Day in the Life: IBM Client Executive

What’s life like at a leading technology company?  Learn first hand from Jeannine Carr on @PennCareerDay, Tuesday, March 27th.  Jeannine has worked for IBM in various areas over the course of her career.  It’s important to understand the different areas one company has to offer in technology and other industries, as well.  What better way to learn the diverse functions at a large organization than from an experienced Penn alum?! Read more about Jeannine below and to view her posts from Tuesday, March 27th, 2012 – visit her story on our Storify account!

Jeannine is a Client Executive in IBM’s Distribution Industry Sales Organization.  She is responsible for IBM’s relationship, revenue and client satisfaction for 4 global clients:  3 in retail and 1 in consumer products.   Her career at IBM has spanned a number of roles including Manufacturing Engineer, Project Manager, Technical Sales Specialist, Services Business Development Executive, and Operational Contract Specialist.

Day to day activities include:  developing relationships with clients, meeting with executives at clients in both IT and the business to understand business strategies and issues in order to identify sales opportunities, working with the extended IBM team to develop and execute plans to close business, acting as the IBM single point of contact and escalation point when clients have problems in their interaction with IBM, coordinating communication and activities among the extended IBM team in order to drive increased revenue and improved client satisfaction.

In addition to her professional responsibilities, Jeannine is a Mom with two sons – – one a junior in college and one a junior in high school.  Her husband, Thomas Carr, is a Penn graduate with a BS in Economics from Wharton.    She is also an active volunteer for the Theater Arts program at her local high school as a costumer for musical productions and is a member of the Penn Engineering Alumni Association Board.

Jeannine graduated from Penn Engineering in 1983 with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering.  She earned an MBA in 1997 from the Leonard Stern School of Business at New York University with a concentration in Finance and International Business.   She has also completed IBM’s Professional Certification program for sales professionals.

Considering Jobs

My favorite barista is a dancer. Today, while preparing another of her oh-so-perfect lattes, she mentioned that her dance company is interviewing people about what their jobs mean to them. They’re at the beginning of this creative endeavor, allowing the process itself to take them to an unknown destination. They do plan to create a dance. Will they interpret their interviewees’ stories through movement? Use interviewees’ words? Voices? Where will the interviewees’ stories lead the dancers? Where will the process itself lead them? Where will their artistry lead us all?

What is a job? What does “job” mean to you? Does it matter?

We’ve used the word since the 1620s, but I would guess that many seventeenth-century jobs are uninteresting to today’s students or no longer exist. According to Merriam-Webster, a job is “something that has to be done” or “a specific duty, role, or function” or “a regular remunerative position.” I assume most of us associate “job” with that third meaning, similar to dictionary.com’s “post of employment.”

None of these definitions address why we need a job, other than “remunerative.” (Perhaps a better definition might be “something your parents ask you about during spring break”!) “Remuneration” is something that rewards or pays. What the reward or pay might be is not part of the definition. So, what do you want your reward to be? A paycheck? A large paycheck? Vacation time? Healthcare? Prestige? Comfort? Luxury? Creating something? Changing an expectation? Providing care? Increasing knowledge? Changing the world?

These questions might not be on your next interviewer’s list, but they should be on your list so that you will know what you’re seeking, why, and how to demonstrate that you and the job “fit” one another. Exploring these questions with a friend, family member, or a career counselor (or on our website) is an ongoing, challenging, and meaningful exercise.

So, what do you think? A past blog of mine addressed a similar issue and invited readers to complete a survey. You are welcome to do so now, and to share this invitation with friends and family so that we have many responses.

As a career counselor and someone immensely curious—from a sociological and historical perspective—about “work,” I am looking forward to the future dance creation of Real Live People (in) Motion, and I’d love to read your thoughts in our survey.

A Day in the Life: Environmental, Health, and Safety Software

Last year’s Year of Water theme demonstrated the variety of green career paths out there.  We are excited to continue to explore these paths during our week focused on Green Careers, leading up to the All Ivy Environmental Career Fair on Friday, February 24th.  We welcome alum, Clare Epstein, to @PennCareerDay on Wednesday, February 22nd.  Clare will post about her role with TRA, an environmental, health and safety software company.  To learn more about Clare, read below and remember to follow her on the 22nd!

