Higher ed is at a crossroads. Career services teams are no longer gatekeepers of opportunity—they’re becoming curators of the student-employer relationship. But how do institutions actually make that shift?
In this episode, I sit down with Christine Y. Cruzvergara, Chief Education Strategy Officer at Handshake, to unpack:
🎯 The biggest mindset shift career services teams must make (or risk falling behind)
📊 How AI & data-driven personalization are transforming student job searches
🔗 Why curated job collections drive 7x more engagement—and how to leverage them
⚖️ The tension between mission-driven work and financial sustainability in career services
If you’re a higher ed leader, career services professional, or employer relations expert, this episode is packed with insights on the future of work, education, and workforce development.
Want more insights into the Higher Ed Space?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Happy to be here.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Yeah Well, it's so great to talk to you, christine.
You had this amazing post onLinkedIn a few weeks back and
I'll just read the beginning ofit and maybe you can
contextualize kind of what youwere talking about Because for
me it resonated.
But I'd really like to hearfrom you when you said today
marks my sixth anniversary atHandshake and remains the best
career decision I ever made.
Besides my close friends, mostpeople don't know the volume of
(00:30):
skepticism and doubt I facedfrom colleagues in career
services when I first announcedI'd be joining.
Handshake what lessons caninstitute.
Oh sorry, that's the end of it.
So curious for me.
Can you contextualize what youmeant by that and maybe we'll
use that as a jumping off point?
And maybe we'll use that as ajumping off point.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Yeah.
So when I decided to joinHandshake six years ago, I think
our profession in particularreally viewed vendors and
technology providers as separatefrom the work that we did.
They were there to serve us.
They were there because we paidthem to be there, but there was
(01:04):
much more of a vendor mentalitythan there was a partner
mentality.
And when I decided to move fromhigher education into the tech
sector and to be part of one ofthese technology partners
(01:25):
honestly about whether or not mycolleagues and my peers and
people that I had very much sortof built my career with and
around would still see me assomeone who was credible,
knowledgeable and a real partnerin this work, because to me it
relies for us to be able to dothis well.
It relies on all of us, withour different areas of expertise
, to actually tackle differentproblems in different ways with
(01:48):
different approaches, and tocome together to actually help
move the needle and changethings for our students.
I don't believe I've neverbelieved, even when I was just
in higher education, that highered alone was going to solve
that problem by itself.
It requires everybody, and so Iwas hopeful, but I knew the
(02:10):
amount of skepticism I faced,because I heard it.
People asked me a lot ofquestions about are you sure you
want to do this?
Is this really the right choice?
Will you ever be able to comeback?
If you decide you don't like it, you're going to the other side
, right?
I heard all of these commentsand it was important to me that
(02:32):
in the time that I started atHandshake that I both establish,
continue to grow and establishmy own credibility and knowledge
in the field and around thetrends and issues that we face.
And when I say we, I still amreferring to the collective we
of higher education, technologyworkforce, government policy.
(02:55):
Like all of these individualsare part of the we, and I hope
that in the six years I havebeen here and done this work,
that I have been able to proveto colleagues that it is
possible to remain credible andknowledgeable and to be able to
be a true partner in how we getthis work done.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, that's incredibly well said.
Where do you see thatdisconnect?
Right, because there is thissort of rampant skepticism that
I see.
I certainly heard similarthings when I was sort of making
this transition from, like youknow, working at a university to
just like decide and I want toserve in different ways what
(03:37):
have.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Sometimes there's a perceived disconnect or
difference when in reality,there's actually more
(04:08):
similarities than people wouldassume.
We just use different words,right?
So in higher education, you'retalking about your stakeholders
In a business or an industry.
You're talking about yourcustomers, right?
You have a board for highereducation.
Honestly, you have a board whenyou have a company as well, you
have to bring in tuition dollarsbecause you have a bottom line
(04:29):
and you have to be able tooperate the university.
For a company, you have revenueand you need to be able to use
that to operate.
So there are more similaritiesthan I think people sometimes
realize.
But honestly, I think peopleget held up on the tax status.
But honestly, I think peopleget held up on the tax status,
the difference between anonprofit and a for-profit, and
the reality is you could reallythink of a nonprofit as being
(04:52):
for impact and so it's purely atax status.
You can work towards a doublebottom line in an organization
or an industry where you aretrying to make an impact and you
are also bringing in revenue.
Both things can be true, and Ithink a lot of the skepticism
sits there.
(05:12):
I think there's a lot of doubtaround can you actually really
care about students or reallycare about the mission if you
also care about money?
And I think the reality is, yes, you can.
But because money is not talkedabout necessarily in that way
in the higher education settingfor anyone who hasn't worked
(05:33):
outside of higher education,they don't necessarily have a
frame of reference for that, andso I think naturally there's a
little bit more skepticism,because it's unknown and it's
different.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah, yeah, I love that answer a lot and I think it
just speaks to that ability tosort of create alignment and I
love the sort of grounding ofjust like simply using language
and how you're sort of findingthat to sort of find those easy
things, that really sort ofcompartment between the two.
How did you do the bridgebuilding?
And this is like this issomething that I see a lot of
(06:06):
sort of institutional leadersstruggling with.
Is, you know, we've got AI onthe horizon, or not even on the
horizon?
I mean, so many of us shouldjust have it baked into your
daily work.
It's just part of the flow,right?
You know, I could say that sortof on the ground or anecdotally,
you know, I see the sort, seethe uptake of different tools,
(06:28):
even the easier functionality,wildly different at institutions
, this crazy emerging toolthat's going in all these
different directions, andagentic AI and interoperability
of systems and things that we'removing towards a more agent
(06:50):
model.
Right now.
I'm so curious from you becauseyou're sitting at this really
interesting intersection of avery traditional industry higher
education with venture and techand all of that like how have
you found like wins in sort ofmaking those two very different
worlds meet and still like drivevalue, drive partners and sort
(07:14):
of do the things that you wantto do for both.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, I think it really kind of comes down to
honestly like basic humanpsychology.
So psychology was actually mybackground and what I studied,
and I think, if you really getdown to the very core, people
want to understand how itbenefits them.
People want to understand howit's going to impact them, and
so when you're introducingsomething new, it's important to
(07:41):
be able to frame it in a waythat allows someone to see
themselves in the new thing thatyou're introducing.
So what is their new role goingto be?
How do they need to adapt?
What will their value be?
How will they use it?
What is the benefit to them?
Those are all the types ofquestions that I think myself
and my team and everyone here atHandshake is always trying to
(08:03):
think about.
We often talk about the factthat we're a three-sided
marketplace.
Many marketplaces that you usein your daily life are two-sided
, and we have the uniquechallenge of being three-sided
because we have our educationpartners, our employers and our
students, and so we're alwaystrying to think of how does this
new thing that we might berolling out benefit all three
(08:25):
sides of the marketplace, howdoes it help all three to
achieve their goal and how doesit help us as a company to be
able to move forward, and Ithink that's a really big piece
of it is articulating thebenefit and the value and the
role for someone so that theycan see themselves in that
change.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah, I love that answer.
I mean, I think you have toreally sort of think about
what's in it for the person andhow do you sort of stack
incentives and those kind ofthings to really sort of meet
that.
Have you found like data pointsthat are like really useful in
that, because, like I have toassume that's like so tricky,
where you've got, you know, likevastly different sort of
metrics for each person thatyou're sort of trying to do Like
(09:04):
what have you found likehelpful from like a measurement
perspective there?
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Sure.
So I think one new thing thatwe've rolled out fairly recently
that I think has reallyresonated with our partners is
something that we callcustomized collections.
