Jaclyn Strominger and Emily McSherry dive deep into the transformative power of career guidance in this engaging episode. Emily, the CEO of Advize, shares her journey of creating a mission-driven platform designed to help students navigate their career paths with clarity and confidence. Through innovative video-based coffee chats and professional interviews, Advise bridges the gap between education and the evolving workforce landscape, particularly at the intersection of AI and technology. We discuss the challenges students face in finding meaningful internships and how Advize aims to make career exploration more accessible and less daunting. Tune in to discover how Emily’s personal experiences shaped her vision and the exciting opportunities that lie ahead for students seeking direction in their professional lives. Jaclyn Strominger welcomes Emily McSherry, the dynamic CEO of Advize—a mission-driven platform that is revolutionizing the way students connect with career opportunities. Throughout the conversation, Emily shares her personal journey from a small town in Texas to the forefront of education and workforce development. She discusses the inspiration behind Advize, rooted in her own experiences of feeling lost despite multiple internships and accolades. Emily emphasizes the gap between academic learning and real-world job expectations, advocating for a more structured and accessible approach to career guidance through technology and AI. The episode highlights the importance of mentorship and networking, as well as innovative solutions like video-based interviews that can demystify various career paths for students, making the process both fun and effective. Jaclyn and Emily dive deep into the challenges of starting a business, the importance of experimentation, and how to navigate the complexities of the education sector—all while keeping the conversation light-hearted and engaging.

Takeaways:

• Emily McSherry shares her journey from feeling lost in her career to creating Advize, a platform aimed at helping students navigate their career paths more effectively.
• The importance of networking through informational interviews is emphasized, as it can provide clarity and opportunities that many students lack.
• Emily believes that video content is a powerful way to share career stories and insights, making information accessible and engaging for students.
• The conversation highlights the common misconception that a specific major determines career success, encouraging students to explore various options.
• Jaclyn and Emily discuss the challenges faced by startups, particularly in the education sector, where closing deals can take a significant amount of time.
• The episode concludes with actionable advice for listeners on how to utilize tools like Advizehub.com to enhance their career readiness and confidence.

Connect with Emily Mcsherry

https://www.advizehub.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/msemilymcsherry/

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High Achievement, Unstoppable Success Coach | Author | Podcast Host

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Engine Spam. Hello everybody and welcome to another amazing episode of Unstoppable Success. I am your host, Jaclyn Schminger.

And as you know, on this podcast we hear from amazing leaders and influential people who are out there doing the work and having unstoppable success. And today I have the absolute pleasure of introducing you to Emily McSherry. Let me tell you a little bit about Emily.

She's a CEO of Advize, which a mission driven career platform and nonprofit, helping students build clarity through structured video based coffee chat, professional interviews and with technology and AI, which I think is absolutely fantastic.

She is especially energized by the work at the intersection of education, learning, workforce development, AI, technology and, and or talent strategy. So welcome Emily. So excited to have you on. Love this platform that you're, that you're building.

So welcome. Thanks. Yeah, excited to be on the show and chat with you today.

So tell me, Emily. So we were talking a little bit before getting started. What first of all drove you to create Advise?

Yes, I would say a combination of things. I think like a lot of businesses, they come from your own pain is probably like the primary driver.

So for me, I grew up in, when I was younger in rural Texas, so there were no stoplights in my town. But I was always an ambitious, excited kid, like wanting to learn and do as much as possible and build the life I wanted and all that.

But I didn't really have like the network around me.

Right.

And you kind of are, you're very influenced by who's around you and what you see and what's in your sphere. So that being said, I, I felt like I ended up doing all the right things. I moved to Arizona with my family, I got a free ride to college.

I was a state champion athlete. I did like five internships. I was a double major, kind of, you name it.

But I still left college feeling extremely lost and confused about my career, which I felt like was not right. Especially because I felt like there's so many people out there that have it way hard, obviously like way harder than me. Right.

And so then I spent about seven years in the recruitment space. That's when I moved out to la.

And that's when it kind of hit me because all of a sudden I had access to talking to professionals about their job day in and day out. And I was training recruiters how to become experts in careers by doing this exercise.

And I was like, wow, we don't, we don't get taught this, like at all in any phase of this. If anything, you might talk to a professional here or there.

But how can you do that in a scalable way to have enough knowledge to feel like you're setting the right goals and you're having confidence?

