provide insights on what’s important to students, both on campus and through virtual programming. Join this session to learn more about how to deliver positive candidate experiences to enhance your MBA/Business Master’s recruiting program. |
|
Building a Career Consulting Program: Incorporating Industry Experts into Your Career Services Team |
Monica Parker-James
Associate Dean of Industry Engagement, Career Services and Alumni Initiatives
Boston University Questrom School of Business
Martha Day Sanford
Executive Director of Industry Engagement
Boston University Questrom School of Business
|
Boston University Questrom School of Business’ ExecConnect program onboards highly successful professionals, most former C-Suite executives, as paid part-time career consultants. ExecConnect differs from programs that enable alumni to participate in networking events, classroom appearances, and other transactional engagements because consultants apply, interview, and onboard as regular part-time staff who commit to ten hours per week of 1:1 coaching with students. ExecConnect complements our career coaching and industry engagement efforts for a holistic approach to career support. Business School attendees will walk away understanding the process to create this program while employers will uncover new ways to strategize talent engagement models with senior leaders. |
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Building on Strengths: How to Leverage the Skills of a Diverse Staff to Catalyze a Career Center Strategy |
Stephanie O'Connor
Associate Dean, Career Services
Chicago Booth
Mike Schaefer
Senior Director, Employer Relations
Chicago Booth
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Career Centers are stretched as schools expand program portfolios and students pursue increasingly diverse career paths. External pressures and job market evolution create a need for further change. Defining priorities and aligning effort with the most important work is critical. However, successfully implementing change requires buy-in and engagement from staff at all levels. The best work often results from the engagement of team members who can see problems from all angles and challenge eachother's thinking. At Chicago Booth, we have taken a structured approach to defining strategic priorities and our process for mobilizing cross-functional teams to advance on high-priority initiatives. |
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Coaching our Candidates Through Denials, Delays and Detours |
Ellen Bartkowiak
Assistant Director, Alumni Career Management
UT-Austin, McCombs School of Business
Nicole Centanni
Associate Director and Alumni Career Coach
University of MN, Carlson School of Management
Brigette Marty
Sr. Associate Director and Career Coach
University of MN, Carlson School of Management
|
Calling all coaches! How can we best support our candidates when they are faced with denials, delays and detours in their career journeys? Join us for an interactive session highlighting strategies for coaching our candidates through times of adversity and vulnerability. This toolkit session will provide space to explore strategies for building resilience and helping our candidates get unstuck through neuroscience and coaching techniques. The techniques and activities shared can be leveraged in orientation activities, workshops or 1:1 coaching session. Participants will walk away with scripts, strategies and new tools for tackling tough situations. |
|
Data Tapas: Serving up Bite-Sized Insights of Big Data |
Nicole Mody
Assistant Director, Data & Analytics
Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College
Stephanie Turner
Associate Director, Recruitment & Employer Relations
Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College
|
Join Nicole Mody and Stephanie Turner from the Tuck School of Business in a discussion of small bytes of big data. Together we will explore how Career Services teams can benefit from leveraging data to gain insights, make informed decisions, improve efficiency and data integrity, enhance the customer experience, and drive innovation and growth. This presentation will center on diverse strategies for tracking, collecting, and maintaining data, including maximizing your contact directory with alumni information, refining processes for maintaining and updating employer directories, engaging in effective techniques for gathering employment data, & enhancing the management of job queues for improved efficiency. |
|
DEI Road Trip: Ways to Drive Cultural Competency Forward with Your Team |
Tenzin Choerap
Associate Director of Business Development
Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota
Will O'Brien
Associate Director, Career Coach
Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota
|
Diversity, equity, inclusion, justice, and belonging are prominent and important topics in professional development. Most of us have probably attended an inspiring training session on a DEI topic, but struggled to implement something tangible. In this session, we will share the simple and routine ways that the Carlson Business Career Center strives to cultivate its staff’s cultural competency. This session will also provide attendees with: discussion time to discover best practices at other organizations (including schools and corporations), sample resources and frameworks used at Carlson and beyond, and a cultural competency goal setting exercise. |
|
Diffusion of Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence Innovations in Career Centers: Perceptions of Acceptability, Appropriateness, and Feasibility |
Phenix Culbertson
Associate Director of Employer Relations
Georgia State University J. Mack Robinson College of Business
|
The diffusion of innovations, like virtual reality (VR) and artificial intelligence (AI), can increase the reach of career centers or your company's talent development programs. We will explore leaders' perceptions regarding the acceptability, appropriateness, and feasibility of implementing VR and AI. In addition to preliminary research findings, attendees will learn how to implement VR and AI within their career center or corporate training program (securing buy-in, funding, and infrastructure). Understand the barriers that may exist to implementation and how to overcome them. |
