Career Coach at a Bar — VFW & MIT — Part I

 

The March dare is to career coach people at a bar.  First of all, what was I thinking when I agreed to this?  It’s plain nonsensical.  People want to have fun when they are out on the town.  The last thing they want to do is engage in a serious career talk with a stranger of questionable intent.  Does she want to pick me up?  Is she trying to get business?

I think the original rationale was to do something I normally do but do it in a weird context.  I remember a friend had suggested reading the news on an iPad on the dance floor of a club.  Well, it’s about equally nonsensical but I’ve already done something similar…  If you must know, back when I was a grad student and slaving away on my thesis.  One evening, I remember that I really wanted to go dancing but I had a deadline the next day that I felt too guilty to do anything but work.  In a stroke of genius, I thought what if I did BOTH?  So I convinced Dan, my housemate, now husband, to go to Atlantis, a local restaurant-turns-club-at-night venue that had drum & base Sunday nights.  It’s small and not very popular so the dance floor is sparse at best.  Dan thought I was crazy but he was a good sport.  We worked on our laptops at a table while we bopped our heads, then when a song we liked came on, we would dance for a while, then sit down and do some work.  We must’ve looked like the biggest dorks but the novelty made the work bearable and I made my deadline.  I doubt it was a sustainable way to be productive which is why I never tried that again.

Coming back to the present day, I figured perhaps doing something meaningful in a weird context would be better, which is why I casually took on this dare.  As a budding career coach, I find myself engaged in conversations about people’s careers wherever I go.  I have obsessed over my career all my life, and now that I’m where I want to be, I find myself needing outlets for my obsession.  So, with this dare, I figured I’d start close to home and go career coaching at the Muddy Charles — the bar at MIT.  As an alumni and a friendly woman, I would have better luck striking up a conversation with random strangers.  The atmosphere is less likely to be very rowdy, which would be more conducive to conversations.

After I made that decision, I realized that it wouldn’t be very challenging.  I know the population well, I know the questions they have and what career issues they tend to wrestle with.  Perhaps, in addition, I should also work with people whose career paths I don’t know much about and learn something new from the experience.  So, I started brainstorming bars where people with a similar career tend to hang out…  Doctors?  Fisherman?  Aha!  I have it, the VFW.  Everyone there is a vet and I don’t know much about military careers.  Also, it felt like a good thing to offer career coaching to veterans who might be thinking about civilian jobs.  Who knows, this might even lead to some volunteer opportunities down the line.

So VFW it is!  With that settled, now to logistics.  Can anyone go to a VFW?  To find out, I called up a local VFW branch.  No surprise, it’s members only.  I explained that I’m a career coach trying to learn more about military careers.   The woman I spoke with was friendly but a little skeptical and said that I would need to obtain permission from the commander and that he is around from 7:30-11am on weekdays.  Well, I guess I had my work cutout for me.

Bright and early on Monday morning, I stopped by the VFW post and asked to speak to the commander.  The commander looks to be in his fifties.  He was not in military uniform and didn’t look as intimidating as I had imagined.  At first he was a little more guarded but after he made sure that I wasn’t a reporter he was very friendly and we struck up a casual conversation.  Turns out he was in Vietnam during the middle of the war.  He told me that he will give my name to the bartender and that I’m welcome to drop by later this week.

Mission accomplished and I can’t wait!

Links to related posts:

• Part 1: this post
• Part 2: Career Coach at at Bar — MIT
• Part 3: Career Coach at a Bar — VFW