Alexandra Leiben 0:00
All right, everybody. My name is Alexander Leiben, and I'm the Deputy Director of the Burkle Center. We are hosting this career panel. We do this every year, because at one point we realized that a lot of you - I'm going to quickly then ask who you are - study all kinds of international things, and then suddenly you don't know where to go, especially on the West Coast. Right on the East Coast, it's much easier if you want to work in international relations. There are many, many options, a lot less here, and that's why I felt like it actually makes sense to bring in people who can talk about their careers in the international realm that are also not necessarily the most obvious ones that you think of.
So each year, we bring in different people and wonderful experts, from wonderful organizations who share their experience with you. First show hands, how many undergrads are here? Pretty much everybody. Seniors, okay, juniors. Oh, wow, you guys are early in this sophomores. Freshmen must be the rest. Okay, all right, that's, that's an interesting distribution. Usually we have largely seniors, some juniors and a few grad students, also grad students during the pandemic. Oh, there you go. During the pandemic. We also had community members. Everybody wanted to come back. So, what we always think about also, is, for many of you, graduating is the first time you have to start making decisions for yourself. Up to this point, you knew you're gonna go to elementary school, to high school, everything in between, and then to college, right? And now it is like you have your particular major. Now it's, where do you go next? Right? You go to grad school. Do you go and work for a while? Do you take an internship? There's so many things. It's like, if you say grad school, then what would you want to do? Right? So many students, international, internationally focused students, go to law school, right? That's sort of a knee jerk graduate degree, which is not a bad one, like three years. It's pretty quick, and it opens a lot of doors for you. But it's not the best thing for everybody. It's like other people want to get a master's, but then to get a PhD or master, so many questions in any case, that that you have. And here again, it's like, what we are going to do is tell you about, you will hear about, about our three panelists careers, and you can ask questions. And I will also talk about, like, what skills, what degrees might be helpful, right? Like, what, how should you prepare? Because that also has changed over time.
So without further ado, let me introduce our panelists one after another, and then I will ask each one of them to speak about five to seven minutes about your respective careers, like, what, including, sort of what, what I'm interested in are the pivots, the unexpected turns. Right? Obviously, it's like, when you, when we look ahead, like, sometimes it's like you have to stress. You need to know what you want to do for the rest of your life. But that is really not the case at all. Case in point, I'm, I used to be a rock concert promoter, and here I'm talking about pivots. So, so it's you never know, basically, right? And that's why, also, we want to take some of that stress away from you too, right? You can try things out. You're young enough. It's completely fine. Everything you do teaches you something about yourselves as human beings, right? Where's the better fit? What resonates with you? Do you want to sit in an office? Do you want to what? Nobody sits in an office anymore. Do you want to sit at a laptop? Do you want to be in the field? Right? There's so many different questions. So in any cases, like you're young enough, you can try things out for a few years, and you can make changes, and you will have nothing lost other than learn about more, more about yourself, about how to relate to other people, how to problem solve, and a little better idea of where you want to go.
All right. Next to me, Dr. Richard Downey is a senior fellow for Latin American Studies at the Pacific Council on International Policy. He's also an adjunct professor in the University of Southern California's Global Security Studies Program and the Missouri State University's Defense and Strategic Studies program. Dr. Downey has held several senior defense and academic leadership roles helping to shape security and defense cooperation across the western hemisphere. In his last position in the US Army, he served as the first Commandant German of the Western Hemisphere Institute for security cooperation. Following retirement from the army, he was director of the William J Perry center for Hemispheric Defense Studies in Washington, DC for nine years, and that's how we met. He was the former president and CEO of the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, and prior to that, of the World Affairs Council of Orange County. Graduate of the United States Military Academy, Dr. Downey earned his PhD in international relations from the University of Southern California, and we still let
him talk.
Next, Kristin Ghazarians is the Associate Director of the Human Rights Watch student Task Force, and has been with that team since 2012. She's a graduate of Syracuse University's public diplomacy program and University of California San Diego's International Studies Department. Her background is in international relations, conflict resolution and public relations. Prior to joining HRW, Krsitin worked for Amnesty International as the Mid Atlantic Regional Office administrator in Washington, DC, interned with the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, and taught English in Cambodia and Los Angeles. She loves to travel, and has spent a lot of time focusing on human rights while abroad. I want to ask you about that. She has dedicated her academic and professional careers to human rights.
Last, but certainly not least. Jim Newton. He's a veteran journalist, author and teacher. In 25 years at the Los Angeles Times, Newton worked as a reporter, editor, bureau chief, columnist and from 2007 through 2010 editor of the editorial pages. He's a recipient of numerous national and local awards in journalism and participated in two staff efforts coverage of the 1992 riots before many of you were born and the 1994 Northridge earthquake that were both awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Before coming to the Times, he was a reporter at the Atlanta Journal Constitution and is a graduate of Dartmouth College, where he graduated with highest honors in 1985. Jim came to UCLA full time in early 2015 to teach in communication studies and public policy and to found blueprint, a UCLA magazine addressing the policy challenges facing California and Los Angeles in particular, he brought some of them. Thank you, Jim. Please take them home. Take a look.
Jim Newton 7:03
Please take them home, because I don't want to have to carry them. Don't leave any.
Alexandra Leiben 7:09
He serves as the magazine's editor in chief, and at UCLA Newton also teaches in communication studies and public policy, and he wrote four important works of history. So often I leave out people's education because it gets so long, but in this case, I feel like it's important, so you guys can also see what people have done.
May I ask you to start?
Dr. Richard Downie 7:30
Oh, I'd be honored. Thank you so much, Alexandra, for a nice, for the wonderful introduction. And again, apologies to all of you for being late and making you eat more pizza. But I represent the government path, if you will, the career path. Are any of you interested in going into government? Oh, wow. Not only is this an interesting distribution, how about foreign service? How many? Wow, it probably looks like that corresponds. Anybody in the military? No, okay, Well, it is a very interesting international career, and I can talk actually both ways, because about not only the military, but also the foreign service side of it. Because one of the things as, if you go into the military, and I'll just, I'll just describe my path. You are in a sort of a parallel track, because you work together. If you're on the international side of the military, you work very closely with the Department of State in embassies in Washington, and that sort of thing. So but but let me give you a little bit of my path, and I'll explain how that works if someone's interested in that either way. But I'm so glad to see at this time. Government is not a favorite spot to consider, but you have a few years to go. Most of you here, so that's a good thing.