Clare Epstein graduated from Penn in 1994 with a Bachelor in Urban Studies and has ended up 18 years later as Vice President of TRA, Inc in charge of the IndustrySafe Safety Management Software.  How did her time at Penn help her prepare for her current position? How did she end up 1) working from a home office in the suburbs 2) starting in environmental, health and safety software and 3) managing programmers and developers (among others)-  all things she did not anticipate upon graduation and some of which she swore she would never do?  Learn what “A Day in the Life” is like for Ms. Epstein as she conducts virtual meetings, participates in webinars and sales demos, utilizes social media and technology for sales and marketing efforts and makes time for “real” non virtual activity in the work day too, like exercising and eating.

Day in the Life: Marketing in the Entertainment Industry with Disney & ESPN Media Networks

We’ll be focusing on Entrepreneurial Careers next week, February 13th-17th leading up to Wharton’s Entrepreneurship Conference.  On Tuesday, February 14th we welcome Sasha Mitchell to @PennCareerDay on Twitter!  As the Affiliate Marketing Coordinator at Disney and ESPN Media Networks, Sasha is focused on branding, negotiations and other critical pieces to start and run a business.  Post your questions to our Facebook page or send us a tweet  to @PennCareerServ leading up to February 14th.   Sasha will answer them on @PennCareerDay throughout her day.  Read more about Sasha below, and remember to follow her on Tuesday the 14th!

Sasha is the Affiliate Marketing Coordinator at Disney and ESPN Media Networks. Her group, Affiliate Sales and Marketing, is a unique group within The Walt Disney Company, generating tremendous revenue each year by negotiating billion dollar deals with cable, satellite, and teleco providers. Sasha works specifically on the Cable Network Group (CNG) Brand Team, which includes Disney Channel, Disney XD, Disney Junior, ABC, ABC Family, and SOAPnet. Her counterparts work on the ESPN channels.

Day to day activities include: coordinating the planning, execution and implementation of multiple Affiliate Marketing projects to support the sales and distribution goals with smooth efficiency,  Overseeing all aspects of the fulfillment of requested marketing materials including processing, tracking and fielding requests from Account Management teams, writing creative briefs for assigned projects and serving as the liaison with external and internal vendors, and tracking the Affiliate Marketing budgets. She attributes networking and cultivating valuable relationships throughout her college career for getting her “foot in the door” with Disney and ESPN Media Networks.

Sasha graduated from The College in May 2010 with a Economics major and a Mathematics minor.

Day in the Life: Development Officer at Penn Medicine by Day, Grad Student by Night

Day in the Life on@PennCareerDay is back!  January 30th – February 3rd we will highlight Careers in Healthcare on our various social media platforms.  There are a variety of career paths in the healthcare industry beyond becoming a nurse or doctor, managing insurance or healthcare policy.  We are excited to welcome Lee Every to discuss an important role to the industry – fundraising for research.  Lee will also talk about a component to anyone’s career path – pursuing an advance degree – as a current graduate student here at Penn.  To learn more about Lee, visit our Penn & Beyond blog.  And remember, follow him on @PennCareerDay next Tuesday.  We welcome questions on Facebook or send them directly on Twitter, and we’ll be sure Lee gets to them!

Lee Every is an Assistant Development Officer at Penn Medicine Development and Alumni Relations.  In his role Lee works to develop fundraising initiatives for a number of centers and institutes within the Penn Medicine Health System.  Currently, Lee is working with the Center for Aides Research and the Neuro-Ophthalmology Program within the Department of Neurology.  Both departments are spearheading cutting edge research that requires additional funding to support their work.  In addition, Lee works in conjunction other Penn Medicine Development Officers in order to fundraise for some of Penn Medicine’s most well known centers and institutes including the Institute on Aging and Center for Neurodegenerative Disease Research that consistently makes strides in the fight to cure Alzheimer’s.

Lee began working at Penn Medicine in 2010 and immediately enrolled in the Fels Institute of Government Executive Program where he will graduate with a Master of Public Administration in May of 2012.  A graduate of the University of Pittsburgh in 2009 with the Bachelors of Science in Business Administration, Lee interned with a number of non-profit entities during college including the American Red Cross and the United Way of America.  Lee hopes to combine his knowledge of public policy and finance with his experience in the non-profit and higher education sectors as his career moves forward.