October 16, 2025 • 56 mins
What if your next big career decision wasn’t about climbing higher - but choosing wiser?
After more than forty years in higher education, Dr. Tara S. Singer has seen it all - great mentors and tough bosses, leaps of faith and gut-wrenching choices to walk away.
As the former CEO and President of Omicron Delta Kappa and now a senior consultant with Academic Search, Tara shares the wisdom that only comes from a lifetime of leading, learning, and listening to your own intuition.
In this episode, we talk about:
- Why the right boss can make — or break — your career
- How to recognize red and yellow flags your intuition is already showing you
- What “leaving things better than you found them” really looks like in leadership
Tara’s story is a reminder that success isn’t about collecting titles — it’s about collecting wisdom. Every season of your career holds lessons if you’re willing to pause and listen.
🔗 Connect with Tara:
LinkedIn → https://www.linkedin.com/in/tara-singer/
Academic Search → https://academicsearch.org/
🎙️ About Your Next Success:
Your Next Success with Dr. Caroline Sangal explores the turning points, decisions, and mindset shifts that shape authentic success — the kind that aligns who you are, what you do best, and the life you’re meant to live.
Subscribe to Your Next Success so you never miss an episode.
Watch full video episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@NextSuccessMethod/
Learn more about Next Success www.nextsuccesscareers.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Caroline (00:04):
What if your next big career decision wasn't about
climbing higher, but choosingwiser?
After more than 40 years inhigher education, Dr.
Tara Singer has seen the fullspectrum of leadership, great
mentors and tough bosses, leapsof faith and gut wrenching calls
to walk away.
(00:25):
In this conversation, she sharesthe wisdom that only comes from
a lifetime of leading, learning,and listening to your own
intuition.
This is the Your Next Successpodcast, and I'm your host, Dr.
Caroline Sangal.
I'm a life first career coachand strategist on a mission to
normalize questioning yourcareer because I believe each of
(00:48):
us is made on purpose for apurpose only we can fulfill.
The longer we live out ofalignment with who we are, what
we do best, and why we're here,the more we miss out.
And the more the world missesout on what only we can give.
The Your Next Success Podcast iswhere we explore how to build a
(01:10):
career that truly fuels yourlife.
We talk about self-discovery,smart job, search strategies,
professional growth, and you'llhear stories from people who've
navigated big career transitionsthemselves so you can see what
it's really like to make boldchanges and feel inspired to
(01:31):
create your own version ofauthentic success, one that is
aligned, meaningful, and trulyyours.
Dr.
Tara S Singer is a highereducation leader and president
emerita of Omicron Delta Kappa,National Leadership honorary,
where she served as CEO for adecade and led its first
(01:53):
multimillion dollar campaign.
Today, she's a senior consultantwith Academic Search, guiding
executive hires and leadershipdevelopment across colleges and
universities after a 40 yearcareer in advancement,
communications, and studentaffairs.
In this episode, you will learn: why the right boss can make or (02:11):
undefined
break your career.
How to read the red and yellowflags.
Your intuition is alreadyshowing you.
What"leaving things better thanyou found them really looks like
in leadership."
Caroline (02:28):
Welcome Tara to Your Next Success.
I am so excited for thisconversation.
Tara (02:36):
Well, it is my pleasure to be here and I've been looking
forward to it for several weeks,
Caroline (02:40):
Let's try to go back to the beginning.
As you know, I wanna talk aboutcareers and career transitions,
and we have some other thingsplanned for this conversation.
Helpful tips for people forinterviews and their careers but
let's go back to the beginning.
You had a successful career inhigher education doing amazing
things, but when you think abouthow it all started, was there
(03:04):
any key moment that nudged youtoward that type of a career?
Tara (03:09):
In essence, I went into the family business.
My mother was in student affairsat the University of Louisville,
and my father was on the facultyand the university was a subject
of dinner table conversation aslong as I can remember.
The neighbors were the graduatedean, the law school dean.
The university was a big deal.
The thing I always remember isthat my mother with her student
(03:30):
affairs job was always veryhappy.
Loved working with students,loved working with her fellow
administrators, and my fatherwas like many faculty of his
generation, not always thehappiest camper.
There was always that pressureto publish or perish, get
research dollars, fight the goodfight in terms of educational
policy.
When I went off to college, Iknew that I wanted to have a
(03:53):
career in higher education, butI thought I would follow my
mother's path, throughadministration and starting out
in student affairs.
Interestingly enough, my kid'ssister decided to follow my
father's path, and she's afaculty member at Wayne state.
And it's fun to haveconversations these days because
now we're replicating, I'mreplicating mom and she's
replicating dad.
Caroline (04:14):
Did you ever think about not going to the
University of Louisville?
Tara (04:17):
I looked at a couple of other institutions, but in
essence, the university wasfree.
My father with the tuition andremission program, had tuition
benefits for us.
When I got my master's degree, Ionly paid for six credit hours
and I was working for theuniversity full-time, I was,
working on my doctorate, and Ionly had to pay for 16 hours of
(04:38):
that.
So I have three degrees from theUniversity of Louisville with
only having paid for a total of22 credit hours in the entire
process.
Caroline (04:46):
Wow, that's amazing.
Some people say it's like thegolden handcuffs, you know, as,
as far as people having childrenand, and then not going anywhere
else because they could go therebut that's amazing that you grew
up in that environment andthrived we're able to not only
get into higher education, butadvance in higher education,
now, what was your first realopportunity for advancement?
Tara (05:09):
When I was a junior in college, I was doing tour guides
on tours, campus tours on theweekend for football recruits,
baseball recruits, volleyballrecruits.
The baseball coach, who was alsothe head of athletic academic
advising, asked me if I knew howto type.
And I said, well, sure.
And he goes, well, do you need ajob?
And I said, well, I would behappy to have a job.
(05:29):
And I went to work in athleticacademic advising as a junior in
college.
Eventually, there was a newperson in that role, one of my
great mentors, a gentleman namedDr.
Steve Millburn.
I got my master's degree workingin that office, and that was my
first full-time job.
Working in athletic academicadvising where I ran orientation
(05:50):
programs and tutoring programsfor student athletes.
I had just finished my master'sdegree, in January of one year,
and Steve put on my deskinternal jobs announcement for
the university community, and hecircled a job which said
associate registrar, and hewrote across it, apply.
(06:11):
I looked at the job requirementsand I'm going, well, I don't
really know what the registrar'soffice is, but I know it's where
transcripts come from.
And, where the grades come fromand it's where diplomas come
from.
Looking at the skills requiredand the experiences required.
And I'm going, oh, I've doneevent planning, I've done
publication editing.
I've helped students figure outtheir academic progression.
(06:34):
I've looked at their transfercredits and tried to figure out
how those would fit with theuniversity.
And I thought.
Well, maybe I could do this.
And I've often thought about howSteve putting that job notice on
my desk, advanced my career.
And I have tried to do the samething with my own employees
through the years, identifyingthose promotional opportunities
(06:56):
for them because we all need togrow and be challenged in the
future.
And for me, it's been paying itforward because that was the
move in my career that reallyadvanced my career and helped me
launch me into the long-termcareer in higher education.
Caroline (07:13):
And what a great example of him as a manager too,
right?
sometimes there's a manager or aleader who loves the work that
an employee is doing and wantsto just keep them in that for
the foreseeable future.
But then there are some that seebeyond and really want the best
for you and the best for yourpotential and the best for your
(07:33):
expansion.
So that was amazing that he didthat and that's also amazing
that you carried that forward,and I'm sure, helped others to
see beyond their initial scope.
Tara (07:44):
Sometimes we, outgrow the nest and need to be kicked out
of the nest so we can learn tofly on our own.
Typically, I found that withemployees in their twenties and
thirties who are still growingand maturing and exploring their
career options, they wanna learnabout a different area of the
(08:04):
organization and maybe serve inthat area rather than being
specific to one thing.
Now, I also have colleagues thathave said, oh, I just wanna be a
dean of students and just be adean of students.
Does not accurately reflect whatit is to be a dean of students
'cause that's a big job.
There's no just be a dean ofstudents.
But there are people who wannabe experts in one area, you
(08:28):
learn about yourself and whatyou wanna do when you have
opportunities to get out of thenest and fly on your own for a
little while and go seedifferent locations and have
different experiences, which iswhy I think it's a very
generative thing to do, is toencourage, employees who are in
the early stages of their careerto explore their options and to
look beyond what they'recurrently doing.
Caroline (08:49):
Did you ever have a specific, instance of when you
saw the next step for somebodybefore they saw it?
Tara (08:57):
Absolutely.
When I was at the University ofWest Georgia, the number two
position in our department, wasopen and the department was the
Division of UniversityAdvancement.
We had an AVP open forfundraising and that person was
the executive director of thefoundation.
When I had come to theuniversity, there was this
(09:18):
younger faculty member, althoughhe was full professor at a
fairly early age in chemistry,and he kind of had college
president written all over him.
He just had all the skills.
He knew how to make an apology.
He knew how to give a speech, Hehad worked in student affairs on
an interim basis and had reallybegun to understand the dynamics
(09:40):
of working with undergraduatestudents as well as graduate
students.
And he wanted another interimappointment and I thought, well,
okay, he's the smartest thingI've met around here.
Let's just put him in for oneyear as the Associate Vice
President for development andexecutive director of the
foundation, after one year weput him in the job permanently.
Caroline (10:03):
Wow.
Tara (10:03):
He was a chemistry professor.
Given your background, he was achemistry professor! And I
always joked about the fact thatAndy knew how to change, straw
into gold with his chemistrybackground, and he was very
effective as a fundraiser.
He just retired as theChancellor of the University of
Wisconsin at Oshkosh.
I was so delighted and I got togo to his inauguration, and to
(10:26):
see how he had gone from being,you know, sort of a young
fireball faculty member to beinga, a serious administrator who
was the steward of hisinstitution and did a great job,
as Chancellor at Oshkosh and ledit through some really difficult
times.
Caroline (10:42):
Now this kind of brings to mind like if you see
opportunities before others seethem for themselves and you're
helping their growth, how do youdecide whether you should pursue
something or not?
When you're unsure of exactlywhat it entails what advice do
you have for that?
Tara (11:00):
Look at transferable skills.
A lot of jobs that have weirdtitles.
but always take a really goodlook at what are the
requirements for the job, notjust the years of experience
and, the academic degreerequirements, but what does the
job really do?
And in this day and time, youcan take a position description
(11:24):
or a job posting and your resumeand put it all into ChatGPT and
ChatGPT will tell you how you'requalified for the job or not.
And you can use those talkingpoints in your cover letter.
You can use them when you govisit with a search committee.
But then there's the other thingabout once you get to that point
(11:44):
where you're actuallyinterviewing for an opportunity,
you probably need to do a lotmore research in order to be
able to articulate to others whomay not necessarily see that you
are the ideal candidate or atleast a viable candidate for a
position.
That research activity is reallyimportant because it not only
(12:06):
helps you get ready for thatinterview, it builds your
confidence, but it also meansthat you're not wasting
anybody's time and they take youseriously.
There are lots of questions thatyou have to be able to answer in
an interview process for peopleto see you as a viable,
reasonable, and seriouscandidate for a job, rather than
somebody who just wanted to goto rural Georgia for the
(12:27):
afternoon and spend it with awhole bunch of people you've
never met before.