Yeah. Thank you, Jim. Anyway, so as Alexandra mentioned, I graduated from West Point, but for anyone who's interested in the military, it doesn't really matter, because there are ways after college to go in through - you probably want to go into the officer training programs and that sort of thing that's certainly a possibility for the military. But one of the things, in my day, it was a little different. Now you specialize more. In my day, we had to have two specialties, and my particular specialty was infantry, and my other specialty was the foreign area specialty. And so in my particular area was the Americas, Latin America. And so the military has a program they call the foreign area Officer Program. And what they do is they, if you go into that program, they send you for a Master's degree. They sent me for a PhD as well. But, I mean, I had to do something on my own, my dissertation, my own, but they sent me for that as well. And then they send you to language training for whatever region you happen to be in, so for about six six months or a year, or depending on the language, could be two years, actually, depending on the language. But then you are a specialist in that area, and typically, one of the things you do as part of the qualification is certainly your master's degree, at least your language. But then you also do a - you either go to a school in a country in that region, or you become an exchange officer. And one of the nice things is, after you spend a year and a year and a half there, they give you a budget to just travel for six months, just to get to know the culture of that country and that region where you are. So that was what I found particularly attractive, actually. So I was an exchange officer, in my case, again in Latin America, I went to Colombia. It was a very, rather difficult time, but it was so I was an exchange officer. So I was technically a Colombian army officer, and my counterpart was back at Fort Bragg in my job. So I was there doing things. I went to their Ranger School. They call it Lancero school. It was very, very interesting. But, and so what in that particular path, and I, again, I had to bounce back and forth. Now you basically go in for a few years and get your specialty, and then you specialize in that, in that area for the rest of your career. It's changed. So in that career path, what they do is you go to embassies, basically, and in your region, and you go in one of two tracks. One of them is called security assistance, and that's one where you help the country to get training or to get if they need defense. Could be trucks, could be weapons, whatever it is aircraft, it's, you know, you help in that you're in the embassy, and doing that. The other track is what they call the attache track, and that's when I was in and so you as an attache, you represent, you represent our government, but you also are, let's just say you're an intelligence collector, and so you, you're reporting on the on what's going on in that country, for our interagency community - the intelligence agencies, Department of State, everybody, because we're reporting on what's going on in the military situation in whatever country you happen to be in. So everyone gets to know you because you're reporting on what is going on in that country. So as you go up that's, there's various levels of doing this, it's very interesting. I mean, you sort of, you're out there in the embassy, and you're working with the Department of State, doing all of those kinds of things, but you're the military representative on that, and all the services are represented. By the way, it's not just the army you have depending on the country. If they don't have a navy, they probably want a navy rep, but if they have a navy, they'll be a navy rep, an Air Force rep, a marine rep and a Coast Guard rep, often depending on the country. So then you go up and you could work at one of the combatant commands you've heard of, CENTCOM, that's the one that's fighting the war in Iran right now. In my case, it was the US Southern Command, which was in Panama at one time, and is now in Miami. But you help, and you coordinate throughout our government and with the countries of the region to do things or you go to the Pentagon, where you work in - I was on the Joint Staff, for example, the Chairman of the Joint Chief has this staff, and there you work very closely with the Department of State, the National Security Council, on all these issues. For example, I was helping to negotiate a treaty with Panama to see if we could stay in Panama after 2000. I mean, there's many things, but you're, you're in that inter-agency environment, so there's lots of opportunities, not only for education, for travel, you know, living in countries, doing those things in the government side. So I'll, I'll leave it there, but I don't know if you'd considered that, but if you're interested in an international career, that's a great way to do it without a whole lot of sort of the overhead of, what's my next job? What's, you know, where am I going? All those kinds of things. But the government is a secure career in that way. And you get a pension, if you got a pension at the end, by the way, which is no small, small deal, but it is something most people don't realize. If you're interested in international career, so love to get your questions afterwards, but I'm really looking forward to hear what Kristin and Jim have to say.
Kristin Ghazarians 15:35
Hi everybody. I don't know about you all, but I grew up thinking there were basically six jobs out there, teacher, lawyer, lawyer, doctor, stay at home, mom, real estate agent and police officer, maybe firefighter as well. I was told at age three that I was going to be a lawyer, because I like to argue. It's to the point that my family, still to this day, asked me, When am I going to law school? And I was like, Are you kidding me? You read my bio earlier. I'll give a little bit more detail about it and how I got onto this path. Because the nonprofit industry is very different than government, very different than journalism, although often overlaps with journalism, partners all the time with government. This was very clearly not the path that I had planned to take. I was going to law school all the way through until I decided not to. In undergrad, I focused on international studies with a concentration in political science and history, because, you know, I loved history, and I figured, sure that'll get me into law school. I started working at a law firm in - I was at UC San Diego, and so I was working at a law firm in downtown San Diego, my final year of undergrad, and I worked there for about two and a half years. I can't even remember now, but while working there, it wasn't the type of law I wanted to practice, but it was going to get me law firm experience and taught me different aspects of the law I worked. I saw land use Law and Estate Planning and family law, criminal law, criminal defense law, and every one of them that I worked in and I was like, this isn't the right fit. I was studying for the LSA, took it, did not get the score I wanted. And was like, hell no, I'm not doing this again, right? It was such a pivot in my life, because from age three to age 22 I was going to law school, my whole life was blown up. I was like, What am I going to do now? I don't want to be a doctor. I don't want to be a stay at home mom. I don't want to be a police officer. What am I going to do? But what I knew I wanted from law school was to work in human rights, but I had no idea what that really meant, because nobody in my life understood human rights either. On my mom's side, my grandfather had been in the Navy. He was actually part of the group that helped develop the first computers in World War Two, and on my dad's side, his father had been we actually don't know where he was born, because his family was uprooted in the Armenian Genocide. So I grew up with their stories of conflict, of pain and suffering, and so I knew human rights was my jam, genocide, in a weird way, was my main interest. Kind of goes back to you wanting to ask me a question about my travel abroad, because I had this interest in human rights. When I decided no longer to go to grad school, I had to figure out what did that really look like. I always pictured working at the UN but I didn't have the connections to get there, so I decided to go to grad school. And you know, you mentioned how on the East Coast, it can be a different world post graduation than here on the West Coast when you have a particular region you want to be working in, or a certain type of job that you want to do. I needed to get out of the west coast, so I did go to Syracuse University. Their public diplomacy program, unfortunately, no longer, no longer exists, but at the time, it was either USC or Syracuse. I chose upstate New York. Don't ask me why. But part of my program, one of the reasons why I picked it is because I worked all through undergrad. I never did an internship, I never did anything that