Whether you’re trekking into your last semester of college, dipping your toes into the world of graduate school, or frantically scrolling through LinkedIn, Jeff Riggins has a piece of advice for you.
Riggins, a self-made man from Georgia and father of two, is currently an adjunct professor in the Drury University Communications Department. His 30-plus years of experience accounts for the words he shares for those entering the workplace jungle.
After serving three years in the Army, Riggins enrolled at Missouri State University at 21. Though he felt his age set him back from his classmates, he felt that his experience as a young adult in college gave him the motivation and discipline to follow through with his studies and the means to network his way onto a successful track once outside. Two years after graduation, he received an effectual word of advice to step into the post-graduate world and return to his academic interest: Communications. He spent the first year of his graduate work under the dean of honors and his second as a teaching assistant position in his department.
Riggins explains the workplace ‘glass ceiling’ phenomenon and gives learned advice on how to avoid this: “Always be looking, always be proactive,” he said. “The key is to be open to learning new things and understand you’re going to have to.”
These are key pieces of advice that any 20-something student should hear. Whatever the next step may be for soon-to-be graduates, he stresses the importance to keep moving forward and be positive-minded. “Being confident in your abilities and not being afraid to make changes is a big thing.”
The advice that Jeff Riggins has to offer is real. His long-time understanding of the wild world of work has given him the ability to be strategic in his path. Recently, the Scoop’s Megan Dern sat down with him to discuss advice he has to pass on to graduates seeking direction.
Would you recommend graduate school?
In many cases having a bachelor’s degree is a minimum. It’s become the minimum. I was working one day, heading to lunch, and all of a sudden I looked around and I was like counting, master’s degree, master’s degree, bachelor’s, master’s degree… they all had at least the bachelor’s. If you don’t have it, they won’t even interview you. The thing about grad school, if you had decent grades as an undergrad, you can apply for an assistantship. Some places will pay you. You can work at the university, and you can get a free degree. So, yeah, I recommend it. I think people get caught in asking themselves, will I make any more money? Will this bring me more income? It’s really hard when people ask me that. I say, “I don’t know. I can’t tell you that, but I will say if I don’t do it, I know what happens if I don’t do it.” It’s investing in yourself. Time and money, hopefully not a lot. You’re investing in yourself, and you carry that with you everywhere you go.
Did you go directly into graduate school after college?
No. Well, I was dating this girl, and I was over at her parents’ house for dinner. At the time I was working over at 9-1-1 emergency center, and I had graduated from college; It was a steady job, right out of college. I was talking about how the job got me so curious about research in communication from all the things I was seeing. My girlfriend’s father had been a professor at Drury for like 40 years, and he said, “Well, just go to graduate school.” He made it sound so matter-of-fact. I was like, that’s an idea! So I took his advice, and decided to roll with that.
Do you think that helped you, or hurt you?
I think waiting helped me in that working opened my eyes to possibilities.
How competitive are master’s program and graduate assistant/teaching assistant positions?
It depends. You need to go through the application process. You have to be accepted into the grad study first. Take the GRE, do the letters of recreation – all that – and then there’s a fee. So when you’re accepted to graduate study, then you can accept a position. Sometimes people will offer you a GA or TA position and you haven’t even applied to the school – it depends. Depends on whether there’s a need. At schools like MSU and Mizzou, there are so many available. If it’s a specific one, you have to do your homework. It just depends on how many applicants there are. Typically you do an assistantship outside your program, and then the second one you do inside of your program. It depends on how much you excel. That’s what I did; I did one year in the MSU student life office and one year as a TA. And with the TA gig you have a couple of classes you need to teach and such.
Do you think being older helped you get jobs after college and graduate school, or set you back?
I think that did help, in the end. I started working when I was 14, you know, summer jobs. So I had a little bit of work-history. In college I was 21, so I was hanging out with adults and networking and hanging out where 18-‘year-olds can’t go. There are a lot of deals that get done on golf courses and in bars, so I had exposure to that which gave me more opportunities. Not like I was out hustling for jobs in bars every night but you go out and you meet people and do what you can to get what you need. Now, it’s more about who you know than what you know. More people are graduating college now more than ever. Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t get the call back, because there’s a lot of stuff going on behind the curtain that you may not be privy too. If I’m looking for another job I will check with my network and see what’s going on and a lot of times I’ll just reach out and say hey you know I’m looking for a job. There’s no shame at all in saying, “Hey, you know I’m looking for something – a lot of times they’ll be glad to hear from you because they’re having trouble finding people. That’s something that we’re finding – now things are so specialized it’s easier now to poach someone from a competitor than it is to bring someone in and train them.
How did you find your way after you got your master’s? What advice do you have for students who have just graduated college?
Even with a master’s degree, you may not know the specifics of the industry. They may know you can do the job because of it, but you need to learn the specifics. My old boss said, “It’ll take you a year.” So I made a goal in my head to do it in less than a year. So in six months I was out on my own on the road billing time. You’re a revenue generating person. Then you become more valuable and that’s how you move up the chain.
The key is to be open to learning new things and understand you’re going to have to. Any time you switch jobs you’re going to have to learn things. Anytime you switch industries, careers, you’re going to have to learn things. There’s a whole lot of learning as long as you’re OK with that. If you’re not – if you don’t want to learn anything new – you better stick where you’re at and hope the place stays, too. Because so many places close now, and if you end up hanging on too long, and the company sells. If you reach the glass ceiling, or if you wait for someone to move on, so you can move up, you’re allowing decisions to be made for you. You should take control of it, your future, always be looking always be proactive. Another thing that’ll happen, too, is what they call a boomerang. You’re stuck, you’ve hit the ceiling, people above you are not leaving – no new positions available – you’re stuck. You take a position with a competitor, could be a very similar job, and then they’re looking for people with your qualifications, and you get a raise, and work there for a few years. Then the other place you used to work wants you back, and you go back and make a bunch more money. So what you’ve done there is you’ve jumped those people who haven’t moved, and you branch out. They look over them and pull you back in. That’s one way of moving up; it’s called a boomerang.
Do you remember a time you took a risk like that?
It was in the late 90’s early 2000’s. Actually if you remember monster.com it was a site that you could put your resume up, like LinkedIn, and apply to jobs. I got that job from Monster.com. Less interaction but you’re just a stand-alone. They would sell access to companies, and they would search keywords for contacts. So I was chilling in Fort Lauderdale and they said, ‘We want to fly you up.’ I was actually so busy, I said, ‘How about next Saturday,’ and they said OK so I flew up there. The plane ticket was waiting for me at the airport. It happens sometimes, not very often. They flew me up, had a room at the Hilton, rental car and everything. They gave me three interviews and took me out to dinner – it was nice. I was happy with the job I had but once they gave me this offer that came along, it was a significant boost; a nice opportunity. If you really want to make more money and to learn more you have to typical move away from the comfort zone. I left a job in 2005; within three years I had doubled my salary. People there who got promoted would get a 2 percent/5 percent raise every year, which is one of the reasons I left because there was no real chance for upward mobility. People in managing positions weren’t leaving, which meant I was stuck, which was fine but I took a risk, I wanted to. I left and it paid off. Being confident in your abilities and not being afraid to make changes is a big thing.
