 Hello everyone and welcome to Working Together on Think Tech Hawaii where we discuss the impact of change on workers, employers and the economy. I'm your host, Cheryl Crozier-Garcia, inviting you to join in the conversation. Please call us at area code 808-374-2014 or tweet us at thinktechhi. Do you remember when you became an adult? That may have been the day you graduated from high school or college or the day you enlisted in the military or the day you earned your driver's license. No matter the event, you had a feeling that life would never be the same again. Just as we had to embrace change, today's university graduates are also preparing to embark on the adventure we call life. Joining me today to discuss how she is preparing for adulting is Nina Ullman. Nina is graduating in May with a master's degree in human resource management from Hawaii Pacific University. Today, she's got some advice for her peers who are getting ready to go out in the world and conquer it. Welcome Nina. It's my pleasure. Now you came to Hawaii from Norway to pursue your graduate degree. Why Norway or why Hawaii and not somewhere else? So I took a semester abroad through my undergrad in hotel management and I went here and I just fell in love with the culture, with how people are with each other. Also, the school system is very different from Norway and I wanted to come back so that's why I chose Hawaii for my master's degree. How is the educational system different from Norway and Hawaii? So the most important thing what I like the most about Hawaii is that in Norway you have three courses like here or five it depends but then you have one big exam in the end and that's it and that's all that you're great will come for is what you get on that exam. Whilst here you have continuously exams and quizzes and presentations and I just feel like the opportunity for you to grow and become better and learn from your mistakes is greater and bigger here and it's also for me it's been easier to achieve the GPA that I want and achieve the results in school so that's mainly why. That's nice. Continuous incremental improvement is probably the most attractive aspect of education here in the U.S. What are some of the other reasons that brought you to Hawaii? The sunshine of course and the nice weather it's just the way people are here they're so friendly they're so open-minded you can really just be creative and I don't know for me it's just I really love the culture that's here and the people I've met and yeah I do not regret it for one second coming here so. Well I'm glad to hear and now do you plan to stay in Hawaii if you can? Definitely if I can I mean I'm allowed to stay for a year after at least so I'm now in the process of searching for a job so if I get a job of course like I would love to stay forever if I could so yeah I see a future here definitely. Good now you're looking for a job and that means that you are creating for yourself an employee brand. What does your brand look like? So I've thought about you know especially for international students it's essential to create a personal brand when you're going into the search process because there's a lot of Americans applying here too and you really have to have the little extra for me I am advertising that you know I'm motivated I have a very strong word I'm willing to learn I'm eager and mainly when I started like building my own brand you kind of have to set your objectives like what do you want people to think of when they go into your as an example LinkedIn profile what impression do you want them to sit with after they've been there and then you have to you know you have to figure out your areas of expertise and use these areas of expertise and advertise them if you use LinkedIn you know you can really there's a section where you can add all your skills you know just promote whatever you're good for for me yeah like customer service is something I've done my whole life you know HR communication especially that I speak a lot of different languages I've been a lot of what are all over the world you know these are all skills that I promote that I'm hard working have a strong work ethic and definitely important to create your own like positioning statement mm-hmm I believe even if it's your resume or if it's in your LinkedIn account this is the first thing an employer or in a recruiter will see so this really has to reflect who you are what you're good for and what you can give to a organization mm-hmm use LinkedIn as you know as a tool to connect with people to get a broader connection field you can follow organizations that you're interested in see what they're doing what they're liking you know get insider information and also you know you can share if there's an article you find interesting you can share that article and then when a recruiter goes into your profile they can see what you're interested in and if that matches their interest that's only a bonus you know but make sure that it's professional make sure that you think about what you put out there also your profile photo or picture that it shows the best side of you the most professional you know that's yeah definitely I'm glad you brought up the idea of photos yeah social media yeah because there have been cases where people have ruined their own opportunities by having the wrong kinds of things on social media so as you were preparing your employee brand did you remove photos or or do do other things like that that would really help to sell your best side definitely I went through all my social media and remove those for I mean there wasn't really a lot to remove but still you know you don't want to have only party photos or you want to show that you're professional and of course have your profile picture is something that really reflects you from a nice or from a professional level and not only on your private matter you know so I definitely went through it and cleaned out what I thought would be best to leave out of my profile so I think it's important to just use time and effort and go through all your portals and make sure that it looks professional and that it will attract the attention from employers and recruiters then yeah that's good now what about issues like work product now I know that because I've had you in class you're a dynamite writer you present yourself on paper extremely well do you have any writing samples on your social media or within your employee brand that a prospective employer could look at oh definitely on my LinkedIn you know I have it's basically my resume which is on my LinkedIn and you know when I first came through the to the US I had my resume with me from Norway which I thought oh that I can use that because the only thing I have to add is my master's degree and I went to an advisor and she said you know you have to make sure that you follow the American standards because the standards for a resume is different here so I had to use a lot of time just changing the way my resume was set to actually make it fit for what employees want from your resume here so