Building Your Intellectual Toolbox: Career Advice from the Experts

The path to becoming a foreign policy expert is often not linear. It may not even be a line at all.

In the ‘How I Got My Career in Foreign Policy’ series, Editor Ivana Saric interviews experts from across the Council on Foreign Relations to learn how they got their careers in foreign policy and what advice they have for young people interested in entering the field.

The thread that ties all of these profiles together is that none of these well-established foreign policy experts declared, “Hey, I want to go into foreign policy one day.” They all took different paths. Some followed the desires they had when they were young, some had to pivot based on a realization, and others stumbled upon their fields by chance. But what enabled these experts to reach their current roles was the skills they acquired along the way.

This blog examines a selection of interviews from the series to explore the diverse paths that led CFR fellows to their current roles and discusses the knowledge, skills, and perspective required to work in the field. 

Path to Foreign Policy: Following Underlying Passions

Farah Pandith, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“It’s easy to look back when you’re in your mid-fifties and think that there is a straight path—but it is not a straight path. We evolve as humans; we think about ourselves differently.”

Driven from a young age by a desire to help people, Padith was profoundly affected by her Kashmiri background’s exposure to the human cost of geopolitical conflict. This experience, coupled with a commitment not to “squander” her life, guided her to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). After 9/11, her focus sharpened: she began analyzing the ideology of extremism and using soft power tools to counter it by engaging Muslims around the world. Read the full interview. 

Ebenezer Obadare, Douglas Dillon Senior Fellow for Africa Studies

“I wanted to be near books. I’ve always loved books.”

Obadare began by writing for Nigerian newspapers, eventually establishing the underground magazine TEMPO to challenge the military regime. Because the magazine’s aims attracted international attention—including involvement from the US and the EU—this quickly became his introduction to “high-stakes politics.” In Obadare’s eyes, the world of journalism and the world of academia aren’t that different, so the transition was easy. He has remained in academia, driven by that initial, enduring desire to be close to words. Read the full interview.

Path to Foreign Policy: Pivoting from a Completely Different Career 

Alice Hill, David M. Rubenstein Senior Fellow for Energy and the Environment

“My biggest career advice for anyone is: be nice to those you sit next to in school.”

In a tale as old as time, Hill became a lawyer because her parents wanted–and bribed–her to. But after a career as a prosecutor and thirteen years on the bench as a judge, she felt restless and wanted to change jobs. Luckily for Hill, her old classmate, Janet Napolitano, was asked to become President Barack Obama’s Secretary of Homeland Security and asked Hill to serve as her senior counselor, focusing on climate change. Read the full interview.

Esther Brimmer, James H. Binger Senior Fellow in Global Governance

“You have to be able to say, “That’s not for me. I need to do something else.”

On October 3, 1990, Brimmer was working at her private sector job when she saw the news that people were celebrating the reunification of Germany. When she looked around, no one else was watching. It was in that moment that she realized that she needed to be working somewhere where people realized the significance of a historical world event like this. Shortly after, Brimmer got a job at the Democratic Study Group in the House of Representatives. Read the full interview.

Path to Foreign Policy: By Chance

Roxanna Vigil, International Affairs Fellow in National Security

“Growing up, I had no clue what the State Department was. I had no clue what any government agency was. That was just not part of my world.”

When Vigil graduated from college, she thought she’d be getting a PhD in Spanish literature. While she didn’t get into any of the PhD programs, one of the schools she had applied to offered her a spot in their master’s program in Latin American Studies. Initially, she saw the program as an opportunity to job search, but soon discovered her passion for this field, particularly in Latin America. Rozanna ended up working at the state department for seven years. Read the full interview.

Sam Viersky, International Affairs Fellow

“I walked down the road, literally, and said, “How can I help?” And that opened up this career that I’ve now been in for twenty years.”

When Sam Viersky left New York in 2005 to figure out what he wanted to do with his career after working at a big corporate firm, Hurricane Katrina struck. Sam remembered being in his apartment, hearing about the disaster, and wanting to lend a hand. During his time volunteering for the Red Cross in both Washington, D.C., and Mississippi, he recognized the need for structured humanitarian aid, marking the beginning of his career in that field. Read the full interview.

What is needed for a career in foreign policy? 

When asked for his advice to young people looking to enter the field, CFR Fellow Michael Wertz said, “You need to spend as much time as you can to build an intellectual toolbox to have the instruments to understand rapidly changing global environments.”

That is what each of these fellows did. Whether it was from the start or developed along the way, they built a toolbox of knowledge, skills, and perspective that enabled them to succeed in the foreign policy world.

In her interview, Alice Hill stated that transitioning into government and national security work was easier for her because she was accustomed to learning about topics she wasn’t an expert in, allowing her to make informed decisions as a judge.

Sam Vigersky credits his ability to negotiate significant diplomatic resolutions at the UN Security Council and his success in getting groups in West Africa to think through strategies for tackling Ebola to the skills he learned while working as a social worker.

When reading about Farah Pandith’s career, it becomes clear that her perspective and understanding of global affairs policymaking from the views of others opened doors.

These experts obtained literacy in global affairs. In an era where students are increasingly less inclined to take classes in the humanities or pursue careers in related fields, it’s important to help them understand that much of what they learn in humanities classes serves as stepping stones to a career in foreign policy.