Because the anxiety I felt as a student and I kind of just landed in the best thing that I could based on what knowledge I did have, it's even getting harder and more difficult now. So I would say that's.

That's really the main thing is realizing there's this gap of how do we get this knowledge from the workforce to students in a way that's effective, more fun, scalable, and then also measurable for the universities, really. Because I wish I had it. And then the almost thousand people we've interviewed wish they had it too.

And I would think that, you know, whether it's the professional and. Or the student, I would think they want it. And I'm. And I'm with the.

The thought that's heading through my brain is literally the conversation I try just had with my daughter where she said, I'm looking for these internships. And she. And she said, my roommate has known what she's wanted to do. I think since she came out of the womb.

She's like, I have all these ideas and things, but I don't know exactly what I want to do. I have. I have.

And.

And I said to her, pick up the phone and start calling places that you think you might want to work, have informational interviews, which is like what you're doing. I mean, so.

Exactly.

People don't know what they don't know.

Yep, exactly. I mean, you could even put yourself in your. In a freshman's shoes.

And they probably pick their major based on maybe what their parents try to help them do or what they. Again, maybe some research that they've done online. But a lot of the time they're not really sure what that actually leads to. And like, what's.

What's at the end of the rainbow.

And what my business partner and I like to compare it to is if you or I were to go online and want to buy a pair of jeans, we could probably watch a thousand videos of people talking about wearing the jeans, what jeans they chose and why, and which ones they'd recommend if they did it again. But there's none of that now that exists out there until now about careers.

And the interesting thing is that there are also so many different careers and career paths and opportunities that I think, which I love what you're. You know, that will net.

You know, because there's so many that are out there, you can actually make them or expose them, so to speak, like for people. Because you don't wake up one day thinking, I'm going to have a career in logistics,

right?

It's like, oh, I want to do that, right. You know, but there's so many things

that people can do and it's hard to scale it, which is really why we believe in the video piece.

I, I'll go out there and say that nothing will beat a one on one conversation with a real person, especially to build your network and especially to get a job. But the scaling in terms of information and storytelling, I think video is the only way because things are rapidly changing so quickly.

Like, how else are you supposed to capture these stories and information so you can come to your own conclusion? And a lot of people get inspired by other people's stories, right?

Like a lot of people kind of land in something or sometimes get a little bit lucky because they met that teacher or they met that person or their parent just happened to connect them with somebody.

But we want that to be available for any student for free and hopefully accelerate that process and make it a little bit more, well, fair, especially for those who don't even know that's something that they're supposed to be doing.

Right. That's interesting. So I love what you're doing. I think it's absolutely fantastic. So I'm curious. So, you know, getting started right is never easy.

And you know, this is one of the things that we love to share on this podcast. You know, what was that like for you? And you know, what were some of the hurdles and how did you combat them?

Yeah, I think, especially I think at any age, but something I had always experienced was always wanting to be this like, future version of you that has something like this, but you kind of get stuck. And I think a lot of people get stuck in having the perfect idea or having the perfect time.

And I think one thing that helped me was starting little experiments in other businesses before this, right? Like I had a coaching business at one point to help like younger people with their getting their values aligned and their career and stuff like that.

And so that helped me build confidence doing events. I think any experience or doing something out of your comfort zone is good. And it also gives you a signal, right?

Like, so if you're feeling really stuck, the worst thing you could do is not take any action because you're, you're not getting any feedback, you're not getting any feedback that yeah, this is good, or no, this is bad, and Then you can't move forward. So, like, I think just taking action and experimenting is very important.

And then I also think people, when they think about starting a company or a business, they think about going from zero to a million. Like. Like that, right? Meaning maybe I should take out a loan or maybe I should do this, or maybe I should.

Like, they want to go all in before they really are confident that they might have something that might actually work. So specifically, I mean, you know, kind of like the lean startup method. That's a very common, like, terminology these days about entrepreneurship.

And it's a way to test an idea or test your assumptions before you go build something that's really expensive. So an example might be, I don't know, I'll take my phone case. Maybe you have a new idea for a phone case, right?

Instead of going to a manufacturer and saying, print me a thousand phone cases with this idea that I think I like, but I know I like, who are the potential people that are going to buy it, right? Like, what's my assumption around that? And if it's not true, then I'm screwed.