Caroline (12:31):
I like to try to help people understand that when
you're going for an interview,you wanna also consider the
interviewer's perspective.
And they wanna be finding notonly somebody qualified for the
role, but thinking this is asafe bet.
So as much as you can draw theline from your past to their
compelling future and how whatyou've done sets you up for the
(12:52):
role.
And even if you haven't donesomething, don't say you didn't
do something.
Tell about the related thingsthat you did do.
So like you with the eventplanning and what you had done
and how that sets you up forsuccess for the future.
So really good tips.
Thank you for those.
You've stepped into so manydifferent types of leadership
roles, what has surprised youmost about some of those
(13:16):
transitions?
Tara (13:21):
To a degree how naive I've been, which is hard to admit.
And, but it's not so hard at 64.
If I had a chance to go back andtalk to my younger self, I might
say, is that don't be in such ahurry to take a job because you
want a title or a paycheck, butyou really need to choose your
(13:41):
bosses carefully.
I was very fortunate early in mycareer to have two exceptional
supervisors, dear friends tothis day.
Later in my career, I wantedresources that came with a job.
I had become a single motheralong the way, although my boys
(14:01):
father is an absolute greatfather to the kids, but I needed
a better paycheck.
I had this career path in mindwhere I thought I would be a
college president by the time Iwas of a certain age.
I was on this very linear pathfor a long time.
I discovered I had a knack fornot choosing the best boss.
(14:24):
And that one should probablyreally make a well-informed
decision before going to workfor somebody directly.
Being naive, I never reallythought about how that person,
although I'd had two greatexamples, how that person who is
(14:45):
my supervisor, might not be thebest person for me in the long
run.
I'll give you a story that oneof them actually said to me.
He had been a division onehockey coach before he became an
alumni director and a vicepresident for advancement.
And one day he said to me, hegoes, Tara, I learned with my
hockey players that some of themwell to being yelled at, and
(15:09):
some of them just fall apart.
And he goes, that I'm in adifferent kind of role, I have
to remember that just don'talways respond well to being
yelled at.
I'm thinking like, yeah, me, forexample, it does me no good.
It shuts me down.
What I would just say to myyounger self is, be very
(15:29):
particular about whose applecart you're gonna hitch your
apple cart to and you know, rideoff into the sunset with,
because that person can do a lotcan make you or break you.
And that's not justprofessionally; they can do a
lot to make you or break youpersonally.
(15:50):
One of my favorite lines that Ilearned after having worked for
several years for somebody whoapparently did not need sleep
was that, for years, I would askthe question, after that, tell
me about the sleep patterns ofthe university president or the
vice president or whoever itwas.
Because if they didn't sleep, ifthey didn't have hobbies, if
(16:13):
they didn't have, much of afamily, they were gonna be
somewhat all consuming.
And I had hobbies and I had afamily and I had other things
that which I was interested inand I need sleep! And therefore,
I think it's a valid questionfor some people because it let
you know, and it's like, okay,how do I fit with this person?
(16:36):
They may be, the world's bestenrollment manager, but if they
don't fit with me and I don'tfit with them, it's maybe going
to be a tenuous relationship atbest.
And that's just some hard earnedwisdom I've acquired.
Caroline (16:52):
So how do you ask, I guess you, you figure out from
your examples, what weresticking points or what made a
boss not so great, and thentrying to find a way to have an
open-ended question to let thosecharacteristics come through in
an interview?
Because how do you balance that?
Wanting to get a title or a jobor a position wanting that
(17:14):
advancement on paper andlearning, you know, kind of try
before you buy, learning moreabout their leadership style and
how well you may or may not meshwith that.
Tara (17:24):
Well, I once went to a presentation where the woman
said, there's great power inasking questions.
You know, we can talk more aboutactually asking questions in a
formal interview setting.
But if you're walking aroundwith somebody who's gonna be
your peer, your colleague, notnecessarily, you know, you don't
ask the boss how many hourssleep do they get?
(17:45):
But you ask, sort of the gentlesoftball question about what is
the culture of the institutionand the organization.
Tell me about after five.
Tell me about the weekends inthis institutional environment.
Are Slack messages coming inleft and right?
Are you getting text messages?
Are you getting emails at allhours of the day or night?
What is it really like to be amember of this team.
(18:06):
There are subtle ways of askingthat rather than being so
direct, the other thing you haveto really think about is, are
you going to be successful?
And often what I would say isthat your spidey sense is going
to tell you whether or not thisis a good environment for you.
And I love telling this storyabout, I had interviewed for a
(18:30):
position vice president forcommunications and marketing at
a regional institution, and oneis it's a vice president's job,
and the president wouldn't meetwith the two finalists.
I didn't take that to be areally good sign.
Because you know, you're gonnabe a direct report to this
person and you're not gonnavisit with them during your
campus interview?
(18:51):
Thinking this doesn't quite feelright to me.
And then communications andmarketing.
If you wanna market aninstitution and help drive
enrollment and fundraising, youmight need some resources.
And I had asked about, well,what is the budget for
advertising?
And they told me the budget, andit was, it was woefully
(19:12):
inadequate.
And I had worked at regionalinstitutions with not a lot of
money, but this was nothingshort of appalling about how
little it was.
And at some point I'm with thesearch committee and they said,
well, how are you gonna get usin the national news?
And by this time, it's towardthe end of day and a half on
(19:33):
campus.
And it's already occurred to me,this is not gonna work.
And I said, well, unless we havea major crisis on campus, I'm
not going to get us on thenational news.
Because Enormous StateUniversity, which is curing
cancer, which is 17 miles away,makes the national news and they
have a D-1 football program, andthey're not a former teacher's
(19:57):
college and they're doing majorresearch and oh, by the way,
they're in a million dollarcampaign, and they are
30-minutes closest to the majorregional city where there is a
television station and anewspaper.
I'm going, we're not gonna geton the national news.
And they looked at me and theywere a little taken aback.
(20:18):
And by that time I just said,this is not, this is not right
the association and governingboards provides a mentoring
service, the individual who wasa mentor had been a former
president at my then currentinstitution, and I sent this
individual an email dear John,there's no budget, president
(20:40):
won't meet.
I just don't think this feelsgood.
My gut tells me to run.
And I got this very discreetmessage back.
Your gut is wise.
And I'm thinking, you know, weshould sometimes listen to our
guts because, you know, peoplesay gut decisions.
Well, your gut is really the sumof all of your experiences and
(21:01):
your knowledge.
It's not just some floatyfeeling of butterflies in your
stomach.
It really is your background,your experiences, your
understanding, and it willinform your decisions if you
only let it.
Caroline (21:16):
Mm, so wise.
So yes, the visceral reactionsyou have in your body are trying
to give you a message, and thetimes that I did override those.
I learned later.
Oh, that was even in interviews.
The times that I like, oh nah,that's not a big thing.
(21:37):
That's a yellow flag.
Yellow flags become red flagswhen you let them.
So tell me a little bit aboutwhat you're doing now.
What opened the door to yourcurrent chapter after all your
successful years and now what?
Tara (21:55):
Yeah.
I'm presently a seniorconsultant with a search
practice called Academic Search,and I had known for years that I
had really wanted to doexecutive search work in higher
ed as this sort of phase of mycareer.
And I had spent a fair amount oftime over my last five years
with Omicron Delta Kappavisiting with people from
(22:19):
different practices.
We had a number of volunteersthat worked for some of the
major, search organizations inthis country, I really wanted to
work with one that wasspecifically higher ed focused
and what I love about ourparticular entity is that we are
a mission-driven organization.
The proceeds that we raise, inaddition to paying our salaries,
(22:41):
fund the American AcademicLeadership Institute and AALI
supports schools from theCouncil of Independent Colleges,
which are lots of liberal artsinstitutions across the country.
And then the Association ofState Colleges and Universities,
which are a lot of regionalinstitutions.
And those were the institutionsthat I served and I love serving
(23:03):
most of all, or regional firstgeneration serving residential
campuses.
We do leadership developmentprograms and we help people,
explore whether or not theywanna experience careers on
further advancement in highereducation and we have a becoming
a provost academy and we have amanaging the presidential search
process.
The irony of all this is thatthe COO and the CEO are both
(23:27):
Omicron Delta Kappa members, asare about 15 other people and we
have an annual retreat and it'sall kumbaya, as far as I'm
concerned, these are my people.
And we talk about the future ofthe academy.
We talk about students, we talkabout political pressures, we
(23:47):
talk about doing excellent workand search.
We talk about treatingcandidates the way that we wanna
be treated.
We talk about helping peoplepursue their next opportunities.
And we talk about helping ourinstitutional partners identify,
you know, there.
It's always one hire, but wehelp them identify, hopefully a
(24:08):
group of people that they wouldbe willing to consider and are
viable candidates who might bereally great for the
institution, if not today,someday.
And we are a leadershipdevelopment organization and,
and therefore, having come outof Omicron Delta Kappa, the
National Leadership HonorSociety, working for a
(24:28):
leadership developmentorganization is really important
to me.
Caroline (24:32):
That's so great.
You're still developing leaders,helping leaders, serving leaders
while also, you know, it's likelifting as you all climb.
That's so cool.
You've seen a lot of resumes,CVs, throughout your time so I'm
curious, what makes someonestand out to you, not just on
paper, but as a leader?
(24:53):
What are those characteristicsthat fog the mirror if you will.
Tara (24:59):
Yeah.
I tend to be net picky aboutediting.
It's just my thing.
And I get teased about it allthe time.
But often your writing is areflection of your seriousness,
and a well-written resume,vitae, cover letter.
All those things are reallyimportant and they should follow
(25:23):
some style guide, AP, MLA,something they should be
consistent.
But what is really important tome is that if you've seen a job
posting and you're tweaking yourresume, and you know, there's a
lot to be said for having astandard resume or a vita with a
(25:44):
section at the beginning, whichhighlights your accomplishments,
and that way people don't haveto dig past page one to figure
out whether or not theexpectations of the position are
aligned with what you've done.
I wanna see that on the firstpage.
That's always a good indication.
I wanna see that in your coverletter.
(26:05):
a cover letter which is alignedwith the resume or vita and the
summary of qualifications andaccomplishments is always a good
thing.
I just think people can't belazy about that because
particularly in an academicenvironment, we want you to show
some level of education andsophistication and, you need to,
(26:26):
you know, write well.
And Grammarly helps with thatthing.
And, and Grammarly is another AItool that I use all the time.
I use it when I'm composingletters to family.
It just makes communication soclear.
And the thing that we do day inand day out in all of our jobs
is communicate.
(26:48):
Send emails, we send textmessages, we share information
with our employees, we shareinformation with our
supervisors.
We share information with thoseindividuals we serve.
We communicate in one's abilityto communicate effectively and
in coherently is reallyimportant, and that's often what
(27:09):
I look for when I see documentscoming across my desk.
Caroline (27:12):
How about when somebody's in a job search or
thinking of starting a jobsearch?
What best practices have youlearned or, or what stands out
for that as far as like whatactually works when starting a
job search?
Tara (27:34):
Taking it seriously.
I often say that if you arepresently gainfully unemployed,
your job is looking for a joband you should sit down at your
home office desk or you go towherever you'd like to work and
you actually do work.
