There are very few graduates today that would lump themselves in the “average” category.
Average debt, that is.
According to Nellie Mae’s student loan debt survey in 2009, the average debt load carried by an undergraduate was just shy of $30,000. Yet, when seemingly “average” recent graduates were asked, their debt loads were at least 1.5 times that if not more. (And that’s before taking into consideration the credit card debt many are carrying…)
In essence, they’re Broke From Go. From the time these young people graduate, they are far more cash strapped than any previous generation. Couple this situation with a difficult job market, a fluctuating stock market, and a depressed housing economy — it’s no wonder the next generation is bucking the status quo.
An intern of mine recently said to me after I had him investigating some statistics on student loan debt, “Can this be right? $200 a month payments for 10 years on $10,000 in student loans?”
He went on to discover that he’ll need a salary of $133,000 a year to “afford” his student loan payments once in repayment status.
Know of any companies looking to hire a recent Liberal Arts graduate for 6 figures?
I didn’t think so…
Such is the case with many students who’ve been sold a bill of goods as to the value of their degree. The fact of the matter is that many two year institutions are graduating 20 year olds with degrees in high demand like nursing and telecomm. Many of whom are grabbing jobs paying in excess of $50,000 a year.
That begs the questions:
Why are all of these people getting 4-year degrees?
What is the point of racking up high 5-figure debt loads?
When is our higher education system going to change?
Who else is seeing this problem and what are they doing to change it?
So, what are we to do about this cash-strapped generation?
First of all, encourage those who don’t know what they want to do to attend a two-year school and get their general requirements out of the way. It’s more economical and quite often, the classes are easier to get into than a larger institution. Guide them in gaining experience through internships so they get a sense of what they really enjoy doing. At that point, see if it makes sense to pursue the four year degree.
More loans are not the answer. Our administration thinks that making student loans more accessible is the answer to our problems. What we need less of right now are cash strapped twenty-somethings. This is one of the most entrepreneurial generations to have ever appeared on the scene and when they’re in debt, they aren’t as prone to start successful businesses.
The single best way to fix the problem is to educate those in the middle of it. It is up to the institutions, the families, and the individuals to seek out every educational opportunity to ensure students make wise and educated decisions when it comes to money.
(For more information about how to get the MOST amount of scholarships check out Scholarship Mastery!)
Have you ever met someone at a coffee shop, job fair, party, social event, or fundraiser? You have a great conversation, find a couple of commonalities, and then find yourself putting their business card in a drawer somewhere only to be found when you do your big annual desk cleanout?
Once you’ve met someone, what do you do to keep in contact?
If the answer is nothing, then you might as well call yourself a professional card collector. You probably have 3 or 4 rubber banded “collections” of cards from past events, meetings, and chance meetups. And you’re keeping these because, hey, you never know when you might need their information. Sound familiar?
There is a better way.
First, when you meet someone and exchange business cards, jot a couple notes down on the back of the card that identify this persons’ desires, goals, kids’ names, or any other piece of information you gleaned from the conversation. One of the things that most impresses another person is a personal detail or two that is brought back up in conversation at a later date. Imagine the power of meeting a potential employer at a job fair and then sending a thank-you note with their daughters’ name in it. Totally puts you in a different category than the other people they met the same day.
Second, keep all of your cards in one place and once a week enter ALL of them into a database. You can use Excel, Numbers, ACT!, or any other CRM system (Customer Relationship Manager).
My preference is to enter all of my new contacts into Google Contacts. This does three things for me:
I can access their information from any computer with an internet connection.
I can sync the information in Google Contacts with my phone so I have them with me almost constantly.
I can export the list as a .csv file to import into a mail system.
Now that all of your contacts are in Google Contacts, the next step is to get all of these contacts into a mail delivery program so that you can write one email and send it out to everyone on your list. My favorite service for this is www.MailChimp.com. MailChimp is a great tool as it’s incredibly easy to use, is FREE for under 2,000 contacts, and the deliverability of the emails is really high (meaning they won’t get caught up in spam filters).
Again, the reason you’re doing these steps is to make sure that the people you meet remember you. So, to make sure that they remember you, 2-4 times a year send the entire list an email that does a few things:
It summarizes what you’ve been up to over the past 3-6 months
It has a couple of links to articles that you’ve read that you think are valuable
It offers assistance to them in any way you might be of service
It asks for potential contacts to someone you’d like to meet, work for, have coffee with, etc.
I wanted to shoot you an email letting you know how much I value keeping in touch with you and to send along a couple of articles that I thought you might find interesting.
This is the second semester of my senior year at Kick Ass University. I’m excited about my prospects after graduation as I just spent the past 12 weeks interning at Cool Company, and I learned that what I most enjoyed was marketing/sales/finance/accounting/grunt work. I’ve decided that the industries I’m most interested in are plastics and wind energy and will be looking for a job after graduation in one of these industries. (If you know of anyone I should meet, I would do backflips for an introduction.)
