"How can I stay open and adaptable?" With Cynthia

Kate learns how Cynthia (HBA '25) kept an open mind and explored options during a challenging job market (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 the Career Management and Corporate Recruitment Team,

followed by an interview with one of our career peers, Cynthia.

Here are your CM updates as we mozy into the month of November.

In addition to individual club and recruiter events, Ivey Career Nights happened this week on the fourth and the fifth.

Next week we'll hear an update on how those went. HBA1 students are currently doing Career Management essential courses,

a few are happening last week,

there's more to come throughout the month, and currently our MSc BA and DM stream students have optional three on one mock interviews this week.

It's a great opportunity to test out your own material, while also learning from other students who are doing their mock interviews.

Last but not least, there are plenty of appointments available for students at any stage of recruitment.

If you're gearing up to recruit either in November or the New Year, we can help you explore resources such as the Challenge Cards,

Clifton Strengths, how to leverage 12Twenty info, as well as document and interview preparation. For students actively recruiting,

we can talk about networking strategies, mock interviews for behavioral interviews, which includes feedback on structure,

content, and presentation, and of course, things like negotiating offers. For students who have landed,

that's fantastic news! Please know that you can still strategize on what you want to learn from the experience,

or how the role fits into your bigger plans with a career coach.

No matter where you're at in your journey or what the topic is, a coach is happy to support you.

Switching gears, our Corporate Recruitment Team just launched a really cool international opportunity the HBA Career Trek to big London, London, UK.

Amanda is here today to tell us a bit more. Amanda, what's the Trek all about?

Hey Kate, thanks so much for having me here. So to all of our current HBA1 and HBA2 students,

if you have ever thought about living and working in the big London - in London, UK, this is definitely the trip for you.

So taking place over our February Reading week, uh, it will really be an opportunity for students to explore careers,

so helping you to understand what it's like to live and work abroad.

Um, to build your network with, uh, alumni who are living and working in the UK, and ultimately to hear from those alumni how they were successful,

whether it was launching an international career right post-graduation or pivoting from a North American market to working and living in London.

And this career track is specifically for HBA1 and HBA2 students, is that correct?

That is correct. Okay. And it's a career exploration trip, as you mentioned;

lots of opportunities to explore current opportunities as well as connect with folks living... living and working.

That's right, that's right. Yeah. It's four days in London and we'll have a series of firm visits and alumni activities.

So first up, students will have the opportunity to do office tours, office visits with companies.

And these companies are going to represent a wide range of industries.

So everything from financial services, consulting, technology,

and these are the companies that are really shaping the global business landscape.

So you're going to be immersed in their office spaces, experience their company culture,

you're going to have opportunities to network with, uh,

a lot of Ivey alumni as well as other business representatives and really just get a feel of what we're doing.

And so we're still working through finalizing our roster. Um, but at this time, I am happy to share

we have Bain, we have Google, we have OTPP, EQT Exeter, and CVC Capital all confirmed to participate.

So some really great global firms already kicking off, uh,

and giving students an idea of what they can expect with the Trek. In addition to company visits, we're also going to host two alumni events.

So there's a dinner, uh, that we do like a kickoff to the Trek where we welcome alumni in,

and then we do a pub social, which is a little bit more casual. Um, and these activities are really all about alumni paying it forward.

I was sharing with you before we started, Kate,

one of the things I love about this Trek the most is seeing how excited our alumni are to engage with our HBA students and share their experiences.

So you're going to make really meaningful connections. You're going to hear from alumni again.

They're going to give you advice. No questions are off the table. They are there to support you.

Fantastic. What does the trip cost and how can student supply if they're interested?

Yeah. Well again great question. So if you have never been to London I just want to say it's an incredible opportunity at a great, great price.

Um, so students will be able to pay a deposit.

It's $650 for the trip. Um, that covers four nights accommodation, four full English breakfasts,

so hot and cold options that we have at the hotel every morning, the kickoff dinner, and some light refreshments at the Alumni Social.

Beyond that, it will be all of your students will be responsible for paying for flights, um,

any transportation on the ground and any personal expenses that they incur during the trip.

Um, and yeah, that's... that's really great. Like I said, it's a great opportunity.

We're going to be right in central London, in the hub of everything. There is downtime for students to be able to get out and explore.

Um, again, a lot of opportunity for you to experience sort of the modern cityscapes and get an idea.

Um, so definitely something that they want to check out and apply for.

Tell me about applications. Yes. So applications recently went live.

There is a LEARN page that you can check out everything related.

We'll have FAQs, there'll be some details about the Trek. The deadline to apply is November 17th, so don't delay.