Panera, you know, some othercoffee house.
There was a local pub where Iworked on Fridays for years.
(27:55):
It was my workspace.
I would go there for four hoursand I just got accustomed to
working there.
So you go to wherever yourworkspace is and you sit down
and you approach it like it'syour job.
Caroline (28:08):
Imagine what your life would be like if your career
aligned with who you are, whatyou do best, and actually fueled
the life you want.
At Next Success, we support allages and stages through career
transitions from studentsexploring majors or careers to
job seekers actively searchingor re-imagining their next move
(28:30):
to professionals committed toself-awareness and leadership
growth.
Stay connected and explorewhat's possible at
nextsuccesscareers.com andfollow@nextsuccessmethod on
LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram,and Facebook.
Tara (28:50):
But I always caution individuals to, if you're
presently employed, set asidetime when you're not, you can go
back to your office desk, butdon't do it.
You know, Monday through Friday,eight to five 30, I used to joke
about leaving church, andwalking across the street to
where my office was, and I wouldsit down on Sunday afternoon and
I would do a job search onoccasion.
(29:11):
You know, you have to set asidetime to do it.
That's one thing.
The other thing is that in thisday and time positions don't
just get posted in the localnewspaper and within higher
education anymore.
As budgets are shrinking for anynumber of reasons, people are
not spending money advertisingin the Chronicle of Higher
(29:34):
Education or higher ed jobs orwhatever else.
They're only posting on theirwebsite or they're posting on
LinkedIn and, and you have tosort of look at places other
than just the trade publicationsor LinkedIn or the local
newspaper.
You might have to go to thewebsite for the institution or
(29:54):
the organization.
And it never hurts to identifythree to five places where you
think you might wanna work and,and then sit down once a week
and check their website to seeis there something there where
I've, there's a job that I mightbe interested in that might
align with my skillset?
And particularly if you'reneeding to move for family
(30:16):
reasons, which is part of thereason I ended up in Virginia.
I did a regional job search andended up with a dream job.
But I was looking atinstitutions and organizations
here in the Commonwealth becauseI needed to move for reasons of
family.
But I was finding that many ofthe jobs were not posted in
those trade publications becausepeople couldn't afford to do it,
(30:40):
which is why you have to dig.
And the other thing that Ilearned to do was that I went
and knocked on doors, notliterally, but I did send emails
and going.
Hi, I'm going to be in, youknow, Charlottesville, Virginia,
visiting with my aunt and uncle,and I'm looking to relocate
because of some family healthissues.
And I was honest about it.
(31:02):
And I would like to come learnabout your institution and your
division of Student AffairsInstitutional Advancement.
I would just go say"Hi, tell meabout your career" I would
interview them in many ways,just sort of like you and I
having this conversation.
How did you end up here?
What is the greatest thing aboutyour institution?
(31:23):
What do you see as the futurefor the school and those
information interviews didn'tnecessarily get me a job, but
they built my network becauseonce I finally had a job, I was
able to go back and say, oh,I've had such a nice, so nice to
visit with you a couple yearsago.
And by the way, now I'm in thisrole and your office supports
this organization.
(31:44):
Can you help?
Caroline (31:45):
Yes.
Tara (31:46):
And therefore, those were good investments in time.
But they, they didn't exactlywork out the way I'd initially
planned, but they worked outwell in terms of a long-term
career strategy because they'realso now people that I can go
back to and say, Hey, youhiring?
Do you need some search work?
You know, a search firm toassist you.
Caroline (32:05):
Ah, so good.
Yeah, so what I heard from thatis there's a lot of proactive
work that can be done.
Firstly, identifying where mightyou want to be, what are the
institutions or companies thatare in that area.
Secondly, getting find a way totry to visit while you're in the
area or reaching out to peopleand genuinely taking an interest
(32:29):
in them and their career.
Because if you do all of thosethings naturally, it can turn
around to what would you like todo next?
How could they possibly help younow or in the future, but really
being intentional about yoursearch, building your network.
And then do you follow up withthem every so often or you let
(32:50):
it go for a couple years?
How, what's the right frequency?
Tara (32:54):
Within the academic search world experience within our
practice.
What I am doing these days isI've got an awful lot of Google
alerts and some of thoseinstitutions or individuals that
I've built a relationship withover the course of time who
might be looking for searchcounsel, I have them pop up on
(33:17):
my Google alerts.
I check my Google alerts once aday.
I mean, I probably have about 80of them.
If something pops up and it'sgood, bad, or ugly, I will send
a contact, a note saying, HeyI'm sorry you lost a student, or
congratulations on securing thegrant.
Or, hang in there.
(33:37):
Hang in there has gotten to besort of my favorite message of
late.
And let me know if there'sanything I can do to assist you,
even if you just wanna chat.
Lots of colleagues need some,you know, lifting up and,
cheering on these days.
And, just a way of a staying intouch with people that I
consider to be friends.
They're not necessarily closefriends, but they've been
(34:00):
colleague friends that, some ofthese people I've known for 40
plus years.
And, I do care about them and wesee them on Facebook and the
interest is genuine.
It's not really about businessdevelopment.
Yes, there's a strategy to itusing Google alerts, but as much
as it is, it is about just beinga decent person and keeping in
(34:22):
touch with people who have beenwalking with me on my journey
and I've been walking with themon theirs.
Caroline (34:28):
I like that idea about the Google alerts for staying
organized what about for jobsearches?
How can somebody make that moremanageable or not overwhelming?
Tara (34:38):
Moral story is you can probably tailor a Google alert
for the kinds of positions inwhich you're searching for, but
lots of institutions have,postings, they'll send you a
notice, you can sign up forpostings with a variety of the
higher ed, trade publications.
And that those ways they kind ofshow up in your mailbox,
(35:02):
quickly.
But I still think that youreally pretty much have to do
the heavy lifting yourself.
That technology can help you toa degree, but if you are
actively searching, you have togo look at where those positions
are posted and you are gonnahave to maybe look beyond a
trade publication or a newspaperor LinkedIn.
As I said, you may have to golook specifically at that
(35:23):
organization.
Caroline (35:24):
Then once you find something that does look
interesting, sparks yourinterest, how do you then move
from, you're looking forsomething to try to get in
process now, how do you prepare?
How do you prepare to apply orget in that job search?
Tara (35:42):
Yes.
Yeah, i'm often amazed at howpoorly people interview.
Some people are really good atit.
In fact, some people are so goodat it that they get referred to
within our practice, as maybegame show host, because they are
just, and you get a car and youget a car and they're so at
(36:02):
saying all the right things, butthey maybe are not the best
candidate for the position thatthe organization is looking for.
And they may not be the loudestvoice in the room.
You know, I'm a classic e on theMyers-Briggs scale.
I'm a chatty Kathy, butsometimes, particularly within
the institutional advancementworld, a quiet, more reserved
(36:25):
person is often a much betterfundraiser because they're a
really good listener and peoplewho are not always sort of rah
rah, rah.
They're not necessarily shy,they just get their energy maybe
from being not in front ofpeople all the time, they can be
exceptional leaders, but theymay not be exactly what you
(36:47):
think that job's supposed to be.
I hope institutions pay moreattention to the substance of
the individuals that they'respending time with as
candidates, but there is so muchyou can do to get ready for an
interview that you will reallysort of hit it out of the park
using another cliche.
When I got ready to interviewfor, my position at West
(37:11):
Georgia, subscribed to the localnewspaper for about two weeks
before my interview because Iknew I had the interview in two
weeks.
And it was an onlinesubscription, which you can do
these days.
So it wasn't necessarily gettingmailed to my, mailbox 500 miles
away.
But with that job that I wasinterviewing for as the Vice
President for Advancement, whichoversaw communications and
(37:33):
marketing, governmentalrelations, fundraising,
athletics, printing andpublications, and I forgot what
else it had, but those were veryexternal facing operations.
Being able to be conversantabout what was going on in the
community, able to be conversantabout the state legislature and
its funding of higher educationwas really important.
(37:57):
Being able to talk about thesports teams, what had been
successful.
All those things were importanttopics that I knew would come up
in the course of my two days oncampus.
That was a good thing to do.
The other thing that I've beenknown to do, in fact, I've been
known to pay somebody to do itwhen I've been so busy.
I paid one of my studentassistants once.
(38:19):
I gave them the names of all thepeople I thought I would come in
contact with in a course of aninterview.
In fact, I even did this withODK, and I had her pull their
photos from, Google Images ortheir LinkedIn pages, get me
their LinkedIn.
Links and then basically writedown what their title was and
if, if she could find an onlinebiography.
(38:42):
And when I walked into theinterview, it was like,"Oh
Caroline, it's so nice meet you"And you know,'cause they knew
what I look like, right?
But to be able to, you know, andthen make small talk,
particularly if you're gonnahave a meal with somebody and to
know a little bit about them.
To be able to be genuine withpeople and have, you know, a
(39:03):
little curiosity about them, butknowing what the good questions
are to ask is always one ofthose things that I think is
really kind of important to do.
And then the other thing is thatit drives me absolutely nuts
every time this happens, but thefirst question a search
committee is almost always goingto ask is.
(39:24):
Why are you interested in thisopportunity at this particular
institution, this phase of yourcareer?
And if you can't answer thatwithout saying, oh, it's about
the salary, and I like thetitle, and oh, it's warmer here
than, and there's no snow, thatis, that, that question is all
about the institution.
They want to hear you say, andthis goes for a company, it goes
(39:44):
for a nonprofit organization.
They want to hear you say, Ireally wanna come serve this
great entity because I know thatit's going in this wonderful
direction.
And you can explain a couple ofthose things specifically.
And I wanna be a part of theteam that advances the interest
of this organization and makesit more successful.
And I just think that, I mayhave some skills that could be,
(40:08):
applied to this opportunity andI really wanna serve.
That question is how they vetwhether or not you're a good fit
for the institution.
And while I think fit issometimes code for reasons for
why people exclude candidatesbased on reasons like they
shouldn't, like gender, race,and ethnicity, I don't always
(40:28):
like the term fit, but fit canalso mean whether or not that
person is really gonna wannacome and be a part of the team
and contribute and be, a partnerwith others in making the place
a better place.
And I think that if you gottaget one question right, that's
the question to get right.
Caroline (40:47):
Yeah.
It's really not about you, it'sabout the organization.
It itself, you know, why are youinterested?
It's not your vision, buttheirs.
And if you join that company,that becomes your vision,
mission, values, all the thingsthat you're going for too.
Tara (41:01):
If they've got a strategic plan, mission, vision, and
values, you need to beconversant about those things
regardless of what kind ofentity that it happens to be.
Caroline (41:10):
Excellent.
So we've heard how to pre lookat people you might be meeting
with, get to know them beyondjust the title, but what do they
actually look like?
What are some other things youcan have in conversation?
How to prepare for thatbeginning question of, you know,
why are you interested?
What are some other things of,how else can people prepare for
(41:33):
interviews for specific jobs?
Tara (41:36):
Yeah, well, it's not so much the getting ready for the
interview as much as it is toget ready for the follow-up.
I'm a big believer in thank younotes.
I'm old school.
have lousy handwriting, so Idon't do them by, by handwriting
anymore, but I have been knownto, take the interview schedule,
(41:59):
get the email addresses for allthe people that I'm projected to
meet, including the student tourguide, and pre-draft a note that
would say, you know, dear Suzy,thank you for showing me around,
Enormous state university'sbeautiful campus.