Like, I really need to figure out what those assumptions are and test those. So maybe I'll go talk to 20 people that I think would buy this, and I'll ask them some questions about what they like and what they would buy.

And then I have some evidence that makes me feel better about actually going forward. Forward.

So conceptually, that's, I think, a really important thing that can help people move an inch without having to quit their job or go, whatever. You can do that with a job, with a family, anything at the same time. And think about it as an experiment for.

For me, I think one thing that I always knew I wanted to do, even when I got my first job, was I knew I eventually wanted to have a company that did something that was good for the world and. And I could make money. Like, that was really, like, my dream. So I think I was always kind of like, looking out for that opportunity.

And in business school, I got a little bit lucky because they have a capstone thesis that is entrepreneurial in nature if you choose that tract. And I kind of just got through in with a random group of UCLA MBA friends or people that I kind of knew. And some I knew.

And we spitballed ideas and we had to come up with an idea in a week, and my team wanted to do my idea, so that was cool. So it's kind of like that just kind of lined up and people are like, you know, that's really interesting.

Like I want to work on that for a year, a year and a half and then in those classes that's what we did was what I was talking about earlier. We did the experiments, we did the research gathering, we thought about prototypes and all of that helped build confidence to do it after school.

So I think that was, that was really important. And then I think you had a third point about like hurdles.

Yeah, I think the biggest hurdle especially, well, I would say like the biggest, one of the biggest hurdles for me is obviously there's risk, some risk involved when you go and have a business and there's trade offs, right? So like my biggest trade off at the time was well, if I don't have my normal job and salary, I can't live in LA and have a startup, right?

Unless you know, I'm not one of those trust fund, you know, here you go, I'll support you, whatever you want to do. So next thing I know I'm living with my in laws on the east coast with my husband, right.

And that was like all good for various reasons, but that was something that I had to be able to you know, like go and do, right? And say I care about this this much that we're going to cut all our costs and go do that. And still two and a half years in, right?

It's, you know, even though the business is having success, I'm still not making what I could make in another job.

So those types of hurdles that go with your, your personal life I feel like are really hard but can be, I would say like compensated if you have that evidence and you have more of that confidence and excitement based on what you've been doing and getting to like that next step you need to get to by the time you need to get to it, right? Yeah.

So I, I love the, it's, it's like taking that step and you know, obviously getting uncomfortable knowing that you have to make a change with what you're doing, right. So you know, having to make a move, obviously being realistic with the fact that if I'm not going to be in job X. Right.

You know what I'm kind of thinking, you know, a lot of people are afraid to take that step, right? Are afraid to make that move.

So when you were with having a business partner, you know, what did that look like in terms of you first like the two of you guys coming together and then you know, have you set like certain milestones that you want to do like you know, if we don't hit this like how does that look. I mean, it's, it's. We. I know, we all know it's a roller coaster.

Mm. Yeah. And that's kind of how we've operated.

Right.

Like the first year was get someone, get, get a couple schools to pay for this thing. Like I got. And so that was my, that was my main goal for the first year was can I get four or five schools to just pay us?

And at the time it was just, it was just me. And I had mostly built the platform like from like less than $1,000. Like, that was my prototype. That was my MVP.

And I thought, you know, if I can get any these, like, couple of schools that are also really hard to sell to, to buy that that's like step one. And so when I did that, it was a lot easier to find a CTO and business partner. Right.

Because then I went out and I started, I wrote down my list of like all the skills and things I needed, like the personality I was looking for. And you know, their motivation is a big part of this because we're not just fast growing, multi million dollar kind of business.

Like we're in like education. Right. So it's. Someone needs to care about that. And so it was a lot easier for me to go get business partners.

One, I had a couple that didn't work out when I was like in the school time. And I kind of knew what I needed then through kind of some hard lessons there. But then I could go say, hey, I've. I have.

We work with ucla, we work with asu, we work with Berkeley, and we work with Sacramento State. And I did that on my own.

So I would really love some help is going to help me do that a lot better because right now I'm like trying to figure out the website and I don't really, I'm not. That's not my thing. So. So yeah, that was kind of my strategy and that's, that's what worked for me. Specific strategy.

YC Combinator has a free founder matching tool. So you can make a profile and get matched with people and you can just interview them. So that's how I actually found my business partner. Now that's.