|
Doing More with Less: What do we do when budgets shrink and staff is reduced? |
Heidi Cuthbertson
Campus Relations & Strategy Lead
BAE Systems
|
The first few years of the 2020s have been a wild ride. We have seen layoffs across multiple industries, economic turmoil, and dramatic changes to how we connect. Support teams (Talent Acquisition, Career Services, etc.) are often the first to feel the impact - especially when leadership is allocating resources. Our budgets have been cut, and we can't backfill staff who leave, yet we still strive to provide the same level of service to our students, interns, and new hires. In this session, we will discuss ways to scale our efforts and share ideas for how we can do more with less. We will address things like the ROI of in-person vs. virtual events, creative ways to stretch our recruiting dollars and staff resources, innovative strategies for serving our student population and maintaining important relationships in spit of reductions in staff. |
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Gen Z & Their Fear of Networking: How Employers and Schools Can Support Grad Students in Building Confidence During the Recruiting Process |
Kay Dawson
Senior DIrector of Career Marketing & Operations
Berkeley Haas
Jaymin Patel
Founder
JayminSpeaks
|
US-focused networking models play a key role in recruiting, but post-pandemic students have a gap in their awareness of what it takes to build meaningful relationships and alliances as they search for their next career move. Attendees will leave this session with a reminder of how to think like Gen Z when marketing to them as an employer and drills to take back to schools to equip students with what it takes to succeed. |
|
Guiding Green Careers: Career Advising for Students Pursuing Climate and Sustainability Careers |
Marcus Castain
Associate Director, MBA Education & Career Advising (CleanTech, Entrepreneurship, and Social Impact)
UCLA Anderson School of Management, Parker Career Management Center
JD Van Alstyne
Graduate Career Advisor
University of Oregon, Lundquist College of Business, Mohr Career Services
|
With interest in sustainability and climate careers on the rise, it’s paramount to understand current hiring growth trends, challenges, and opportunities when advising students or partnering with employers. You’ll walk away from this session with: • A framework for thinking about the climate crisis and its economic impact • Market Research from HolonIQ • An overview of climate and sustainability platforms and career resources • Ways to enhance collaboration between employers and academic institutions to develop talent |
|
How to Adapt to Tech Recruiting in 2024 |
Ed Bernier
Assistant Dean, Daytime MBA Career Services
Duke University - The Fuqua School of Business
Stephen Cognetta
CEO
Exponent
Jenny Zenner
Senior Director Career Coach - Tech Sector
UVA Darden
|
The tech ecosystem has undergone one of the most significant economic shifts we've seen in years. As MBA/Masters students gear up for another challenging tech recruiting cycle, we'll discuss how students and schools should adapt for tech recruiting in 2024 and 2025, including how artificial intelligence will be shaping the tech industry. We'll also do a deep-dive on what's required to be a successful tech candidate, targeted at both MBA/Masters schools and employers. |
|
Insights on Supporting International Students - How can we do better? |
Manish Bengani
Associate Director
Mays Business School, Texas A&M University
Noel Paul
Founder, President & CEO
Tiger Careers & Consulting
Melissa Ruggiero
Assistant Dean and Director
University at Buffalo School of Management
|
With the increase in International students in our classrooms, it is essential to explore their multifaceted challenges in adapting to U.S., specifically focusing on their social, cultural, academic, and career transition experiences. By analyzing survey responses from international students and insights from career professionals, attendees will gain valuable insights into the expectations, preparation, service utilization, and outcomes of this unique demographic. The presentation will empower institutions to plan resources, target programming, allocate resources effectively (i.e. who provides services) and request additional funding to support international students' success better. Join us to foster a more inclusive and supportive academic environment. |
|
Integrating Employer Connectivity: A Career and Professional Development Course Embedded in MBA Core Curriculum |
Amanda Olson
Senior Associate Director
Texas A&M University Mays Business School Graduate Programs
|
This session introduces building an integrated for-credit course into the core curriculum, focusing on career and professional development with a unique emphasis on employer connectivity. Unlike conventional approaches, this course prioritizes practical skills and industry connections over traditional resume-building and interview preparation. Through modules on professional presence, storytelling, and direct engagement with employers, students learn to navigate the competitive market successfully through employer feedback and participation. The course emphasizes hands-on learning experiences and meaningful interactions, empowering students to develop a strong professional presence, master storytelling techniques, and establish connections essential for future career success. This initiative represents a strategic investment in shaping next-gen business leaders. |
|
Making Smart Career Decisions in Uncertain Times |
Dong-Wook Lee
Director of Career Development
NYU Stern Abu Dhabi
Rhoda Yap
Global Director Career Development Centre
INSEAD
|
