Let me fill you in...

Boy, it has been a loooong while since I have posted. Let me give you a whirlwind update of my professional life. I got a job selling furniture at a retail store. It was not what I was looking for, but it offered a paycheck (something I was temporally missing) and some skills about sales. While working that job, I went to an IIDA event and met some awesome people from the furniture and design industry. We exchanged business cards, etc. etc., and now I am working at Color Art Integrated Interiors as the Customer Experience Manager. I am doing some sales, some design, managing the resource library, and meeting and event planning. It is really fun, and very fast paced. I am learning so much, it is hard to believe that I actually went to school before this. Some advice to current Interior Design students: there is so much they don't teach you in school. Well, rather, they can't teach you in school. Like how to deal with snotty clients, or how to work within a budget. Those kinds of things are too hypothetical, it would just be hard to make a realistic lesson.

I am very grateful to have this position, and to work for this company. I have met so many people that have been my champions, and I know they will continue to help me grow.

Lindsey Pollak's "Getting from College to Career: 90 Things To Do Before You Join the Real World"

So I recently joined the professional networking website www.gurunation.com and from there, I found the profile of Ms. Lindsey Pollak. In her profile she listed the book she had written "Getting from College to Career: 90 Things To Do Before You Join the Real World". I was interested in the book, so I ordered it off of Amazon. I started reading it tonight and so far it is really great! It is a very easy read, and everything is broken down into small sections. I think I might carry this book around with me everywhere I go. If I just have a free minute or two I could do a little reading here and there. I also think it is really great that she has all 90 of her tips listed in the Table of Contents, so you can easily go back and find a tip to refer to it.

One of the tips she talked about is figuring out what you look like online, including, but not limited to Facebook. She recommends that you Google yourself and see what comes up. She says "...if you don't exist in Google, you don't exist at all." Well, I just Googled myself, and apparently I have a fairly popular name. I am a lawyer, I play lots of different male college-level sports, and I have various other jobs too (haha). This blog didn't show up until page 5 of the Google results. I feel like that is not very good "Googleability" for me, although, from reading the page titles of the other Jordan Becker's in the world, they might be hard to beat. Pollak suggests getting profiles on several networking websites other than Facebook, so I will work on that. She also suggests writing reviews for books or short papers and submitting them to professional organizations you are involved in, for me, that would be ASID.

I feel like I have a lot of work to do, but atleast this blog is a step in the right direction! I exist on Google, just not until page 5.

Job Opportunities in this Tough Economy

I keep in touch with one of my friends from our Interior Design program who just recently graduated. She is having a really hard time finding jobs, which makes me very nervous for this upcoming May, when I will be job searching as well.

I am putting my portfolio together this semester and it really has made it "hit home". Graduation is just a few short months away and I don't know if I am ready! I am ready to get out of the dorms, but I am not sure how ready I am to be job hunting.

I also have become interested in working for Disney World (doing design work). Boy, their website is hard to figure out! I found the section that talks about the design work they do, but in order to see if there are job listings, you have to create an entire profile, and to be honest, I didn't understand all of the questions the job profile application was asking.

Hopefully my classes this semester will help me get ready for the real world. And if not, I always have my wonderful Professors to back me up!