3 Ways to Crush your Senior Year of College

As an adjunct professor of a senior-level course and someone who has reviewed tens of thousands of resumes over the last 16 years at my marketing agency, I am passionate about helping students be well prepared for the interviews that lie ahead.

As you prepare for the start of your senior year, you can either approach it with fear and anxiety, or you can lean into the excitement and opportunity of your final year of undergraduate work.

At this point, you are gaining clarity on your career path, taking high-level coursework, have an established group of friends, and you know your university department well. You have people you can lean on and gain answers to difficult questions.

You have everything you need to excel.

This is the year that sets you up for your future.

Choose to be excited. Choose to finish well. And choose to invest your relational energy into your next chapter.

If you’re ready to crush your senior year of college, focus on these 3 things:

Networking
Defining your skillsets
Setting goals

Networking

Learning to build your personal and professional network while still in undergraduate studies will put you miles ahead of your peers. It is a skillset you will use for the rest of your professional life, whether it’s networking to get your foot in the door at a dream job or simply learning how to be an active, respectful, and engaged member of your social circle. These skills will literally last a lifetime.

There are several great resources to assist you in networking, but the best resource is the act of doing:

Join clubs
Introduce yourself to students in your class you haven’t met yet
Attend conferences and meet your fellow attendees
Engage special speakers in your class or seminar

Often, networking doesn’t require you to go out of your way; it is simply making the most of the activities you are already participating in.

As you begin to network, you may be out of your comfort zone, but it’s great practice and it is confidence building. You are learning key skills while also expanding your professional connections.

In preparation for graduation and beginning your career, few things are as important as developing your communication and relationship-building skills. As you review job openings, you’ll realize that most positions include “strong oral and written communication skills” as one of the requirements.

The skills you hone while networking will help you in several ways:

Build relationships with your colleagues
Allow you to comfortably present information to your supervisor
Engage leads or clients within a sales context
Craft detailed and engaging emails to help move a project along.

Hey, introverts! Did a wave of anxiety just wash over you?

Meeting new people, engaging in small talk, and trying to sell yourself – no thanks! But I have great news for you – networking is possible for introverts, and the first place to start is LinkedIn.

Why LinkedIn?

As a young college student, LinkedIn is likely the social media platform you’ve spent the least amount of time on. The average age group of a LinkedIn user is 30-49, so it makes sense if you’re less familiar with the platform. But, as you think about your career and what’s next for you, it’s important to spend time in the places decision makers spend time, and the main social media platform for business professionals and leaders is LinkedIn.

I’ve taught as an adjunct professor since 2020, and typically about 20% of my students invite me to connect on LinkedIn. I’ve been impressed with how they use LinkedIn as a resource to grow their network and prepare for their career, but they are certainly in the minority, and that’s great news for them. As an employer, I always visit the social media accounts of the people I am interviewing, and an impressive LinkedIn account always captures my attention.

Setting Up a Great Profile

LinkedIn is a social network that requires some time; it is a living, breathing, and much better version of your resume and has unlimited potential. Here are a few tips to help you setup a profile that will capture the interest of viewers.

Professional headshot – you can hire a photographer for less than $150 to take a great headshot. You can also have a friend take a nice picture on a blank background with an iPhone and use an AI app to clean it up and improve the backdrop. There are low-cost options to allow for a professional image on your profile.
Header graphic – Google the header dimensions and design a simple background; this will help the top portion of your profile stand out. Be sure to check it on desktop and mobile. LinkedIn has a much higher desktop usage than other social platforms. You can also use this area to highlight your personal vision statement and demonstrate your creativity.
Engaging Headline and bio – a great headline will engage people when they view your profile but also when your posts and comments appear on their LinkedIn feed; your headline appears below your name when you post. Decide what makes you unique and work it into your headline. After that, work on your bio; make it about what you’ve done and what you aspire to do, including your passions. This gives employers an idea of your professional goals.
Employment – add any relevant work experience, tag the employer, and give good details on your responsibilities. Take it a step further and request a recommendation on LinkedIn from your boss or colleague at each place of employment.
Extracurriculars – Add all your professional extracurricular activities, including certifications, memberships, and volunteer experiences.

Creating a Post Strategy

As you begin using LinkedIn, it can feel a bit daunting. While you’re social natives, posting to LinkedIn is different than posting to Instagram or TikTok. The audience and goals are radically different.