helped me figure out my career path. I just needed to put myself through college and so working in the law firm was the first time I was trying to get on a career path. So I needed to pick a program that had built in internships that could give me connections to different types of work, that would help me figure out my career. Syracuse University did that. There was two different internships built into the grad program. One of them was able to - that's how I got into the UN the second one, we were moving for our final semester of the grad program to Washington, DC, getting out of Syracuse - and I got my own internship at Amnesty International USA. And I don't actually, I should ask, how many people have heard of Human Rights Watch before? Okay, good. Thank you. So can't imagine how many times I asked that question, and nobody raises their hand, and that's okay, but I always because I knew I wanted to be in human rights, I was trying to figure out, how do I get my foot in the door? I kept seeing job posts for researchers, but I didn't have the field experience. So when I got the internship at Amnesty, I was actually doing three different internship roles, one with their African division, one with their I can't even remember what they called it, but it was like their digital investigations and one with some congressional work. Then I got hired in their mid Atlantic Regional Office, which they no longer have. But the way they were structured at the time was that the staff members worked with their student and local groups. I think some of you probably have heard of Amnesty International and how they have those local groups. So I was organizing protests and getting young people and community members to attend, get on the bus events. We'd go to Congress and present and advocate. And I was like, Whoa, this is super cool. How do I keep doing this? Unfortunately, the economy was taking a turn at the time, which actually it took a turn when I was in law school, in working at the law firm as well. If I hadn't quit my job to go to grad school, I would have been fired two months later because they started massive layoffs. So my timing worked out. Amnesty, and the whole world was going through another round of layoffs. I love to travel, if that wasn't clear, I've been to 65 countries, and I had just gone on a trip with a friend of mine to Southeast Asia, and I fell in love with Cambodia, so I came back two months later, quit my job and moved to teach English there. Don't ask me why. Couldn't tell you. I just knew that I felt at home in Cambodia. Still to this day, if you asked me where to travel, that's number one on my list. Loved it there, and I was teaching English, and I got certified while there as well. And the irony is, if you ask anybody in my family, would I become a teacher, answer is, under no circumstance would that ever happen. When I moved back to the US, I was still teaching English here in Westwood, actually, right across the street, somewhere, wherever the direction is. I came back in February, in May, I saw Human Rights Watch Student Task Force. I was like, Oh, my God, I get to apply for a job at Human Rights Watch and actually have a chance at getting the position. And it'd be a perfect five year role. I'm about to start my 15th year. The program that I manage is youth advocacy. We're a leadership and youth advocacy training program, and so we work with high school and some college students. We actually work with the group here on campus at UCLA, and we're helping people learn skills, learn how to host events, public speak, which I'm horrible at, so please forgive any of my ramblings here. But more importantly, advocacy, help people find their voice. And for me, that's what's so crucial. So you know, I know that I'm not really talking so much about the work itself, but for me, one of the things, one of my pieces of advice for those of you who are trying to figure out your life, is consider, what do you want to focus on? I wanted to focus on human rights. Who do you want to work with? I figured out, through a little bit of trial and error, that my passion is working with young people. For other people, it might be more or you might look at it through the lens of I want to work at Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International, the big human rights organizations. And the third thing to consider is, where do you want to be doing this? That's the East Coast versus West Coast. That's the domestic versus International. And as you think about your career path, as you think about those pivots that you need to make in your life, those are the three main things you're going to consider, and you have to prioritize them and what matters to you. Me moving back - I'm an LA native - Me moving back to LA from Cambodia, that was my number one thing that I wanted to do. So that's why I was teaching English until I could find something else that helped me move forward in my career path. When working for a nonprofit or in the nonprofit industry, you do have to accept less pay. Not gonna lie, I've actually been looking recently, not that. I know there's a couple of STF alumni in here, so I'm not gonna say I'm ever considering leaving, but I was interested and was poking around. And it's not easy in the nonprofit sector, you know, so you do want to make sure that you can negotiate some benefits there. But you really need to figure it out, and I think this is true regardless of your sector. Be careful about boxing yourself into one type of career, but be careful about becoming a jack of all trades or a master of one, right? You really need to know what your passion is, because people either have a career or you have a job. Most people are not super happy in that job. So if you can find your career, that's what matters, and that's where you're going to really find your niche and figure out that when you planned on being a lawyer, now you're going to be inspiring the next generation of human rights advocates. I can stop there, unless you want me to keep going. Thank you.
Jim Newton 25:57
That's great. Where I find myself asking the questions that I wish I'd asked you're asking on.
Well, so my story briefly, I guess I had the benefit, and I see this as my I know that not everyone has the benefit of this, which is that I knew exactly what I wanted to do when I was a sophomore in high school. I mean, I knew I wanted to write for a living, how to write and write for whom, and write about what those things all took shape later, but I was always interested in government, politics. I interned for my local congressman when I was in high school, and I wrote my first story for the Palo Alto weekly when I was a sophomore in high school, and I edited my high school paper and published my college paper. So in one sense, it was all very easy for me. It was not so easy for my mom, who's still - my mother has Alzheimer's now - and one blessing of that is, I think that she thinks that I became a lawyer. Even more tragic for her is my little brother became a lawyer, and then he became a writer with his law degree. So she really, she really struck out there, but I grew up in Northern California, mostly. My family moved around a lot, but I grew up in Mexico, partly. But I went to high school in Northern California, and then went off to Dartmouth to go to college, as I said, worked in the paper there, and never, nothing I ever did really distracted me from a desire to have a career in journalism and in writing. When I left college, I went to work for Scotty Reston, who was a columnist at the New York Times - you probably don't know him, but he was a big deal and a generation prior to mine, and he had a clerk every year, immodestly, modeled on the Supreme Court Clerk program that Felix Frankfurter of the court is the one who suggested the clerkship program to him, and so he hired one recent undergraduate graduate to clerk for him every year. And I did in 85/86 and then I worked on the foreign desk for a year for the New York Times. After working for him for a year in Washington, I worked on the foreign desk for a year in New York, and then I left the New York Times to go to work for the Atlanta Constitution. And this would be to your question earlier, Alexandra, about pivots. I guess I'm - if there is a through line in my career, it is the desire to stay, to brave for a living. If there is a happenstance to it, it is very much sort of at the whim of people, people who I trusted and wanted to work for places I was interested in being, and the first and or the second - I guess Reston would be the first - the second of those, in some ways the most important, the Washington bureau chief of The New York Times. When I was working in the Washington bureau, left the New York Times to become the editor of the Atlanta Constitution, and I went to work for him, and would have stayed a long time, but then he left the Constitution after a couple of years fight with the publisher, the first of many times in my life, where fights with the publisher dictated