Author gives hints on success

Blending personal stories with audience participation and straight-out advice, professional speaker and writer Patrick Combs shared some of his job-getting secrets Wednesday night in a presentation based on his best-selling book Major In Success: Make College Easier, Beat the System, and Get a Very Cool Job! In a talk hosted by Penn's Career Planning and Placement Services, Combs, 31, explained the strategies that helped him land a job that he loved right out of college -- "surprisingly" making $80,000 -- to approximately 50 students gathered in Houston Hall's Benjamin Franklin Room. He noted that the mentoring he received during his college years at San Francisco State University, especially advice from one of his professors who said that "the most important homework that you will ever do during college is never going to be assigned," helped him get his first job managing a videoconferencing team at Levi Strauss & Co. He then demonstrated, by having his audience members stand up and then sit down if they did not fulfill certain resume criteria, that the keys to getting a good job are internship experience, club leadership or volunteer work, computer skills and membership in a professional association related to the job. Combs added that his mother always told him to do what he loves, "look it up" if he didn't know something and not to worry about his mistakes. These three ideas, he said, along with the phrase "chances aren't given, chances are taken" has helped shape his career and are the most important things to keep in mind when looking for a job. Combs cited a University of Chicago study that found that the one thing that "successful people" have in common is extraordinary drive and not natural-born ability or intelligence, as one might have expected. One can achieve this drive, he said, "if you lock on to something you naturally have a passion for." And after sending out resumes, he added, "the key is to try wild and outrageous ideas," such as simply walking in to a newspaper editor's office and asking to write, or compiling and submitting detailed suggestions for product improvements. Combs ended his talk by describing "the most profound thing" he witnessed in college, which he compares to finding a career. He said he watched a spaceship as tall as an 18-story building being launched 200 miles above the ground, and noted that "85 percent of the fuel is expended in the first few seconds, just to get it a few feet off the ground." "Success takes off like a rocket, that's what you need to know," he concluded. Engineering senior Michael Tse said he came to the presentation because he is looking for a job and noted that Combs helped him see his potential. "I'm not as worthless as I think I am," he said. Combs' speaking tour began five years ago without sponsorship, but this year, sponsorship from Visa and MBNA allows him to give a free copy of his book to all audience members. Combs, who appears regularly on the TV shows Hard Copy and Real TV, has written two other books and maintains a motivational Web site at http://www.goodthink.com.