Career transitions are increasingly common in today’s volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) job market requiring a transformation of career decision making models. It highlights the limitations of widely-used models that overlook search costs, suggesting they may no longer be entirely relevant. Participants will gain insights from decision science research on smart heuristics, or rules of thumb, tailored for career choices and candidate engagement. Interactive breakouts will engage attendees in discovering and discussing practical heuristics for making informed career decisions, ways to reduce information over-load, and how, when, and what employers communicate to candidates in today’s dynamic employment landscape. |
|
Measuring Corporate Partnerships |
Amy Johnson
Senior Employer Relations Manager
University at Buffalo School of Management
Cynthia Shore
Senior Assistant Dean, Alumni Engagement and External Relations
University at Buffalo School of Management
|
Measuring corporate partnership effectiveness within your school is not an easy task, nor is measuring employer engagement within your career center. The University at Buffalo School of Management's External Outreach Committee (all external facing departments) created one, collaborative database that focuses on evaluating the depth and breadth of the entire school's corporate and organizational relationships. Spun from this initiative, the Career Resource Center created a system for measuring employer engagement that can be compared year over year and offers annual key performance indicators. From scorecards to portfolios, these systems are now an integral way the business school does its work. |
|
Navigating New Landscapes: A Responsive Approach for Coaching International Students in the American Job Market |
Rushab Kamdar
Founder and CEO
Executive Presence
Misty Start
Senior Director of Career Services and Strategy
Boston University Questrom School of Business
|
In this dynamic session, we will explore responsive coaching strategies for international students based on action research conducted by the Questrom School of Business. This presentation will share insights collected from international students highlighting their career service experiences in their home countries and expectations of career services in the United States. Empowered by these findings, career counselors can adopt a responsive coaching approach to meet the students’ individual needs. Discover how action research can guide career services in helping international students navigate the job search process, exude executive presence to employers and assimilate to American social and professional etiquette. |
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Navigating the Storm: Empowering Students to Own Their Career Path in Challenging Times |
Maureen Cleary
Assistant Dean, McDonough Career Center
Georgetown McDonough School of Business
Leigh Gauthier
Director, Growth | Coach Instructor
The Academies
|
In today's VUCA job market, students face unprecedented challenges in charting their career paths and taking ownership of their future direction. This dynamic workshop will equip career centers with innovative strategies to address this crisis. Blending psychological insights with practical tools, we will address trends such as students’ fight-flight-freeze reactions to the volatile job market, misconceptions with hiring processes, and fear-driven reflexes that result in panicky behavior. You'll gain cutting-edge coach approaches to empower students to navigate with confidence. Join us to continue transforming the way your institution supports the next generation of business leaders. |
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Optimizing On Boarding for Student Success |
Jean Gekler
Senior Associate Director, Career Coach
University of Washington – Foster School of Business
Leslie Meagley
Senior Associate Director—Professional Development, On-Boarding, Coaching
University of Washington – Foster School of Business
|
Most incoming students have some idea about their career direction, but engaging early with the career centers can make all the difference in student satisfaction, drive and success. This session will focus on how we as career professionals help our students from the time when they commit to attending our schools through their first few months. The session will include activities, discussions and idea sharing aimed at building a strong foundation and partnership with the career team that will help them maximize their career journey. |
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Roundtable Discussion: Effectively Serving a Diverse Set of Students Across the Changing Landscape of Graduate Business Programs |
Darbe Allison
Associate Director
IU Kelley School of Business
Randi Edmonds
Associate Director
IU Kelley School of Business
Sarah Nagelvoort
Director of Coaching & Development
IU Kelley School of Business
|
Our students are changing, and we need to change with them! As specialized master's programs grow, in-resident MBA programs change, and online/part-time MBA programs proliferate, career services offices and employers serve a growing and diverse range of students. With this changing landscape, we see recruiting and societal shifts, generational changes, and emphasis on wellness needs that require us to be innovative and adaptable. IU Kelley’s Graduate Career Services team will facilitate discussions on ways to enhance employer brand awareness amongst students, strategies to communicate effectively through various channels, and how to generalize career services offerings as we well as specialize support and resources for subsets of student populations. |
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Stairstep To Offer: Converting Interviews to Offers |
Tina K. Hagopian-Fahey
Associate Director / Career Coach
Kellogg School of Management / Northwestern University
|
Whether you are coaching 1:1, 1:many, enjoy coaching relationships, or coach transactionally, it’s common to hear, "I got the interview but didn't get the offer, or, I made it to round 2 but they offered it to someone else; what am I doing wrong?" Rooted in knowing your audience, the "Stairstep" model focuses on how different people involved in the hiring process assess skills and fit. Coaches know the effects of rejection. If not interrupted with a solution, impact compounds. This is your toolkit to eliminate the downward spiral, immediately. |
