3 Great Recession grads who now earn 6 figures and have worked for Netflix and Bank of America share the exact steps they took to land a job during a downturn
- As many as almost 53 million Americans could be without work as a result of the pandemic - and with graduation season around the corner, students finishing their programs will be looking for jobs.
- If you're about to graduate, don't panic: These people who graduated amid the 2008 recession went on to six-figure roles at major companies.
- Don't be afraid of accepting a more lucrative role instead of your dream job, consider relocating, have a backup plan, and never stop stretching your goals.
- Click here for more BI Prime stories.
Upwards of 47 million workers in the US could become unemployed in the second quarter of 2020, according to reporting from Markets Insider. Add to that individuals laid off in February and that could bring the total of unemployed to nearly 53 million and put the overall unemployment rate at 32%. Soon, this year's graduating undergrads and grads will also be looking for work.
When times are good, more than half of college undergraduates (54.5%) and graduates (69.5%) typically find a full-time job within six months of graduating, according to the most recent data available from 2018 from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, which tracks these statistics annually.
And in period of record unemployment, more than 40% of college graduates secure work not requiring a college degree, with these workers ending up earning about $10,000 less per year than those who find positions that require a college degree, according to a 2018 report from the nonprofit Strada Institute for the Future of Work and career analytics company Burning Glass Technologies.
In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, and corresponding predicted recession and hiring downturn, this year's graduating class - both undergrads and grads - will be entering the workforce during challenging, but not entirely unprecedented, times.
Business Insider turned to three successful graduates who launched their careers in the midst of the Great Recession - during record unemployment and hiring slowdowns - and have gone on to work for major companies including Netflix, Bank of America, and Kaiser Permanente and earn six-figure incomes. They shared how graduating at this time affected their career trajectories, how they managed to find work, and what advice they have for the class of 2020.
Accept that you might have to take on less glamorous work while you job search
When B. Pagels-Minor offered to the class of 2020, "Don't be ashamed to do less than glamorous work, like working in a warehouse or retail, as you're looking for your next dream gig," they spoke from experience.
Pagels-Minor worked up from being a store manager at Target, after being laid off from their first job out of college, to earning two degrees and advancing in their career to land their current role: senior data product manager at Netflix, where they earn nearly $500,000 a year.
Toward the end of 2007 and start of 2008, Pagels-Minor, who was studying history at Northwestern University at the time, realized that their graduating class was not going to have "as easy a time finding meaningful work that also paid well" as earlier graduating classes had, they said. Career fairs were filled with smaller, less prestigious companies offering lower-than-expected salaries.
Pagels-Minor's career plans changed drastically, they noted. While they originally imagined they would pursue a career in consulting or finance, they no longer aimed for top consulting companies. "Instead, I started looking at any company that seemed solid," they added.
Pagels-Minor landed a consulting job upon graduation, but was let go within a few months and ended up spending the rest of 2008 hopping from one part-time or freelance gig to another.
"I made tea at Teavana, filed paperwork in offices, ran errands for folks … until I landed a store manager job at Target in 2009," they explained. Target was tough work, they said, but paid for Pagels-Minor to go to graduate school.
"It was clear to me at that point that I would need an advanced degree to be considered for many of the companies for which I dreamed of working," they said.
In the end, they earned both a masters in information systems (MIS) and MBA at Robert Morris College, graduating in 2014, both of which they paid for through a combination of working, earning scholarships, and taking out loans. Things turned around for Pagels-Minor that year, when they landed a business analyst job.
"For the first time, I was doing deeply analytical work that I felt helped me grow," they said. And that growth was a sign that they were finally on the right career track and gaining skills that would translate to better compensation and a greater competitive advantage in the marketplace.
Today, Pagels-Minor credits that early experience at Target to their career growth. "My time at Target taught me more about being a decent leader than any class or experience since then," they added.
And you might have to pivot your career dreams for a better salary
While enrolled at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, pursuing a bachelor's degree in journalism and mass communication, LaToya Evans built a career as a freelance writer - helping finance her undergraduate degree - by contributing to major national publications including Glamour, People, Woman's World, Seventeen, and Cosmopolitan and interning at Vogue, Vanity Fair, Real Simple, and CosmoGirl.
Early in 2008, as she began to notice layoffs among her editors, mentors, and friends in the magazine industry, she broadened her job search and began exploring the field of public relations and corporate communications.
By graduation in May 2008, she received five job offers, with some from magazines and PR agencies and one in corporate communications for a major company that, at $60,000, paid two times as much as the others and included a relocation package.
