Alumni Profile: Melinda Bufton

Degree: Arts 1996 Current Position: Principal and Careers Consultant, Periscope Mode The uncertain world of modern work is a place Melinda Bufton is happy to delve into daily. After eleven years working across recruitment, human resources and career development, she has started her own boutique careers consultancy.

What does your current position involve?

I am a one-person operation, so everything! Myriad administration tasks, marketing and publicity to keep it all ticking and seeing individual clients for careers consultations. From time to time I am invited to share ideas as a guest speaker or run workshops relating to modern and creative careers, which is a nice change of gear. Much time is spent on the internet combing the globe for my own brand of trend-spotting, keeping an eye on developments in how people are working now.

My main specialisations are in creative/arts careers and people in early-to-mid career. This is the group I belong to, and we are the most changeable in the way we work; several jobs at once, full-time followed by travel, start-up businesses plus a day-job, and dozens of other combinations. Ergo, I also work in a project capacity at various universities and channel my inner swot as I try to write my first novel.

What led you to begin your own business?

People sought me out for career advice frequently, because they knew I worked in the field of career development and that I have a background in the arts. After years of this happening, I decided to formalise this into a specialised consultancy. Another driving force was my love of small business; although large organisations are exciting for their sheer impact, small allows you to see all the aspects and layers of the operation at once. I think subconsciously I was working towards my own setup for many years. I just didn’t know it then.

How did completing an arts degree shape your career?

It was definitely transformative. Like many people around my age, I saw studying arts at the University of Melbourne as an experience rather than something leading me to a vocation. It was a really lovely, enjoyable experience too; never before had I had such broad platforms of interesting topics to choose from as I learnt. It was a real opportunity to stand up and see what I could do, what I could think, and what I could articulate (once I’d learnt the vocabulary, which took some time!).

For several years afterwards, I could not see the connections between my arts study and the worlds of work I found myself in. When I finally did, I realised that completing an arts degree is like setting off slow-motion fireworks and waiting to see where the sparks land. Happily, some of them are still landing years later.

What advice would you offer to current students?

That you can’t know the end of the story yet, so don’t be hard on yourself if you don’t know what the opening pages look like either. Particularly as, in my observations, people often make their most profound or constructive career decisions after they’ve experienced the two or three jobs following university. And of course, seek out professional career advice. You might be able to cut some corners and get to the things that delight you much sooner.

Melinda can be contacted via her website, www.periscopemode.com.au.