To help you get over the writer’s block, here are a few tips:

Decide what categories of information you’d like to write about: marketing, insights from classes, takeaways from books you’ve read, sharing and commenting on industry-related topics, etc.
Determine your writing style: inquisitive, informative, fun, serious
Set a dedicated time each week to post: build in time on your calendar to write a post and comment on other posts.
Write about your week: if a guest speaker spoke to your class, tag them and discuss your key takeaways. If you took a field trip, tag the business and discuss what you admire about their culture, processes, or services. If you had a club meeting, tag your advisor or professor and list out the topics the meeting focused on.

If you take 30 minutes a week to create one well written, authentic, engaging post, comment on 3-5 posts within your network, and send connection requests to 15-20 people (more below) you will be miles ahead of your peers and will begin building your network prior to graduation. This will extend your reach and help you source employment leads as you near graduation.

Building a Network

Once you’ve completed your profile and begun making regular posts, you’re ready to start building your personal network. Your network helps you learn about new job or volunteer opportunities, shares content that aids in your professional development, and keeps you connected with your peers, professors, and others you’ve interacted with in a professional or collegiate manner.

Here’s a few tips to help you start building your network:

Don’t be afraid to send a cold connection request, but use the Notes section to tell them why you’d like to connect
When a special lecturer comes to your class or a club meeting, briefly introduce yourself afterwards and then send a LinkedIn connection request that evening
Send out connection requests to all your professors – they are great referral sources for future employment
Connect with colleagues at your job or internship
Follow top voices within your industry and key companies that share information relevant to your interests
Follow your current University, your specific department (Business, Education, etc), and alumni groups
Follow any schools you may be considering for furthering your education
Join groups that are connected to your interests; it’s a great place to learn and e-meet people within your future industry

Defining your Skillsets

As you prepare to market yourself to potential employers, it’s important to define your skillsets and help them envision you being a vital part of the team. Employers value a quick upstart and onboarding process, and a key way for them to judge that is by viewing your previous experience with learning new concepts.

Picking up industry certifications is a great place to start. With most careers, you will be engaging in continuing education, so getting a head start on this is helpful for you and makes you more attractive to an employer. Regardless of your career path, there are a number of great resources out there that offer free certifications.

Here are a few sites to explore with free training:

As you think through defining and improving your skillsets, start by setting aside an hour and Google “free certifications for [insert industry]” or “free certifications in [insert skillset]” and build a list of certs you’d like to start gaining over the next 3 months. Once you’ve completed one, add it to the Certifications portion of your LinkedIn profile and add a post stating you’ve obtained it, with a few things you learned and how you plan to apply the new skillsets.

Goal Setting

As you prepare to begin your senior year, take a day to focus on yourself and set goals for the year. These goals should be more detailed than “get a good job” or “get a job that makes me happy.” Spend some time envisioning your future. What matters most to you? Is it pay, hours, work culture, social impact? What values do you want your employer to possess? What does it look like for you to be happy?

And most importantly, make sure your goals are specific and include the steps required to accomplish them. Proper planning is required to accomplish any goal.

A Goal Setting Guide

After you’ve written out a few goals, it’s time to make them SMART. This is a 5-part process that will significantly improve your success rate. Simply writing a goal down, without putting actionable steps in place, will not get you very far.

A SMART goal is Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely:

Specific – be as detailed as possible with the result of your goal. What will it accomplish? What will it look like when it’s complete? The more specific you are, the less room there is to debate whether the desired result was achieved.
Measurable – the goal should be so specific that you can easily answer whether it was done or not done; for example, “Attend 10 networking events” is easily measured.
Attainable – this asks if you have the capacity to complete the goal. That capacity could be tied to your time, the financial resources needed to accomplish it, or some other factor.
Realistic – is the goal possible? Can you complete what you’ve identified within the time frame, while also focusing on graduation, your job, and other responsibilities?
Timely – goals are a priority, and they should always have a deadline. This is where building out a plan helps. You can break your goal into multiple sub-steps. This will allow you to tackle it bit by bit.

If you’ve taken the time to invest in networking, defining your skillsets, and goal setting, you will be miles ahead of your peers and well prepared for the job market. While most of the planning will happen in the 2 months leading up to the start of your senior year, the real work happens during the school year – it will require a persistent focus and dedicated time each week to accomplish the work you’ve identified.