my career. And so after working for Bill Cobb, which was his name for a couple years in Atlanta, when he left, I had no interest in staying, so I came. That's when I came here. And as noted, I spent 25 years at the LA Times. You know, I guess there's some lessons maybe to learn from that. I mean, I do think a determination to stay with writing, despite changes in the newspaper industry, despite changes in what I was covering, is helpful. It helped to be sure about that. At the same time, I do think a benefit of a career in journalism, or at least the career that I've been happy to have, has been to be flexible about the other aspects of it. So, you know, I worked the Constitution, I covered the mayor's office and traveled. Then Andy Young was the mayor there, and so did some international work through covering him. Came back here. My first job at the LA Times was covering the city of Mission Viejo. I never thought I would do anything so small in my life. But that led to cover the city of LA, and then the state and editorships, etc. And ultimately, something I always had in the back of my mind is that I did want to write books. And I started that part of my career at the LA Times taking book leaves. They got a little tired of that after a couple but then when the paper started to really hit its downward spiral, and we can talk more about that in a minute, if you want, I felt the need to leave the last year or two of my time at the LA Times. I was a department head. It was mostly fighting off layoffs and trying to sort of preserve things in the face of cutbacks. And so coming to UCLA relieved me of all of that, and also gave me a much bigger opportunity to write books. This is a much more forgiving environment for book writing than the paper was, and so I've been able to do that here, and for me, then the real joy of book writing. Book writing doesn't have the same collegiality and camaraderie that the paper used to. Anyway, and so I do miss that. On occasion, there really is a sense of working with others to produce the daily miracle that is a good newspaper. My editor at the LA Times, Shelby, one of my editors at LA Times, used to point out that there, in those days, there were more words in a Sunday Los Angeles Times than in the New Testament. And you do it every week. So it's quite a product. Book writing doesn't have that. It doesn't have that, the rush of the daily deadline, the colleagues, but it has the, for me as a writer, the joy of telling a whole story, which is really hard to do in daily journalism, you always feel like you're nibbling at a story and making progress, but it's very hard to get the whole thing just right. And so book writing has really offered me the opportunity to do that, and UCLA has offered me the opportunity to do that. So I am happy that it has led to here. It has not always been what I would have predicted or expected, but it's ended up where I would like it to be. The last thing I'll say just quickly, the newspaper business. The newspaper business sucks. It's really bad right now, and so the path that I just described is not as easily available to all of you as it was to me. But I would say this, the journalism industry, broadly speaking, has a lot of opportunity. If newspapers, as a business model, are in the tank, and they are, what it has given rise to is all kinds of new ways of communicating. The trick there, what's still gelling is, is how to make money doing that, there's a lot of ways to express yourself now, many, many more ways than there were when I was at the stage you're at, but the business model is still in need of coalescing, and the only the optimistic take I would just add to that. In conclusion, I guess people said this, people who are bemoaning the end of journalism are right to be worried, but it's some of the same voices and some of the same concerns that people voiced about the music industry just 10 or 15 years ago. That Napster was here. It was the end of recording. There was just no way to make money in the recording industry at that point. And then what it gave rest was a new model, right? Which is now that musical groups basically use albums to promote tours. They make money on the tours. The model has really gotten foot and it works. And the new model doesn't work for everyone. It works differently. But I do think there's a market for journalism. There is a desire for journalism. I do think business models are slow catching up, but I also think that they will. So if you are interested in it, I wouldn't let the fate of the LA Times or the various papers that are struggling discourage you from it. I do think there's still some life left in it.
Alexandra Leiben 33:58
Thank you, three of you. I have a quick - I'm going to open it up in a minute - but I have a question for you, and that is, skills, what skills? What attitude, personal attitude, and what character traits, right, are important? It's like we just talked about this before we started, what, what do you guys need to know and be capable of doing if you want to go into this particular field, what attitude, how you carried yourself, also in your own careers, has been helpful. And what character traits would you say matter to be successful?
Jim Newton 34:42
Journalists come in lots of shapes and sizes. Most investigative reporters I know are not terribly nice people. You know, there is a kind of grit and a toughness and a willingness to make people mad that is sort of essential for a certain part of the business. But you know, there's also, there's sports writers and restaurant critics and art critics and, I mean, there's lots of ways to participate in journalism. You know, the work that I mostly did is beat reporting, which is to say covering an institution or a subject over a long period of time. I mean, I do think it helps to be kind of willing, able to take criticism. Scotty Reston, who I mentioned, used to say that the great accountability in journalism is that your byline appears on the story, and you have to see the person the next day, and they'll punch you in the nose if they didn't like it. So I was sharing Alexander earlier some of the email I get, some of it's pretty frosty, but you know, I think a willingness not to take yourself too seriously is helpful too, because it can be challenging, difficult work, but it's really rewarding too. So I don't mean to say that to discourage you, but I do think it's helpful to be able to handle yourself.
Kristin Ghazarians 36:03
That's gonna be true of any career. We have a joke, or at least we used to have a joke at HRW that the staff was 80% lawyers and journalists. And in the nonprofit sector, you need perseverance. I think that's true of any field, but especially in the nonprofit sector and in the Human Rights field, or advocacy in general, let's say advocacy, because it doesn't matter what you're advocating for, it doesn't have to be human rights, perseverance and empathy if you're going to do the human rights lens right. Really helps if you speak more than one language. I work for an international organization, and we operate in English, but we have offices in well, we cover more than 100 countries, so you need to be able to, if you can, it's helpful to speak multiple languages, but honestly, that 80% lawyers and journalists. Our organization is changing. We need data analysts we were talking about. We have our digital investigations lab that's growing, that doesn't need lawyers or journalists - no offense - doesn't need that skill. They need people who can code. In my grad program, I had to take public relations classes that I was hating every single day because I had the International Studies background. I use the graphic design skill because I do web design and I create flyers and multimedia and video editing on a daily basis in my role. And so having those practical skills that helps separate you from the other international studies people who are coming in with a poli sci background that wants to travel the world and do good. Having those practical skills - speech writing, knowing how to write is so critical. Speech writing, public speaking skills in my organization, a good chunk of our staff are interviewed by journalists on a daily basis - I think we're quoted more than 100 times a day on average in global news. So you know, things that you might not think are relevant to your degree, they're actually not relevant to your degree, but they will help you figure out how to set yourself apart from everyone else learning your same subjects, but you're going to have to have that same grit. Nonprofit work is not easy, if you want to know how absolutely insane Human Rights Watch staff are there's a documentary that Netflix did in 2013 called the E team, which covered four of our staff in the emergencies division, and it's still on Netflix so you can watch it. Yeah, we're nuts, and you kind of have to be driven in order to succeed in the nonprofit sector. Whether you're a grant writer, a development officer, Executive Director, a researcher on the ground.
