Shakira C.

Honestly, this might be like a cliche answer, but I probably would attribute my success to my mother. I feel like she's very hardworking. Just from a young age, I've just noticed how hard she's worked for everything for us as a family, and so I think as I've gotten older and just wanted to do my own thing, I feel like that has shaped me and where I'm at, my goals, my work ethic. I just learned everything from her, so I feel like she was a great teacher, and so I just want to be the same way for my son. I think that's what attributes to my success, just watching her before me.

I would say the best career advice for me is that you can have multiple dream jobs. I used to think that when I was in undergrad, I wanted to be a reporter, I wanted to be a news anchor, or just work in news, and when I got there, and I experienced it, I'm like, okay, well, this no longer is my dream, I have another dream. So I would say, have as many dream jobs as possible, and never get tired of one thing. If you want to move on to something else, do that. If you want to try your hand at another field, do that. You can have multiple dream jobs. I used to think that was just one thing that you could do, but the sky's the limit for trying new things and just kind of being successful in different career fields.

I would say to get as much experience as possible. I think just being well-rounded, for instance, if you're trying to go into communications, if you want to try your hand at media, try to get some experience in news stations, or if you want to do communications, maybe you can try different organizations where they can put you in place. I think it's just being well-rounded. So, like we mentioned before, being able to pivot and just having that cushion to do everything, I think that's important advice I would give someone, and I would probably want to hear myself when I'm young and graduating. Just be able to pivot, be teachable, and like I said before, you can have multiple dream jobs. The sky's the limit when it comes to fulfilling your dreams and being successful.

I would say the biggest opportunities would be maybe leveraging AI in different ways, figuring out how to use it to your best ability. Of course, not use it for everything, but maybe there's something, or maybe some story ideas you can kind of use it for, like topics or prompts, but I think leveraging AI. I know we're moving towards that, we're already there in it, so I think just being able to use it to your best advantage.

For work, I love making sure I'm organized, being a people-first person, connecting either with my colleagues, or just with any people I encounter, my patients I might encounter, always being friendly, getting the work done. I think that's probably the most important thing for me professionally. And then personally, I would say just being in the moment. Like I said, I'm very family-oriented, and just enjoying the moment of where I'm at right now. I think that's the most important thing for me.