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Verso University Presents: Career Coaching: Entry Level and Early Career Series
Course Details
Tuesdays, January 27 & February 3, 6:30-7:30 pm (McCall Room)
Individual appointments: Tuesday, February 10, 6:30 to 7:30 pm (Reserve with instructor)
Verso University presents The Search Party: Early Career Series with Career Wing Woman Jodi Rabinowitz — turning clarity into confidence and job searching into momentum.
Whether you’re launching your career, changing directions, or simply figuring out what’s next, the Search Party Series will help you move from uncertainty to action. This two-part course blends practical strategy, self-discovery, and modern tools, including how to use AI effectively in your job search to help you stand out and move forward with confidence.
You’ll learn how to:
- Identify your strengths, transferable skills, and career focus
- Build a compelling résumé, LinkedIn profile, and online presence
- Use AI to explore roles, tailor your materials, and prepare for interviews
- Network naturally and tell your story with authenticity
- Nail interviews and create early wins once you land the job
This course includes two one-hour interactive classroom experiences followed by appointment for individualized support, offering a chance to get personal feedback on your résumé, LinkedIn profile, interview prep, or next-step strategy.
Designed for early-career professionals (zero to eight years of experience), this program combines expert guidance, peer connection, and hands-on practice to make your next step not just clearer but exciting.
Because your career journey deserves more than a search … it deserves a Search Party!
About the Instructor
Jodi Rabinowitz, known to clients as the Career Wing Woman, brings more than 25 years of executive experience in talent acquisition, leadership development, and organizational design. Her career spans innovative technology leaders such as Zoom Video Communications and cultural institutions like The Metropolitan Museum of Art, giving her a rare ability to navigate both high-growth corporate environments and mission-driven organizations.
Blending corporate expertise with a clinical foundation in social work, Jodi approaches every engagement with equal parts strategic precision and heartfelt empathy. She specializes in helping professionals who feel stuck, uncertain, or blindsided by career disruption rediscover their confidence and direction.
She is especially effective because she has lived it herself — five times over — experiencing firings, reorganizations, relocations, and reinventions, and emerging stronger each time. Her own nonlinear journey fuels her conviction that career setbacks are simply plot twists on the way to something better.
Known for her warmth, wit, and unflinching honesty, Jodi helps clients transform anxiety into action, frustration into focus, and transition into triumph. As the Career Wing Woman, she meets every client exactly where they are and designs a process that reflects their unique strengths, story, and aspirations.
Jodi earned both her Bachelor of Arts and Master of Social Work from the University of Pennsylvania. She lives in Connecticut with her husband and two labradors, Bosco and Nilla, and is the proud mother of two grown sons. Jodi owns the career consultancy, Congratulations, You’re Fired, where loves serving as her clients’ Career Wing Woman. Outside of work, she channels her creativity into vibrant paper collage art, along with hiking, yoga, and home cooking.
Why the Holidays Are a Hidden Goldmine for Job Seekers
There’s a common misconception that searching for a job during the holidays is a waste of time because everyone is out of the office and hiring is on hold. However, the opposite is true! Research shows that January and February consistently bring the highest number of job postings and new hires. The work you do now — including networking, reconnecting, and refining your materials — will pay off directly when new budgets and headcounts kick in.
Here are a few ways to keep your momentum strong during the holidays:
- Network, network, network. It remains the #1-way people learn about new opportunities (far more effective than job boards). The holidays give you the perfect reason to reach out. Send warm reconnect notes as it’s the most natural time of year to do it.
- Schedule informal coffees either in person or virtually, people are more relaxed and open to conversation.
- Remember that hiring managers are still in the office and often checking email with fewer meetings and more time to respond. Meanwhile, other applicants assume nothing is happening, so you gain an early edge simply by showing up.
- Join December meetings of professional associations and community groups. They tend to be celebratory and social and a great way to expand your circle and keep your energy up.
- Say yes to holiday gatherings. Every new person you meet expands your network. Even casual interactions such as a chat at a party or in the grocery checkout line can lead to unexpected opportunities.
The holidays aren’t downtime for your job search rather they’re a strategic runway for what’s next. Use the quiet to build momentum, nurture relationships, and enter the new year ready to take off.
You’ve got this — it only takes one right job!
Important Information About Verso University Classes
- Classes are usually structured as a consecutive series.
- Class size is often limited.
- Each series has a one-time fee registration fee covering all classes in the series.
- Registration is mandatory.
- The Westport Library wants to ensure that all interested students are able to participate in Verso University courses. If the registration fee is a barrier to entry for you, please contact [email protected].
Verso University is the Library’s lifelong learning and education initiative, serving up year-round offerings of classes, workshops, and lectures designed to further education and learning. Offerings run the gamut of educational opportunities, ranging from one-time lectures to ongoing courses to classes that meet weekly or perhaps monthly.
Verso University programs are made possible by the generous support of the Nancy J. Beard Lifelong Learning and Education Fund.
The Westport Library is committed to intellectual freedom, inclusivity, and lifelong learning. Our mission is to provide welcoming spaces for the free exchange of ideas. The Library does not endorse or condemn points of view, including any program content or the views expressed by presenters or participants.