It's a way for our schools tocurate information to their
students so they can curate jobs, they can curate employers,
they can now curate events andin the coming months they'll be
(09:30):
able to also curate posts.
So let's just take, for example, mike, a career center that has
the career community or careercluster model right.
So they have different careercommunities for different
industry areas that theirstudents might be interested in
and let's say they are focusedon.
Well, choose an easy one wherethere's always students that
(09:51):
want to go into it Finance,finance, consulting, ibanking OK
, so you have a community forthat.
So now, as a school, let's takemy previous institution,
wellesley.
I can curate specific employersor jobs, alumni events, posts
that are about finance, ibanking, consulting, and I can put it
(10:12):
into this collection, and whatwe've been able to show our
partners is that thosecollections are getting 7x the
number of views, clicks andapplications right, and so their
expertise, their curation, doesmatter to students.
Students want to see what yourschool is suggesting or
(10:34):
recommending.
It doesn't mean they don't wantto be able to see all the other
stuff.
They want to have the abilityto find it if they want to find
it.
But they really do care aboutwhat schools are curating, and
so that is one of the ways inwhich we benefit the entire
network, because we providegreater customization and
personalization.
That is related to your schoolaffinity, which students like,
(10:58):
and it helps our partners to seethat their role is shifting
towards being more of a curatorinstead of being a gatekeeper.
Right, no longer do studentsneed to go through the gates of
career services to getinformation.
They can get that informationon their own laptops, on their
own phones.
They can get it everywhere andanywhere.
So now, instead, the role ofsomeone in career services has
(11:23):
changed.
They don't need you to be theholder of information.
They need you to be someone whocan help make sense of the
information that is out there,add value to that information
and give them something morethan they could have gotten
through their own normal Googlesearch.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Yeah, that is such a such a win because it stacks.
You know for everybody, right,what's the what's like the
process of sort of rollingsomething like that, and what's
what's the sort of what are thetesting phases look like, and
then what's the sort ofdeployment aspect on on your end
, to make sure that it's sort oflike hitting the, the wins, for
(11:59):
you know, the three markets.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, everything's very cyclical, so it starts with
obviously identifying a problemwhat is changing or what needs
to change in order to be better?
In this situation, we knew thatstudents were not accessing a
lot of jobs.
There was a high volume of jobson Handshake, but every
individual average student wasonly getting a small percentage
(12:23):
of them because of old model ofapproving and declining jobs,
and so we knew that was aproblem, and the only way that
we could ensure more studentswere getting more opportunities
that they were interested in, sothat they could get better
outcomes, was to increase whatthey were able to see and have
access to.
So we started from there and westarted brainstorming
(12:46):
essentially what were the waysin which we could increase
liquidity for the network andfor our students.
We diverge in all of thoseideas and look at all of the
various possibilities and thenwe start to hone in on ways that
we can do that that benefiteach of the different parties.
For us, we actually bring ourADU partners into the process
(13:08):
fairly early, so we do somethingcalled mini advisory boards
around different features ordifferent topics in the product
and we bring together a group ofusually somewhere between 20,
25, sometimes 30 institutionsthat span across four-year,
two-year large, small, public,private, kind of all the
different demographics and wepresent to them the problem.
(13:34):
We present to them the feedbackthat we've gotten from students,
because we're students first,so that's one of our first
values, so we always providethat and we essentially start to
lay out for them these are someof the various possibilities of
how we might go about solvingthis problem, and we get their
thoughts, we get their feedback.
Then we go back to the drawingboard, we incorporate that in
and we continue meeting withthem throughout the process in
(13:55):
designing what essentiallybecomes the solution.
And then, from that pointforward, we start to share with
the masses all 1,600 partners inusually a webinar format.
First, here are some of thethings that are coming down the
road.
Here are things that are comingdown the roadmap six months
from now, a year from now, tostart to get folks wrapped
(14:18):
around what is coming.
And then I think part of it isliterally exposure.
We have to talk about itmultiple times.
People aren't always going tounderstand it the first time.
They need to hear it multipletimes.
Right, you mentioned thatyou're doing a lot of work in
marketing with a lot of theschools that you're working with
.
It's the same concept.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
You need exposure.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
You need repetition.
And then we of course alwaysbeta test everything.
So we do that with anothersmall group of schools, usually
about 100 to 200 beta schools,and then we take that feedback,
we continue to tweak it and thenwe make those changes before we
do a larger rollout.
With the rollout, sometimes weroll out to a percentage of
(14:57):
schools first, kind of see howthat goes, and then we open it
up further.
Sometimes we go ahead and dowhat we call a GA launch, which
is a general launch to everybodyafter the beta, so that one
varies a little bit depending onthe future.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, I mean, that roadmap makes a ton of sense,
though, and gives you, I think,a plug and play, iterative way
to sort of do things soft,launch them, so to speak, test
workout bugs and then sort ofget people sort of ready for
what's coming next Exactly readyfor what's coming next, Exactly
Switching gears a little bit.
(15:31):
You're seemingly really aheadof trends in career services and
where you see things going.
You mentioned the gatekeepermodel, and I love the way that
you were able to build that intothe product so that you could
have a more sort of curatedaspect of it and fit the sort of
like challenges of sort ofinformation asymmetry that I
(15:52):
think people have sort of likehad trouble pivoting to in this
space, Like what are some shiftsthat you've seen happening and
then how do you thinkinstitutions can adapt to them?
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Well, I think there's a few things over the course of
the past decade that I've seen,and I'll mention them because I
think there's a pattern to allof this right.
So, back 10 years ago, whenHandshake first came onto the
market, what most of ourcolleagues in career services
ourselves included, mike what wewere used to were closed
(16:25):
enterprise systems.
You would buy a closedenterprise system and, as an
employer, you had to log intoall these different enterprise
systems to post your jobmultiple times, and the notion
of putting your employers oryour jobs for your students onto
a network that was shared wasreally scary.
Really tough shared was reallyscary.
(16:50):
I remember the conversationswhen a lot of our colleagues
highly skeptical and they werereally worried that if they did
this they would lose all theiremployers, they would lose all
their jobs and none of theirstudents would get hired Right.
Like that was the concern atthe time and I think you know
that mentality is a little bitof a zero sum game sort of
mentality and I think thereality is, when you're talking
(17:14):
about access and trying to helpall students be able to get
greater access to allopportunity, it's actually not a
zero-sum game and our dataproves that as new schools came
on, every new school that joinedHandshake increased the number
of employers and job andinternship opportunities by over
200, sometimes 300%.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, network effect.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Yeah, because of the network effect, right, and so
that, fundamentally, was one ofthe first major shifts and
changes within career servicesjust in the past decade.
And now, if you think about it,people don't bat an eye about
it.
Nobody thinks twice about thefact that you're joining a
network.
In fact, it's a pretty big plus, right, and people find it
pretty normal.
But the reason I use thisexample first is because the
(17:59):
pattern that happens is a newthing is introduced, people are
scared and skeptical becauseit's unknown.
You start to get a few earlyadopters and innovators to do it
, then the rest of the majormajority starts to join them and
you hit a tipping point wherenow it becomes the norm.
And that is almost always theexact same pattern for pretty
(18:23):
much every new change that isintroduced.
It's introduced, there'sskepticism, you get a few early
people to adopt it and to showyou that it can work, and then
you start to get more peopleover the hump, and so that was
one of the first things.
I think another one wascertainly the example I gave you
earlier around this notion ofmore curation, and I think one
(18:44):
that we're working on right nowis really about content creation
and it's about the feed.
So we know that Gen Z consumesinformation differently than we
did, as millennials or Gen Xersor boomers and to still directly
(19:05):
connect into their line ofthinking, their line of
consumption, because otherwisethey're consuming other
information elsewhere and Iwould honestly, if they're going
to scroll on something, I wouldrather them scroll on Handshake
around career material.
