During my PhD program, my faculty supervisor surprised me with a task: craft a professional development course for graduate students in applied anthropology. I had no clue where to start and did not feel qualified, as I was still a student myself.
I entered my PhD program in Fall 2023, already aware of the troubling job market. Like a good anthropologist, I talked to those on the market and paid attention to hiring trends, especially at conferences, an ideal place for this work. Perusing the 2024 SfAA conference, someone at a booth caught me eyeing their banner, “Anthropology Career Readiness Network.” He asked about my career goals. I explained my anxieties about the shrinking academic job market. After a long conversation and much encouragement, he suggested I check out ACRN. I did not appreciate that I had been talking to Riall Nolan, an esteemed applied anthropologist, or that ACRN was already a vast and growing network offering important resources on career preparation.
The next two years worsened my academic career prospects. Trump’s second inauguration brought censorship and targeted reductions to research grants and university hiring. Most of the faculty in my department had grants frozen or cut, and I found many grants were cancelled, unavailable, or oversaturated.
I asked my supervisor for resources and insights. She said something that resonated with what student anthropologists are facing: “The landscape is so different; I’m not sure my advice will be as helpful.” This was her reason for asking me to develop the professional development course. Her sentiment echoes Margaret Mead’s “prefigurative” learning framework from her 1970 Culture and Commitment: when change outpaces elders’ knowledge modeling the future, youth become the guides. In our case, the institution of higher education has been changing so rapidly that grad students have a whole new career landscape to navigate. Business acumen is increasingly important for graduating students on the job hunt.
I was now positioned as a kind of broker—navigating the liminal space between student and career professional. I was also mediating that space for both students and faculty—something many alumni had done previously for me. Remembering Riall’s recommendations two years earlier, I began scouring ACRN, databases, and job boards, searching for themes and tips on professional development in applied anthropology. Anthropology graduates increasingly look outside academia for work, but academic structures and knowledge are not yet fully developed to help bridge the gap to anthropological practice. I decided to design the course to train students for both academic roles and practice professions. I gathered materials on anthropological practice, individual development plans, job searching, CVs/Resumes, skills translation, public writing, and more, to put together a course I wished I could have taken.
At the 2026 SfAA conference, I had a clear mission: gather skills, connections, and knowledge on professional development. Here I attended Elizabeth Briody’s networking workshop. Her strategies for talking to professionals and requesting informational interviews were useful for the rest of that conference—I left with over a dozen new connections and planned meetings.
Later, I approached her at the ACRN table and described the course I had developed. I put the same skills I had learned from the ACRN materials and her workshop into practice to connect and ask clear and pointed questions such as “What resources must current anthropology grad students read to prepare for the workforce?” and “Who should I talk to next about this project?” She then suggested incorporating a client-based class project as a way to build student portfolios and put course skills into practice. We made plans to bring her on as a course advisor. After the conference, I finalized the details and structure of the course, delivering it to my supervisor,who was ecstatic with the results. Time will tell how students react: the course is scheduled for this fall.
From this experience, I learned several important lessons:
- Professional development in graduate studies is more essential than ever. Anthropologists-in-training must adapt to the new workforce paradigm—departments will not have all the answers, so it is up to us to learn and take control.
- Programmatic structures should be reorganized with student input to provide the skills to navigate this new and changing market environment. Course re-development, restructured program requirements, and faculty training on career readiness will help prepare this generation of grad students for various careers.
- Forming a community for career-prep can greatly benefit its members. Some recent hires have attributed success on the job market to working groups that drafted and reviewed resumes, cover letters, and other statements—an invaluable resource both students and departments should explore.
- Networking is about more than talking to people: it is about requesting a meeting with key scholars/professionals you admire, organizing who you go to for what, and sending follow-up emails and progress updates after a meeting. This approach builds connections and can make the difference in finding a job.
The landscape is changing, but departments can adjust resources and curricula in kind; faculty can build pipelines for internships/jobs with local organizations and train for multiple career fields, and students have the opportunity to guide and shape the future before them.