especially on LinkedIn and professional portals I write what I'm good for I write my skills what I've done in every job what I've accomplished so far so yeah mm-hmm what about the other social media platforms are you on Twitter or Facebook Instagram all of those things yeah I am on both Instagram and on on Facebook but my profiles there are close to friends and so I haven't really my most the most effort I've put into such as glass door or LinkedIn to to present for those who actually go out to the employer I have on my my private accounts I have more just worked on with deleting photos or if there was anything that I would feel that was inappropriate I would take that away yeah mm-hmm yeah that can that can be a problem yeah I remember when I was doing corporate HR I was conducting a search and the potential employee actually gave us permission to look at her Facebook page yeah and so we did and then we decided that maybe this young woman would not be a good fit right for our company and I know that there are young people out there who say I should be able to do whatever I want in my personal time right it's my private time if I want to party with my friends or you know chug a lug a beer or whatever I should be able to do all of that yeah and I don't disagree with that but that's not something I think that we want employers to see exactly so so for those of you out there who are thinking about putting up that picture of yourself hanging five at the at the local beach that might be okay but if you're wearing your cap and gown at the time maybe it's not so okay yeah yeah that's true so how do you find life in Norway say different from life in Hawaii because from my experience having worked with many many many Norwegian students across the years the way you describe Hawaii people I could use those exact adjectives with people from Norway friendly open honest fun loving all of those things yeah what is it about Hawaii though apart from the weather that that makes it different and that and that calls to you and who you are as maybe as the person you want to be well I don't really I don't have anything negative about Norway like my country it's beautiful the people are amazing but you have like you said you have the same thing here you have people are nice people are warm the only thing is I feel people here maybe on the more open side you know they will see you on the other side of the street and like scream at you and be like hey Nina what's up and you met them once before you know no one in Norway would do that you know or on the bus they will sit next to you and start talking about their family and it's just I feel like people here want to help you especially also in a professional way in school you know I can go talk to my advisor I can go talk to a friend and he tries to refer me to a company to an organization people are not holding on to what they got they try to share it with you they try to help you go up and get better and develop as a professional so well that's good to know yeah and we are going to take a quick break but we will be back in 60 seconds and then you're gonna tell us more about what you love about Hawaii okay so we will be back in just a minute this is working together on Think Tech Hawaii this is Think Tech Hawaii raising public awareness good afternoon my name is Howard Wigg I am the proud host of Code Green a program on Think Tech Hawaii we show at three o'clock in the afternoon every other Monday my guests are specialists both from here and the mainland on energy efficiency which means you do more for less electricity and you're generally safer and more comfortable while you're keeping dollars in your pocket welcome back to working together on Think Tech Hawaii I'm Cheryl Crozier Garcia and we are talking today with Nina Ulman a soon-to-be graduate of the master's program in HR at Hawaii Pacific University Nina is an international student from Norway and she has some good advice for other international students who are hoping to spend their one year of occupational professional training here in Hawaii so Nina how is that process different than it would be for a US citizen I think there's a lot of things you need to think of as an international student and job seeker because obviously you don't have the same visa or green card as people that are from here and live here so first of all you know you need to you need to learn the rules of your visa you need to figure out what can I do with the visa I have so most of us that are students you know we have a student visa and we are not allowed to work while on the student visa outside of school you can apply for the OPT even an extension of this but just make sure you know what what it covers and who you can apply for and I would definitely you know build myself a list of companies that I'm interested in and go into you can go into my visa jobs.com and you can actually put in the name of the company you're interested in and it will tell you if they do sponsorship which visa they cover and it's really a useful tool from people that are not from here that are seeking a job and in addition to this you know build up your LinkedIn profile like we talked before you can even put up alerts on your LinkedIn profile so when you put in your skills on LinkedIn and it matches with the job description you get notified that there's a job available that matches your skills hang out with Americans you know learn more about their culture it's easy for there's so many Norwegian Swedish Danish people at the universities here so it's easy for us to tend to hang out with those who are from here from your same country or same area but I've really focused on you know being with people from here even learning their humor their way of behaving their way of talking to make you more confident when you talk to an employer or a recruiter later and yeah like I said build up your resume make sure it's after American standards talk to a professional you know find someone that's within your field that can give you advice or maybe if you're interested in organization find someone from that organization from that company get some insider information you know bringing that to an interview is definitely a plus for you as an international and practice practice your interview you know it's something else when you're sitting at home and knowing the answers but when someone puts you on a spot and actually asks you you might just not know the answers anymore so it's definitely important and even when you have friends from here you know tell them about your career interest let them know what you're good for so they can refer you which is good yeah you know you bring up a couple of good points the first point is expanding your circle of friends to include people from all over the world right as much as you can I remember saying to a group one time that the only truly integrated group of students at HPU were the smokers yeah because they all had to share the ash tray right and so they gather around and and then at that point everybody had to speak English