How do we help our partners,quite frankly, to stay relevant?
(19:27):
How do we help our partners,quite frankly, to stay relevant?
It would be really easy for ourentire profession to
potentially become irrelevant ifthey to stay relevant, to stay
plugged in and to be able tohelp students get the
(19:56):
information that a lot of timesthey don't even know.
They need to ask becausethey're going through it for the
first time, and so the valueand expertise of our partners,
of our EDU partners, is soimmense.
I want to keep finding ways toplug them in directly, and I
literally just said this on awebinar last week to our
partners.
My hope is that in three years,if we've done our job well at
(20:19):
Handshake, we will have createda consumer product that is so
sticky and intuitive andseamless for students that they
will find so much value.
They will be there, they willwant to be there.
They will tell their friendsabout it and none of my higher
education institutions will haveto spend their very precious
(20:41):
and valuable time trying to getstudents onto a platform.
Instead, they can spend theirtime creating the content that
those students need and they canspend their time engaging
one-on-one with those studentswho actually really need that
help and support, and they canspend their time creating the
right programming and events forthose students to meet the
(21:04):
employers and the alumni thatthey actually want to meet.
That is a really valuable useof our colleagues' expertise and
that's what I want to be ableto build for them.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
That is super cool and I love the way that you're
sort of essentially freeing uptime for staff members to do
things that are just morenuanced and that require unique
and nuanced expertise and techis sort of, I think, solving a
lot of those backgroundchallenges.
It strikes me that that has tobe like a massive UX challenge,
right, because it's like you'vegot like you've got such a, you
(21:39):
know, a very sort of quicklychanging student demographic and
you have to do a lot of sort oflike testing and things and
feedback to sort of make surethat new product features but
sort of products overall, sortof like testing and things and
feedback to sort of make surethat new product features but
sort of products overall, sortof meeting those expectations.
But then you've also got,because of the marketplace
concepts, you've got employers,you've got, you know, partners
that you're sort of doing andyou have to have a sort of
(22:01):
probably a different lens forsort of each of those pieces of
it.
What's the mentality aroundthat, around sort of creating
and designing things that likework for everybody, and how do
you sort of balance that, thesort of the pieces of that?
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah, I think for us, we're really continuing to move
towards having more of, inmarketing terms, a consumer
narrative and consumer persona,so that it is actually just one
rather than three separate ones,but something that is
consistent.
And so we've been verytransparent and we've been very
(22:36):
direct with all three sides ofour marketplace that we want
Handshake to be the platform,the place for early talent, and
we want it to be the platformfor Gen Z, because Gen Z is the
emerging population in ourworkforce right now, and so we
need to do that and we need tobe very intentional around how
(23:00):
we attract that particularpopulation, because they are the
largest and fastest growingpopulation in our workforce
today, and just last year theyofficially overtook the number
of baby boomers in the workforce, right, so it's happening, it's
growing significantly, and so Ithink that piece is really
important.
Obviously, when it comes to theactual building of specific
(23:22):
product features, we are alwayspaying very close attention and
talking to our employer partners, talking to our higher
education partners, to reallyunderstand what are you trying
to do, what's the problem you'retrying to solve and how do we
build something that both helpsthe marketplace and helps the
students, but also helps youwith your workflow and what
you're trying to create.
(23:44):
But I think when we really lookat the marketing and the
narrative, we try to be reallyconsistent around who we are?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Yeah, I like that.
What advice would you have forinstitutional leaders that are
just struggling with thecomplexity of onboarding new
processes, budget cuts, allthese different pieces that I
think we're seeing some changesin the hiring marketplace where
(24:15):
you know and I guess it's been along time coming but you know
the sort of middle market issort of like kind of quickly
disappearing.
We've got demographic cliff of15-ish percent of students that
are enrollment drops.
I think we've got a lot ofplaces that are going to
continue to have to sort ofclose or sort of reposition or
(24:36):
completely sort of reimagine.
What are your advices forplaces that are just really
struggling to find that sort ofniche in place?
And how does a platform likeyours sort of uniquely add value
to students, to employers, toexperiences, to sort of like be
an agent that is going to sortof like help sort of push them
(24:57):
in the direction they need to go?
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Yeah, let me actually answer your question kind of in
two different ways one morebroad and then one more specific
to Handshake broad and then onemore specific to Handshake.
The broader answer, I think, isit's always important for teams
, institutions, leadership, toremain nimble and resilient and
to be willing to rethink whatyour value proposition is.
(25:20):
That's really, really key and,mike, I know you doing all of
this work and helping a lot ofthese schools do their marketing
it's probably part of yourrepertoire and what you're
telling them all the time butreally having a good hard look
at what is your current valueproposition, if the world around
you has changed and people canget X, y and Z in other places,
(25:43):
why do they come to you?
What is it that you canuniquely bring them that nobody
else can, and be willing toactually let go of the things
that are no longer unique to youanymore.
I think that is really actuallya big lesson in staying
adaptable and reinventingyourself.
It's something that I've toldstudents for years when I've
(26:04):
advised them in career advisingis to reinvent yourself means
you have to be willing to kindof let go of some of the things
you did before to make room fordoing new things that are more
relevant at this particularpoint in time.
So I think that is a big piecekind of broadly, and I think
partnerships is another uniqueway that institutions could be
(26:27):
thinking about that too.
So maybe you are not the expertin X area, but the school down
the road is, and they're kind ofin a similar boat to you.
Is there a way that you couldpartner?
Is there a way that you couldscale your resources?
Is there a way that you couldstreamline some things for your
students so that they can getthe best of both worlds, but you
personally at your institutiondon't have to try to be all
(26:50):
things to all people, as youactually said early in our
conversation today.
So I think that's my take onthe broad question.
I think the second part of thequestion is sort of handshake,
and how can handshake help toprovide value to some of these
institutions?
So I think, first and foremost,we provide access for your
students.
I think when you are a studentthat goes to an institution that
(27:13):
perhaps is not the stateflagship or the Ivies or sort of
the top 50, right, you needaccess to great opportunities.
There are so many smart,talented, intelligent students
that go to these institutions,but they don't have the same
introductions, they don't havethe same access, they don't have
(27:34):
the same pathways into some ofthese different industries or
fields or employers, and that'swhat we provide is an
opportunity for those studentsto be able to meet those
employers and vice versa.
Those employers often want thattalent.
They just don't know where togo to get them, and so I think
we can provide a lot of that.
The second thing that we canprovide is data.
(27:55):
We sit on a treasure trove ofdata and information that would
be so helpful for anyinstitution.
I'm thinking the Dean ofAdmissions, I'm thinking the VP
of Enrollment Management I'mthinking the dean of admissions,
I'm thinking the VP ofenrollment management, I'm
thinking the president or theprovost.
(28:17):
That can really allow them totell a more compelling story
around their success or theirstudents and employers, and
that's what we can do.
So by using Handshake, you'llhave a lot of that data and
you'll be able to help put thattogether in a compelling way,
and I think that's really key.
And then the third part isperhaps more operational and
(28:38):
kind of day-to-day.
When we roll out new technologyand new features, what is hard
sometimes for partners is thatit requires them to rethink
their workflows.
It requires them to rethink howthey might do something
operationally.
We're actually also providingan opportunity.
(29:07):
We're providing you anopportunity to flex that muscle
right, to choose to say, wow,okay, we can do this a different
way, how could we actuallychange the way that we do this
right?
That is actually a choice thatevery partner gets to make every
single day when they go to work, and I know that that's not
always easy and you have tobuild that muscle, sometimes
slowly, with your teams.
