Professional Development
Smith alums are leaders and trailblazers. The Office of Alumnae Relations supports Smith College graduates with quality career management resources at every step of their ascent. Just starting out? Redefining your career? Looking for the next step? No matter what stage your career is in, we’re here to help you thrive and reach your goals. And no matter where your career takes you, the Smith College alum network is your most powerful resource. Stay connected through the Alum Directory, clubs and groups, your class and through the college's social media outlets.
Smithies are a powerful force in business. They lead some of the most influential companies in the world, start businesses that shake up the status quo, advise governments around the globe and change industries by advocating for fairness and equality. The Smith College Business Network provides tangible support among a group of the world’s most accomplished leaders.
The world needs more leaders from Smith. Smithies in business are making an impressive impact, yet the landscape still looks decisively male. With the Smith College Business Network, we aim to shift the tide, ensuring that a diversity of voices have a seat at the decision-making table and make their way to the top of industries and corporations.
Smith College is committed to its leaders. We’re nurturing the next generation of game changers just as we’re supporting our alums who are working in the trenches, leading companies and tipping the demographics. Smith is an incubator of big ideas and a launching pad for bold and ambitious leadership. At Smith, we teach our graduates to make their world.
Events
Join us online! Our free alum webinar program brings personal thought leaders and industry experts right to you. Register to participate in upcoming webinars and take a look at some recent ones below. Visit our YouTube channel for additional topics.
Stay tuned for Summer 2023 events
Resources
Lazarus Center for Career Development
The Lazarus Center offers career-related services to alumnae up to five years out.
View moreJill Ker Conway Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center
Access resources on creative thinking, problem solving, business skills and more.
View moreSmith Executive Education
Smith Executive Education offers programs throughout the year for women at all professional levels.
View moreLibrary Resources
Alums have special online access to a range of Smith College library resources.
View moreManage Your Career
The Lazarus Center for Career Development offers career-related services to alums up to five years out. Request an advising appointment and access industry programs, resources, job opportunities, graduate school information and career fairs. Alums may also post positions at their organizations. Sign up through Handshake.
Handouts
Visit the Lazarus Center website for additional handouts and resources.
General Career Advice
- Learn, Work, Lead: Things Your Mentor Won’t Tell You by Terri Tierney Clark ’81
- Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success by Penelope Trunk
- Callings: Finding and Following an Authentic Life by Gregg Levoy
- Career Coach: Getting the Right Job Right Now! by Linda Conklin
- Career Match: Connecting Who You Are with What You’ll Love to Do by Shoya Zichy and Ann Bidou
- Career Renegade: How to Make a Great Living Doing What You Love by Jonathan Fields
- Coach Yourself to a New Career: 7 Steps to Reinventing Your Professional Life by Talane Miedaner
- Do What You Are: Discover the Perfect Career for You through the Secrets of Personality Type by Paul Tieger and Barbara Barron-Tieger
- Free To Succeed: Design the Life You Want in the New Free Agent Economy by Barbara Reinhold
- Get The Job You Want, Even When No One’s Hiring by Ford R. Myers
- Look Me Up: LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter & Social Networking Yourself to Job Search Success by Jeff Altman
- Really Useful Job Search Tactics: A Handbook of Contemporary Job Hunting Techniques by Rick Gillis
- Secrets of the Hidden Job Market: Change Your Thinking to Get the Job of Your Dreams by Janet White
- StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath
- They Don’t Teach Corporate In College: A Twenty-Something’s Guide to the Business World by Alexandra Levit
Women-Specific
- Back on the Career Track: A Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms Who Want to Return to Work by Carol Fishman Cohen and Vivian Steir Rabin
- Going Back to Work: A Survival Guide for Comeback Moms by Mary W. Quigley and Loretta E. Kaufman
- How Remarkable Women Lead: The Breakthrough Model for Work and Life by Joanna Barsh and Susie Cranston
- It’s Not a Glass Ceiling, It’s a Sticky Floor: Free Yourself from the Hidden Behaviors Sabotaging Your Career Success by Rebecca Shambaugh
- Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office: Unconscious Mistakes Women Make That Sabotage Their Careers by Lois P. Frankel
- Secrets of Six-Figure Women: Surprising Strategies to Up Your Earnings and Change Your Life by Barbara Stanny
- Women Don’t Ask: The High Cost of Avoiding Negotiation–and Positive Strategies for Change by Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever
Entrepreneurship
- Birthing the Elephant: The Woman’s Go-For-It Guide to Overcoming the Big Challenges of Launching a Business by Karin Abarbanel and Bruce Freeman
- Entrepreneurship: Successfully Launching New Ventures by Bruce Barringer and Duane Ireland
- Entrepreneurship: A Process Perspective by Robert A. Baron and Scott A. Shane
- Innovation and Entrepreneurship by Peter Drucker
- The Girl’s Guide to Starting Your Own Business by Caitlin Friedman and Kimberly Yorio
- The Profitable Artist by Artspire and the New York Foundation for the Arts
- Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters 3.0: How to Stand Out from the Crowd and Tap Into the Hidden Job Market using Social Media and 999 other Tactics Today by Jay Conrad Levinson and David E. Perry
- A Foot in the Door: Networking Your Way into the Hidden Job Market by Katharine Hansen
- Highly Effective Networking: Meet the Right People and Get a Great Job by Orville Pierson
Networking
- Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters 3.0: How to Stand Out from the Crowd and Tap Into the Hidden Job Market using Social Media and 999 other Tactics Today by Jay Conrad Levinson and David E. Perry
- A Foot in the Door: Networking Your Way into the Hidden Job Market by Katharine Hansen
- Highly Effective Networking: Meet the Right People and Get a Great Job by Orville Pierson
Career Stories
Kathryn Calley Galitz ’86, author of The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Masterpiece Paintings, says her liberal arts education gave her a love of learning that has sustained her throughout her career.
For Employers
Promote your opportunities to recent graduates and Smith students by posting to Handshake, our internship and job database. This service is free to employers. In addition to reaching Smith’s student community, internship and job opportunities posted in Handshake are shared with our partners at Amherst College and Mount Holyoke College, and selected postings may be shared with other recruiting consortium college partners.