Dr. Richard Downie 39:02
No, thank you. And so for the from the military, and I'll go into the diplomatic side as well, because so many of you are, are interested in foreign service work, but, and I'm biased, obviously, because I have a degree in International Relations but if you're going to work internationally, that's really something you need to to have - an understanding whether that, whether that's in the sort of the political side of that, the economic side, the national security side, depending on which way you go, but understanding what's going on around the world, just the dynamics of international relations, is really important. And the other part of that is the area studies, depending on the region you want to concentrate in, because the more you understand what's going on with the history and the culture of that area, that you really get involved in it, and that's how you understand what's what's going on. And most diplomats, and whether you're an intelligence collector or in the military, and by the way they have diplomatic passports, or a Foreign Service Officer at an embassy or or even at in Washington, you know you're reporting, you're basically talking about what's going on in that country, because you are helping the wider interagency community, all the intelligence agencies, all of the agencies throughout Washington, understand what's going on in your country or your region. And that's writing. And so it's how to write, communicate what's going on. But in order to do that, you have to be able to relate to people. And so relating to people you know, talking to people, you're making, developing a relationship with them, understanding what's needed, and all those things. And by the way, all diplomats, not just ours, when you go to an embassy party and you're sitting there having hors d'oeuvres and a drink with them you're all doing the same thing. You're all trying to get information. It's not just so people - they've all these parties - and it's not because they just like to party. It's because, after people have had a drink, they talk a little easier, and so you talk with them, but you have to understand how to relate to those people. And the way you relate to them is understanding their culture, understanding their background, their history, and how you relate to all of that. So part of that, again, in terms of academic preparation, it really is area studies and or international relations. But the other thing is getting along with people and writing. So you could be an English major or whatever, but, you know, writing is very, very important. So it's, sort of as Kristin mentioned. It's all those other skills, they come together, but it is really relating to people.
Alexandra Leiben 42:17
So you recognize the commonality here, and also with three very different careers, and they all relate very strongly to human beings, right? It's all people work, and here too, like we hear so much about what AI can replace, cannot replace any of this, because it is really you have to engage, to get information, to learn, to build those bridges, right? Diplomacy is all based on that. The military does, I love working with the military, because you guys are peace makers, peace builders, right? That's the last thing you are. So it's the same always, like, how can we get that common ground, that understanding. Same for your work, same for you. We need to learn about each other. But in terms of, that's why it's like language skills, right? It's like, people say it's like, oh no, like, my glasses are gonna translate for me, or whatever AI program. No, it's not because it doesn't tell you anything about the human being. You lose all of the cues, it's understanding, right? Well, people are really communicating. That's what language - the need to learn languages will never go away and cannot be replaced. Writing, public speaking, right? It's like basically presenting yourself. Who are you? Right? Like and with that opening doors and engaging others, but also it's like, what you mentioned in terms of characteristics, is like, and what's helping you, it's the perseverance, right? And the empathy also, and that's the same thing. We live in a people world, nothing is changing that. So if we want to relate, and we see this, you talk about the frosty comments you get is like, here's like, but at the end of the day is like, we sit in this room, right? We share interests. So that's we move along as one community and sense of humor, thick skin, and I would add really sort of humility and flexibility and adaptability. I mean curiosity, right? Like, because you don't know, everybody has pivoted here, right? We always find ourselves in positions we did not anticipate, and it's because we were willing to walk through the door that just opened up. And that's why you never know where that door can lead you next, and that is why, also you don't want to burn bridges, because people may not want to open doors for you. So it's right, it's like, it's always the long game, really, and who you want to be in this and, and I think, yeah, the sense of humor that's gonna save all of us, at the end of the day.
I want to open it up for questions.
Student 1 44:46
Thanks for being here today. Thank you. My question is, for Richard today, I also share an interest in sort of going into government and these sorts of things, but I'm finding it really difficult to be honest, given our current situation, and I don't want to give up on it, because that's what they want from me, but I'm just finding it really difficult to find ways into, you know, federal agencies, whether it would be the State Department or anything I'd want to be involved in, I guess, internationally. And so I, you know, I just would love your advice on that. And also, I'm wondering if you also have faced any difficulties relating to, you know, presidential administrations changing with your work. Like I'd just love to know a little bit more about that.
Dr. Richard Downie 45:30
Well, the military and the Foreign Service are a little bit different than that, but they're somewhat protected depending on how high you go. I mean, when you're, you know, sort of a worker at whatever level, if you're at the State Department, the first thing you do for your first two years, you are what's called a Vice Consul, and that means that you are at a window giving visas to people that want to come the United States. So I mean, regardless of the presidential administration, that's what you are doing. So I mean, it depends on the level to where you go. But yes, right now is a particularly difficult time, and in terms of just this administration, a lot of people have left the Foreign Service. A lot of people have left the military because of just the environment. And so it's, you know it - but administrations change every four years - and by the way, even if it's the same president, it can change dramatically. So it's the fact that you guys are in school right now probably - well, you're a senior so, so you have a little less time. So, but that said it is, it is challenging, but it does change. So even if you, if you were able and wanted to go in at this point, at that lower level, you start with training, and you start with these kind of basic jobs that you're really insulated from a lot of the politics where you find and it's just a fact of life, the higher up you go, the closer you get to an assistant secretary or a secretary who is a political appointee. And those are the guys, they get appointed because they are loyalists to that President, to that philosophy, or whatever it is, and so, and they're, yes, they get in that job, and they're supposed to be nonpartisan, but it leaks out. But I think right now, even for you, because there's a pipeline you have to get in, you have to go through training and do those basic jobs. So that will be in a new administration, even for you. So I wouldn't say, government never, because it's always changing. And you never know how fast it will change.
Student 2 48:02
I have two questions. Thank you all for your amazing insights. First of all, Richard, I want to start with you. I know you've worked a lot on the civilian military interface, and so I'm wondering if someone coming in from more of a legal and nonprofit background, what do you think is the most credible entry point, like defense advisory and like targeting specifically within, like an international armed conflict?