(29:29):
But the point is there's nobetter time than now to start.
Just do a little bit every dayand you're able to start to
actually really change and adapt.
And once you get that muscleunder you and I know this from I
worked at two differentinstitutions where I was hired
in to specifically help leadtransformational change at both
institutions Once you start tobuild that muscle within your
(29:52):
team, it will keep going and youwill be able to have a team
that is nimble, that isresilient, that is adaptable to
change, because they've nowbuilt the capacity for doing
that and when they look atthings, when they look at new
challenges, when they look atchanges that are coming, they
will no longer see them asobstacles, they will see them as
opportunities, and they will beable to think in a different
(30:15):
way around.
How could I change this up?
And so I think that's exciting,but it takes a little work and
a little patience and a littlepersistence to get there.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
That's incredibly well said.
I couldn't agree more.
The focus on the training andthe mindset, really sort of
getting people to sort of seethese challenges as
opportunities.
And there's like these weirdtweaks I think like leaders can
do in terms of like what youcelebrate or give attention to,
like.
There's this great book I readI'm blanking on the name but I
(30:47):
think it's called you Are whatyou Do or that affects Silicon
Valley book on leadership butreally sort of gets to, you know
, the heart of like the talkingpoints and what people are
actually saying like mattersvery little relative to, like,
the actions that people aretaking and people are paying
very, very close attention tothe actual actions and paying
are taking, um, and people arepaying very, very close
attention to the actual actionsand paying less attention to the
(31:08):
sort of lip service becausethey're, you know, incentives
drive everything kind of to thepoint you made you made earlier.
Um, so these little things aboutsort of celebrating, you know,
um, celebrating people that aresort of taking risks or trying
new things, or like giving likeattention and praise to that or
um, you know, like finding thesmall little sort of iterative
(31:29):
things and, even if it doesn'twork, just sort of like owning
and celebrating that and owningexperimentation, like all these
little little things that youcan do to have like outsized um,
uh, you know, outsized leverageto like what, what you're
actually trying to do, which isreally cool.
I'd love to maybe just sort ofpick your brain on like what's
(31:55):
the future of career services?
Look like to you and where doyou see Handshake sort of in
that space, like if you had toproject out five, 10 years?
Where do you see things goingand what do you see as your role
in that?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Where do you see things going and what do you see
as your role in that?
Yeah, well, I think one of thebig pieces is career services is
going to continue to be moreand more critical to the success
of higher education.
I believe one of the main waysto bring that back around is to
(32:28):
show them the value and thereturn on investment of that
education.
I don't mean that in thatschools only need to have
certain types of majors orcertain types of programs.
I'm actually a huge believer inthe liberal arts but what I do
mean is that we must talk in away that actually translates and
(32:48):
resonates with the generalpublic, and I think we've kind
of lost some of that.
I think that's a marketingchallenge, quite frankly.
I think we need to, as anentire entity, as higher
education.
I think we need to own thenarrative of who we are.
We need to articulate thatvalue in words that are not
higher ed speak but generalpublic speak, so that people can
(33:11):
see and really garner forthemselves Wow.
This is why it's useful.
This is why it's valuable.
This is what I'm getting out ofit.
Career services, quite frankly,will play a really big role in
that if an institution is smart,because what career services
can do is help increaserecruitment.
It can help with revenue, itcan help with reputation, which
(33:34):
ultimately helps with rankingright, like.
These are all the things Ialways say that career services,
if done correctly, can actuallyhelp impact the four R's of an
institution.
Those are the four R's.
I do think that in order forcareer services to do that,
though, there are a couple ofthings that need to happen on
both sides.
So, on the leadership side,you've got to give career
(33:57):
services a seat at the table.
You don't always have toprovide a lot of resources.
As much as I would love toadvocate for tons of resources
for career services, I know thatnot all institutions at the
moment have extra resources toallocate.
What you can do that iscompletely free is to give your
leader of career services a seatat the table, a seat at the
table with your deans, a seat atthe table with your provost or
(34:20):
associate provost, a seat at thetable with your cabinet to
really emphasize the importanceand the connectivity of career
with curriculum and how youthink about that.
You could build in feedbackloops, right?
I think, actually, our two-yearinstitutions do a really
fantastic job of this, where alot of them have industry
(34:42):
advisory boards for many oftheir programs, where employers
are plugged in and actuallyproviding real-time feedback on
the skills and the competenciesthat they're seeing of the
graduates that are coming outand going into work at their
workplaces and what that lookslike and what is the new
technology or the new thingsthat they're teaching or doing
in their workplaces and how canthat be infused back into the
(35:05):
classroom.
Right, that doesn't always meanchanging curriculum, but it
might mean a change in how youframe that curriculum.
It might mean a change in theexamples that you use in helping
students to understand things.
There are lots of differentnuances to how this can look, so
I think that's a big piece ofit is making sure the right
(35:26):
people are at the table andmaking sure that you're actually
being open to changing some ofthe ways in which you've done
things at your institution forsome time Now.
On the other side, careerservices leaders it's important
that you actually build theskills of navigating the
politics of your institution.
You have to be an incrediblystrong communicator of the
(35:47):
vision, the direction and thework that you and your team are
doing.
So if you're not a strongverbal and or written
communicator.
That's something to work onright now.
You have to know how to buildbridges and build relationships,
because so much of what you'redoing requires influence, not
positional power, right.
And you have to be fairly datasavvy.
(36:08):
And if you are not personallydata savvy in pulling that data,
analyzing the data yourself,you need to know how to hire
someone on your team that can dothat.
And what you need to be able todo is craft the story around
that data so that you can tellthat compelling vision to those
above you, around you, besideyou, right, is going to be
(36:29):
really key.
So I think those are some ofthe things that I still see as
the future of where careerservices is going.
I think Handshake plays a hugerole in that.
From, quite frankly, the mostbasic baseline core value, which
is we want your students tohave great outcomes, just like
you want your students to havegreat outcomes, we are literally
(36:51):
driving towards the same thing,which is your students getting
employed at the employers thatthey want to be at, right, and
so the best way to do that is toensure that they actually have
access to all of those employers, to all of those opportunities.
And then the second part, whichI talked about a little bit
earlier, is we sit on all ofthat data, so now we can provide
(37:14):
that back to you.
One of the big marquee projectsthat we're doing this year, in
2025, is actually aroundoutcomes.
So we recognize that, becausewe're sitting on so much good
data, we actually can providesourced outcomes that help to
supplement every school's firstdestination outcomes Based on
handshake profiles, based onpublic profiles, based on
(37:36):
employer sourced data that wehave proprietary access to.
We can give our schools greaterinsight into where their
students are going, even beforethey are surveyed, and we're
really excited to be able towork on that and to be able to
provide that for our partners.
We learned recently that weactually have 2x the number of
(37:59):
profiles for recent graduatesand early talent than any other
platform out there, and sothat's pretty exciting.
Those are things that we haveproprietary access to that we're
now going to be able to surfaceto our partners in a more
meaningful way.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
That's incredible.
What excites you?
Maybe a great place to closewould be like.
What excites you about the roadahead?
It seems like you guys arebuilding really incredible
pieces and you know layeringonto core product and adding
value in unique, unique ways.
You know supporting andaugmenting the broader value
proposition that higher ed andcareer services offer.
(38:35):
But like what, personally, getsyou really excited?
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Oh, I mean, it's the same thing that that brought me
to Handshake in the first place,which is being able to actually
meet this mission of increasingaccess to opportunity for all
of our students.
It feels more personal to methese days.
My son is 12.
And in the next six years, he,too, will be in college and he
(38:58):
will be looking for his firstinternship.