As a means of continuously offering value to our relationship, I’m sending a couple of links to articles that I read recently. The first link is all about time management and is by one of the leaders in the field, David Allen. The second link is an interesting look at the Art of Smiling, something we could all do more of!
If there’s anything I can ever do for you, please feel free to contact me anytime! Thanks so much for your time, <First Name>, I really appreciate knowing you.
As you can see, the email doesn’t have to be long or elaborate. The above example is simple, direct, and to the point. It offers value in the articles, asks for contacts, and lets people know what you’ve been up to.
Where the example lists <First Name>, this is a feature in MailChimp that allows you to customize the email to whomever you’re sending it to. Now you can blast 200 emails in one fell swoop and have every email have the recipients name within the body of the email.
Super simple. Super efficient.
Too much info? Let me boil it down to the ridiculous:
Put biz card info into a spreadsheet
Import spreadsheet into MailChimp
Send an email 2-4 times a year to everyone
Laugh at your friends who can’t score a job while you have multiple offers
Without fail, a great majority of the students I present to on a regular basis have no real concrete idea what they want to do with their career. So if you’re in that boat, don’t worry, you’re not alone!
Just because you haven’t committed to one line of work upon graduation doesn’t predict success or failure. There have been many before you that took some meaningless job upon graduation but eventually found their way.
So here are four examples of what to do while you find your way:
CONSIDER WHAT YOU’RE GOOD AT. Make a list of all of the things that people tell you you’re good at. Even if it’s video games, maybe there’s a future in that for you. I know of a student who makes a pretty good part-time income getting sponsored by game companies to play in tournaments. He, ultimately, wants to develop and code games. While you’re mapping this list out, be thinking about industries and companies that might hire someone with your unique skill-set. NETWORK WITH PEOPLE WHO LIVE A LIFE YOU’D LIKE TO LIVE. There’s a caveat on this one — network with these people and realize that it probably took them some time to reach this level and you’ll have to “earn your stripes”. There’s a 3-year rule that applies to just about everything and it is this: It will take you 3 years to reach the level of success that you thought you’d have in year 1. Networking isn’t rocket science — it simply requires an ability to extend an invitation to someone for coffee or lunch and the willingness to ask questions and listen. People love to talk about their life path and you just may learn what to do and what NOT to do to get to their level faster. TAKE A JOB FOR WHAT YOU LEARN, NOT WHAT YOU EARN. Too many recent grads are looking for the big buck payout on their first gig. Trust me when I tell you that the money will come and go just as sure as the sun rises and sets every day. But the knowledge that you get from working alongside someone who’s making it happen every day is worth it’s weight in gold. Find those people that you know you can learn something from and let them know you’re interested not just in the job, but in finding a mentor that can help them hit the next level. It’s a no-brainer situation for them to hire you. You’re eager, teachable, and you’ve just said you want to strive for bigger things — I’d take that over a higher GPA any day. INTERVIEW SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE. This goes back to networking with the people you want to emulate, but has a little bit higher purpose. When you’re on a mission to find out what makes people successful, you’ll generally begin to apply their advice to your life and start to make radical changes. If you record the interviews and put them up on a website, it may even create a raving fan following and you’ll make scads of money from affiliates and never have to work a day in your life. Hey, it could happen. Check out these dudes: www.retireat21.com and www.mixergy.com.
When all else fails, follow your heart and do what makes you happy. While you’re doing this, live on less than you make, save and invest the rest, and begin searching out the best opportunities for YOU!
PS> Keep one last thing in mind: You Are NOT Your Major. Get creative about potential jobs that would keep you engaged for the first few years of your career. You CAN have fun. I promise!
Every now and again I get questions from students that I think are worth answering for everyone. I recently spoke at Drake University in Des Moines and had several questions that came up about student loans. One in particular was about how to get a smaller student loan payment than what Direct Loan initially sets yours at. Here’s the answer:
If you have any questions you’d like answered, please email me at Adam@AdamSpeaks.com!
Whoops, I said it.
Well, someone (else) had to. After all, all the folks who’ve said something similar in the past year seemed to have gone a bit by the wayside. Not my friends Mike Wagner and Doug Mitchell — they’ve created a Secret School of Business that actually doesn’t exist… it’s a bit like Fight Club. And you know the first rule of fight club, don’t you?
Take a spin around their site and make sure you watch the video in the blog linked below. It’s maddening, frustrating, and completely accurate from this non-academic’s point of view. http://secretschoolofbusiness.com/12-minutes-to-change-your-mind/
Remember, there is no Secret School of Business.
to have ever appeared on the scene and when they’re in debt, they aren’t as prone to start successful businesses.
