"How can I leverage the network I already have?" With Joey

Kate talks with Joey (HBA '25) about why some people dislike networking and how he leveraged his pre-existing connections to land an internship (after updates from the Coaching and Corporate Recruitment Teams). 

What is Ivey Career Management?

The Ivey Career Management Podcast shares practical career advice, alumni insights, and expert perspectives to help Ivey students and graduates navigate their careers with confidence.

[Auto-generated transcript. Edits may have been applied for clarity.]
Welcome to the Career Management Podcast at Ivey Business School.

We're excited to bring you stories and strategies from students, special guests, and the Career Management team.

Make yourself comfortable and let's get started.

On today's podcast, you'll hear updates from our Corporate Recruitment Team, Career Management, and one of our Career Peers, Joey.

This past week, we hosted the November Ivey Career Nights and have received positive responses from employers.

Students who attended were able to make valuable first impressions, and this is a good point to iterate

that part of making a good impression is being sure to follow up on your attendance when you sign up for something in 12Twenty.

If you've registered to attend and you attend and get to make that connection, that's wonderful.

You're putting a face to your name and again, making a powerful first impression.

Saying that you will attend an event or registering and then not showing up also leaves a first impression.

So I would encourage you to pause this podcast, take a look at your registrations in 12Twenty and check in with yourself.

Is everything on your list something that you are willing and able to attend?

And if something comes up and you're no longer able to attend, please be sure to go on 12Twenty and cancel.

This is all about first impressions and we want to help you make a good one.

International week is just around the corner and today I have one of our career coaches,

Vanessa in to tell us a little bit more about what we can expect.

Vanessa, welcome to the podcast and what is International Week?

Thanks, Kate. So International Week is an annual event celebrated across Western and Ivey communities from November 18th to the 22nd.

So both campuses are hosting a variety of different events and creating a dynamic learning experience for students,

staff and faculty and community members. So definitely feel free to check it out.

What can students look forward to? Yeah, so Career Management has some exciting initiatives this year.

So here's what you can look forward to. First, we're introducing two new podcasts. Oh, podcast that's us!

Yeah. Alumni insights; so in this episode we'll hear from an alumni who will share his international career journey,

the challenges that he's faced, the strategies that helped him succeed,

so it's a really great way to get practical advice for navigating your own career path.

Now the second one is our corporate perspective.

So in this episode, we'll bring a corporate partner and their views on how their organization values cultural intelligence,

and how you can highlight your international experience to make a strong impression.

As a planner, what's been one of your most enjoyable experiences?

So one thing that we're really looking forward to is launching our first ever Global Perspectives Wall

and so this space is where students, staff, faculty and community members can share their insights for exploring international

careers or simply celebrating what they admire about their international peers.

So through this experience, we hope that will bring everybody together.

You can find valuable support, resources, and a fresh perspective, so please feel free to participate in the events this week.

We look forward to seeing you folks there. And Vanessa, thank you so much for sharing. Thank you.

We now hear from Joey.

Joey shares his top tips on how to use the connections you already have from high school, Ivey and beyond in your recruitment planning.

Joey, thank you so much for joining me in studio today. Yeah, so happy to be here.

Would you like to introduce yourself? Yeah. So I'm Joey Lisser.

I'm currently in HBA2. I was in section four last year.

Uh, and I worked at a growth seed startup last summer.

Very cool. Uh, and, Joey, I know most people don't like the word "networking", including me.

Why do you think that is? I think networking feels very transactional.

It feels like I want something from you and I'm going to be fake and inauthentic to get it.

And to a certain extent, you might see that as true, but there's ways to go about it that are authentic and true to yourself. Mhm.

Well, and what's one thing that helps you be authentic and true to yourself in your networking?

Yeah, so I like the analogy of studying for a test.

When you're studying for a test, you could either do the case work before and work your way up very slowly throughout the entire semester,

or you could cram at the last minute. And so when we're thinking about a job interview,

you could either build connections through your everyday life or, right at the last minute when there's a job posted,

you could be transactional and try and jam in as many coffee chats as you can.

I think the first way is much more authentic to me. Fair enough.

What was your kind of story around how connections supported you in getting you the role or the company that you wanted?

Yeah, so I really looked at the people who I knew, and I realized that I was probably,

you know, 3 or 4 degrees of separation from any potential job at Ivey on the portal.

And so one job that I saw, I actually realized that somebody who worked at the company went to the same high school as me,

and rather than just reaching out, I decided to reach back out to my grade 11 business teacher who was able to put me in touch,

and I ended up getting a great coffee chat, and then from there was selected for an interview and ended up getting the role.

