Career Development for Graduate Students: 3 Steps to Turn Your Degree Into Momentum
BY Martin Gahbauer, M.Ed. | 5 MIN READ
Getting a graduate degree isn’t just about putting in the academic hours—it’s about turning your passion into career momentum. Whether you’re eyeing a promotion, leaping into a fresh field or stepping into leadership, your graduate degree is the ultimate launching pad. But here’s the secret: career exploration shouldn’t wait until you have a diploma in hand. It’s an active, strategic process of aligning your expanding expertise with where your industry is actually heading.
Employers today want more than technical credentials—they want dynamic problem-solvers, savvy communicators and forward-thinking leaders. That’s where your college or university gives you a decisive edge: you have full access to career services, like Elmhurst University’s Russell G. Weigand Career Center for Professional Excellence (WCCPE) to fuel every step of your journey.
Here is your three-step playbook to anchor your goals, leverage career resources, and ensure your graduate degree pays huge dividends long before you cross the graduation stage.
Step 1: Think Inside-Out
Before you look outward at job markets and industry trends, you have to look inward. Truly successful career development for graduate students starts with a clear understanding of your core drivers:
- Your Strengths: The natural talents and hard skills you execute effortlessly.
- Your Interests: The complex problems, topics, or environments that fire you up.
- Your Values: Your workplace nonnegotiables—like work-life harmony, innovation, autonomy or social impact.
Knowing your personal baseline is the ultimate filter. Without it, you’re chasing after every shiny job title like a dog chasing its tail. With it, you possess a powerful compass that guides you through potential career opportunities with helpful clarity. To build this foundation, take advantage of career assessment tools like PathwayU or schedule a one-on-one session with a career advisor to pinpoint your unique value proposition.
Step 2: Map the Industry and Plug Into Your Network
Once you know your baseline, connect your coursework to real-world opportunities—and the people driving them. Dive into labor trends, industry reports and job postings across your discipline (healthcare, business, tech, education, OT, or speech-language) to spot emerging roles and key credentials.
Remember: career growth is a team sport. Leverage tools like Handshake, which is a career network and job board specifically designed for college students, recent graduates, and alumni, to explore top employers and tap into a mentoring program to connect directly with experienced industry leaders. Internships for graduate students are available. Treating every internship, placement, and project as a high-value networking event turns your academic work into real-world momentum.
Step 3: Master the Art of the Informational Interview
If networking is the engine of career progression, informational interviews are the high-octane fuel. Unlike a high-pressure job interview, an informational interview is a low-stakes conversation where you sit in the interviewer’s chair to learn from an experienced practitioner—whether that’s an occupational therapist breaking down specialized clinical settings or a tech leader navigating digital transformation.
This is where your self-assessment pays off: when an insider describes their day-to-day reality, you can instantly weigh it against your own values and goals to decide if that path is a true fit for you.
How to execute informational interviews like a pro:
- Prepare Your Pitch: Use resume and LinkedIn optimization tools so your digital presence looks polished before you reach out to alumni or industry leaders. Send a brief, polite message on LinkedIn or via email. Introduce yourself as a grad student, mention why you admire their career path, and ask for a quick 15-to-20-minute chat.
- Ask Strategic Questions: Skip basic facts you can Google. Ask targeted questions like: “What surprised you most about transitioning into this role?” “How did your graduate degree help you navigate industry shifts?” or “What skills are most critical for emerging leaders in our field?”
- Reflect and Follow Up: Immediately evaluate their insights against your strengths and values and then send a warm thank-you note within 24 hours. mentioning a specific point from your conversation. Remember, you can never say thank you enough. Keep the door open—these contacts often turn into lifelong professional mentors. (At Elmhurst, for example, graduate students retain lifelong access to WCCPE career coaching as alumni, making these relationships valuable for years to come.)
Proof in the Power of Connection
Erica Johnson, a 2026 Elmhurst University graduate with a master’s degree in industrial/ organizational psychology, is a big believer in conducting informational interviews. “Informational interviews offer insider perspectives you simply can’t get from reading a job description online” she says. “Even within a specialized graduate program, a single degree can branch into a multitude of career directions, making it easy to feel overwhelmed when deciding which path or role suits you best.”
During her graduate school journey, she made intentional efforts to have informational interviews with a variety of industrial/organizational psychology professionals whose job titles and role descriptions interested her. “Those conversations did more than help me understand their day-to-day responsibilities,” she says. “They expanded my network with people doing the work I aspired to do, exposed me to professional development opportunities such as local networking events and industry groups, and even led to internship opportunities.”
Ultimately, informational interviews are one of the most powerful tools for career exploration, authentic networking, and opening doors you didn’t even know were there.
Build Your Momentum Today
Career progression isn’t a switch you flip on graduation day—it’s momentum you build continuously. By anchoring on your self-knowledge, researching industry trends with the help of your campus career resources, and mastering informational interviews, you can turn your degree into an active engine for long-term career growth.
Ready to move forward on your career goals? Elmhurst University can help you get there. Explore Elmhurst University Graduate Programs or fill out the form below to discover where a graduate degree can take you!
Martin Gahbauer, M.Ed. is the executive director for Elmhurst University’s Russell G. Weigand Career Center for Professional Excellence.