I enjoyed hearing about why youchose the institution.
(42:20):
Note to self ask Suzy why shechose that institution.
So I'll come back to a,preparing your questions that
you're gonna ask during, in theinterview.
But go ahead and sort ofpre-draft those and then take
something that from thatconversation you had with Suzy
and put that personal detail inthere, but it doesn't hurt to go
(42:42):
ahead and have the whole thingsort of prepared in advance and
edited on the fly.
On the flight home, and getthose things out.
Maybe not the night you gethome, because that does seem a
little creepy to a degree.
But, you know, it's like cannedresponses.
But, you know, sometime in thefollowing day get those messages
(43:02):
out.
But, you know, edit them so thatthey come across as being
genuine, which they should be.
I said we get back to it.
Think about the questions you'regonna ask.
Okay?
Don't ask what are the benefitsthat stuff's on the human
resources page.
Ask about, the future directionof the organization, what are
(43:22):
the challenges?
If you're talking, to somebodywho would be your collegial
peer, ask them, what has beenyour greatest accomplishment to
date in your current role?
What has been your greatestchallenge?
What do you like best aboutworking here?
What is problematic for theinstitution?
And is there any way my skillsetmight be able to help?
(43:43):
Those are the kind of generalquestions you should ask.
And then the last thing youshould always ask is not so much
the question, but ask for thesale.
Before you leave the interview,make it clear that you are
interested in the job.
Tell the truth like I did withthe job and saying, I'm not
gonna get you on the nationalnews, but, but if it's a job you
(44:06):
want, say, I really wanna behere.
I've learned so much about theorganization over the last
couple of days.
I think it's, an invitingopportunity.
I, enjoyed the people that I'vemet.
I know there's some challenges,but I think I can help us all
rise.
And I wanna be a member of yourteam, ask for the sale, ask for
(44:28):
the opportunity to serve Andthat's an important thing to do.
Caroline (44:30):
So important, all other things being equal.
The person that asked for thejob is going to rise above the
other people that just said, oh,well, let me know.
You know, somebody that getsthings done asks for those
opportunities.
So, so good.
When you look back at yourcareer.
(44:52):
What are some of the momentsthat stand out as the most
meaningful for you?
Tara (44:58):
I was thinking about this the other day.
There are two sets of moments.
The first one, some of thepersonal relationships, I have a
former student assistant who isgetting ready to interview for a
college presidency.
She was working in my office oneyear.
She was on her way to spend,summer at the beach.
I have a friend who, was thehead of a program at a
(45:19):
university at the beach.
He hired her to, you know,basically folding stuff,
envelopes for that summer whenshe was between her junior and
senior year.
She got so interested in theprofession of student affairs by
hanging around the two of us.
She decided to get a master'sdegree.
We've kept in touch with her.
We're just, incredibly fond ofthis woman.
She actually happened to be ouradvisor for ODK at one of our
(45:41):
institutions I still think ofher as the 22-year-old, but
she's probably 52 now, and I amso proud of her.
And it's just, you know, Ilaugh, not the right word, but
she's one of my gifts to theprofession.
And I've worked with lots ofother young people, but she's my
gift to the profession becauseshe will be a president one day,
(46:04):
and she calls me up every sooften and asks for advice and
I'm going you've got this, youknow this, but she needs to talk
it through with somebody.
And I'm flattered that she stillthinks of me as her mentor.
What an honor.
That's one thing, the otherthing that I say all the time.
Is that I wanna leave anorganization in better shape
than I found it.
(46:25):
I've tried to make that thecase.
and I'll give you three reallyquick examples.
There's a sorority atLouisville, my sorority that got
established when I was incollege and I was a founding
member of that and had a fairamount to do with the
establishment of that particularchapter of that sorority.
It's still there.
I've been out of college formore than 40 years.
(46:45):
Tickles me to no end it's stillthere.
One of the institutions I servedwent through a mascot
transition, which is anexperience I would not wish upon
my worst enemy.
It was genuinely painful for theinstitution.
But when I go to that town thesedays and I see 20 years later
and I see the new mascot allover the place, I'm going like,
(47:06):
oh, I had something to do withthat.
And then with ODK, when Istarted the endowment was about
800,000.
And when I left it was 2.8million.
And that endowment, largelyfunds scholarships.
And scholarships are one of thethings that, being a member of
an organization that providesscholarships is an incentive to
(47:26):
join the organization.
And I just keep thinking thatthat's maybe one of the things
that I did to leave ODK inbetter shape than I found it.
Those are all really good thingsto remember.
The final thing along thatcourse of topic is that the way
you leave a job is really somuch more important than the way
(47:46):
you come into a position.
Because I learned at a fairlyearly age, in fact, when I was
leaving the associateregistrar's position in my early
thirties, there were severalpeople who kept handing me
matchbooks with the hope that Iwould burn down the bridges
behind me on their behalf.
Take the matchbooks, right?
(48:08):
Don't take the dynamite.
Don't take, you know, don'ttake, don't take the torch,
don't take that stuff.
walk out, you document as bestas you possibly can for your
successors.
and your, documentation is notjust for the person who will
step into whatever role youhave, but it is for everybody
else because institutionalmemory is important.
(48:30):
And your successor may ignorethe workbook that you left for
them, which did happen at onetime, but the number two in the
office used it all the time tofigure out how to do something.
But, you know, document, holdyour head high.
If you're leaving, even ifyou're being a little pushed
out, be gracious about stuff.
(48:51):
Thank people.
You may be celebrated, but it'sa great chance for you to
celebrate others that, havehelped you along the way.
Those are all just right thingsto do they show that you're a
class act.
I think all of our mothers andfathers would like us to be
class acts.
And if your children are yourretirement dinner, it provides a
(49:11):
good example to them about howthey manage that moment when it
comes their turn to retire.
Caroline (49:16):
Have you ever thought about, if you could go back to
your younger self, your 20something year old self, what
advice would you want to tellher, knowing what you know now?
Tara (49:30):
As I said earlier, to not be so naive.
Not to jump at an opportunityfor a title, or a salary and
pick your bosses carefully wouldbe that I would say is probably
most significant.
But then, there is a little bitof the, they say don't sweat the
small stuff.
And it's all small stuff.
(49:50):
that trivializes to a degree,some of the trauma that I think
many of us experience in thecourse of our career.
We've all had some hard moments.
We've lost colleaguesunexpectedly.
There has been a budgetarysituation, which has forced us
to reorganize and let goodpeople go.
There has been some other formof a crisis.
(50:11):
There has been, expectations notmet, and pressure your boss has
pressure on top of the pressurethat you're feeling.
And, sometimes things get saidin the heat of the moment.
And so I don't mean totrivialize some of the
experiences that we have thatare difficult, there is a part
of it.
Don't always take it asseriously as we sometimes want
(50:33):
to and to also think about yourcareer does not need to be as
linear as we all think that itdoes.
being administrative associateto academic advisor to associate
registrar to a VP for alumnirelations, to moving to the
development office and becomingthe head of corporate and
foundation relations because Ireally needed to raise money if
(50:53):
I was gonna be a vice presidenton my way to the presidency.
And then I went to be a vicepresident, and after three years
of being a vice president, Irealized my skin's not thick
enough to be a president.
And I decided that.
I moved to Chicago for love, and19 months later I moved away.
And when I made that move away19 months later.
I thought I'm pretty fragile atthis moment because my heart was
(51:16):
broken.
And I thought, well, what withinthe advancement world do I
really like?
And I thought, well, I reallylike the communications and
marketing piece.
I like fundraising, but Ireally, should have been an
editor if I'd known that was ajob.
I might've done it as a job.
Something that they don't tellyou in high school.
You know, I chose communicationsand marketing.
So I did a search incommunications and marketing, I
(51:39):
ended up with a job that Ireally, really liked at an
institution that I really liked.
And then, I saw the ODK job andactually I'd been interested
when it was open four yearsearlier, but I didn't have, so
many months to look for a job, Ineeded a job now.
Caroline (51:52):
Hmm.
Tara (51:53):
And the job I needed was a great job in many ways.
I had to laugh because there's agroup that does interim
placement within higher ed Itold them I thought I would be a
good interim placement as a VPfor advancement.
And they go, your career is justtoo all over the place.
I'm going like, you have no ideawhat I've done because you're
looking only at my titles.
(52:13):
But you know, careers are notnecessarily linear and sometimes
plan B or C or D or whatever,being adaptable is really
important and you know, youdon't always have to go in a
straight line and you might endup with the most rewarding
opportunity you can imagine,which is what I ended up with,
(52:35):
Omicron Delta Kappa.
And it was something that Iwould've never really about if I
hadn't sort of meandered throughthe way, through the years.
I'd actually been an ODK advisorwhen I was the vice president
for advancement.
It was like, oh wow, this iskind of cool.
You end up often where youbelong, but you don't
necessarily end up there on theroute you intended.
Caroline (52:57):
Now, how can people find out more about your work or
connect with you?
Tara (53:02):
I love LinkedIn.
I'm on it all the time.
And I think I'm one of the fewTara Singers, but you'll see the
Louisville stuff so that you'llknow that's me.
And academicsearch.org, is ourpractices website and we have
team bios and so you can find myteam bio there.
Feel free to reach out.
I like helping people,regardless of whether or not
(53:25):
they're really considering acareer on higher-ed or nonprofit
administration, I find that I'mdoing a fair amount of informal
coaching and just sort of tipsfor searching.
And I enjoy that tremendously ascheering people on, as they're
exploring the next phase oftheir leadership journeys.
Caroline (53:41):
Oh, all the more reason we're so aligned.
I, I'm big on, as you know,authentic success.
And authentic success is howeveryou define it.
So how do you define authenticsuccess for you in this moment?
Tara (53:57):
I'm doing something I find meaningful.
I'm doing for an organizationthat I think is a leader, as I
know is a leadership developmentorganization, which I find
meaningful.
I'm kind of doing it at the paceand the schedule that after 40
years of working a lot of hours,I am grateful to have time, with
(54:20):
my sweetheart, now my fiance andtime with my children and,
actually our five childrenbetween the two of us and
granddaughter.
And I'm so blessed to haveliving parents who are well into
their eighties and having thatflexibility to, be close to
friends and family and have timefor them, but still do
generative work.
(54:41):
I serve as a board officer forthe local performing arts
center.
I really enjoy, sharing myknowledge about nonprofit
administration, through that.
It's just giving back.
A wonderful family.
I've had a great life and I'vehad this great career and I've
been so fortunate to have goodfriends, to walk with me along
(55:03):
my journey, it's now time to payit forward, but I'm glad to not
be doing it full time.
Caroline (55:09):
Thank you so, so very much, Tara, for sharing part of
your story, for part of thesearch tips, interview tips,
wonderful life advice, and forsharing your version of
authentic success.
And it sounds like you are goingto be quite busy, with all the
things coming up, fiance'sbecome spouses and,
Tara (55:32):
They do.
And even at, 65 and 68, which wewill be next year, we're having
a wedding.
I will say I'm having so muchfun planning this, it's a whole
lot different than when I was 21and 22.
If I want fried chicken at thereception, we're gonna have
fried chicken at the reception.
