Read the empowering career story of this new college grad and soon-to-be world changer. Also included are the suggestions and resources from the Quintessential Careers team -- for this job-seeker and any other job-seeker facing a similar situation.

by Cynthia Buenger, as told to Katharine Hansen, Ph.D.

Cindy Buenger

New college grad Cynthia (Cindy) Buenger has just one tiny ambition for the future: To change the world. Two weeks after graduation she doesn't yet know exactly what form her future world-changing career will take. So in addition to the usual new-grad burden of trying to find that first career job, Cindy also must determine what that job will be.

"My biggest obstacle is not knowing where to go," she says. "I know I love dealing with people; from there I am not sure. I need some more emotional direction as far as my first career goes."

It's not as though Cindy hasn't had a taste of the working world; her work ethic while in school outshone that of many college students. In fact, she began working well before college and cites her first job as influential in setting her on her future path. "I started out as a hostess/busperson at a local restaurant and moved up to becoming one of their best waitresses," Cindy recalls. "I never dreaded going into work, and I don't remember being miserable at work. What I do remember is the people interaction. I have customers to this day -- I haven't worked there in years -- who still email me and invite me over for tea. I love interacting with people and having the ability to immediately impact them."

Her realization that she had a knack for relating to people propelled her to her choice of college major -- management. By taking heavy courseloads, she completed college in four years despite carrying a double major and a minor, "but," she says, "I started out with management, and that is still my passion."

Cindy, 22, earned her management degree (along with a marketing major and political-science minor) at Stetson University, DeLand, FL, but Stetson wasn't the school she had always dreamed of attending.

That school was Yale -- in the backyard of her native Hamden, CT. Even after she started at Stetson, she hoped to transfer to Yale. The fact that the transfer didn't work out set her on an entirely new path at Stetson.

"My luckiest break was that Yale didn't take spring transfers." she explains. "I wanted to leave Stetson but didn't realize that the school I wanted to attend didn't accept spring transfers, so I kinda got stuck at Stetson." But soon after, she found her niche at the Florida school, 1,200 miles away from her home and family. "As soon as I realized that dream was gone, I seized what I had in front of me and was truly able to realize its value. A month later I earned one of only three undergraduate research grants ever given to a business student at Stetson," she says. "Then I studied abroad through Stetson and really networked." She also found professors who mentored her and gave her opportunities. "My luckiest break was staying at Stetson where I found a community that could really help me develop."

A Personal Glimpse FAVORITE MOVIES Pride and Prejudice, Juno LATEST BOOK READ Becoming Mona Lisa, by Donald Sassoon FAVORITE BOOK Always the Bridesmaid, by Whitney Lyles INTERESTS/ HOBBIES Duckpin bowling, running, swimming, reading, music FAVORITE TV SHOWS Gilmore Girls, Grey's Anatomy, The Girls Next Door FAVORITE FOOD Peanut Butter FAVORITE WEBSITE WebMD FAVORITE MAGAZINE Inc. BIGGEST THRILL Being in love PERSONAL PHILOSOPHY "You only live once, so you need to do whatever it is you need to do, to ensure that you don't look back and wish you had done something you hadn't."

In addition to various clerical jobs and service positions in restaurants, Cindy has served as a teaching assistant to several of her professors, worked as a research assistant for authors and academics, and completed three internships. She was QuintCareers' first intern, planning the site's 10th anniversary tour in 2006. She spent a summer interning in Washington, DC, for Siemens Corp., monitoring legislative hearings and conducting research. Her third internship was for Target Corp., where she revamped a vendor-performance evaluation system. "I changed it so it was more detailed, offered more feedback, and hopefully improved vendor performance," she says. "The goal was to save the store payroll hours and keep everything looking Target-branded without needing to use the team members to do the vendors' work for them."

Amid her many jobs and heavy coursework, Cindy managed to hold a work-study job in the Management Department, serve as a community assistant in a university residential apartment facility, and play an active role in Alpha Kappa Psi, the co-ed professional business fraternity. She also spent a summer studying abroad in Innsbruck, Austria. On several occasions during her time at college she traveled to participate in a professional duckpin bowling tour.