I don't know if I would have gotten the role without that connection, and not to say that I had an advantage,

but that was that was super helpful in making that initial connection.

Oftentimes when we talk about networking or coffee chatting with people, we think it's about meeting new people or making new relationships,

whereas this was an existing relationship and kind of blowing the dust off of, uh, you know, what old connection that you had.

Yeah. I think that's super important because. At the end of the day, if somebody is going to vouch for you, they have to know you for who you are,

not just for a 15 minute coffee chat or because it's some kind of transactional thing.

If they know you, it's going to be much better. My guess is you also didn't know that this grade 11 teacher would be that connection down the road.

He was just someone you learned from. And then it happened that way. Is that right?

For sure. It's somebody who I learn from. I took an interest in when I was at school in grade 11 and have stayed a little bit in touch with,

but other than that, you know, I didn't really fully understand that the capacity of this connection going into it.

Fair enough. Many of us have past connections, either through high school, through old jobs, through family,

whatever it is, um, where we might not have kept in touch as often or as intentionally as we wanted to.

Would you have any recommendations for people who are, you know,

maybe thinking of reaching out to past connections, but feeling a little bit awkward that time has passed?

Yeah. So it's it's definitely a valid feeling to feel awkward,

but I think at the end of the day, people are always willing to help.

And if you frame it in a way to where you're just trying to learn and to be curious, I think there's no harm in doing that.

And I think you don't need to do that right before a job gets posted. Even if you're thinking that somebody might be beneficial

in certain industry, even before a job is posted, just reaching out and saying,

"hey, I'm curious to learn about what you do on a daily basis and about your industry;

there's no job for me here right now, but I just want to learn," that's tremendously helpful.

Very cool, and how would you describe what you did if you were telling this story or giving advice to another student?

Yeah. So I think I first of all looked internally.

So we discussed before looking within your existing network to all teachers, old camp counselors, my friends,

other people who I knew, and I didn't just go look on the portal or go onto LinkedIn and start blindly emailing people.

And I guess on that, I had a few connections that were really deep because of that,

and they were able to vouch for me and able to put in a really warm connection that led to me getting a job.

So I looked internally and then went super deep rather than being very broad.

You mentioned that your previous connections were a big part of you landing this role.

Have you also coffee, chatted or made new connections that have been helpful to you?

For sure, and you need to do that. You always want to show to a company that you are interested in coffee

chatting and meeting people in an office or a function that you want to work in; it's tremendously important.

I just wouldn't expect somebody after a 15 minute coffee chat to really vouch for you,

and so for that person who's going to really vouch for you, you might need to look a little bit deeper,

but in order to make the connection and really show that you're interested, you're definitely going to need to, and I did.

Often students will ask coaches, how many people is a good amount of people to coffee, chat with?

Or like, what's the magic number? Um, what would you suggest?

It would push back a little bit in that there's not just one magic number. For one person,

it might be one really deep coffee chat that they can ride all the way. For others,

they might have to do a little bit more digging and really push. So it's a balance,

and this is where there's some nuance to it, because you need to understand who the company is,

what the culture is and how they're running the recruiting process.

But overall, I would try and stay under at least ten. I think Career Management would agree that there is no perfect number.

It really does come down to that quality versus quantity piece,

and um, like you said: one great connection sometimes being just as valuable or more valuable than 2 or 3 "meh" connections.

Exactly. Joey, are there any last tips or suggestions that you'd have for Ivey students as they're working their way through the recruitment process?

Yeah, so I think coffee chatting is a key point, and networking is a key point because at the end of the day,

you're working with people and they're hiring for people.

So the more that you can know them and they can know you, the better, even before an interview starts.

So this is kind of the importance of it, and I think why we're having this discussion today.

Joey, knowing that you did a lot of independent work on this coffee chatting, it's obviously one student taking the initiative and reaching out.

Um, what would you say the resources are people that helped you either build confidence

in coffee chatting or keep the motivation going for this type of networking?

Yeah, so in terms of motivation and practice, I think your classmates are tremendously helpful.

You're all in this together, and you're all going to be working together to all find jobs,

and so I think it's really important to find people who keep you motivated, to find people who are in the same boat,

and to find people that can support you when times are not great, and those are often your classmates.

Joey, thank you so much for taking the time to be here with us today. Thank you for having me.

Thank you for listening. If you are interested in connecting with Career Management,

you can book a one on one appointment by visiting the 12Twenty appointments tab online or by visiting our space at room

2235 in the Ivey Building at Western University.

Take good care.