Caroline (55:49):
I love it.
Tara (55:49):
So
Caroline (55:50):
I love it.
Well, thank you again forsharing so much with our
audience, and I wish you justcontinued amazing happiness and
success.
Tara's story is a reminder thatsuccess isn't just about
collecting titles.
It's about collecting wisdom.
Every season of your careerholds lessons if you're willing
(56:11):
to pause and listen.
If you'd like to connect withTara, please find her on
LinkedIn or atacademicsearch.org.
Tara (56:20):
Thanks for listening to Your Next Success with Dr.
Caroline Sangal.
Remember, authentic success isyours to define and includes
aligning your career to supportthe life you want.
What if your next big career decision wasn't about
climbing higher, but choosingwiser?
After more than 40 years inhigher education, Dr.
Tara Singer has seen the fullspectrum of leadership, great
mentors and tough bosses, leapsof faith and gut wrenching calls
to walk away.
(00:25):
In this conversation, she sharesthe wisdom that only comes from
a lifetime of leading, learning,and listening to your own
intuition.
This is the Your Next Successpodcast, and I'm your host, Dr.
Caroline Sangal.
I'm a life first career coachand strategist on a mission to
normalize questioning yourcareer because I believe each of
(00:48):
us is made on purpose for apurpose only we can fulfill.
The longer we live out ofalignment with who we are, what
we do best, and why we're here,the more we miss out.
And the more the world missesout on what only we can give.
The Your Next Success Podcast iswhere we explore how to build a
(01:10):
career that truly fuels yourlife.
We talk about self-discovery,smart job, search strategies,
professional growth, and you'llhear stories from people who've
navigated big career transitionsthemselves so you can see what
it's really like to make boldchanges and feel inspired to
(01:31):
create your own version ofauthentic success, one that is
aligned, meaningful, and trulyyours.
Dr.
Tara S Singer is a highereducation leader and president
emerita of Omicron Delta Kappa,National Leadership honorary,
where she served as CEO for adecade and led its first
(01:53):
multimillion dollar campaign.
Today, she's a senior consultantwith Academic Search, guiding
executive hires and leadershipdevelopment across colleges and
universities after a 40 yearcareer in advancement,
communications, and studentaffairs.
In this episode, you will learn: why the right boss can make or (02:11):
undefined
break your career.
How to read the red and yellowflags.
Your intuition is alreadyshowing you.
What"leaving things better thanyou found them really looks like
in leadership."
Caroline (02:28):
Welcome Tara to Your Next Success.
I am so excited for thisconversation.
Tara (02:36):
Well, it is my pleasure to be here and I've been looking
forward to it for several weeks,
Caroline (02:40):
Let's try to go back to the beginning.
As you know, I wanna talk aboutcareers and career transitions,
and we have some other thingsplanned for this conversation.
Helpful tips for people forinterviews and their careers but
let's go back to the beginning.
You had a successful career inhigher education doing amazing
things, but when you think abouthow it all started, was there
(03:04):
any key moment that nudged youtoward that type of a career?
Tara (03:09):
In essence, I went into the family business.
My mother was in student affairsat the University of Louisville,
and my father was on the facultyand the university was a subject
of dinner table conversation aslong as I can remember.
The neighbors were the graduatedean, the law school dean.
The university was a big deal.
The thing I always remember isthat my mother with her student
(03:30):
affairs job was always veryhappy.
Loved working with students,loved working with her fellow
administrators, and my fatherwas like many faculty of his
generation, not always thehappiest camper.
There was always that pressureto publish or perish, get
research dollars, fight the goodfight in terms of educational
policy.
When I went off to college, Iknew that I wanted to have a
(03:53):
career in higher education, butI thought I would follow my
mother's path, throughadministration and starting out
in student affairs.
Interestingly enough, my kid'ssister decided to follow my
father's path, and she's afaculty member at Wayne state.
And it's fun to haveconversations these days because
now we're replicating, I'mreplicating mom and she's
replicating dad.
Caroline (04:14):
Did you ever think about not going to the
University of Louisville?
Tara (04:17):
I looked at a couple of other institutions, but in
essence, the university wasfree.
My father with the tuition andremission program, had tuition
benefits for us.
When I got my master's degree, Ionly paid for six credit hours
and I was working for theuniversity full-time, I was,
working on my doctorate, and Ionly had to pay for 16 hours of
(04:38):
that.
So I have three degrees from theUniversity of Louisville with
only having paid for a total of22 credit hours in the entire
process.
Caroline (04:46):
Wow, that's amazing.
Some people say it's like thegolden handcuffs, you know, as,
as far as people having childrenand, and then not going anywhere
else because they could go therebut that's amazing that you grew
up in that environment andthrived we're able to not only
get into higher education, butadvance in higher education,
now, what was your first realopportunity for advancement?
Tara (05:09):
When I was a junior in college, I was doing tour guides
on tours, campus tours on theweekend for football recruits,
baseball recruits, volleyballrecruits.
The baseball coach, who was alsothe head of athletic academic
advising, asked me if I knew howto type.
And I said, well, sure.
And he goes, well, do you need ajob?
And I said, well, I would behappy to have a job.
(05:29):
And I went to work in athleticacademic advising as a junior in
college.
Eventually, there was a newperson in that role, one of my
great mentors, a gentleman namedDr.
Steve Millburn.
I got my master's degree workingin that office, and that was my
first full-time job.
Working in athletic academicadvising where I ran orientation
(05:50):
programs and tutoring programsfor student athletes.
I had just finished my master'sdegree, in January of one year,
and Steve put on my deskinternal jobs announcement for
the university community, and hecircled a job which said
associate registrar, and hewrote across it, apply.
(06:11):
I looked at the job requirementsand I'm going, well, I don't
really know what the registrar'soffice is, but I know it's where
transcripts come from.
And, where the grades come fromand it's where diplomas come
from.
Looking at the skills requiredand the experiences required.
And I'm going, oh, I've doneevent planning, I've done
publication editing.
I've helped students figure outtheir academic progression.
(06:34):
I've looked at their transfercredits and tried to figure out
how those would fit with theuniversity.
And I thought.
Well, maybe I could do this.
And I've often thought about howSteve putting that job notice on
my desk, advanced my career.
And I have tried to do the samething with my own employees
through the years, identifyingthose promotional opportunities
(06:56):
for them because we all need togrow and be challenged in the
future.
And for me, it's been paying itforward because that was the
move in my career that reallyadvanced my career and helped me
launch me into the long-termcareer in higher education.
Caroline (07:13):
And what a great example of him as a manager too,
right?
sometimes there's a manager or aleader who loves the work that
an employee is doing and wantsto just keep them in that for
the foreseeable future.
But then there are some that seebeyond and really want the best
for you and the best for yourpotential and the best for your
(07:33):
expansion.
So that was amazing that he didthat and that's also amazing
that you carried that forward,and I'm sure, helped others to
see beyond their initial scope.
Tara (07:44):
Sometimes we, outgrow the nest and need to be kicked out
of the nest so we can learn tofly on our own.
Typically, I found that withemployees in their twenties and
thirties who are still growingand maturing and exploring their
career options, they wanna learnabout a different area of the
(08:04):
organization and maybe serve inthat area rather than being
specific to one thing.
Now, I also have colleagues thathave said, oh, I just wanna be a
dean of students and just be adean of students.
Does not accurately reflect whatit is to be a dean of students
'cause that's a big job.
There's no just be a dean ofstudents.
But there are people who wannabe experts in one area, you
(08:28):
learn about yourself and whatyou wanna do when you have
opportunities to get out of thenest and fly on your own for a
little while and go seedifferent locations and have
different experiences, which iswhy I think it's a very
generative thing to do, is toencourage, employees who are in
the early stages of their careerto explore their options and to
look beyond what they'recurrently doing.
Caroline (08:49):
Did you ever have a specific, instance of when you
saw the next step for somebodybefore they saw it?
Tara (08:57):
Absolutely.
When I was at the University ofWest Georgia, the number two
position in our department, wasopen and the department was the
Division of UniversityAdvancement.
We had an AVP open forfundraising and that person was
the executive director of thefoundation.
When I had come to theuniversity, there was this
(09:18):
younger faculty member, althoughhe was full professor at a
fairly early age in chemistry,and he kind of had college
president written all over him.
He just had all the skills.
He knew how to make an apology.
He knew how to give a speech, Hehad worked in student affairs on
an interim basis and had reallybegun to understand the dynamics
(09:40):
of working with undergraduatestudents as well as graduate
students.
And he wanted another interimappointment and I thought, well,
okay, he's the smartest thingI've met around here.
Let's just put him in for oneyear as the Associate Vice
President for development andexecutive director of the
foundation, after one year weput him in the job permanently.
Caroline (10:03):
Wow.
Tara (10:03):
He was a chemistry professor.
Given your background, he was achemistry professor! And I
always joked about the fact thatAndy knew how to change, straw
into gold with his chemistrybackground, and he was very
effective as a fundraiser.
He just retired as theChancellor of the University of
Wisconsin at Oshkosh.
I was so delighted and I got togo to his inauguration, and to
(10:26):
see how he had gone from being,you know, sort of a young
fireball faculty member to beinga, a serious administrator who
was the steward of hisinstitution and did a great job,
as Chancellor at Oshkosh and ledit through some really difficult
times.
Caroline (10:42):
Now this kind of brings to mind like if you see
opportunities before others seethem for themselves and you're
helping their growth, how do youdecide whether you should pursue
something or not?
When you're unsure of exactlywhat it entails what advice do
you have for that?
Tara (11:00):
Look at transferable skills.
A lot of jobs that have weirdtitles.
but always take a really goodlook at what are the
requirements for the job, notjust the years of experience
and, the academic degreerequirements, but what does the
job really do?
And in this day and time, youcan take a position description
(11:24):
or a job posting and your resumeand put it all into ChatGPT and
ChatGPT will tell you how you'requalified for the job or not.
And you can use those talkingpoints in your cover letter.
You can use them when you govisit with a search committee.
But then there's the other thingabout once you get to that point
(11:44):
where you're actuallyinterviewing for an opportunity,
you probably need to do a lotmore research in order to be
able to articulate to others whomay not necessarily see that you
are the ideal candidate or atleast a viable candidate for a
position.
That research activity is reallyimportant because it not only
(12:06):
helps you get ready for thatinterview, it builds your
confidence, but it also meansthat you're not wasting
anybody's time and they take youseriously.
There are lots of questions thatyou have to be able to answer in
an interview process for peopleto see you as a viable,
reasonable, and seriouscandidate for a job, rather than
somebody who just wanted to goto rural Georgia for the
(12:27):
afternoon and spend it with awhole bunch of people you've
never met before.
Caroline (12:31):
I like to try to help people understand that when
you're going for an interview,you wanna also consider the
interviewer's perspective.
And they wanna be finding notonly somebody qualified for the
role, but thinking this is asafe bet.
So as much as you can draw theline from your past to their
compelling future and how whatyou've done sets you up for the
(12:52):
role.
And even if you haven't donesomething, don't say you didn't
do something.
Tell about the related thingsthat you did do.
So like you with the eventplanning and what you had done
and how that sets you up forsuccess for the future.
So really good tips.
Thank you for those.
You've stepped into so manydifferent types of leadership
roles, what has surprised youmost about some of those
(13:16):
transitions?
