Edie Fraser narrates her career path from growing up in a retailing family to service-oriented roles in the Peace Corps and U.S. poverty programs, later moving into entrepreneurship (starting her own business in 1975) and leadership in women’s business ownership. She now works as a senior consultant at Diversified Search and is CEO of stemconnector.org. Fraser emphasizes the importance of STEM education and digital skills for future job opportunities, citing ~8.1 million open jobs when IT skills are counted, and urges building internships, volunteering, and strong resumes to prepare.
I'm Edie Fraser and today I am a senior consultant at Diversified Search and I'm the CEO of stemconnector.org I came from a really great mother and dad who had been in retailing and is my mom joined my dad when they moved to Atlanta. And after being with one of the big retailers, Macy, they switched and opened up their own business called Casual Corner. And clearly I worked in the stores. But my dreams were very different. My dreams were really to impact the world. So clearly when John Kennedy said, what are you doing for your country? And I think I'd been involved in five exchange programs by the age of 20 that around the world is that I said I wanted to impact the Peace Corps. And so I wanted to go to Washington and be on the Peace Corps staff, which I did. So I came to Washington with that dream and that vision and moved up and became a. After I did college recruiting around America, I moved up to be a desk officer and took on Africa. And so it was clearly after I'd been an exchange student in Mexico and had got a very different perspective and then wanted to continue to impact when we had riots in this country and Martin Luther King was killed and Bobby Kennedy was killed, I wanted to go look at the domestic part of America. So I spent the next five years going to work in the poverty program and the capacity around America to make a difference. Then I knew that the business world was calling in some way and the entrepreneurial spirit. So I had some government experience. But then when I went with a global public relations firm and I had a guy that said, let's start our own public relations firm, and he was one of the most respected people in America. And he chickened out and I went and did it. But that was the entrepreneurial bent that my parents instilled. So even though I had that social conscience, I knew that we could take on some issues with the entrepreneurial thrust. And so it was very exciting in 1975 that I started my own business and quickly became president here of the national association of Women Business Owners and truly wanted to make a difference on the entrepreneurial thrust. You ask about the whole area of STEM science, technology, engineering and math. The world is so open. The STEM jobs are where the jobs are. Right now we've got 8.1 million jobs that are truly open, if we count all the IT skills out there. So when girls are looking at what they can be and where the jobs are, the whole digital, first of all, the digital learning is so exciting. And to truly learn with innovation where all the jobs are, and it's in every industry. So the IT industry is fascinating, but the aerospace industry has gone with STEM jobs and utility industry and so many entrepreneurial companies that are using STEM skills. And if we think about even the M that is in STEM for math and what the accounting firms are, it teaches you, if you put that together, consulting. And so if you put all that together with the right counseling and look at where you want to be and the innovative kind of people you want to work with and go and build internships and in your resume, which are extremely important, and go volunteer for other activities.
