Disclaimer: The views expressed by our interviewees are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of GradSimple. We only edit these responses for clarity. All opinions remain those of the interviewee.
- Year Of Graduation: 2024
- College/University: University of South Carolina Aiken
- Major: Business Administration
What do you do for a living, or how are you supporting yourself right now?
I work in account management. I live in the middle of nowhere in South Carolina and we have a lot of little companies around here, and I do account management for them. We do contract manufacturing, so we don’t make any of our own products. We make products for a lot of big companies. For example, say if Coca-Cola needed a soda can to be made, they could come to someone like us and say, “Hey, we want you to make these cans.” That’s the type of work we do, but in the textile fabrication industry.
Account management is a branch of sales, and there are two methods of sales. You have the hunters, who go out and try to bring in new clients, and then you have the gatherers, or the farmers, as I sometimes call them. Those are the people who already have the clients and just want to grow the accounts.
Account management is on the “farmer” side. All of my clients are long-term, and we’ve had them for over 20 years. My job is to keep building our relationships, maintaining them, and trying to grow the accounts. I’m their main point of contact for anything they need, whether it’s a big quote or a missing receipt.
Can you tell me about your experience finding a job after graduation? Are you happy with where your journey has led you so far?
Leading up to graduation, I was actually planning on going straight into my MBA. After my bachelor’s, I was already accepted into Clemson University. I had my schedule made, and I mentioned something to my professor, and he kind of hit the brakes on me. He said, “In business, you don’t want to jump straight into your master’s, because if you have your MBA with no real-world experience, it’s not going to carry you much further than a bachelor’s with four years.”
I talked to a couple of other professors and my advisor, and they all had the same sentiment. That was around March, and I was graduating in May. So I had to slam the brakes and say, “Okay, I need to figure out what I’m going to do. Am I going to go for my master’s? Am I going to start job searching?”
Ultimately, I decided to take a few years off and revisit my master’s when it makes more sense financially and for my career. I had worked at a farm through high school and college, and I was able to go work there immediately after. They offered me a full-time job, which sounded a lot more appealing than it turned out to be, but I took that while I searched for a different job. It took me from May to February this year, so about eight or nine months, to actually land something. That was at least an hour or two every single night on LinkedIn, on Indeed, texting people, sending out resumes. It was a grind.
Why did you choose your undergrad major? Do you feel your time spent in college was valuable? Why or why not?
Early in high school, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. Most high schoolers don’t. We had a career center in my high school, which was very helpful. I tried engineering and auto mechanics, and thought I wanted to do that, but it didn’t work out. Then I think sophomore year I was watching The Office and thought, “Business seems kind of cool.” So I took a business class, and I actually really liked it, funny enough. In senior year, I was in our business club. I was taking several business classes, and I really enjoyed them. That’s what helped me decide to pursue business in college.
College was valuable for me because I needed it to try and get where I wanted to go. I’d say I’ve learned more just being in the real world for the last eight months in this role than I did in my four years of college, though. I’m very much a kinesthetic learner, I need to be hands-on, and the lecture style just doesn’t click as much for me.
What does purpose mean to you? Do you think you’re living a purpose-driven life?
I am religious, so maybe I’m cheating a little bit by saying that. But, you know, I do everything to honor the Lord, and that’s where I find my purpose.
If I were to put that to the side, I think purpose comes from finding fulfillment in life, the moments where you’re laughing, the moments where you can help someone. Just whenever you find joy, there’s purpose in that.
What’s your biggest struggle right now? What led to it, and how are you moving forward?
I think discipline is my biggest struggle right now. I used to be a very disciplined individual, but not so much lately. I think that stems partly from not being fully invested in my job. I know that can have a big impact.
Sometimes I’ll sit there for eight hours, and I have a window in my office, and I look out and think, “Man, I kind of miss the farm days when I was making $14 an hour but running around.” You’d think that would spark something in me to feel more inspired and get active, but it almost wears me down a bit. I get off at 5:00, and instead of going to the gym or driving down to my parents’ house to play with the dog, I come home and kind of rot on the couch. So discipline is definitely something I’ve seen fall off for me, and I’m trying to identify ways to get back to how I should be.
What do you want to spend more time working on, either personally or professionally? What’s stopping you?
You know, there’s absolutely nothing stopping me from doing stuff, but I have really bad shiny object syndrome. One week I’m like, “Man, I really want to learn how to play this song on the piano,” and if I spend an hour a night for a month, I could master it. But then three days go by, I skip a day, then I skip two days, and then I don’t touch it. And then something else shiny grabs my attention.
So again, it comes back to the lack of discipline. There’s so much I could be pursuing. I started courses in AI, and it was the same thing. I skipped a few days, and now I’m three months removed from it. And when you’re that far removed, you have to come back and start from scratch, and you don’t want to do that.
How do you define being a successful person?
I think to be successful, you need to define your goals first. When you set your goals, whatever it is you need to do, even if it’s something as simple as, “I’m going to read for 20 minutes today,” and it’s something you struggle with but you do it anyway, I think that’s success. And if you spread that out across a lifetime, and you work to hit your goals, that’s where you find success.
If we traveled three years into the future of your life, what do you want to achieve? What would you hope has changed?
I hope to be somewhere that’s not this rural town in South Carolina. I think it’s gotten a little bit old. I definitely yearn for something a bit bigger.
I’d like a more fulfilling job where, on Sunday night, I’m more eager to go into work than I am dreading it. I think that’s the main thing. Not that I completely dread going to work, but I definitely dread it more than I’m excited.
What’s the biggest lesson or piece of advice you wish you’d known earlier?
I always thought you graduate college, you apply for a job, and you go work. It’s not as simple as it sounds. Take internships when you can. Identify exactly what it is you don’t want, because that’s more important than knowing what you do want. You don’t want to be stuck somewhere doing stuff all day that you hate, because it weighs very heavily on you.
Connect With Evan
- LinkedIn: @EvanAnderson
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