Dr. Richard Downie 48:26
Well, there's, there's a number of ways to do it. I mean, were you thinking of going directly into a federal type job? Okay well, there's, there's a couple of ways to do that, because there's, you know, you can certainly go into the Department of Defense, for example, or Department of War. There's lots of jobs. I mean Department of Defense, Congress has not changed the name, although the Secretary of War calls himself that so. But the Department of Defense is the largest employer in the world, and there are certainly a million and a half who are military, but the rest are all civilians. So there's an enormous amount of jobs that you can get as a civilian within the Department of Defense, for example, but you can also go into contractors, contracting agencies. You know, you see a lot of Northrop Grumman or Raytheon, or there's all these and today, there's more and more smaller companies that are working as defense entities that are working very closely with the military to do things. And that gets you sort of into that network, but you're still outside of it. So, and there's pluses and minuses both way. So it's a nice way to kind of - working for a contractor, you can see where you'd really like to go in or not go in at all, or, you know, and you get to know people, they say, wow, we have an opening coming up, wouldn't you like to get into it? So by the way, speaking of nonprofits, let me just say one point for those of you, because many of you are not seniors, and I was, as Alexander mentioned when she introduced us, I used to be the president, CEO of not only the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, but before that, the World Affairs Council of Orange County and so nonprofits. So let me just say one great thing - highlight what Kristen said about that - was the the fact that if you're going to be an intern, you want to be at a nonprofit. Why? Why would that be? Because you want to go to a law firm. Why don't I go to intern at a law firm? The great likelihood is you're going to get really good at getting coffee. You'll learn how to sharpen pencils. And you're doing all kinds of things because you're not a lawyer, so you're going to be doing other things. Whereas if you go to Human Rights Watch, or you go to the World Affairs Council Orange County to be an intern, you will get more experience doing a multitude of things that you can put on your resume, because there is always a need for things. And they'll say, hey, look, you're we want you to do some fundraising. Great, got it. We want you to write a marketing plan. I've never done that before. It's okay, figure it out, do it, and you will do all of these things, I mean, and Kristin can tell you this. And then you literally can put on your resume. I created a marketing plan for this. I was the one who coordinated this event, and you truly did, because there's nobody else to do it, and they need you. And you figure it out and you do it.
Kristin Ghazarians 52:01
I mean, I'm actually hiring for two assistants for the academic year next year, so you know, yeah.
Student 2 52:07
Bouncing off of that. Thank you. My next question was actually for you. So I work for two nonprofits. One of them specifically does - we were kind of in the war crime sector and - using AI and Osin to find mass graves and so through that, this is kind of more of an existential question, but the question of funding and getting funding, and how to keep your head up through that process, like, because you touched so much on the non profit, which I really appreciated, because I feel like people don't address that enough. And so how do you keep going and keep applying for these experiences? I think, in the age of AI, people are so afraid of the applications of AI, especially in the Human Rights sector. And so I'm wondering kind of what your thoughts are on that, and how you can bring that, and how you can break through that barrier with the AI thing. Does that make sense?
Kristin Ghazarians 52:53
Sort of, mostly because I'm actually terrified of AI. And just today, I was working on a grant application trying to use AI to improve my language, to improve the writing, and I just was like, Oh, my God, that's so uncomfortable with us. Fundraising is hard, not gonna lie, I came into my role with the International Relations background that you're talking about, with the program development, the program management, so coming up with our annual advocacy campaigns I could do in my sleep, and I do it in my sleep all the time. But me having to ask people for money makes me curl into a ball and want to cry, and yet, that is what keeps our program going. And so navigating trying to find money, I mean, in for profit industries, it's very different, because then you're just sitting there, you know, selling something. In the nonprofit industry, you're trying to get people to support your work so you can keep doing it. And you know, technically, my program is housed in the Development Division of Human Rights Watch, but that's just a technicality. Our development division - they make up, I think, about 25% of the organization staff and we have a foundations team that are constantly drafting grants. We have city teams that are sitting there cultivating individual donors to give to the organization. We have a leadership gifts team, so anybody who gives more than $100,000 goes there. We're trying to expand the model of the different ways that we fundraise. And I think that even internally, in the organization we have - because we're a human rights organization, we do have certain rules and standards, and AI is forcing us to figure out what our relationship as a human rights organization needs to be with AI, but also how we can utilize it in our fundraising. I had a former intern who when she was interning with me, I asked to help me draft a grant application. She became a grant writer, and so I asked her recently to help me figure out how to do foundations research a little faster. And she was like, oh, just put in a chat GPT, it'll tell you if you still qualify. I'm like, no, I don't want to do that. I don't know if I'm answering your question here, but you know, I think for some people going back to that skills piece, grant writing or the ability to ask people for money is so important. You know, if you're going into sales, it's the same thing as going into sales, you know, if you're trying to sell a product, and in this case, asking people for money is that product asking them to pay for you to keep your job at a nonprofit so you can not have to sell something is a skill that you have to develop.
And there's all, there's a lot of platforms out there for volunteers to help provide additional support. I'm tapping into, I tapped into, recently, a platform where I got a volunteer to redesign our website, and so now I'm just going back in and cleaning everything up. Yeah, hopefully that helps.
Alexandra Leiben 56:13
There are people out there who love to raise money.
Kristin Ghazarians 56:18
Oh, my colleagues love it.
I don't.
Student 3 56:26
I actually have a question about grant research and writing. Me personally, like kind of like technical skills that I really rely on during application and hopefully in my career, is more like graphic design, media, like video editing, media marketing, but I do want to branch into grant research and like grant writing, because I feel like it is such a useful skill. Would you say that most nonprofits are open to just having a lot of volunteers from anywhere off the top, or have you seen your own volunteers?
Kristing Ghazarians 57:13
So, I'm going to give you two different answers here. For Human Rights Watch, the larger organization, because the program that I manage, the Student task force, we're actually a restricted budget program, so I have to fundraise for the program without support from the larger Human Rights Watch organization. Our development division, they fundraise for the larger 100 million dollar budget, right? The larger Human Rights Watch organization, they have grant writers on staff, they are trained, they know what they're doing. Me, I kind of had to learn as I go. I am constantly looking for classes that can teach me how to write, because development language in and of itself is very different than journalism or essay writing or speech writing or anything like that, and sometimes I feel like I don't have that development writing bone. Apparently, I can do it when I speak, but when I get nervous writing it, I guess that intern that I told you about, she went, I think it was at Columbia, maybe they had a program that taught her how to do grant writing, and so there are books out there, there are the what is it? The Journal of Philanthropy has classes or webinars that you can watch. There's actually quite a lot out there that I've been finding for my own edification recently, because, again, it's. I've been doing.. I've been in the nonprofit sector for almost 20 years now, and I still don't feel like that is my strong suit, but what I have found, at least for myself, when you're passionate and you know how to talk about what it is you're trying to sell or ask for money in that grant, it comes out in your writing just like it comes out in your speech. And so, do I think anybody in any field should know how to ask for money and write a grant. Absolutely, that is one of the things that I wish I had learned in my education, and it just wasn't there because it wasn't something people thought about. And so, if you can take classes or figure out how to do that, get practice. There's a lot of nonprofits that do need help out there, and there's a lot of local nonprofits that are going to want that support. I mean, here you got two people in this room, talk to each other, but you know, I think that that's absolutely a critical skill to work on.
