Kansas State University

College of Business Administration's Career Coach program expands with the addition of new coaches

Submitted by Brent Fritzemeier

The Kansas State University College of Business Administration is expanding its ability to provide students with personalized career advice by adding two new career coaches to its Career Development team.

Wendy Pfeifer and Rebecca Gould each bring more than 10 years of experience in the corporate sector to their new roles as career coaches, where they will work with students to provide a personal, industry-specific component to career planning as part of K-State Business Career Development. In their new roles, Pfeifer will work primarily with management students, while Gould will focus on those in the marketing major to provide individualized advice based on careful assessment of the students' strengths, interests and goals.

"Wendy and Rebecca will make an excellent addition to our Career Coaching team," said Kurt Roberts, director of the Career Coach program. "They each bring a unique perspective that will allow them to provide valuable advice to our students as they make some of the most impactful decisions of their lives."

In addition to one-on-one career planning, a major function of the coaches will be to provide a stronger connection with employers — helping the college better understand critical success factors for students in their first jobs, strengthening existing corporate partnerships, and building additional relationships that will benefit students and the college as a whole.

Pfeifer comes to K-State with more than a decade of experience in human resources management, most recently at Steel and Pipe Supply, where she played a key role as an internal coach and advisor to leaders across the company in the areas of talent acquisition, onboarding, performance management and development. She served as the talent acquisition partner for all Manhattan-based open positions, and also was the project manager for implementing recruiting, onboarding, and performance management modules of a new human resource system. Prior to her time at Steel and Pipe Supply, Pfeifer worked in human resource roles at Frontier Farm Credit and Meadowlark Hills. She is a 2006 graduate of Kansas State, where she majored in human resource management.

Gould has spent the last 11 years with Panda Restaurant Group, most recently as an area coach of operations supporting eight states. During this time, she was instrumental in the development and promotion of two district managers, more than 20 general managers and more than 25 assistant managers. As an area coach, Gould was responsible for the successful opening of three new markets and creating the marketing plan for each area. She assisted in creating a national marketing promotion that was rolled out companywide, and was chosen to be a presenter at the Leaders Conference in front of more than 500 upper-level managers, executives and business partners.

Prior to joining Panda Restaurant Group, Gould spent seven years with Sykes Enterprises Inc. working as a training leader where she developed training materials and assisted in opening a new call center in the Philippines, where she was stationed for one year. She graduated from K-State in 2008 with a degree in marketing.