The Low Down

Check out the latest news and events from your Columbia alumni community.

Alumna Lynn Berger '84, '90TC, of the Columbia Career Coaches Network, weighs in on how to have more creativity in the workplace through visualization strategies, and how it can help with your career and personal growth. 

Having more creativity in your work is a perfect, almost sure way to enjoy feelings of growth. And most of us have more creative powers than we give ourselves credit for.

Rachel Israel's film, Keep the Change, has been a long time coming.

The 2013 School of the Arts alumna's creation, which premieres at the Tribeca Film Festival this month, began as a short film for her graduate school thesis project. But Israel knew it had to become a feature length film.

"I had the idea of the feature even before I made the MFA short," she told The Low Down.

Exclusive events, a new membership opportunity, and valuable career advice in this week's roundup. 

Alumna Melody Wilding '11SW, of the Columbia Career Coaches Network, spoke about change and self-doubt during a recent TEDx talk. Read her thoughts and check out the talk below:

When it comes to change, we're often our own worst enemy. Anyone who has tried to embark on a professional or personal challenge is familiar with the voice of the inner critic that says things like "you're not good enough," "this is a stupid idea," "nothing will ever work out." Most self-development advice espouses the need to overcome self-doubt and banish negative thoughts. But as a therapist and Human Behavior professor, I know that this prevailing notion that calls for eradicating so-called "negative emotions" is not just plain wrong—it can actually backfire. While it's true that self-doubt can be toxic, what's more problematic is the fact that we never learn to deal with this normal, expected emotion in healthy ways. Any change brings up fear and worries—and learning to cope with uncertainty is a skill.

We enjoyed talking to the Design Studio so much that we wanted to share more of the candid conversations we had about Design Thinking (and much more).

We wanted to get a better idea of who Adam and Alice are, not just as Design Studio representatives, but as design thinkers in general. What we got was a look into how they look at the world around them and what they see in the future of design thinking.

Spoiler alert: There's a blooper reel at the end!

Inspiring alumnae, Legends of the Ivy League, and trailblazing Law graduates in this week's Low Down roundup: 

For this episode, we visited one of the forward-thinking initiatives taking place at Columbia. Tucked away on a side street near the Morningside campus, we found a place where thinkers, doers, and general challengers of the status quo come together to design a better future.

It's called the Columbia Entrepreneurship Design Studio and it's a project that developed through the Columbia Entrepreneurship program. The Studio brings innovators and entrepreneurs from across campus to pitch human-centered design ideas, identifying problems and dreaming up solutions for everything from micro-gardening to a dream team of surgeons in East Africa.

By Caroline Ceniza-Levine '93BC of the Columbia Career Coaches Network 
Originally published on SixFigureStart.com

If I could wish one success trait for my clients, it would be follow-through—doing something with the recommendations that are given.

Get the low down on the latest from the Columbia Alumni Association.