"I took the role, thinking that I would do the job a year until the recession 'blew over,'" said Evans. "It didn't just blow over and instead went on and on. But during that time, I fell in love with PR and never looked back."
For Evans, the switch paid off, and not just initially: She began earning six figures at age 26 and grew through the ranks in corporate communications at IBM, Philips, and Walmart and served as vice president of media relations at Bank of America, VP of communications at Compass Group, and director and head of communications, North and South America, at Cisco.
"When I got my first c-suite role at a Fortune 500 company at age 30, I felt like I made the right decisions to get there and had been very fortunate," she added.
The next step for Evans? Creating her own PR firm, LaToya Evans Public Relations, in the fall of 2017, with high-profile clients having included US presidential candidates Andrew Yang and Mike Bloomberg.
Consider the cost of living and whether you can relocate
Both Pagels-Minor and Evans discussed one key factor when searching for jobs: the cost of living. Pagels-Minor recommended that students "choose strategically," explaining that while it may not be practical to live in costly cities like New York, Los Angeles, or San Francisco, smaller cities like Chicago, Atlanta, Austin, and Phoenix may be more affordable on a smaller salary.
Location was a factor for Evans' decision not to accept a job offer in New York, where she would have had to cover the cost of moving from where she was living in North Carolina on her own. There was a risk of moving and "not having a job within six months," Evans said, something she didn't want to chance.
Have a backup plan in place
Evans' backup plan in case her current role didn't pan out was investing in her own continuing education.
After realizing that many of her peers were getting advanced degrees since they couldn't find work, she pursued a master's degree, which she self-funded, in arts, organizational leadership, and communications, with a specialization in crisis management from Marist College. She graduated in 2011.
"I didn't want to be disadvantaged with less education even though I would have more experience, so I also got a master's degree while working full time during the recession," she explained.
Not only would the degree give her a competitive advantage, she knew it would open the door to teaching at the undergrad level, "creating a second, backup career in education - a field that is often recession proof, unlike most corporations," she explained. "It worked."
In addition to her full-time PR and communications career, Evans has been an adjunct professor at Fayetteville Technical Community College for six years, something she can fall back on and take on on a full-time basis if needed in the future.
Since graduating from the University of California, Berkeley in 2008 with a master's in public health, Mary Grace Gardner, who is currently the director of business operations and chief of staff for Intuitive, a company that has pioneered in robotic assisted surgical systems, has been pursuing healthcare leadership opportunities.
In addition to earning her six-figure income, she always has and still continues to pursue side hustles.
"I was a seller on eBay. I tried food blogging … I've invested in startups and also in a hotel. I now have a side hustle as a college admissions and career coach and am also working on another project with some cofounders for a high reliability certification program," she said. She added that it's key to diversify skills and income sources "because you never know what will happen to the economy."
Focus on growth potential
When Gardner graduated from her MPH program in 2008, she opted for a lower salary for the chance to take a fellowship at Kaiser Permanente.
"The beauty of the program was that in two years, I experienced what might take a regular employee a decade to experience," she said, explaining that the trade-off for a lower salary was receiving mentorship from executives, building her network, and maximizing her growth.
After that, her career "took off immediately," she said. Upon completing the fellowship, she received multiple offers through her newly built network, with her first job after the fellowship landing her a six-figure salary.
"Seeing what was happening around me, I saved relentlessly. I felt like I officially made it when my husband, who is a teacher, and I were able to pay for our wedding, our house, and the down payment for my parents' house all in our mid-twenties," she shared.
Invest in learning, while weighing the costs and benefits
While Evans doesn't regret obtaining her second degree, she noted it may not be necessary for everyone, especially those considering more creative fields.
Gardner shared that while she was accepted into Yale, Johns Hopkins, and Emory for her undergraduate education, she didn't receive as much financial support from these institutions as the other programs she was offered entry to.
"I remember how upset I was in the decision-making process and my father talking to me about what a blessing it is to have no debt," she said. She opted for University of California, Los Angeles for her bachelor's. In hindsight, she realized that "What matters most is what you do with the time," she said. "You can build great networks, have world-class learning opportunities, and build lasting friendships no matter where you go," she added.
Know that you're not alone
There's no doubt about it, "This is going to be tough," said Pagels-Minor, noting that there is a bright spot: "Every single human is experiencing this at the same time," they said.
This year's graduates can use this sudden downtime to learn new skills (through online learning) and take advantage of a "captive and bored audience," said Pagels-Minor. Make virtual connections to people working in roles that are of interest and ask them how they got started in their field, they recommended.
Plus, when things do get up and running, there will be high demand for short-term work, Pagels-Minor added, "Simply because the world will have to ramp back up so many systems."
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