Tara (13:21):
To a degree how naive I've been, which is hard to admit.
And, but it's not so hard at 64.
If I had a chance to go back andtalk to my younger self, I might
say, is that don't be in such ahurry to take a job because you
want a title or a paycheck, butyou really need to choose your
(13:41):
bosses carefully.
I was very fortunate early in mycareer to have two exceptional
supervisors, dear friends tothis day.
Later in my career, I wantedresources that came with a job.
I had become a single motheralong the way, although my boys
(14:01):
father is an absolute greatfather to the kids, but I needed
a better paycheck.
I had this career path in mindwhere I thought I would be a
college president by the time Iwas of a certain age.
I was on this very linear pathfor a long time.
I discovered I had a knack fornot choosing the best boss.
(14:24):
And that one should probablyreally make a well-informed
decision before going to workfor somebody directly.
Being naive, I never reallythought about how that person,
although I'd had two greatexamples, how that person who is
(14:45):
my supervisor, might not be thebest person for me in the long
run.
I'll give you a story that oneof them actually said to me.
He had been a division onehockey coach before he became an
alumni director and a vicepresident for advancement.
And one day he said to me, hegoes, Tara, I learned with my
hockey players that some of themwell to being yelled at, and
(15:09):
some of them just fall apart.
And he goes, that I'm in adifferent kind of role, I have
to remember that just don'talways respond well to being
yelled at.
I'm thinking like, yeah, me, forexample, it does me no good.
It shuts me down.
What I would just say to myyounger self is, be very
(15:29):
particular about whose applecart you're gonna hitch your
apple cart to and you know, rideoff into the sunset with,
because that person can do a lotcan make you or break you.
And that's not justprofessionally; they can do a
lot to make you or break youpersonally.
(15:50):
One of my favorite lines that Ilearned after having worked for
several years for somebody whoapparently did not need sleep
was that, for years, I would askthe question, after that, tell
me about the sleep patterns ofthe university president or the
vice president or whoever itwas.
Because if they didn't sleep, ifthey didn't have hobbies, if
(16:13):
they didn't have, much of afamily, they were gonna be
somewhat all consuming.
And I had hobbies and I had afamily and I had other things
that which I was interested inand I need sleep! And therefore,
I think it's a valid questionfor some people because it let
you know, and it's like, okay,how do I fit with this person?
(16:36):
They may be, the world's bestenrollment manager, but if they
don't fit with me and I don'tfit with them, it's maybe going
to be a tenuous relationship atbest.
And that's just some hard earnedwisdom I've acquired.
Caroline (16:52):
So how do you ask, I guess you, you figure out from
your examples, what weresticking points or what made a
boss not so great, and thentrying to find a way to have an
open-ended question to let thosecharacteristics come through in
an interview?
Because how do you balance that?
Wanting to get a title or a jobor a position wanting that
(17:14):
advancement on paper andlearning, you know, kind of try
before you buy, learning moreabout their leadership style and
how well you may or may not meshwith that.
Tara (17:24):
Well, I once went to a presentation where the woman
said, there's great power inasking questions.
You know, we can talk more aboutactually asking questions in a
formal interview setting.
But if you're walking aroundwith somebody who's gonna be
your peer, your colleague, notnecessarily, you know, you don't
ask the boss how many hourssleep do they get?
(17:45):
But you ask, sort of the gentlesoftball question about what is
the culture of the institutionand the organization.
Tell me about after five.
Tell me about the weekends inthis institutional environment.
Are Slack messages coming inleft and right?
Are you getting text messages?
Are you getting emails at allhours of the day or night?
What is it really like to be amember of this team.
(18:06):
There are subtle ways of askingthat rather than being so
direct, the other thing you haveto really think about is, are
you going to be successful?
And often what I would say isthat your spidey sense is going
to tell you whether or not thisis a good environment for you.
And I love telling this storyabout, I had interviewed for a
(18:30):
position vice president forcommunications and marketing at
a regional institution, and oneis it's a vice president's job,
and the president wouldn't meetwith the two finalists.
I didn't take that to be areally good sign.
Because you know, you're gonnabe a direct report to this
person and you're not gonnavisit with them during your
campus interview?
(18:51):
Thinking this doesn't quite feelright to me.
And then communications andmarketing.
If you wanna market aninstitution and help drive
enrollment and fundraising, youmight need some resources.
And I had asked about, well,what is the budget for
advertising?
And they told me the budget, andit was, it was woefully
(19:12):
inadequate.
And I had worked at regionalinstitutions with not a lot of
money, but this was nothingshort of appalling about how
little it was.
And at some point I'm with thesearch committee and they said,
well, how are you gonna get usin the national news?
And by this time, it's towardthe end of day and a half on
(19:33):
campus.
And it's already occurred to me,this is not gonna work.
And I said, well, unless we havea major crisis on campus, I'm
not going to get us on thenational news.
Because Enormous StateUniversity, which is curing
cancer, which is 17 miles away,makes the national news and they
have a D-1 football program, andthey're not a former teacher's
(19:57):
college and they're doing majorresearch and oh, by the way,
they're in a million dollarcampaign, and they are
30-minutes closest to the majorregional city where there is a
television station and anewspaper.
I'm going, we're not gonna geton the national news.
And they looked at me and theywere a little taken aback.
(20:18):
And by that time I just said,this is not, this is not right
the association and governingboards provides a mentoring
service, the individual who wasa mentor had been a former
president at my then currentinstitution, and I sent this
individual an email dear John,there's no budget, president
(20:40):
won't meet.
I just don't think this feelsgood.
My gut tells me to run.
And I got this very discreetmessage back.
Your gut is wise.
And I'm thinking, you know, weshould sometimes listen to our
guts because, you know, peoplesay gut decisions.
Well, your gut is really the sumof all of your experiences and
(21:01):
your knowledge.
It's not just some floatyfeeling of butterflies in your
stomach.
It really is your background,your experiences, your
understanding, and it willinform your decisions if you
only let it.
Caroline (21:16):
Mm, so wise.
So yes, the visceral reactionsyou have in your body are trying
to give you a message, and thetimes that I did override those.
I learned later.
Oh, that was even in interviews.
The times that I like, oh nah,that's not a big thing.
(21:37):
That's a yellow flag.
Yellow flags become red flagswhen you let them.
So tell me a little bit aboutwhat you're doing now.
What opened the door to yourcurrent chapter after all your
successful years and now what?
Tara (21:55):
Yeah.
I'm presently a seniorconsultant with a search
practice called Academic Search,and I had known for years that I
had really wanted to doexecutive search work in higher
ed as this sort of phase of mycareer.
And I had spent a fair amount oftime over my last five years
with Omicron Delta Kappavisiting with people from
(22:19):
different practices.
We had a number of volunteersthat worked for some of the
major, search organizations inthis country, I really wanted to
work with one that wasspecifically higher ed focused
and what I love about ourparticular entity is that we are
a mission-driven organization.
The proceeds that we raise, inaddition to paying our salaries,
(22:41):
fund the American AcademicLeadership Institute and AALI
supports schools from theCouncil of Independent Colleges,
which are lots of liberal artsinstitutions across the country.
And then the Association ofState Colleges and Universities,
which are a lot of regionalinstitutions.
And those were the institutionsthat I served and I love serving
(23:03):
most of all, or regional firstgeneration serving residential
campuses.
We do leadership developmentprograms and we help people,
explore whether or not theywanna experience careers on
further advancement in highereducation and we have a becoming
a provost academy and we have amanaging the presidential search
process.
The irony of all this is thatthe COO and the CEO are both
(23:27):
Omicron Delta Kappa members, asare about 15 other people and we
have an annual retreat and it'sall kumbaya, as far as I'm
concerned, these are my people.
And we talk about the future ofthe academy.
We talk about students, we talkabout political pressures, we
(23:47):
talk about doing excellent workand search.
We talk about treatingcandidates the way that we wanna
be treated.
We talk about helping peoplepursue their next opportunities.
And we talk about helping ourinstitutional partners identify,
you know, there.
It's always one hire, but wehelp them identify, hopefully a
(24:08):
group of people that they wouldbe willing to consider and are
viable candidates who might bereally great for the
institution, if not today,someday.
And we are a leadershipdevelopment organization and,
and therefore, having come outof Omicron Delta Kappa, the
National Leadership HonorSociety, working for a
(24:28):
leadership developmentorganization is really important
to me.
Caroline (24:32):
That's so great.
You're still developing leaders,helping leaders, serving leaders
while also, you know, it's likelifting as you all climb.
That's so cool.
You've seen a lot of resumes,CVs, throughout your time so I'm
curious, what makes someonestand out to you, not just on
paper, but as a leader?
(24:53):
What are those characteristicsthat fog the mirror if you will.
Tara (24:59):
Yeah.
I tend to be net picky aboutediting.
It's just my thing.
And I get teased about it allthe time.
But often your writing is areflection of your seriousness,
and a well-written resume,vitae, cover letter.
All those things are reallyimportant and they should follow
(25:23):
some style guide, AP, MLA,something they should be
consistent.
But what is really important tome is that if you've seen a job
posting and you're tweaking yourresume, and you know, there's a
lot to be said for having astandard resume or a vita with a
(25:44):
section at the beginning, whichhighlights your accomplishments,
and that way people don't haveto dig past page one to figure
out whether or not theexpectations of the position are
aligned with what you've done.
I wanna see that on the firstpage.
That's always a good indication.
I wanna see that in your coverletter.
(26:05):
a cover letter which is alignedwith the resume or vita and the
summary of qualifications andaccomplishments is always a good
thing.
I just think people can't belazy about that because
particularly in an academicenvironment, we want you to show
some level of education andsophistication and, you need to,
(26:26):
you know, write well.
And Grammarly helps with thatthing.
And, and Grammarly is another AItool that I use all the time.
I use it when I'm composingletters to family.
It just makes communication soclear.
And the thing that we do day inand day out in all of our jobs
is communicate.
(26:48):
Send emails, we send textmessages, we share information
with our employees, we shareinformation with our
supervisors.
We share information with thoseindividuals we serve.
We communicate in one's abilityto communicate effectively and
in coherently is reallyimportant, and that's often what
(27:09):
I look for when I see documentscoming across my desk.
Caroline (27:12):
How about when somebody's in a job search or
thinking of starting a jobsearch?
What best practices have youlearned or, or what stands out
for that as far as like whatactually works when starting a
job search?
Tara (27:34):
Taking it seriously.
I often say that if you arepresently gainfully unemployed,
your job is looking for a joband you should sit down at your
home office desk or you go towherever you'd like to work and
you actually do work.
Panera, you know, some othercoffee house.
There was a local pub where Iworked on Fridays for years.
(27:55):
It was my workspace.
I would go there for four hoursand I just got accustomed to
working there.
So you go to wherever yourworkspace is and you sit down
and you approach it like it'syour job.
Caroline (28:08):
Imagine what your life would be like if your career
aligned with who you are, whatyou do best, and actually fueled
the life you want.
At Next Success, we support allages and stages through career
transitions from studentsexploring majors or careers to
job seekers actively searchingor re-imagining their next move
(28:30):
to professionals committed toself-awareness and leadership
growth.
Stay connected and explorewhat's possible at
nextsuccesscareers.com andfollow@nextsuccessmethod on
LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram,and Facebook.