He'll be looking for hispart-time job and, at some point
, looking for his first job outof school, and I want to make
sure that we are building aproduct that I am proud of him
using, something that's actuallygoing to help him to locate and
to build his network to findthe types of things that he's
most interested in, and we'vegot a few more years to do that
(39:23):
before he opens the app andstarts using it himself.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
But that is awesome.
Um well, I think that's anawesome place to end.
Thank you, Christina, Iappreciate you.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
Happy to be here.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Yeah Well, it's so great to talk to you, christine.
You had this amazing post onLinkedIn a few weeks back and
I'll just read the beginning ofit and maybe you can
contextualize kind of what youwere talking about Because for
me it resonated.
But I'd really like to hearfrom you when you said today
marks my sixth anniversary atHandshake and remains the best
career decision I ever made.
Besides my close friends, mostpeople don't know the volume of
(00:30):
skepticism and doubt I facedfrom colleagues in career
services when I first announcedI'd be joining.
Handshake what lessons caninstitute.
Oh sorry, that's the end of it.
So curious for me.
Can you contextualize what youmeant by that and maybe we'll
use that as a jumping off point?
And maybe we'll use that as ajumping off point.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Yeah.
So when I decided to joinHandshake six years ago, I think
our profession in particularreally viewed vendors and
technology providers as separatefrom the work that we did.
They were there to serve us.
They were there because we paidthem to be there, but there was
(01:04):
much more of a vendor mentalitythan there was a partner
mentality.
And when I decided to move fromhigher education into the tech
sector and to be part of one ofthese technology partners
(01:25):
honestly about whether or not mycolleagues and my peers and
people that I had very much sortof built my career with and
around would still see me assomeone who was credible,
knowledgeable and a real partnerin this work, because to me it
relies for us to be able to dothis well.
It relies on all of us, withour different areas of expertise
, to actually tackle differentproblems in different ways with
(01:48):
different approaches, and tocome together to actually help
move the needle and changethings for our students.
I don't believe I've neverbelieved, even when I was just
in higher education, that highered alone was going to solve
that problem by itself.
It requires everybody, and so Iwas hopeful, but I knew the
(02:10):
amount of skepticism I faced,because I heard it.
People asked me a lot ofquestions about are you sure you
want to do this?
Is this really the right choice?
Will you ever be able to comeback?
If you decide you don't like it, you're going to the other side
, right?
I heard all of these commentsand it was important to me that
(02:32):
in the time that I started atHandshake that I both establish,
continue to grow and establishmy own credibility and knowledge
in the field and around thetrends and issues that we face.
And when I say we, I still amreferring to the collective we
of higher education, technologyworkforce, government policy.
(02:55):
Like all of these individualsare part of the we, and I hope
that in the six years I havebeen here and done this work,
that I have been able to proveto colleagues that it is
possible to remain credible andknowledgeable and to be able to
be a true partner in how we getthis work done.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, that's incredibly well said.
Where do you see thatdisconnect?
Right, because there is thissort of rampant skepticism that
I see.
I certainly heard similarthings when I was sort of making
this transition from, like youknow, working at a university to
just like decide and I want toserve in different ways what
(03:37):
have.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Sometimes there's a perceived disconnect or
difference when in reality,there's actually more
(04:08):
similarities than people wouldassume.
We just use different words,right?
So in higher education, you'retalking about your stakeholders
In a business or an industry.
You're talking about yourcustomers, right?
You have a board for highereducation.
Honestly, you have a board whenyou have a company as well, you
have to bring in tuition dollarsbecause you have a bottom line
(04:29):
and you have to be able tooperate the university.
For a company, you have revenueand you need to be able to use
that to operate.
So there are more similaritiesthan I think people sometimes
realize.
But honestly, I think peopleget held up on the tax status.
But honestly, I think peopleget held up on the tax status,
the difference between anonprofit and a for-profit, and
the reality is you could reallythink of a nonprofit as being
(04:52):
for impact and so it's purely atax status.
You can work towards a doublebottom line in an organization
or an industry where you aretrying to make an impact and you
are also bringing in revenue.
Both things can be true, and Ithink a lot of the skepticism
sits there.
(05:12):
I think there's a lot of doubtaround can you actually really
care about students or reallycare about the mission if you
also care about money?
And I think the reality is, yes, you can.
But because money is not talkedabout necessarily in that way
in the higher education settingfor anyone who hasn't worked
(05:33):
outside of higher education,they don't necessarily have a
frame of reference for that, andso I think naturally there's a
little bit more skepticism,because it's unknown and it's
different.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah, yeah, I love that answer a lot and I think it
just speaks to that ability tosort of create alignment and I
love the sort of grounding ofjust like simply using language
and how you're sort of findingthat to sort of find those easy
things, that really sort ofcompartment between the two.
How did you do the bridgebuilding?
And this is like this issomething that I see a lot of
(06:06):
sort of institutional leadersstruggling with.
Is, you know, we've got AI onthe horizon, or not even on the
horizon?
I mean, so many of us shouldjust have it baked into your
daily work.
It's just part of the flow,right?
You know, I could say that sortof on the ground or anecdotally,
you know, I see the sort, seethe uptake of different tools,
(06:28):
even the easier functionality,wildly different at institutions
, this crazy emerging toolthat's going in all these
different directions, andagentic AI and interoperability
of systems and things that we'removing towards a more agent
(06:50):
model.
Right now.
I'm so curious from you becauseyou're sitting at this really
interesting intersection of avery traditional industry higher
education with venture and techand all of that like how have
you found like wins in sort ofmaking those two very different
worlds meet and still like drivevalue, drive partners and sort
(07:14):
of do the things that you wantto do for both.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, I think it really kind of comes down to
honestly like basic humanpsychology.
So psychology was actually mybackground and what I studied,
and I think, if you really getdown to the very core, people
want to understand how itbenefits them.
People want to understand howit's going to impact them, and
so when you're introducingsomething new, it's important to
(07:41):
be able to frame it in a waythat allows someone to see
themselves in the new thing thatyou're introducing.
So what is their new role goingto be?
How do they need to adapt?
What will their value be?
How will they use it?
What is the benefit to them?
Those are all the types ofquestions that I think myself
and my team and everyone here atHandshake is always trying to
(08:03):
think about.
We often talk about the factthat we're a three-sided
marketplace.
Many marketplaces that you usein your daily life are two-sided
, and we have the uniquechallenge of being three-sided
because we have our educationpartners, our employers and our
students, and so we're alwaystrying to think of how does this
new thing that we might berolling out benefit all three
(08:25):
sides of the marketplace, howdoes it help all three to
achieve their goal and how doesit help us as a company to be
able to move forward, and Ithink that's a really big piece
of it is articulating thebenefit and the value and the
role for someone so that theycan see themselves in that
change.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah, I love that answer.
I mean, I think you have toreally sort of think about
what's in it for the person andhow do you sort of stack
incentives and those kind ofthings to really sort of meet
that.
Have you found like data pointsthat are like really useful in
that, because, like I have toassume that's like so tricky,
where you've got, you know, likevastly different sort of
metrics for each person thatyou're sort of trying to do Like
(09:04):
what have you found likehelpful from like a measurement
perspective there?
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Sure.
So I think one new thing thatwe've rolled out fairly recently
that I think has reallyresonated with our partners is
something that we callcustomized collections.
It's a way for our schools tocurate information to their
students so they can curate jobs, they can curate employers,
they can now curate events andin the coming months they'll be
(09:30):
able to also curate posts.
So let's just take, for example, mike, a career center that has
the career community or careercluster model right.
So they have different careercommunities for different
industry areas that theirstudents might be interested in
and let's say they are focusedon.
Well, choose an easy one wherethere's always students that
(09:51):
want to go into it Finance,finance, consulting, ibanking OK
, so you have a community forthat.
