Career Services inaugurated its 2006 Employer Connections Fair Monday evening with an address entitled "Uncharted Maps: Life through Multiple Careers" by Dartmouth Trustee Michael Chu '68, who told students that it is possible to successfully switch back and forth between corporate and not-for-profit careers and simultaneously contribute to society.
Chu's speech, which kicked off a week of employment-related activities for undergraduates, is part of an on-going Career Services initiative called "Careers for the Common Good," a program that aims to empower students to find value-driven work in the not-for-profit, public and private sectors by connecting them with alumni who have succeeded in those areas.
"Michael Chu represents an amazing model because he proves that you do not have to choose between the corporate and the not-for-profit world ... and that doing well and doing good are not mutually exclusive," Career Services Director Skip Sturman said.
Chu has served as senior vice president and CFO of a New York based private equity firm, president and CEO of a nonprofit corporation that developed financial services for the working poor and senior partner of a firm dedicated to deploying equity capital for projects in Latin America.
"The not-for-profit and corporate worlds are often very porous, and it's more the barriers that you build in your mind that closes one off from the other," he told the audience of approximately 50 students.
Chu also urged students to engage their hearts and minds when constructing career goals.
"You can make gazillions in a job that engages your mind, but if it doesn't do the same for your heart, it becomes really hollow," he said.
Conversely, Chu noted that one can also serve soup in a soup kitchen, "which is a great thing to do and which will engage your heart, but which sometime, sooner or later, will prove to not be enough for the mind."