Tara (28:50):
But I always caution individuals to, if you're
presently employed, set asidetime when you're not, you can go
back to your office desk, butdon't do it.
You know, Monday through Friday,eight to five 30, I used to joke
about leaving church, andwalking across the street to
where my office was, and I wouldsit down on Sunday afternoon and
I would do a job search onoccasion.
(29:11):
You know, you have to set asidetime to do it.
That's one thing.
The other thing is that in thisday and time positions don't
just get posted in the localnewspaper and within higher
education anymore.
As budgets are shrinking for anynumber of reasons, people are
not spending money advertisingin the Chronicle of Higher
(29:34):
Education or higher ed jobs orwhatever else.
They're only posting on theirwebsite or they're posting on
LinkedIn and, and you have tosort of look at places other
than just the trade publicationsor LinkedIn or the local
newspaper.
You might have to go to thewebsite for the institution or
(29:54):
the organization.
And it never hurts to identifythree to five places where you
think you might wanna work and,and then sit down once a week
and check their website to seeis there something there where
I've, there's a job that I mightbe interested in that might
align with my skillset?
And particularly if you'reneeding to move for family
(30:16):
reasons, which is part of thereason I ended up in Virginia.
I did a regional job search andended up with a dream job.
But I was looking atinstitutions and organizations
here in the Commonwealth becauseI needed to move for reasons of
family.
But I was finding that many ofthe jobs were not posted in
those trade publications becausepeople couldn't afford to do it,
(30:40):
which is why you have to dig.
And the other thing that Ilearned to do was that I went
and knocked on doors, notliterally, but I did send emails
and going.
Hi, I'm going to be in, youknow, Charlottesville, Virginia,
visiting with my aunt and uncle,and I'm looking to relocate
because of some family healthissues.
And I was honest about it.
(31:02):
And I would like to come learnabout your institution and your
division of Student AffairsInstitutional Advancement.
I would just go say"Hi, tell meabout your career" I would
interview them in many ways,just sort of like you and I
having this conversation.
How did you end up here?
What is the greatest thing aboutyour institution?
(31:23):
What do you see as the futurefor the school and those
information interviews didn'tnecessarily get me a job, but
they built my network becauseonce I finally had a job, I was
able to go back and say, oh,I've had such a nice, so nice to
visit with you a couple yearsago.
And by the way, now I'm in thisrole and your office supports
this organization.
(31:44):
Can you help?
Caroline (31:45):
Yes.
Tara (31:46):
And therefore, those were good investments in time.
But they, they didn't exactlywork out the way I'd initially
planned, but they worked outwell in terms of a long-term
career strategy because they'realso now people that I can go
back to and say, Hey, youhiring?
Do you need some search work?
You know, a search firm toassist you.
Caroline (32:05):
Ah, so good.
Yeah, so what I heard from thatis there's a lot of proactive
work that can be done.
Firstly, identifying where mightyou want to be, what are the
institutions or companies thatare in that area.
Secondly, getting find a way totry to visit while you're in the
area or reaching out to peopleand genuinely taking an interest
(32:29):
in them and their career.
Because if you do all of thosethings naturally, it can turn
around to what would you like todo next?
How could they possibly help younow or in the future, but really
being intentional about yoursearch, building your network.
And then do you follow up withthem every so often or you let
(32:50):
it go for a couple years?
How, what's the right frequency?
Tara (32:54):
Within the academic search world experience within our
practice.
What I am doing these days isI've got an awful lot of Google
alerts and some of thoseinstitutions or individuals that
I've built a relationship withover the course of time who
might be looking for searchcounsel, I have them pop up on
(33:17):
my Google alerts.
I check my Google alerts once aday.
I mean, I probably have about 80of them.
If something pops up and it'sgood, bad, or ugly, I will send
a contact, a note saying, HeyI'm sorry you lost a student, or
congratulations on securing thegrant.
Or, hang in there.
(33:37):
Hang in there has gotten to besort of my favorite message of
late.
And let me know if there'sanything I can do to assist you,
even if you just wanna chat.
Lots of colleagues need some,you know, lifting up and,
cheering on these days.
And, just a way of a staying intouch with people that I
consider to be friends.
They're not necessarily closefriends, but they've been
(34:00):
colleague friends that, some ofthese people I've known for 40
plus years.
And, I do care about them and wesee them on Facebook and the
interest is genuine.
It's not really about businessdevelopment.
Yes, there's a strategy to itusing Google alerts, but as much
as it is, it is about just beinga decent person and keeping in
(34:22):
touch with people who have beenwalking with me on my journey
and I've been walking with themon theirs.
Caroline (34:28):
I like that idea about the Google alerts for staying
organized what about for jobsearches?
How can somebody make that moremanageable or not overwhelming?
Tara (34:38):
Moral story is you can probably tailor a Google alert
for the kinds of positions inwhich you're searching for, but
lots of institutions have,postings, they'll send you a
notice, you can sign up forpostings with a variety of the
higher ed, trade publications.
And that those ways they kind ofshow up in your mailbox,
(35:02):
quickly.
But I still think that youreally pretty much have to do
the heavy lifting yourself.
That technology can help you toa degree, but if you are
actively searching, you have togo look at where those positions
are posted and you are gonnahave to maybe look beyond a
trade publication or a newspaperor LinkedIn.
As I said, you may have to golook specifically at that
(35:23):
organization.
Caroline (35:24):
Then once you find something that does look
interesting, sparks yourinterest, how do you then move
from, you're looking forsomething to try to get in
process now, how do you prepare?
How do you prepare to apply orget in that job search?
Tara (35:42):
Yes.
Yeah, i'm often amazed at howpoorly people interview.
Some people are really good atit.
In fact, some people are so goodat it that they get referred to
within our practice, as maybegame show host, because they are
just, and you get a car and youget a car and they're so at
(36:02):
saying all the right things, butthey maybe are not the best
candidate for the position thatthe organization is looking for.
And they may not be the loudestvoice in the room.
You know, I'm a classic e on theMyers-Briggs scale.
I'm a chatty Kathy, butsometimes, particularly within
the institutional advancementworld, a quiet, more reserved
(36:25):
person is often a much betterfundraiser because they're a
really good listener and peoplewho are not always sort of rah
rah, rah.
They're not necessarily shy,they just get their energy maybe
from being not in front ofpeople all the time, they can be
exceptional leaders, but theymay not be exactly what you
(36:47):
think that job's supposed to be.
I hope institutions pay moreattention to the substance of
the individuals that they'respending time with as
candidates, but there is so muchyou can do to get ready for an
interview that you will reallysort of hit it out of the park
using another cliche.
When I got ready to interviewfor, my position at West
(37:11):
Georgia, subscribed to the localnewspaper for about two weeks
before my interview because Iknew I had the interview in two
weeks.
And it was an onlinesubscription, which you can do
these days.
So it wasn't necessarily gettingmailed to my, mailbox 500 miles
away.
But with that job that I wasinterviewing for as the Vice
President for Advancement, whichoversaw communications and
(37:33):
marketing, governmentalrelations, fundraising,
athletics, printing andpublications, and I forgot what
else it had, but those were veryexternal facing operations.
Being able to be conversantabout what was going on in the
community, able to be conversantabout the state legislature and
its funding of higher educationwas really important.
(37:57):
Being able to talk about thesports teams, what had been
successful.
All those things were importanttopics that I knew would come up
in the course of my two days oncampus.
That was a good thing to do.
The other thing that I've beenknown to do, in fact, I've been
known to pay somebody to do itwhen I've been so busy.
I paid one of my studentassistants once.
(38:19):
I gave them the names of all thepeople I thought I would come in
contact with in a course of aninterview.
In fact, I even did this withODK, and I had her pull their
photos from, Google Images ortheir LinkedIn pages, get me
their LinkedIn.
Links and then basically writedown what their title was and
if, if she could find an onlinebiography.
(38:42):
And when I walked into theinterview, it was like,"Oh
Caroline, it's so nice meet you"And you know,'cause they knew
what I look like, right?
But to be able to, you know, andthen make small talk,
particularly if you're gonnahave a meal with somebody and to
know a little bit about them.
To be able to be genuine withpeople and have, you know, a
(39:03):
little curiosity about them, butknowing what the good questions
are to ask is always one ofthose things that I think is
really kind of important to do.
And then the other thing is thatit drives me absolutely nuts
every time this happens, but thefirst question a search
committee is almost always goingto ask is.
(39:24):
Why are you interested in thisopportunity at this particular
institution, this phase of yourcareer?
And if you can't answer thatwithout saying, oh, it's about
the salary, and I like thetitle, and oh, it's warmer here
than, and there's no snow, thatis, that, that question is all
about the institution.
They want to hear you say, andthis goes for a company, it goes
(39:44):
for a nonprofit organization.
They want to hear you say, Ireally wanna come serve this
great entity because I know thatit's going in this wonderful
direction.
And you can explain a couple ofthose things specifically.
And I wanna be a part of theteam that advances the interest
of this organization and makesit more successful.
And I just think that, I mayhave some skills that could be,
(40:08):
applied to this opportunity andI really wanna serve.
That question is how they vetwhether or not you're a good fit
for the institution.
And while I think fit issometimes code for reasons for
why people exclude candidatesbased on reasons like they
shouldn't, like gender, race,and ethnicity, I don't always
(40:28):
like the term fit, but fit canalso mean whether or not that
person is really gonna wannacome and be a part of the team
and contribute and be, a partnerwith others in making the place
a better place.
And I think that if you gottaget one question right, that's
the question to get right.
Caroline (40:47):
Yeah.
It's really not about you, it'sabout the organization.
It itself, you know, why are youinterested?
It's not your vision, buttheirs.
And if you join that company,that becomes your vision,
mission, values, all the thingsthat you're going for too.
Tara (41:01):
If they've got a strategic plan, mission, vision, and
values, you need to beconversant about those things
regardless of what kind ofentity that it happens to be.
Caroline (41:10):
Excellent.
So we've heard how to pre lookat people you might be meeting
with, get to know them beyondjust the title, but what do they
actually look like?
What are some other things youcan have in conversation?
How to prepare for thatbeginning question of, you know,
why are you interested?
What are some other things of,how else can people prepare for
(41:33):
interviews for specific jobs?
Tara (41:36):
Yeah, well, it's not so much the getting ready for the
interview as much as it is toget ready for the follow-up.
I'm a big believer in thank younotes.
I'm old school.
have lousy handwriting, so Idon't do them by, by handwriting
anymore, but I have been knownto, take the interview schedule,
(41:59):
get the email addresses for allthe people that I'm projected to
meet, including the student tourguide, and pre-draft a note that
would say, you know, dear Suzy,thank you for showing me around,
Enormous state university'sbeautiful campus.
I enjoyed hearing about why youchose the institution.
(42:20):
Note to self ask Suzy why shechose that institution.
So I'll come back to a,preparing your questions that
you're gonna ask during, in theinterview.
But go ahead and sort ofpre-draft those and then take
something that from thatconversation you had with Suzy
and put that personal detail inthere, but it doesn't hurt to go
(42:42):
ahead and have the whole thingsort of prepared in advance and
edited on the fly.
On the flight home, and getthose things out.
Maybe not the night you gethome, because that does seem a
little creepy to a degree.