Keep in mind that space will be limited to 50 students and that includes 50 students;

that could be HBA1's or HBA2's, um, and all students

when you're completing your application, you're going to be asked to commit that

you are, uh, you're committing to attend all of the events that we plan, um, as well as tell us why you're interested in this Trek.

Right. With limited space, we want to make sure that you're getting the most out of this.

Um, so let us know why you're interested in it and what you're hoping the experience will help you do when you think about your career long term.

Fantastic. Thank you so much, Amanda. Thanks, Kate. Good luck everybody. Hope to see you in London!

We'll now hear from Cynthia. Cynthia shares her top tips for how to stay open and adaptable in recruitment planning.

Cynthia, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for inviting me.

I'm excited for our conversation today, and I'd love to know

what are your top tips for current Ivey students? Um, okay, so I am currently at HBA2, so my

recommendations for the HBA1's who are going through like the recruiting, finding their career path...

I recommend you to be adaptable to challenges and changes, and it also means to maintain an open mindset to the other new possibilities.

So if I have a whiteboard here, I'll highlight two keywords.

So "adaptability" and "open minded". Cool, and Cynthia I'll add there....

I know you mentioned you're in HBA2 and we're thinking specifically about HBA1 students...

That's a great tip for any of our Ivey students, whether it be HBA, MSc, MBA.

Um, but yeah, tell me more about, you know, your journey and what helped you stay open and adaptable.

Okay, so I think I thought "I am a finance girly"; I'm like, "I'm going to finance!"

And then I remember clearly that in high school I was like, ugh, accounting.

Like I'm never going to go into accounting, but oops, like, look at me now.

I did a summer internship at one of the big fours, and then currently pursuing my CPA.

So if I told my like, younger self that, like, "oh, you're going to accounting,"

I'm not sure whether I would be like disappointed or shocked, but I think it's definitely something that would not...

I would totally not expect that. So you might wonder like, oh, like what happened?

Like what has like changed me from like finance to like accounting?

So I started applying for an internship when I was like my third year, a little bit like between like summer of my second year-ish.

And that's when I realized that, oh, it's a little bit hard if I wanted to go into finance, like directly,

because as someone who did not have any prior internship experience or just any experience related to finance,

it is hard to get my foot into this industry here.

It just... it is competitive. Not gonna lie. Also the market wasn't doing the best and I have seen my classmates struggling with it.

So don't worry guys, we are all on the same page. You are not the only one who's been through this.

And from there I've been learning to this new role or like new position, whatever you call this; it's called Audit, as a small sector of accounting.

And it's not much affected by the economy right now.

So I was like, okay, that sounds something that's like really interesting.

And it's also a good experience to have before you enter to the finance market.

So my mindset have changed from like, oh, like "I have to; I have to get into finance" to "okay,

maybe I don't need to get in there directly - in one big step, or as well as like there are many other ways I can do this.

I can get myself into the finance market, finance sector."

So for like a job in finance, yeah. Two things I want to point out about that, Cynthia.

One is you mentioned that it was in your second year that you started looking at internships in finance.

And for our listeners who... some may be interested in finance, um, many will be interested in other areas.

Not every industry recruits at the same time frame.

Finance does tend to recruit quite early, really early on.

So that's why you found yourself in that position.

If you are new to Ivey (specifically our HBA1s), and thinking "I didn't start recruiting in second year", that is okay.

These are all dependent on the industry and also HBA1's who are interested in finance.

Sometimes you don't know those things before you get here, and you know it's never too late to look at some of those options.

Um, thinking about what Cynthia did, thinking about pivoting and exploring.

Not to mention you will always have plenty of time after your Ivey career, but I just wanted to highlight, um, for for folks outside of finance.

Don't panic. Yes, recruitment happens at many different times of year.

It's a year round activity. It sure is.

And it's also a lifetime,

so you don't have to rush through it... like there is an information gap between like... there might be people who already know this information,

and then there are people who enter Ivey like me. I'm like, like, oh, I don't know this.

I don't know what's happening. And people already started doing this. I'm like, okay, nobody ever told me that.

So don't worry about it. Like you're here. You're like, learning new information.

So good for you. Mhm. We recently (in Career Management) found out about a student group who has a podcast and um,

kind of like a... I don't want to say it's a club but a gathering of students called The Finance Haven.

Um, so if you check out thefinancehaven.com, that's a group of Ivey students who actually all got together very similar to you, Cynthia,

who didn't have that finance background before they got to Ivey and came together

to try and streamline some resources and some information related to finance.

So if you are a finance listener, the finance haven; those are Ivey students.

Uh, and actually, I think we're hoping to interview one of those folks coming up.