Alexandra Leiben 59:32
I bet UCLA Extension has grant writing classes.
Kristin Ghazarians 59:35
They used to have a program that my actually my boss took and got certified, and she was trying to get me to do it, but apparently it got shut down, so I don't know if they still have other full on programs, but there used to be a full series that you could take here at UCLA Extension.
Alexandra Leiben 59:50
Jim, can I ask a quick question about podcasts? Actually, podcasting is an exploding industry, and how is that? I mean, so much of that is opining also about things right, but still, that people writing all of this is like there's people who do background research. Would you feel that that's an avenue if somebody is interested in journalism and taking that podcast path?
Jim Newton 1:00:11
I think the essentials of podcasting are no different than the essentials of print writing. I mean, it's communicating factual public policy information to me is the is the ambition, the rest is just the medium and yeah, I mean, I had a book came out last August, and I bet three quarters of the promotion I've done around the book has been through podcasts, some of them very popular, some not so popular, but it's clearly in that in this environment where newspapers are not so dominant at all. I think it gives rise to all these other ways to communicate, and that's certainly one of them, for sure.
Kristin Ghazarians 1:00:55
Yeah, and I think the tech skills that go alongside that too, learning those sound editing and things.
Jim Townton 101
And they're very simple, really. I mean, much easier, really, than - certainly than video editing, but also, if you are proficient in just, just basic sort of laptop functionality, you can edit audio just as easily as you can edit print.
Alexandra Leiben 1:01:19
Yes.
Student 4 1:01:20
Thank you so much for your talks. So far we talked a lot about, like, early careers and kind of organic trajectories to fit those different paths that you described, but my question comes from a little different point in time and a problem some scholars face. So many people like I'm from, from social sciences, from anthropology, many of us face a problem where our research on conflict or societal issues are ending up basically at the level of research and at the level of paper writing and government specifically sometimes feel as this unpenetrable, you know, castle that you are unable to connect your research with to transform the research into applicable solutions and applicable policies, and all of that. So, in that regard, my question is, first of all, how would you advise to approach the building of those bridges for those who are not organically grown, as you know this person for the industry, but you know somebody from outside, and second part of that is very specifically now to me, because again the overlap between the government, the military, and communication - can you describe a little how it works? Because, for instance, my research is about hate, is about like language of war, is how to train soldiers to be able to perceive enemies. What is enemy? How to make killing of enemy easier through the language, and I wonder, in the structure of the military of the United States, what is the body there who decides, you know, how we talk about the enemy, how we narrate them?
Dr. Richard Downie 1:03:11
Yeah, that's a really interesting question. And the point that you're raising, I'm sorry, your name is?
Student 4 1:03:16
Anatoly
Speaker 3 1:03:17
Anatoly, so the point that Anatoly is raising is the difference between theory and practice. You all heard of that sort of, you know, it's the idea, like, well, if you're a practitioner, you know, it's if you're an academician, you write theories, and all the practitioners say, well, that may work in theory, but will it work in practice? I was at a conference one time, and this guy got up, and it was an academician. He says, 'Well' after a speech of a practitioner, he says, 'Well, that may work in practice, but will it work in theory?' But the idea, the idea is that there are two sides to this, and it's an interesting situation, because I had a conversation with Zoom call with two Rand researchers about two weeks ago, and they said, "Hey, we're trying to break into some government research on this, and we want to work with the US Southern Command on drug trafficking, and I said great, interesting, and so they said we want to show you what we've got, and then we will, you know, get your thoughts. I said, okay, great. So they started the call, and they're showing me all these things that they've done, these very impressive matrices, and very these products that they put together, and they said, well, how should we market this to the government? And I said, well, you need to go to, and I went to these points of contact that throughout the government that I mentioned to them that they need to go to, and I said, but you know the approach, it's in that salesmanship aspect is kind of backwards. You've got all these products, and these people will, I said, if you ask them, they will give you a half hour of their time, you know, a deputy secretary for whatever, because you're from Rand, they'll give you a half hour, but they'll listen politely as you describe all those products, and they'll say, well, that's very nice, it's nice to talk to you, see you later. And the reason is, in that guy's mind, he's thinking, these are really interesting, but this has nothing to do with what I need, with what I do, and so I advise these folks. I said, look, I think you should go. It's great that the products you've done, great work, nice, impressive, but it's not about what you've done, it's about what they need. And so, what I would advise is, go talk to those people and find out what they need, and then you'll get, wow, you, you actually want to help me do things in my job better. Wow, well, I need this and this and this, because if you're selling a product that you know, if I, that you don't need, there's no, there's no salesmanship there, but if you find out what I need and you can help me, I'm all over it. So that's really what I guess - sorry for the long story, but what the point I'm making is this, and there are times for anthropology, for example, when we were in Iraq, there was, it was all about violent extremist beliefs and all this, and we needed to know about about anthropological approaches to this, so but so the point I'm making is it's not about the research that you're making now and you want to sell to them, it's find out what they need and then do that, and then you, if you want to get in, they'll be open arms to you, but for you to take your research and say, where can I fit this in, it's backwards.
Kristin Ghazarians 1:07:13
I have to say, yes, I get that all the time. People are coming up to me saying, I want to help you do this, and I was like, that's great, I don't need that, and so, yes. What he just said, please.
Jim Newton 1:07:25
I would just have a quick plug for Blueprint. By the way, here, that's exactly what Blueprint exists to do, is to say to public policy makers, here is research in areas that you don't know you need, but you do, and to researchers, this is what policymakers are in search of, and so it is deliberately an attempt to try to bridge the gap.
Dr. Richard Downie 1:07:47
That's great. Where is that?
Jim Newton 1:07:48
Blueprint - right there. It's mostly related to domestic and LA and California issues, so it may not be apropos of your research, but it is that the conundrum that you're describing is precisely the one that blueprint is intended to address.