And what was that site?

YC Combinator.

Oh, okay. Yep, yep. Yc, that's actually really great. That's a. Yeah, that's a really fun. That's a really good way to do that.

And that's actually, I mean this is a huge thing. It's, you know, being able to identify obviously what's actually working, but also Know, you are always going to have hurdles to get through that.

I mean, obviously there's going to be stepping stones in getting through that. So talk to me, like, what is your big, what is like your next biggest hurdle to get over?

Yeah, the next biggest hurdle is going from about 10 paying universities to I would say, sustainable cash flow and revenue. Right. What's really challenging about the market that we're in is a deal could take a year to close and a year to implement and get the results.

So it's really hard to move quickly and it takes a lot of patience. So I would say like, the investment landscape is also really hard right now. Right.

If we were, I don't know, a couple years ago or during COVID I think we'd be getting checks pretty easily right now. And education and online education was thriving because everyone was at home. But now with AI and the uncertainty and the job market, etc.

People are not as willing. Right. I, I was in ed. I was in New York City pitching as a finalist for Ed Tech Week a couple months back, which was really great.

Talking to some investors who came up to me afterwards and they say they're angel investors, which means that usually they would be like on the earlier side before you have a ton of revenue, who are now asking, come back and talk to us when you have a million ARR or annual recurring revenue. So that puts people like me in a position where you're like, well, how am I going to get to a million ar if I have no money?

So it's that it's like getting through that gap phase to the other side through sales.

One of the other things that we're doing is we did open up the nonprofit side of the business for grants because there is a huge mission driven part of our business that can pay for operations, kind of like all that other stuff, while we can still keep the, the tech side open and for profit.

Yeah. So with what you're doing, are you, I mean, we're talking about schools. Are you also talking in and exploring any of the trades as well?

Because that's a huge. But you know, there's the gap between, I mean there's, you know, do you go to the four year college, you go to the two year college?

Right. We want to get into trades. We haven't specifically dug in yet.

I would say a challenge from a content perspective with trades is those profiles typically aren't on LinkedIn and that's typically how we source our content.

So we do have a volunteer program that we just started where we actually have a couple people very passionate about trades who are recruiting all their friends to interview with us. And that's kind of how we're just, you know, starting to dip in a little bit.

And we're very, very open and pro trade and we're also pro bringing this earlier into high school, as you're kind of implying here, because that's when I've heard parents and students, especially today, thinking about, well, which degree is worth it, where do I want to go? And I just want to know what all my options are. Not just what does this bachelor degree and this major lead to?

Because traits you can make, I don't know, up to 200k and do something with your hands and not be stuck behind a computer and not be replaced by a robot for now. So, I mean, it sounds pretty, sounds like a pretty good option to me.

I think if my kids were in that age group and that was something they're interested, I'd definitely be exploring that with them.

Yeah, I, actually, I, it's, it's, it's, I think it's a really interesting thing because I look at some, some of the things that are out there now. I mean, with.

I have two kids, one's about to go to college and one's in college and I'm still blown away by all the opportunities that are out there for people that like, for people. Jobs. Right.

And I think that's also one of the things that I think is really important for, for us to, you know, remember a robot is not going to take the place of a human in so many different ways. Like AI is a tool and how do we use it as the tool and things? You know, you can't, you know, we're not as advanced as Rosie in the Jetsons.

You know, if you've ever watched the Jetsons, right. You know, they're not going to have that maybe that mind yet to their, you know, it's not going to think.

It's not that personal connection in human connection is something we obviously, you know, need.

But there's so many opportunities out there and I still think there's always going to be other opportunities that are going to be made or new things that we haven't even thought about because it's new.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

I mean, I, I'm pretty sure if I went back in time when the car was being invented or the washing machine, everyone thought all the jobs were going to be gone then as well.

Not to oversimplify it, but I do think that, and I think one job in particular, that everyone thought would be wiped out would be radiology or, you know, the people that do the X rays at the hospital. Because people are like, well, a machine can analyze an X ray perfectly compared to a human.

But my brother is training to be a radiologist and those people are getting paid so much money. Because there's also other things you have to do.

Right.

You need to talk to an elderly person who maybe broke their foot and helped them up on a table. You need to deliver good and bad news to people. You need to assess a situation that might be. That might not show up in the records.