So stay tuned. Well, it's my first time hearing that.

So learning something new every single day! It's very, very new.

So, um. No, I'm glad we could share it. And coming back to the idea of your your journey being centered around openness and adaptability,

um, what helped you have or develop that, that flexibility and openness?

Yeah. Okay.

So I think most people there are even like, for myself, we might have felt this like, oh, I'm not so comfortable stepping out of my comfort zone.

And you might think, like, what's the reason why behind it? I think most of the time it is because we lack of the information.

We don't know what's going to happen in the future.

That unpredictability piece is what caused us to like panic, to have anxieties.

So what I recommend you to do is to collect as many information as you can.

So a little bit story that I haven't really mentioned, but I'll bring it up right now.

So it's during the summer, um, of my second year.

So what I have been doing during this time is I coffee chat,

I don't know what caused me to coffee chat people from like different industry, different sectors, but I just did it.

I don't know why I did that, but it's a good choice.

Um, so I talk to people in consulting, in finance, and also in accounting, even though I said I don't want to accounting, but I still did it.

Um, and from there I learned that, like, okay, accounting is not just what I learned in high school, it's not that boring subject

that's like definite on the left, quarterly on the right. It's not boring.

And then CPA is not just accounting.

There is actually a lot more fun. You get to do some taxation strategies.

There is also like leadership or like teamwork piece of it.

So I think what I wanted to say is that "don't limit yourself" with only looking to the path

of, "oh, I want to go into finance. I'm only going to search for information of the sectors."

Maybe broaden up your choice at a beginning, having to a really vague and brought search.

And then once you find your interest you can be like okay, I'm gonna filter out some other sectors.

So from there, for a really broad search of "who am I going to coffee chat?" to

"Okay, I want a coffee chat. People who are also having the same background as I am", for example,

like people who might have already got a CPA or who are people who have done an audit internship, just to ask them like,

oh, what was your experience? Like, why did you do a

CPA? And from there you're able to learn what your future career path is going to be looking like.

Kate has asked, like, oh, so how did you stay open minded? Well, um,

find more information and then make yourself comfortable with all the information that you have so that you know what you can expect for the future.

It's fascinating that you mentioned that,

Cynthia. Career Management was recently doing classes with our Business Analytics and our Digital Management students this week.

And one of the things we talked about when you think about recruitment is sometimes we start with,

okay, well, you know, I have this type of degree or this type of course....

Therefore I need to find this type of job, this type of company and then, you know,

move up that way, when in reality it's very often flipped, kind of like what you were saying.

What kind of work do you enjoy doing? What kind of projects do you want to work on?

What do you need to do to get there? Who are the people working on those challenges and those things,

and then talking with them to to learn more about their journey and kind of reverse-engineering that path.

And part of that is being open to new challenges, new people, and again,

not being open to everything because there's not enough time in the day for that,

but having a little bit of a sense of, of direction enough to say, I know I don't want to do this, what could I do with this?

And then talking to people. Yeah, that's like I select a few areas, like consulting, like Ivey -

We all love consulting, finance... something that I wanted to do for long... accounting, something I have done before.

I was good at it, but never thought about a future path on it until pretty much recently.

But you knew you were good at it before. Yes. That's right. Yeah, yeah, surprisingly.

I'm like, I'm good at accounting. I'm good at doing journal entries, but like as a career path? Mm-mm, maybe

no. But the thing is, like, whatever you have learned right now, that's not the whole image of this career.

So just something that you have to keep in mind. Absolutely.

Some students know what they're really good at coming in, but maybe feel, for whatever reason,

that they can't make a career out of it or don't want to make a career out of it.

Whereas there are also many students who come to Ivey and discover what they're good at,

or what they enjoy, and what you're good at and what you enjoy can be two different things; that's also

okay. Um, so again, that openness there. Cynthia, any last tips for our students?

Yeah. So like I said in the beginning, this is a really long journey.

And I did say that like, well, maybe you're not going to get there in one huge step.

Maybe like it's... you're going to take like five more steps than all the other people.

But it is key to have that grit. So knowing that believing in yourself and knowing that it will take a long time, but you will get there.

I love that point, Cynthia. One: that it kind of acknowledges that a lot of students do look around and compare themselves to other students.

It's normal to do that.

It can be really disheartening at times when it feels like so many people are moving forward or moving at a different pace than you.

But also recognizing that we do that sometimes; bringing it back to your path, your journey, and how... what you can do for yourself.

Yes. Thank you so much for taking the time to be here, Cynthia,

today. It's been a pleasure to chat with you. Thank you. And I hope this is helpful for all the audience, of course, listening to this.

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.