because there were many many different languages spoken right the other issue that I think you bring up that has tremendous merit is the idea of trying to find a champion or a sponsor inside either the profession that you're interested in or inside one of the companies that you may be interested in and straight up don't be afraid right to walk in and say what does the ideal candidate look like in your eyes because that's what I want to be exactly yeah yeah that's true I feel like as a student you also or as a job seeker you know you have to know what am I looking for in an employer you know because in one way you're giving them a lot of you you're doing them a favor by by providing your services so you have to be critical also not just take a job because you need it you know make sure as for me I really I think about the values for an organization like for me I value honesty and integrity you know and these are values that are it's important that they match mine with the organization or even you know it does the company culture fit your personality you're gonna spend a lot of time in that in that organization and it's important that it fits you so yeah have you ever had a job that you hated I have no I don't think I have actually lucky yeah because I have yeah and there is nothing worse yeah I was very very young I needed a job yeah my you know first apartment first all of that and I literally cried every day on my way into work and then after work I cried all the way home yeah and and I and that was actually one of my motivators for going to college because I said to myself you know what never again yeah am I gonna go through this yeah yeah it's really you know that's why you really have to be critical and you have to make sure that what you choose is something that that also makes you happy you know I'm looking for does the organization give me the opportunity to learn you know I'm eager to learn I want to develop as a professional but if you're going into a company that doesn't give you this opportunity it's gonna be hard or is there a chance for me to grow you know I'm I have a strong worth that work ethic I don't mind answering the phone at one in the night for a customer in need or coming to work four hours earlier than I need because I'm needed as long as I see that what I'm doing is giving me results and I can develop within the organization and also it's also a lot about if they set you up for success you know do they really give you training in depth training do they follow up do they do that is there open communication you know do they teach you transferable skills something that you can take with you further in your career I believe that an organization that teaches you these types of skills is something that's really good and something you should consider and yeah also something that challenged me you know that gives me a challenge that I don't mind having a heavy workload I don't mind having to do a really hectic work environment as long as I see that it gives results you know I get motivated by that I see that I I'm actually doing something so yeah now let me ask you this one of the things that everybody looks at as they search for that all important first job is the financial aspect right to what degree should new job seekers be willing to perhaps accept a lower rate of pay and then view that as a way to pay tuition in learning those parts of the job that maybe University didn't teach you that's a good point I think especially for international students we're not the first one to get chosen in the line you know because we're not from here they actually have to see a reason for investing in us for a year or or lease you know so it's important to if you see that this company can actually develop me as a professional it might weigh up for a little less pay especially for me right now I'm more interested in growing as a professional gaining experience meeting new people you know developing in professional network so I would say that a good payment is something you can get later on in life right now especially for me it's more about the experience getting the foot within the door you know so yeah which would you rather have a job that pays well or a job that is fun to do or a job that will teach you something right now definitely the job that will teach me something okay yeah because I'm at that stage in my life I just I'm gonna graduate this may you know well maybe not you know yeah maybe but I'm yeah I'm fresh out of you know University and for me I'm just so eager to learn new things and develop so the last one definitely for me at this point later on you know also the others will be an important factor like having fun of at least having feeling comfortable with the people you work with you know and and being able to pay for housing and whatever it costs to live here it's yeah yeah is there anything about jobs in particular that you would try to avoid specific companies or specific attitudes atmosphere I don't have a specific company that I can mention but I I know that I would not want to work with a really close-mind organization where there's no room for innovating where there's close communication you know strong hierarchies where you can't really reach out to anyone except those on your level you know I valued the opportunity to actually talk to someone who's been in this area and worked in this field for a long time because from them those are the people you can learn from you know and I really think that human resource management is essential in today's work field I feel like human resources are the backbone of the organization and if you find the right people at the right place at the right time you know the organization can really succeed so I feel when you're working in that field you need to be able to work in an open-minded organization someone who lets you create and innovate and also where you can communicate and work together in teams I think that's really essential yeah I agree with you yeah 100% you're hired thank you our time is rapidly coming to a close and I'm sorry for that because I love talking to you so thank you for joining us and I know that you are going to change the world you really are you know change is a never-ending phenomenon people come and go technologies become obsolete and jobs that didn't exist five years ago are now the hot employment prospects it seems the only thing we can't change is change itself today's generation of young people are coming of age in one of the most exciting times in human history almost anything is possible from interplanetary travel to cures for deadly diseases to electing a reality TV star to the presidency as we baby boomers and generation actors age out of active employment we must learn to depend upon the next generation to pick up where we left off learn from our mistakes and make the world a better kinder more gentle place that's all for today on working together on think tech Hawaii on behalf of all of the volunteer citizen journalists here at think tech we'll see you in two weeks till then take care