So there is that element that I think people sometimes forget about.

Right, right. Yeah. And I also think, you know, it's like I could kind of compare it to, you know, when, you know, movies, DVDs, you know, whatever.

You know, we still have movie theaters. Maybe they're not as prevalent, but. Right. There's still a movie theater, but we still have what we have in the house.

Like, things, things evolve and change, but we. And we still have radio. Right. So, you know, somebody thought the radio is going to go away still here.

I do think the one thing, though, that is different about this time is it really is impacting our culture and our. In our social interaction more than any of the things that we just talked about. Yeah. Especially for students. Right.

And I think that's another thing I talk to these universities about a lot is before they go talk to somebody, which they're.

It's even harder for them to do today, like, use a stepping stone to get comfortable, hear how people talk about their business, hear how people talk about their industry so you're not going and blind and don't feel kind of silly or young when you go talk to somebody. So you have some. Some context.

And then the other thing that's strange that's going on is the market is generally performing quite well, which usually means, like, jobs are performing well, but things are possibly becoming more efficient and performing better, but it's not because of more jobs. So it's just an interesting time to be watching stuff and navigating careers and education and all this kind of thing.

A lot's going to be happening in the next, who knows how long. Yeah.

So, you know, going back to, you know, what you're doing with advise and, you know, getting into schools and you like, is it, you know, do you want to, you know, be in every university? Is it, you know, more than just an app?

Yeah, I would say our sweet spot right now. And yes, of course, I'd want to be in every university. And also, you know, I think Also K through 12 has a spot as well.

Like the real vision is changing the way people can research jobs. Right.

And creating this ecosystem that if you want to know what it's like to be a project manager, you can go see somebody who's a project manager, talk about it in any industry and do it in a couple minutes instead of a couple hours before you go talk to that person. Like, that's really the change there.

And then the app really, I would say our biggest impact with the best results right now is we have this classroom assignment tool. We call it like a career assignment.

So basically an educator, faculty member, career advisor, career coach, even a parent, whoever can go in and say, we want you to watch X amount of content, we want you to watch from Y people, or just keep it open for 20 minutes, 30 minutes. You set the parameters and then you also set what questions you want the students to reflect on. And they reflect by typing in answers.

So what's cool about that is it's customized and measurable career education at scale. And so like a first year program at a university could send that to thousands and thousands of students. And they all complete it in 20, 30 minutes.

And the students say they get, you know, 30% of them, their anxiety goes down. They on average increase their career confidence by 45%.

They learn things like, oh, I didn't know that my major is not going to determine everything in my future, so I'm feeling a lot less pressured or I'm sure I want to stay in my major now.

So that tool allows the educators to scale that knowledge really effectively without having to try to address every need for every student in this one class. You're just like one person who's working at the school and hasn't been outside of the school in a while themselves. Right.

So that's specifically what we're trying to get into as many places as possible because we, we see it working and we know it has really good impact and solves a big problem.

Yeah, yeah, no, I absolutely, absolutely love it.

So, you know, I could probably talk to you for hours on this topic because, you know, knowing that my kids are in like going into this area right now. But let me ask, like, how can people learn more about you and advise.

Yes. So advise. Our website is advisehub as in boy.com, so you can go on there, access the free part of the site if you would like.

Also sign up to provide an interview if you would like, or just reach out and then for me, I'm a big LinkedIn, LinkedIn girly. So just if you look up Emily McSherry advise on LinkedIn, I'm there. And then you can follow advise.

And we have a weekly newsletter that comes out with case studies, kind of what's going on. And that's probably the best way to stay informed and stay in touch.

Well, that's absolutely fantastic. I love it. So listeners, please do me the favor. Go to advisehub.com and sign up.

Just get the information, get on the newsletter actually and please actually put in. To have an interview like that was so important. It's gonna, it'll help fuel so many different careers and help impact so many different people.

So please make sure you do that. And then of course connect with Emily on LinkedIn.

And then I would love for you to do me one other favor because it is all about getting in the right rooms and learning how to work those rooms.

Go to our brand new school community called Unstoppable Success, where we actually have courses on working the right rooms so that you know how to work them properly. So, Emily, thank you so much for being an amazing guest listeners, thank you for listening. I'm Jaclyn Stinger.

This is Unstoppable Success and keep being unstoppable.