Transferable Skills: What Did You Really Get Out of Grad School?

First, start with what you've got. You do indeed have skills that workplaces value.

 Mike Sansone via Compfight

I've written on this at my own post-ac blog, focusing on reading and writing in this post, and time and self-management. These are skills that I honed in grad school and now use in my post-ac job at an academic publisher. Here's an example:

I go through a similar process of research and thought as I would when writing a seminar paper. I spend time on the professor and school's web sites--gathering information about his/her research agenda, the school's student body, the kinds of works the professor has assigned in the past. Then, much as I looked for patterns of women painters in 19th c novels, I look for patterns that match our products to the professor's needs. Does this professor work in Gothic literature? Our new anthology has a cluster on "monsters." Working with the research I've done on a professor/insitution, and fitting the information to my "reading" of our sales call, I try to create an argument explaining why this professor must use this book.

Stay tuned for more  on this important topic!