Dr. Richard Downie 1:08:07
Well, in fact, along those times, if they don't mind me saying so, I went to a dinner last night. It was a speaker, and Sebastian Mallaby, I don't know if you ever heard of him, but he just wrote a book on this genius, it's called The Infinity Machine. This guy is this Demus Havas, and he's deep mind, is on the forefront of AI, he's probably the foremost guy, and so somebody asked him, as well, How did you write this book? How did you get all this time with this brilliant guy? He works for Google, for, you know, all their deep think, all this sort of stuff. And what he said is, he said, look, he met, he got time to talk with this guy, Dennis, I mean, who's very wealthy, just brilliant guy, doesn't have time for much, but he said, let me tell you something. What you're doing is disrupting the world with AI. He says, you don't realize it, but there has to be a book about you, because what you're doing is so disruptive to the world, people have to understand why you're doing it, and how you are doing it, and where you want to go, and what your motivations are, and so you need a book, and I want to write that book, and so I want time with you, and so he says, yeah, let's do it, but it's selling, so it's he didn't know he needed that, but he sold him this. Sebastian Mallaby sold this guy, Demus Havis, on what he didn't know he needed, but he found out, yeah, and now there's a book about him.
Alexandra Leiben 1:09:55
Other questions?
Student 5 1:09:59
I'm pretty interested in, like, journalism as a career, but I'm interested also in, like, the management and, like, the editorial side of journalism, so, like, not just writing, but managing a newspaper, and I'm wondering, like, if you have any insight into the differences, or, like, I guess the key characteristics of that role, and also I know it's not very predictable, but since journalism is changing as an industry, where you see like that side of the field going?
Jim Newton 1:10:33
it's good question, you know. I would say there's the pattern at most newspapers that I've worked at, anyway, and that I'm aware of, has been to take sort of best reporters and turn them into editors, and that is, at best, a kind of iffy proposition, right? I mean, the best ball player is not necessarily the best manager, the best student is not necessarily the best teacher, so it works often enough that that idea has persisted, but the skills that it takes to manage journalists are different than the skills it takes to write. I mean, I think I think it's very hard to be a good journalism manager who isn't already a good writer, but just because you're a good writer doesn't make you a good manager too. So, the fact that you're interested in both, I think, would be real selling point for an employer. You know, I mean, there's a lot of hit or miss, a lot of trial and error in editing. These are, I used to have a boss, John Carroll, who you said that some editors edit stories and some editors edit people, and, and there's a big difference there, right? But the best editors edit both, and so I think if you can master the skills of writing and being edited, that's a big leg up to then functioning as an editor, but then there is the other, there's a sort of just a human side of management of dealing with people's troubles and managing their vacations and giving them time off and not laying them off, if you could help it. That's a different side of it that I think a lot of reporters are not necessarily good at. So, as to the future, I mean, I think that when newspapers were kind of the king of the hill, it was possible to make mistakes with management positions, because you could tolerate if you had. When I came to the Los Angeles Times, there were 1280 people on the news staff, that's writers, editors, photographers, all in 1280. Now it's about 250 so you can't - an organization of that size cannot afford to limp along with editors who aren't doing a good job, so it's a much more rigorous assessment of people now, and I suspect, although I don't know it firsthand, I suspect that will be true across the board in smaller organizations where the 5 and 10 person journalism organization can't afford to have an editor who isn't a really good one. So again, I don't say that to cause you to walk away from it. I think it actually is exciting. It's good, you know. When I, of those 1280 when I write a paper, a fair number of them were playing solitaire at their computers, you know? I mean, so that's not true anymore. It's a more demanding environment, but in a way, I think that's also very fulfilling, and it does leave room for people to really be appreciated when they're good at it.
Dr. Richard Downie 1:13:33
If I can make a comment to this.
Kristin Ghazarians 1:13:36
You're probably going to make the same one I am.
Dr Richard Downie 1:13:38
Well, it's getting back to what Alexandra was saying about pivoting. This is not me, my daughter. My daughter got a master's in journalism, and I won't say where, but she went to work for ABC News, and then she went to work for the Phnom Penh Post in Cambodia, and while she was there, her boss from ABC, who had left, says, "You got to come back here, I'm working in reality TV, and we need you." And so she went back to reality TV to start developing reality TV shows. This was years ago, you know, it's kind of fallen now, and then she found that she liked casting, she was like genius in casting director for reality TV stuff, and then you know this reality TV started going down, and she kind of said, and so she jumped to now she's a producer for commercials, so you know it's, you never know, you never know, but again, those skills from her being a journalist, they really are applicable in so many different things.
Jim Newton 1:14:48
For sure. Right, certainly, yeah.
Kristin Ghazarians 1:14:51
What I was going to add to it, I know we're running out of time, but what I was going to add to it is that skill set concept. A lot of universities have classes on management. I took them in my grad program. I know that there's some undergrad minors. I've seen them through reviewing applications of people who want to work with us in nonprofit management. What you're talking about as an editor, that people piece being able to manage people, to give feedback, to receive feedback, doesn't matter what industry you're in, you need to have that skill set. So, kind of going back to my pitch earlier of finding what makes you unique, taking management classes can help regardless of your industry, and can help you figure out how to navigate those challenges, because it is hard to manage people, and it is hard to navigate those individual requests, and while you all are starting out at your entry level, someday you're going to be that higher up person that is going to be managing 50 to 10,000 people, depending on what type of industry you're in, right. So, getting that - building that skill set is also going to be really helpful.
Alexandra Leiben 1:15:57
So, looking into your skills, is that same - all the internships you've done here, you've learned things. What you can transfer those right? They make you marketable, and they set you apart from other candidates. So it's like thinking about - abstracting from the context. It's like, what do you actually have to offer? And I was thinking, is like about what we said about selling, right? Something, it's like you also, every interview you go to, you sell yourself, but the way you do it is by convincing the person you interview with that you are value added to them, and that is that you have researched the organization, the company, that you understand sort of what they are looking for, and you are the one who can provide that, so it's not about what you get out of it. It is what they get out of hiring you.
Dr. Richard Downie 1:16:47
That's really good.
Kristin Ghazarians 1:16:48
Please do that. Again, our job openings right now, I'm going to get about between 4-600 applications, and I cannot tell you how many, and it's an entry-level position. Cannot tell you how many people write their cover letters that are just like, here's my resume, and they don't mention even the program at once, or they say, you know, here's what I hope to gain by being in your on your team, and I'm like, that's great, but what am I going to gain from having you? So, as somebody who is a hiring person, please, please, please take that advice.
Alexandra Leiben 1:17:18
So, my very last thing, I would like to introduce our interns to all of you. Burkle Center Interns. They helped put this program together tonight. They help us throughout the entire year. We put them to work in all kinds of different ways, and you can ask them any questions, and we are right now looking for interns. We're hiring for the next year, so if anybody has not applied yet and is interested, talk to our wonderful interns here and to us and apply. Okay? Thank you very much for joining us. Thank you very much. This was really wonderful.
Dr. Richard Downie 1:18:00
Thank you so much.