Cindy credits her personality and work ethic for the success she's attained in her short career thus far. "I enjoy interacting with people and solving problems," she says. "I also have a very determined personality, and I don't like to leave things unsettled or incomplete. Both of these attributes combined have made me good at what I love to do."

Still, there have been bumps in the road. Although she says she does not believe in regrets, Cindy can point to her biggest mistake in the work world: "I was joking around with someone in upper management prematurely, and the person seemed to perceive it as a sign of disrespect. I approached the individual about it later and was told I need to be aware of my audience. This is my biggest mistake. I'm so excited about meeting people and interacting with others -- so excited about my desire to make a difference in the world -- that sometimes I forget who I am talking to, and I just need to slow down and be who I need to be."

Born in New Haven, CT, Cindy's earliest ambition was to be a teacher and a writer. "I thought I would teach elementary-school kids because I really liked elementary school. It didn't feel like "learning" in the tedious sense; it felt like fun," she recalls.

Of her early writing ambition, she says, "I also really enjoyed writing, and I liked that one of my teachers hosted an author's tea where we would dress up and read our books to our classmates and parents." If she could do anything she wanted with her career, writing would play a central role. "I've never lost my passion for it," she says, "however, my ability to write well in the sense of published writing isn't as mature as I would like it to be, and I do not think that will change much."

Cindy's immediate plan is to spend the summer at home doing part-time work to save money and searching for the perfect job in New York City where she plans to move in September with a college friend who already has a job lined up. By that time, Cindy hopes to have landed her first career job.

Her challenge is to figure out what that job will be. "I think eventually I can move up to senior management of a big company," she says. "I would love to have that kind of opportunity." Although she calls it "totally cliched," her career advice for others may hold a grain of wisdom for herself: "Figure out what you love doing and find a way to get paid well to do it." Cindy knows what she loves to do and that she wants to change the world. All she needs is to do is determine what job and what organization can offer her that opportunity.

Suggestions and Resources for Cindy and Others in Similar Situations

We suggest that Cindy:

• Research the jobs that use the skills she most enjoys using. In addition to interacting with people and writing, she values autonomy and being trusted to do her job. "My best boss was able to be give me assignments and let me do them," she says. "I have found that many bosses hate delegating ... but being the subordinate who feels like they're being babysat is the worst thing ever." Nor surprisingly, her worst boss was the babysitting type: "My worst boss gave me tasks to complete but then would go ahead and do them," she says. "I felt like they didn't trust me with the project, and I felt useless. It killed my organizational commitment and my sense of community within the company because I just felt like, 'why am I even here? You obviously do not trust or need me.'"
• Conduct informational interviews. Cindy did at least one informational interview in college. Now she should find organizations in New York City that intrigue her and interview people in them to learn more about what job would be right for her. Informational interviews are also amazing networking opportunities. Cindy will make excellent contacts through these interviews and could even learn of job opportunitites. Summer may be a great time for these interviews as some companies have slower periods in the summer. Find out how to do informational interviews in our Informational Interviewing Tutorial.
• Network. Informational interviewing, a subset of networking, is a great start, but Cindy needs to network with everyone she knows to find out about job opportunities in New York City. She should talk to her parents' friends and her friends' parents -- and anyone she can. Her extroverted personality should make networking easy. She might consider asking people in her network what kinds of jobs involve heavy contact with people, writing, problem-solving, and autonomy. Learn more about networking in our The Art of Career and Job-Search Networking.
• Spend as much time as possible looking for a job. In finding a summer job to save money, Cindy should try to plan a schedule that will enable her to job-hunt and perhaps spend at least a day weekly in New York. She could read our articles, 10 Ways to Develop Job Leads, One-Week Job-Search: How to Lay the Foundation for a New Job in Just Seven Days, and Strategies for Staying Upbeat During a Long Job-Search.
• Continue to keep her audience in mind. As she goes on interviews, Cindy should remember the unpleasant incident in which the member of upper management did not see the humor in her joking around.
• Keep writing. Although Cindy is skeptical that her writing can ever reach the mature level she feels it needs, she should remember that the way to improve one's writing is to write. She might consider starting a blog or look for a similar outlet that would let her practice her writing regularly.