So now, as a school, let's takemy previous institution,
wellesley.
I can curate specific employersor jobs, alumni events, posts
that are about finance, ibanking, consulting, and I can put it
(10:12):
into this collection, and whatwe've been able to show our
partners is that thosecollections are getting 7x the
number of views, clicks andapplications right, and so their
expertise, their curation, doesmatter to students.
Students want to see what yourschool is suggesting or
(10:34):
recommending.
It doesn't mean they don't wantto be able to see all the other
stuff.
They want to have the abilityto find it if they want to find
it.
But they really do care aboutwhat schools are curating, and
so that is one of the ways inwhich we benefit the entire
network, because we providegreater customization and
personalization.
That is related to your schoolaffinity, which students like,
(10:58):
and it helps our partners to seethat their role is shifting
towards being more of a curatorinstead of being a gatekeeper.
Right, no longer do studentsneed to go through the gates of
career services to getinformation.
They can get that informationon their own laptops, on their
own phones.
They can get it everywhere andanywhere.
So now, instead, the role ofsomeone in career services has
(11:23):
changed.
They don't need you to be theholder of information.
They need you to be someone whocan help make sense of the
information that is out there,add value to that information
and give them something morethan they could have gotten
through their own normal Googlesearch.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Yeah, that is such a such a win because it stacks.
You know for everybody, right,what's the what's like the
process of sort of rollingsomething like that, and what's
what's the sort of what are thetesting phases look like, and
then what's the sort ofdeployment aspect on on your end
, to make sure that it's sort oflike hitting the, the wins, for
(11:59):
you know, the three markets.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, everything's very cyclical, so it starts with
obviously identifying a problemwhat is changing or what needs
to change in order to be better?
In this situation, we knew thatstudents were not accessing a
lot of jobs.
There was a high volume of jobson Handshake, but every
individual average student wasonly getting a small percentage
(12:23):
of them because of old model ofapproving and declining jobs,
and so we knew that was aproblem, and the only way that
we could ensure more studentswere getting more opportunities
that they were interested in, sothat they could get better
outcomes, was to increase whatthey were able to see and have
access to.
So we started from there and westarted brainstorming
(12:46):
essentially what were the waysin which we could increase
liquidity for the network andfor our students.
We diverge in all of thoseideas and look at all of the
various possibilities and thenwe start to hone in on ways that
we can do that that benefiteach of the different parties.
For us, we actually bring ourADU partners into the process
(13:08):
fairly early, so we do somethingcalled mini advisory boards
around different features ordifferent topics in the product
and we bring together a group ofusually somewhere between 20,
25, sometimes 30 institutionsthat span across four-year,
two-year large, small, public,private, kind of all the
different demographics and wepresent to them the problem.
(13:34):
We present to them the feedbackthat we've gotten from students,
because we're students first,so that's one of our first
values, so we always providethat and we essentially start to
lay out for them these are someof the various possibilities of
how we might go about solvingthis problem, and we get their
thoughts, we get their feedback.
Then we go back to the drawingboard, we incorporate that in
and we continue meeting withthem throughout the process in
(13:55):
designing what essentiallybecomes the solution.
And then, from that pointforward, we start to share with
the masses all 1,600 partners inusually a webinar format.
First, here are some of thethings that are coming down the
road.
Here are things that are comingdown the roadmap six months
from now, a year from now, tostart to get folks wrapped
(14:18):
around what is coming.
And then I think part of it isliterally exposure.
We have to talk about itmultiple times.
People aren't always going tounderstand it the first time.
They need to hear it multipletimes.
Right, you mentioned thatyou're doing a lot of work in
marketing with a lot of theschools that you're working with
.
It's the same concept.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
You need exposure.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
You need repetition.
And then we of course alwaysbeta test everything.
So we do that with anothersmall group of schools, usually
about 100 to 200 beta schools,and then we take that feedback,
we continue to tweak it and thenwe make those changes before we
do a larger rollout.
With the rollout, sometimes weroll out to a percentage of
(14:57):
schools first, kind of see howthat goes, and then we open it
up further.
Sometimes we go ahead and dowhat we call a GA launch, which
is a general launch to everybodyafter the beta, so that one
varies a little bit depending onthe future.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, I mean, that roadmap makes a ton of sense,
though, and gives you, I think,a plug and play, iterative way
to sort of do things soft,launch them, so to speak, test
workout bugs and then sort ofget people sort of ready for
what's coming next Exactly readyfor what's coming next, Exactly
Switching gears a little bit.
(15:31):
You're seemingly really aheadof trends in career services and
where you see things going.
You mentioned the gatekeepermodel, and I love the way that
you were able to build that intothe product so that you could
have a more sort of curatedaspect of it and fit the sort of
like challenges of sort ofinformation asymmetry that I
(15:52):
think people have sort of likehad trouble pivoting to in this
space, Like what are some shiftsthat you've seen happening and
then how do you thinkinstitutions can adapt to them?
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Well, I think there's a few things over the course of
the past decade that I've seen,and I'll mention them because I
think there's a pattern to allof this right.
So, back 10 years ago, whenHandshake first came onto the
market, what most of ourcolleagues in career services
ourselves included, mike what wewere used to were closed
(16:25):
enterprise systems.
You would buy a closedenterprise system and, as an
employer, you had to log intoall these different enterprise
systems to post your jobmultiple times, and the notion
of putting your employers oryour jobs for your students onto
a network that was shared wasreally scary.
Really tough shared was reallyscary.
(16:50):
I remember the conversationswhen a lot of our colleagues
highly skeptical and they werereally worried that if they did
this they would lose all theiremployers, they would lose all
their jobs and none of theirstudents would get hired Right.
Like that was the concern atthe time and I think you know
that mentality is a little bitof a zero sum game sort of
mentality and I think thereality is, when you're talking
(17:14):
about access and trying to helpall students be able to get
greater access to allopportunity, it's actually not a
zero-sum game and our dataproves that as new schools came
on, every new school that joinedHandshake increased the number
of employers and job andinternship opportunities by over
200, sometimes 300%.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, network effect.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Yeah, because of the network effect, right, and so
that, fundamentally, was one ofthe first major shifts and
changes within career servicesjust in the past decade.
And now, if you think about it,people don't bat an eye about
it.
Nobody thinks twice about thefact that you're joining a
network.
In fact, it's a pretty big plus, right, and people find it
pretty normal.
But the reason I use thisexample first is because the
(17:59):
pattern that happens is a newthing is introduced, people are
scared and skeptical becauseit's unknown.
You start to get a few earlyadopters and innovators to do it
, then the rest of the majormajority starts to join them and
you hit a tipping point wherenow it becomes the norm.
And that is almost always theexact same pattern for pretty
(18:23):
much every new change that isintroduced.
It's introduced, there'sskepticism, you get a few early
people to adopt it and to showyou that it can work, and then
you start to get more peopleover the hump, and so that was
one of the first things.
I think another one wascertainly the example I gave you
earlier around this notion ofmore curation, and I think one
(18:44):
that we're working on right nowis really about content creation
and it's about the feed.
So we know that Gen Z consumesinformation differently than we
did, as millennials or Gen Xersor boomers and to still directly
(19:05):
connect into their line ofthinking, their line of
consumption, because otherwisethey're consuming other
information elsewhere and Iwould honestly, if they're going
to scroll on something, I wouldrather them scroll on Handshake
around career material.
How do we help our partners,quite frankly, to stay relevant?
(19:27):
How do we help our partners,quite frankly, to stay relevant?
It would be really easy for ourentire profession to
potentially become irrelevant ifthey to stay relevant, to stay
plugged in and to be able tohelp students get the
(19:56):
information that a lot of timesthey don't even know.