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Student-Centric Strategies for Online/Part-time MBA Data Management |
Sarah Nagelvoort Director of Coaching & Development
IU Kelley School of Business
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Imagine an online program with 2 cohort starts per year, 4 graduating cohorts, and students progressing through their program on different schedules. Dive into the Kelley Direct Online MBA program’s data evolution. Beginning with the student journey at the center of the data process, we will walk through data needed and data wanted, mechanisms launched to improve employment and salary outcome collection, developing a streamlined process to share and report insights cross-functionally, implementing success measures, and sharing lessons learned while navigating the complexities of an online program structure. |
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The Art of Stacking: Using New and Underutilized Resources to Engage International Students in Career Services |
Liz Matthews
Associate Director, Coaching and Career Education
Johns Hopkins Carey Business School
Katie Pluemer
Associate Director, Coaching and Career Education
Johns Hopkins Carey Business School
|
What’s working? Many of us are familiar with the multitude of challenges facing international students. Students who feel included are more likely to be engaged pre and post-graduation. Join two JHU Carey career coaches who serve full-time master’s students to hear successful approaches and to share best practices that engage international students in Career and Life Design. Discover data-driven practices you can “stack” to better support students studying in the U.S. Leave this session inspired and ready to implement strategies right away and others that may take more planning and support. Join to learn and to share what’s working. |
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The Carlson Inclusive Employer Program: Partnering with Employers to Ensure Inclusivity |
Chaka Booker
Chief People Officer
Broad Foundation and Family Office
Maggie Tomas
Executive Director, Carlson Business Career Center
Carlson School of Management/Univ of MN
|
The University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management partnered with Chaka Booker to launch a certification program for their employers called the Carlson Inclusive Employer Program. The goal was to create a set of workshops for employers to learn from the experiences of Carlson students—specific ways to ensure inclusion during job search interactions with students. The program was a huge success. In this session, Chaka Booker and Carlson's Career Center Leader, Maggie Tomas, will share how they created and promoted the program and provide a sample of the content shared. |
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Using the Case Method to Address MBA Recruiting Dynamics |
Christie Julien
Senior Assistant Dean Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
University of Virginia Darden School of Business
S. Kellogg Leliveld
Senior Director Career Education & Advising
University of Virginia Darden School of Business
Jenny Zenner
Senior Director Technology Careers
University of Virginia Darden School of Business
|
To address the ever-evolving timing of MBA recruiting including pre-matriculation programming for under-represented minority students and ongoing challenges international candidates face, the Darden Career Center composed and delivered a teaching case to the student coaching class, rising student leaders, and the new incoming class of residential first years. The case team collaborated with the Senior Assistant Dean of Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, students, and case writer and will be sharing their process along with an introduction to how you can use the case with your student, faculty, and career center populations to foster dialogue and build empathy and community. |
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Values Slap or Values: A Foundational Activity for Career Development |
Laura Lane
Sector Director
The Duke University Fuqua School of Business
Katie Peterssen
Program Director, MMS Career Services
Duke University Fuqua School of Business
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The career development process begins by identifying and prioritizing career values and as a result sets the standard by which we can make authentic, satisfying decisions. This interactive session will focus on identifying your personal career values while sharing strategies for application while working with increasingly diverse student populations. Presenters will facilitate an activity to prioritize and apply your work values. You’ll leave with a new framework to engage and jumpstart student career investigation and evaluate opportunities while staying grounded in foundational theory. |
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What's in it For Me? Effective Strategies for Marketing Events to Students |
Matt Smith
Director of Graduate Employer Relations
Penn State Smeal College of Business, Professional Graduate Programs
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Marketing can be an important learned skill for both Employer Relations and Career Services professionals, as well as for recruiters when it comes to student engagement and attendance. There is so much competition for open rates, views, clicks, interests, likes, etc. and the rules of engagement are continuously evolving. This session will provide some tactics to employ when forming effective strategies around event marketing, newsletters, content strategy, and making informed decisions with data. Topics discussed will also include event formats, registration/attendance, and relatable event content. |
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| execasst@mbacsea.org | 813.390.9851 |
