Working World

Last week, Mark blogged about this article from the New York Times.  If you haven’t taken the opportunity to read his post and the related article, I would recommend doing so.  While Working World presents a variety of paths to a rewarding international career, the Foreign Service is still one of the most attractive magnets for young Americans who want to serve their country in a very direct way and who are willing to be sent wherever they are needed most.  Over the years I have been privileged to observe many Foreign Service Officers at work at our Embassies and consulates around the world, as well as here in DC.  Almost always, I came away impressed by their hard work, dedication, and wide array of tasks their daily responsibilities entail.  Those drawn to this career should definitely peruse this article.

A ray of hope for job seekers in the fields of international affairs and interested in the U.S. Foreign Service, courtesy of the New York Times. Despite the economic downturn, the Foreign Service is actually expanding: it asked for funding for 1,500 new jobs for the current fiscal year.  An interesting wrinkle on the heels of the “NGOs v. Foreign Service” discussion from two weeks ago. In that vein, the Times article offers a bit of editorial regarding the fact that, perhaps, the Foreign Service isn’t for everyone:

Not everyone is cut out for Foreign Service work, which can be stressful and highly demanding. About two-thirds of a diplomat’s career is spent overseas; officers usually move every two to four years and can be exposed to dangers like disease and war…

Yet career diplomats like Ronald E. Neumann, a former ambassador to Afghanistan who now heads the American Academy of Diplomacy, called it the best job in the world. “I enjoy what I’m doing now but it’s nothing like working on foreign policy,” he said. “In my 37 years of service I may have gone home tired or frustrated with how a decision came out, but I never went home and asked myself if what I was working on was worthwhile.”

But it seems to be for a lot of people, or so they seem to think: it’s worth noting that this story currently ranks as the most emailed on the NY Times site.  I wonder if this is an indication of the fact that there’s that many people out there who suddenly want to join the Foreign Service, or maybe its more of an indication of where people’s heads are at these days.  That is, things might be redirecting. With the sudden bottoming out of the financial sector, talented people from/headed to that field may be reconsidering their career trajectories, with international affairs as a potentially attractive destination.

Reader Garrett Kuk (who blogs himself on “focused communication”) writes in response to my post on changes in the Foreign Service:

With all of the pre-election parallels drawn between JFK and Obama , it will be interesting to see how/if Obama’s foreign policy harnesses the enthusiastic young demographic. JFK created the Peace Corps during his administration, and the global worldview of Gen Y seems to suggest the right sort of strategic foreign policy will yield tremendous volume of talent and impact. Are we better off encouraging private NGO involvement rather than Foreign Service?

I hope it’s a “how” and not an “if.” Obama undoubtedly has the influence, the hipness, and all the right conditions to call upon an enthusiastic young demographic to “ask not what your country can do for you…”. But unlike in the Kennedy era, when it was the Peace Corps, the Foreign Service, USAID and that was about it, there are infinitely more opportunities out there for meaningful international work, whether it be at NGOs/nonprofits, universities, foundations, consulting firms, etc. The Foreign Service is certainly a place where meaningful international work is done (and it seems like that will be especially true in an Obama administration: they’ve got this weird notion that we should talk to other countries…). I’ve tried to encourage international job seekers not necessarily to lean one way (the government) or the other (the private sector) but rather to expand their notion of international work. No longer is it solely the Foreign Service, the World Bank, and the UN. There is so much more. So as long as you are aware that the Foreign Service is but one choice among many, I suppose it doesn’t much matter where you end up throwing your enthusiasm for international work, as long as you throw.

After the jump, a mini-rant of some other thoughts Garrett’s question provoked.

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A surprising and not unwelcome announcement just came out of Georgetown’s (my employer, in case you forgot) Office of Communications and is now being picked up by the Washington Post and other news outlets: the university received its largest donation ever, an estate gift of $75 million to support faculty compensation and research, technology, and staffing infrastructure.  No real career connection here, perhaps other than to note that the benefactor, Robert L. McDevitt, graduated from the arts and sciences school here at Georgetown.  I think this serves as another reminder to us liberal arts majors fretting that our course of study will take us nowhere: yes we can.

Some very disturbing news from CNN’s Political Ticker:  Fran Drescher, the actress of “The Nanny” fame, may be seeking Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat.  What’s perhaps even more disturbing is that in the article, Drescher is described as a “women’s health advocate and public diplomacy envoy for the U.S. State Department.”  Hold up.  So Fran Drescher is being used to better the image of our country?  Sending out The Kid is one thing, but subjecting on the world someone with an “adenoidal voice that could strip the rust off an engine block” and then hoping that they’ll like us better afterwards seems an ill-informed move indeed.

(Props to Ari Gerstman for the lead on this.)

I recently ran across Upwardly Global, a unique career site designed to help “highly-skilled immigrants, refugees, and asylees reclaim their careers here in the United States and help American employers discover and understand this hidden talent pool.” While I presume that most of the readers of this blog (all 12 of them) are American citizens looking for international jobs and to build international careers,* for all you non-American readers of Working World, Upwardly Global strikes me as a useful job hunting, networking, and cultural assimilation tool.

And for “established” American professionals working in any field (international relations or otherwise), Upwardly Global is looking for mentors and advisees who can help immigrants swim the waters of the American professional environment. Meet someone from somewhere else. Establish more professional contacts. Help someone with their career. Sounds like a good gig.

*I probably shouldn’t assume this, especially given the fields we’re talking about here, but anyway.

The Foreign Service faces something of a crisis as baby boomers go into retirement: in the next decade, 60 percent of federal workers will reach retirement age, said this Washington Post article in 2006.  An even bigger problem, the Post article goes on to point out, could be this: that young people don’t necessarily want a career in traditional diplomacy.  It points to a Gallup survey that concluded internationally-minded folks of the ages of 18 and 29 think “the private sector offers more creativity and attracts the best minds.”*

In order to make itself more competitive and attractive amongst the array of specialized international NGOs, as well as to get the best candidates, the Foreign Service thought it might shake things up a bit:

In a proposed overhaul of its hiring process slated for next year [2007] and to be announced to employees in coming days, the State Department would weigh resumes, references and intangibles such as “team-building skills” in choosing who represents the United States abroad, according to three people involved in the process. The written test would survive, but in a shortened form that would not be treated as the key first hurdle it has been for more than 70 years.**

So how is the new test faring about a year in?  Andrew Curry thinks not so well. In his article in the October 2008 Foreign Affairs, he finds, after sitting for the new exam himself, that it is a far better judge of a candidate’s knowledge of management jargon than international affairs:

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The New York Times reports that an ever-increasing number of lawyers are headed to places like Doha, Tokyo, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, Hong Kong, and Dubai:

As applications pour into places like Dubai, American firms are stoking the attraction of overseas work by downsizing at home….

Mr. Ahluwalia, 30, grew up in Dubai, went to law school in Michigan and began his career in New York. Now, he says, he sees a big push from young lawyers hoping to find work in the Middle East. “Even kids currently in law school are coming by Dubai for jobs,” he says. “I met a very enthusiastic candidate from a Chicago law school in his second year who basically flew to Dubai for four days and actually cold-called and made visits to a bunch of firms.”

While many are headed abroad because work has dried up in the U.S., it seems that many others also see the value of experience abroad for their careers:

For some lawyers, looking abroad for work is also a chance to evolve personally as well as professionally — as long as they have the requisite skills to stand out in increasingly competitive markets.