They need to ask becausethey're going through it for the
first time, and so the valueand expertise of our partners,
of our EDU partners, is soimmense.
I want to keep finding ways toplug them in directly, and I
literally just said this on awebinar last week to our
partners.
My hope is that in three years,if we've done our job well at
(20:19):
Handshake, we will have createda consumer product that is so
sticky and intuitive andseamless for students that they
will find so much value.
They will be there, they willwant to be there.
They will tell their friendsabout it and none of my higher
education institutions will haveto spend their very precious
(20:41):
and valuable time trying to getstudents onto a platform.
Instead, they can spend theirtime creating the content that
those students need and they canspend their time engaging
one-on-one with those studentswho actually really need that
help and support, and they canspend their time creating the
right programming and events forthose students to meet the
(21:04):
employers and the alumni thatthey actually want to meet.
That is a really valuable useof our colleagues' expertise and
that's what I want to be ableto build for them.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
That is super cool and I love the way that you're
sort of essentially freeing uptime for staff members to do
things that are just morenuanced and that require unique
and nuanced expertise and techis sort of, I think, solving a
lot of those backgroundchallenges.
It strikes me that that has tobe like a massive UX challenge,
right, because it's like you'vegot like you've got such a, you
(21:39):
know, a very sort of quicklychanging student demographic and
you have to do a lot of sort oflike testing and things and
feedback to sort of make surethat new product features but
sort of products overall, sortof like testing and things and
feedback to sort of make surethat new product features but
sort of products overall, sortof meeting those expectations.
But then you've also got,because of the marketplace
concepts, you've got employers,you've got, you know, partners
that you're sort of doing andyou have to have a sort of
(22:01):
probably a different lens forsort of each of those pieces of
it.
What's the mentality aroundthat, around sort of creating
and designing things that likework for everybody, and how do
you sort of balance that, thesort of the pieces of that?
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah, I think for us, we're really continuing to move
towards having more of, inmarketing terms, a consumer
narrative and consumer persona,so that it is actually just one
rather than three separate ones,but something that is
consistent.
And so we've been verytransparent and we've been very
(22:36):
direct with all three sides ofour marketplace that we want
Handshake to be the platform,the place for early talent, and
we want it to be the platformfor Gen Z, because Gen Z is the
emerging population in ourworkforce right now, and so we
need to do that and we need tobe very intentional around how
(23:00):
we attract that particularpopulation, because they are the
largest and fastest growingpopulation in our workforce
today, and just last year theyofficially overtook the number
of baby boomers in the workforce, right, so it's happening, it's
growing significantly, and so Ithink that piece is really
important.
Obviously, when it comes to theactual building of specific
(23:22):
product features, we are alwayspaying very close attention and
talking to our employer partners, talking to our higher
education partners, to reallyunderstand what are you trying
to do, what's the problem you'retrying to solve and how do we
build something that both helpsthe marketplace and helps the
students, but also helps youwith your workflow and what
you're trying to create.
(23:44):
But I think when we really lookat the marketing and the
narrative, we try to be reallyconsistent around who we are?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
Yeah, I like that.
What advice would you have forinstitutional leaders that are
just struggling with thecomplexity of onboarding new
processes, budget cuts, allthese different pieces that I
think we're seeing some changesin the hiring marketplace where
(24:15):
you know and I guess it's been along time coming but you know
the sort of middle market issort of like kind of quickly
disappearing.
We've got demographic cliff of15-ish percent of students that
are enrollment drops.
I think we've got a lot ofplaces that are going to
continue to have to sort ofclose or sort of reposition or
(24:36):
completely sort of reimagine.
What are your advices forplaces that are just really
struggling to find that sort ofniche in place?
And how does a platform likeyours sort of uniquely add value
to students, to employers, toexperiences, to sort of like be
an agent that is going to sortof like help sort of push them
(24:57):
in the direction they need to go?
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Yeah, let me actually answer your question kind of in
two different ways one morebroad and then one more specific
to Handshake broad and then onemore specific to Handshake.
The broader answer, I think, isit's always important for teams
, institutions, leadership, toremain nimble and resilient and
to be willing to rethink whatyour value proposition is.
(25:20):
That's really, really key and,mike, I know you doing all of
this work and helping a lot ofthese schools do their marketing
it's probably part of yourrepertoire and what you're
telling them all the time butreally having a good hard look
at what is your current valueproposition, if the world around
you has changed and people canget X, y and Z in other places,
(25:43):
why do they come to you?
What is it that you canuniquely bring them that nobody
else can, and be willing toactually let go of the things
that are no longer unique to youanymore.
I think that is really actuallya big lesson in staying
adaptable and reinventingyourself.
It's something that I've toldstudents for years when I've
(26:04):
advised them in career advisingis to reinvent yourself means
you have to be willing to kindof let go of some of the things
you did before to make room fordoing new things that are more
relevant at this particularpoint in time.
So I think that is a big piecekind of broadly, and I think
partnerships is another uniqueway that institutions could be
(26:27):
thinking about that too.
So maybe you are not the expertin X area, but the school down
the road is, and they're kind ofin a similar boat to you.
Is there a way that you couldpartner?
Is there a way that you couldscale your resources?
Is there a way that you couldstreamline some things for your
students so that they can getthe best of both worlds, but you
personally at your institutiondon't have to try to be all
(26:50):
things to all people, as youactually said early in our
conversation today.
So I think that's my take onthe broad question.
I think the second part of thequestion is sort of handshake,
and how can handshake help toprovide value to some of these
institutions?
So I think, first and foremost,we provide access for your
students.
I think when you are a studentthat goes to an institution that
(27:13):
perhaps is not the stateflagship or the Ivies or sort of
the top 50, right, you needaccess to great opportunities.
There are so many smart,talented, intelligent students
that go to these institutions,but they don't have the same
introductions, they don't havethe same access, they don't have
(27:34):
the same pathways into some ofthese different industries or
fields or employers, and that'swhat we provide is an
opportunity for those studentsto be able to meet those
employers and vice versa.
Those employers often want thattalent.
They just don't know where togo to get them, and so I think
we can provide a lot of that.
The second thing that we canprovide is data.
(27:55):
We sit on a treasure trove ofdata and information that would
be so helpful for anyinstitution.
I'm thinking the Dean ofAdmissions, I'm thinking the VP
of Enrollment Management I'mthinking the dean of admissions,
I'm thinking the VP ofenrollment management, I'm
thinking the president or theprovost.
(28:17):
That can really allow them totell a more compelling story
around their success or theirstudents and employers, and
that's what we can do.
So by using Handshake, you'llhave a lot of that data and
you'll be able to help put thattogether in a compelling way,
and I think that's really key.
And then the third part isperhaps more operational and
(28:38):
kind of day-to-day.
When we roll out new technologyand new features, what is hard
sometimes for partners is thatit requires them to rethink
their workflows.
It requires them to rethink howthey might do something
operationally.
We're actually also providingan opportunity.
(29:07):
We're providing you anopportunity to flex that muscle
right, to choose to say, wow,okay, we can do this a different
way, how could we actuallychange the way that we do this
right?
That is actually a choice thatevery partner gets to make every
single day when they go to work, and I know that that's not
always easy and you have tobuild that muscle, sometimes
slowly, with your teams.
(29:29):
But the point is there's nobetter time than now to start.
Just do a little bit every dayand you're able to start to
actually really change and adapt.