But, you know, it's like cannedresponses.
But, you know, sometime in thefollowing day get those messages
(43:02):
out.
But, you know, edit them so thatthey come across as being
genuine, which they should be.
I said we get back to it.
Think about the questions you'regonna ask.
Okay?
Don't ask what are the benefitsthat stuff's on the human
resources page.
Ask about, the future directionof the organization, what are
(43:22):
the challenges?
If you're talking, to somebodywho would be your collegial
peer, ask them, what has beenyour greatest accomplishment to
date in your current role?
What has been your greatestchallenge?
What do you like best aboutworking here?
What is problematic for theinstitution?
And is there any way my skillsetmight be able to help?
(43:43):
Those are the kind of generalquestions you should ask.
And then the last thing youshould always ask is not so much
the question, but ask for thesale.
Before you leave the interview,make it clear that you are
interested in the job.
Tell the truth like I did withthe job and saying, I'm not
gonna get you on the nationalnews, but, but if it's a job you
(44:06):
want, say, I really wanna behere.
I've learned so much about theorganization over the last
couple of days.
I think it's, an invitingopportunity.
I, enjoyed the people that I'vemet.
I know there's some challenges,but I think I can help us all
rise.
And I wanna be a member of yourteam, ask for the sale, ask for
(44:28):
the opportunity to serve Andthat's an important thing to do.
Caroline (44:30):
So important, all other things being equal.
The person that asked for thejob is going to rise above the
other people that just said, oh,well, let me know.
You know, somebody that getsthings done asks for those
opportunities.
So, so good.
When you look back at yourcareer.
(44:52):
What are some of the momentsthat stand out as the most
meaningful for you?
Tara (44:58):
I was thinking about this the other day.
There are two sets of moments.
The first one, some of thepersonal relationships, I have a
former student assistant who isgetting ready to interview for a
college presidency.
She was working in my office oneyear.
She was on her way to spend,summer at the beach.
I have a friend who, was thehead of a program at a
(45:19):
university at the beach.
He hired her to, you know,basically folding stuff,
envelopes for that summer whenshe was between her junior and
senior year.
She got so interested in theprofession of student affairs by
hanging around the two of us.
She decided to get a master'sdegree.
We've kept in touch with her.
We're just, incredibly fond ofthis woman.
She actually happened to be ouradvisor for ODK at one of our
(45:41):
institutions I still think ofher as the 22-year-old, but
she's probably 52 now, and I amso proud of her.
And it's just, you know, Ilaugh, not the right word, but
she's one of my gifts to theprofession.
And I've worked with lots ofother young people, but she's my
gift to the profession becauseshe will be a president one day,
(46:04):
and she calls me up every sooften and asks for advice and
I'm going you've got this, youknow this, but she needs to talk
it through with somebody.
And I'm flattered that she stillthinks of me as her mentor.
What an honor.
That's one thing, the otherthing that I say all the time.
Is that I wanna leave anorganization in better shape
than I found it.
(46:25):
I've tried to make that thecase.
and I'll give you three reallyquick examples.
There's a sorority atLouisville, my sorority that got
established when I was incollege and I was a founding
member of that and had a fairamount to do with the
establishment of that particularchapter of that sorority.
It's still there.
I've been out of college formore than 40 years.
(46:45):
Tickles me to no end it's stillthere.
One of the institutions I servedwent through a mascot
transition, which is anexperience I would not wish upon
my worst enemy.
It was genuinely painful for theinstitution.
But when I go to that town thesedays and I see 20 years later
and I see the new mascot allover the place, I'm going like,
(47:06):
oh, I had something to do withthat.
And then with ODK, when Istarted the endowment was about
800,000.
And when I left it was 2.8million.
And that endowment, largelyfunds scholarships.
And scholarships are one of thethings that, being a member of
an organization that providesscholarships is an incentive to
(47:26):
join the organization.
And I just keep thinking thatthat's maybe one of the things
that I did to leave ODK inbetter shape than I found it.
Those are all really good thingsto remember.
The final thing along thatcourse of topic is that the way
you leave a job is really somuch more important than the way
(47:46):
you come into a position.
Because I learned at a fairlyearly age, in fact, when I was
leaving the associateregistrar's position in my early
thirties, there were severalpeople who kept handing me
matchbooks with the hope that Iwould burn down the bridges
behind me on their behalf.
Take the matchbooks, right?
(48:08):
Don't take the dynamite.
Don't take, you know, don'ttake, don't take the torch,
don't take that stuff.
walk out, you document as bestas you possibly can for your
successors.
and your, documentation is notjust for the person who will
step into whatever role youhave, but it is for everybody
else because institutionalmemory is important.
(48:30):
And your successor may ignorethe workbook that you left for
them, which did happen at onetime, but the number two in the
office used it all the time tofigure out how to do something.
But, you know, document, holdyour head high.
If you're leaving, even ifyou're being a little pushed
out, be gracious about stuff.
(48:51):
Thank people.
You may be celebrated, but it'sa great chance for you to
celebrate others that, havehelped you along the way.
Those are all just right thingsto do they show that you're a
class act.
I think all of our mothers andfathers would like us to be
class acts.
And if your children are yourretirement dinner, it provides a
(49:11):
good example to them about howthey manage that moment when it
comes their turn to retire.
Caroline (49:16):
Have you ever thought about, if you could go back to
your younger self, your 20something year old self, what
advice would you want to tellher, knowing what you know now?
Tara (49:30):
As I said earlier, to not be so naive.
Not to jump at an opportunityfor a title, or a salary and
pick your bosses carefully wouldbe that I would say is probably
most significant.
But then, there is a little bitof the, they say don't sweat the
small stuff.
And it's all small stuff.
(49:50):
that trivializes to a degree,some of the trauma that I think
many of us experience in thecourse of our career.
We've all had some hard moments.
We've lost colleaguesunexpectedly.
There has been a budgetarysituation, which has forced us
to reorganize and let goodpeople go.
There has been some other formof a crisis.
(50:11):
There has been, expectations notmet, and pressure your boss has
pressure on top of the pressurethat you're feeling.
And, sometimes things get saidin the heat of the moment.
And so I don't mean totrivialize some of the
experiences that we have thatare difficult, there is a part
of it.
Don't always take it asseriously as we sometimes want
(50:33):
to and to also think about yourcareer does not need to be as
linear as we all think that itdoes.
being administrative associateto academic advisor to associate
registrar to a VP for alumnirelations, to moving to the
development office and becomingthe head of corporate and
foundation relations because Ireally needed to raise money if
(50:53):
I was gonna be a vice presidenton my way to the presidency.
And then I went to be a vicepresident, and after three years
of being a vice president, Irealized my skin's not thick
enough to be a president.
And I decided that.
I moved to Chicago for love, and19 months later I moved away.
And when I made that move away19 months later.
I thought I'm pretty fragile atthis moment because my heart was
(51:16):
broken.
And I thought, well, what withinthe advancement world do I
really like?
And I thought, well, I reallylike the communications and
marketing piece.
I like fundraising, but Ireally, should have been an
editor if I'd known that was ajob.
I might've done it as a job.
Something that they don't tellyou in high school.
You know, I chose communicationsand marketing.
So I did a search incommunications and marketing, I
(51:39):
ended up with a job that Ireally, really liked at an
institution that I really liked.
And then, I saw the ODK job andactually I'd been interested
when it was open four yearsearlier, but I didn't have, so
many months to look for a job, Ineeded a job now.
Caroline (51:52):
Hmm.
Tara (51:53):
And the job I needed was a great job in many ways.
I had to laugh because there's agroup that does interim
placement within higher ed Itold them I thought I would be a
good interim placement as a VPfor advancement.
And they go, your career is justtoo all over the place.
I'm going like, you have no ideawhat I've done because you're
looking only at my titles.
(52:13):
But you know, careers are notnecessarily linear and sometimes
plan B or C or D or whatever,being adaptable is really
important and you know, youdon't always have to go in a
straight line and you might endup with the most rewarding
opportunity you can imagine,which is what I ended up with,
(52:35):
Omicron Delta Kappa.
And it was something that Iwould've never really about if I
hadn't sort of meandered throughthe way, through the years.
I'd actually been an ODK advisorwhen I was the vice president
for advancement.
It was like, oh wow, this iskind of cool.
You end up often where youbelong, but you don't
necessarily end up there on theroute you intended.
Caroline (52:57):
Now, how can people find out more about your work or
connect with you?
Tara (53:02):
I love LinkedIn.
I'm on it all the time.
And I think I'm one of the fewTara Singers, but you'll see the
Louisville stuff so that you'llknow that's me.
And academicsearch.org, is ourpractices website and we have
team bios and so you can find myteam bio there.
Feel free to reach out.
I like helping people,regardless of whether or not
(53:25):
they're really considering acareer on higher-ed or nonprofit
administration, I find that I'mdoing a fair amount of informal
coaching and just sort of tipsfor searching.
And I enjoy that tremendously ascheering people on, as they're
exploring the next phase oftheir leadership journeys.
Caroline (53:41):
Oh, all the more reason we're so aligned.
I, I'm big on, as you know,authentic success.
And authentic success is howeveryou define it.
So how do you define authenticsuccess for you in this moment?
Tara (53:57):
I'm doing something I find meaningful.
I'm doing for an organizationthat I think is a leader, as I
know is a leadership developmentorganization, which I find
meaningful.
I'm kind of doing it at the paceand the schedule that after 40
years of working a lot of hours,I am grateful to have time, with
(54:20):
my sweetheart, now my fiance andtime with my children and,
actually our five childrenbetween the two of us and
granddaughter.
And I'm so blessed to haveliving parents who are well into
their eighties and having thatflexibility to, be close to
friends and family and have timefor them, but still do
generative work.
(54:41):
I serve as a board officer forthe local performing arts
center.
I really enjoy, sharing myknowledge about nonprofit
administration, through that.
It's just giving back.
A wonderful family.
I've had a great life and I'vehad this great career and I've
been so fortunate to have goodfriends, to walk with me along
(55:03):
my journey, it's now time to payit forward, but I'm glad to not
be doing it full time.
Caroline (55:09):
Thank you so, so very much, Tara, for sharing part of
your story, for part of thesearch tips, interview tips,
wonderful life advice, and forsharing your version of
authentic success.
And it sounds like you are goingto be quite busy, with all the
things coming up, fiance'sbecome spouses and,
Tara (55:32):
They do.
And even at, 65 and 68, which wewill be next year, we're having
a wedding.
I will say I'm having so muchfun planning this, it's a whole
lot different than when I was 21and 22.
If I want fried chicken at thereception, we're gonna have
fried chicken at the reception.
Caroline (55:49):
I love it.
Tara (55:49):
So
Caroline (55:50):
I love it.
Well, thank you again forsharing so much with our
audience, and I wish you justcontinued amazing happiness and
success.
Tara's story is a reminder thatsuccess isn't just about
collecting titles.
It's about collecting wisdom.
Every season of your careerholds lessons if you're willing
(56:11):
to pause and listen.
If you'd like to connect withTara, please find her on
LinkedIn or atacademicsearch.org.
Tara (56:20):
Thanks for listening to Your Next Success with Dr.
Caroline Sangal.
Remember, authentic success isyours to define and includes
aligning your career to supportthe life you want.
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