And once you get that muscleunder you and I know this from I
worked at two differentinstitutions where I was hired
in to specifically help leadtransformational change at both
institutions Once you start tobuild that muscle within your
(29:52):
team, it will keep going and youwill be able to have a team
that is nimble, that isresilient, that is adaptable to
change, because they've nowbuilt the capacity for doing
that and when they look atthings, when they look at new
challenges, when they look atchanges that are coming, they
will no longer see them asobstacles, they will see them as
opportunities, and they will beable to think in a different
(30:15):
way around.
How could I change this up?
And so I think that's exciting,but it takes a little work and
a little patience and a littlepersistence to get there.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
That's incredibly well said.
I couldn't agree more.
The focus on the training andthe mindset, really sort of
getting people to sort of seethese challenges as
opportunities.
And there's like these weirdtweaks I think like leaders can
do in terms of like what youcelebrate or give attention to,
like.
There's this great book I readI'm blanking on the name but I
(30:47):
think it's called you Are whatyou Do or that affects Silicon
Valley book on leadership butreally sort of gets to, you know
, the heart of like the talkingpoints and what people are
actually saying like mattersvery little relative to, like,
the actions that people aretaking and people are paying
very, very close attention tothe actual actions and paying
are taking, um, and people arepaying very, very close
attention to the actual actionsand paying less attention to the
(31:08):
sort of lip service becausethey're, you know, incentives
drive everything kind of to thepoint you made you made earlier.
Um, so these little things aboutsort of celebrating, you know,
um, celebrating people that aresort of taking risks or trying
new things, or like giving likeattention and praise to that or
um, you know, like finding thesmall little sort of iterative
(31:29):
things and, even if it doesn'twork, just sort of like owning
and celebrating that and owningexperimentation, like all these
little little things that youcan do to have like outsized um,
uh, you know, outsized leverageto like what, what you're
actually trying to do, which isreally cool.
I'd love to maybe just sort ofpick your brain on like what's
(31:55):
the future of career services?
Look like to you and where doyou see Handshake sort of in
that space, like if you had toproject out five, 10 years?
Where do you see things goingand what do you see as your role
in that?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Where do you see things going and what do you see
as your role in that?
Yeah, well, I think one of thebig pieces is career services is
going to continue to be moreand more critical to the success
of higher education.
I believe one of the main waysto bring that back around is to
(32:28):
show them the value and thereturn on investment of that
education.
I don't mean that in thatschools only need to have
certain types of majors orcertain types of programs.
I'm actually a huge believer inthe liberal arts but what I do
mean is that we must talk in away that actually translates and
(32:48):
resonates with the generalpublic, and I think we've kind
of lost some of that.
I think that's a marketingchallenge, quite frankly.
I think we need to, as anentire entity, as higher
education.
I think we need to own thenarrative of who we are.
We need to articulate thatvalue in words that are not
higher ed speak but generalpublic speak, so that people can
(33:11):
see and really garner forthemselves Wow.
This is why it's useful.
This is why it's valuable.
This is what I'm getting out ofit.
Career services, quite frankly,will play a really big role in
that if an institution is smart,because what career services
can do is help increaserecruitment.
It can help with revenue, itcan help with reputation, which
(33:34):
ultimately helps with rankingright, like.
These are all the things Ialways say that career services,
if done correctly, can actuallyhelp impact the four R's of an
institution.
Those are the four R's.
I do think that in order forcareer services to do that,
though, there are a couple ofthings that need to happen on
both sides.
So, on the leadership side,you've got to give career
(33:57):
services a seat at the table.
You don't always have toprovide a lot of resources.
As much as I would love toadvocate for tons of resources
for career services, I know thatnot all institutions at the
moment have extra resources toallocate.
What you can do that iscompletely free is to give your
leader of career services a seatat the table, a seat at the
table with your deans, a seat atthe table with your provost or
(34:20):
associate provost, a seat at thetable with your cabinet to
really emphasize the importanceand the connectivity of career
with curriculum and how youthink about that.
You could build in feedbackloops, right?
I think, actually, our two-yearinstitutions do a really
fantastic job of this, where alot of them have industry
(34:42):
advisory boards for many oftheir programs, where employers
are plugged in and actuallyproviding real-time feedback on
the skills and the competenciesthat they're seeing of the
graduates that are coming outand going into work at their
workplaces and what that lookslike and what is the new
technology or the new thingsthat they're teaching or doing
in their workplaces and how canthat be infused back into the
(35:05):
classroom.
Right, that doesn't always meanchanging curriculum, but it
might mean a change in how youframe that curriculum.
It might mean a change in theexamples that you use in helping
students to understand things.
There are lots of differentnuances to how this can look, so
I think that's a big piece ofit is making sure the right
(35:26):
people are at the table andmaking sure that you're actually
being open to changing some ofthe ways in which you've done
things at your institution forsome time Now.
On the other side, careerservices leaders it's important
that you actually build theskills of navigating the
politics of your institution.
You have to be an incrediblystrong communicator of the
(35:47):
vision, the direction and thework that you and your team are
doing.
So if you're not a strongverbal and or written
communicator.
That's something to work onright now.
You have to know how to buildbridges and build relationships,
because so much of what you'redoing requires influence, not
positional power, right.
And you have to be fairly datasavvy.
(36:08):
And if you are not personallydata savvy in pulling that data,
analyzing the data yourself,you need to know how to hire
someone on your team that can dothat.
And what you need to be able todo is craft the story around
that data so that you can tellthat compelling vision to those
above you, around you, besideyou, right, is going to be
(36:29):
really key.
So I think those are some ofthe things that I still see as
the future of where careerservices is going.
I think Handshake plays a hugerole in that.
From, quite frankly, the mostbasic baseline core value, which
is we want your students tohave great outcomes, just like
you want your students to havegreat outcomes, we are literally
(36:51):
driving towards the same thing,which is your students getting
employed at the employers thatthey want to be at, right, and
so the best way to do that is toensure that they actually have
access to all of those employers, to all of those opportunities.
And then the second part, whichI talked about a little bit
earlier, is we sit on all ofthat data, so now we can provide
(37:14):
that back to you.
One of the big marquee projectsthat we're doing this year, in
2025, is actually aroundoutcomes.
So we recognize that, becausewe're sitting on so much good
data, we actually can providesourced outcomes that help to
supplement every school's firstdestination outcomes Based on
handshake profiles, based onpublic profiles, based on
(37:36):
employer sourced data that wehave proprietary access to.
We can give our schools greaterinsight into where their
students are going, even beforethey are surveyed, and we're
really excited to be able towork on that and to be able to
provide that for our partners.
We learned recently that weactually have 2x the number of
(37:59):
profiles for recent graduatesand early talent than any other
platform out there, and sothat's pretty exciting.
Those are things that we haveproprietary access to that we're
now going to be able to surfaceto our partners in a more
meaningful way.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
That's incredible.
What excites you?
Maybe a great place to closewould be like.
What excites you about the roadahead?
It seems like you guys arebuilding really incredible
pieces and you know layeringonto core product and adding
value in unique, unique ways.
You know supporting andaugmenting the broader value
proposition that higher ed andcareer services offer.
(38:35):
But like what, personally, getsyou really excited?
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Oh, I mean, it's the same thing that that brought me
to Handshake in the first place,which is being able to actually
meet this mission of increasingaccess to opportunity for all
of our students.
It feels more personal to methese days.
My son is 12.
And in the next six years, he,too, will be in college and he
(38:58):
will be looking for his firstinternship.
He'll be looking for hispart-time job and, at some point
, looking for his first job outof school, and I want to make
sure that we are building aproduct that I am proud of him
using, something that's actuallygoing to help him to locate and
to build his network to findthe types of things that he's
most interested in, and we'vegot a few more years to do that
(39:23):
before he opens the app andstarts using it himself.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
But that is awesome.
Um well, I think that's anawesome place to end.
Thank you, Christina, Iappreciate you.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
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