jerseyshorejohnny
Well-known member
A Financier Turns to Boosting Medical Careers
WALL STREET JOURNAL / Greater New York Section / Page A13
By CORINNE RAMEY
Feb. 19, 2016
Sitting around a small table recently at a Queens Library branch, two Pakistani doctors discussed an uncomfortable visit to a hospital. Library career-counselor Nancy Cafferty had persuaded the men to walk into Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, where one of the men, Sunny Kumar, had an interview, just to get a better sense of the place. But it wasn’t easy, because visiting without an invitation wasn’t something either man would have done in Pakistan.
“I belong to a culture where we do not expose ourselves,” Dr. Kumar said.
Ms. Cafferty, who declined to give her age but says she “crossed the 70 mark a little while ago,” worked for four decades in finance. Now, she has moved on to a second career in a Queens Library program called the Job & Business Academy. Clients of the program, which worked with some 24,000 people last fiscal year, range from professionals to recent immigrants to the homeless.
Ms. Cafferty is developing a small following among Pakistani doctors interviewing for residencies. Last winter, three doctors came to the library for interview preparation. Then the three doctors turned into eight.
“And they came, and they came, and they came, for six weeks,” Ms. Cafferty said. “Most of them had never been interviewed for anything.”
This interview season, during which area hospitals size up candidates for residencies, there are four so far.
The two at the library recently, Dr. Kumar, 30 years old, and Avinash, 28, who uses just one name, arrived late last year from Pakistan. The men, both of whom graduated from medical school and worked as doctors in Pakistan, are interviewing for residencies in the New York City area. Discussions often revolve around cultural assimilation.
“We put the cards on the table,” Ms. Cafferty said. “We talk about shaking hands with women. We talk about food restrictions and how to deal with them.”
During that recent session, the group discussed eye contact, how to approach authority figures and how to demonstrate empathy. They debated whether a doctor should describe himself as “fun-loving and charming” during an interview.
“There’s a fine line,” Ms. Cafferty said, and Dr. Kumar continued, “between arrogance and confidence.”
Word of Ms. Cafferty has spread through the five-bedroom apartment in Woodhaven that the two men share with other Pakistani doctors The apartment is organized through the Association of Physicians of Pakistani Descent of North America, a professional group.
Ms. Cafferty works at the library two days a week and relishes when people she has worked with come in with what she mimes as the “I’ve got a job” fist pump.
Born and raised in Cedarhurst, on Long Island, Ms. Cafferty earned a bachelor’s degree and master’s in business administration at St. John’s University. Over the years, she worked in finance at the New York Stock Exchange, the former Royal Dutch Petroleum and the American Bar Association. More recently, she was finance director of the Joffrey Ballet and the National Academy Museum & School.
Ms. Cafferty said she was often one of just a few women in a male-dominated field. She tells a story about a business meeting where a male colleague, apparently assuming she was on a serving staff, asked her to fetch him coffee. She says she placed the coffee in front of him—then walked to the head of the table to run the meeting.
Sometimes, family and friends question why she now works with the library program.
“As a well-educated woman from the ’60s, I faced prejudice so often in my professional career,” she said. “Fighting prejudice, it drives me. And there are wonderful people who helped me out in my life.”
She now lives in Douglaston, Queens. When not working at the library, she runs a small financial-planning business (“I’m a tiny, mini Suze Orman,” she said), travels and walks her Yorkie, Tara. She connected with the library through the organization called ReServe, which connects retired professionals with part-time work at nonprofits.
Ms. Cafferty is “friendly and happy to help anyone, but she won’t take any nonsense,” said librarian Lauren Comito, who manages the jobs program at the library’s Central branch.
If a client is a little late for a mock interview, she scolds them. If they’re really late, she insists they reschedule.
Former colleagues described Ms. Cafferty as a straight shooter with a lighthearted side. Sitting at the library, she bantered with the Pakistani doctors, but put her foot down when they began asking her too many personal questions.
“It’s like polishing diamonds,” Ms. Cafferty said. “I can’t change the raw materials, but I can buff the edges.”
“You are a complete package for us,” said Avinash, the Pakistani doctor.
Ms. Cafferty’s face flushed. She was a bit embarrassed.
Mr. Kumar added, “The guys say, ‘Go to Nancy and you will be fine.’ ”
Write to Corinne Ramey at Corinne.Ramey@wsj.com
WALL STREET JOURNAL / Greater New York Section / Page A13
By CORINNE RAMEY
Feb. 19, 2016
Sitting around a small table recently at a Queens Library branch, two Pakistani doctors discussed an uncomfortable visit to a hospital. Library career-counselor Nancy Cafferty had persuaded the men to walk into Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, where one of the men, Sunny Kumar, had an interview, just to get a better sense of the place. But it wasn’t easy, because visiting without an invitation wasn’t something either man would have done in Pakistan.
“I belong to a culture where we do not expose ourselves,” Dr. Kumar said.
Ms. Cafferty, who declined to give her age but says she “crossed the 70 mark a little while ago,” worked for four decades in finance. Now, she has moved on to a second career in a Queens Library program called the Job & Business Academy. Clients of the program, which worked with some 24,000 people last fiscal year, range from professionals to recent immigrants to the homeless.
Ms. Cafferty is developing a small following among Pakistani doctors interviewing for residencies. Last winter, three doctors came to the library for interview preparation. Then the three doctors turned into eight.
“And they came, and they came, and they came, for six weeks,” Ms. Cafferty said. “Most of them had never been interviewed for anything.”
This interview season, during which area hospitals size up candidates for residencies, there are four so far.
The two at the library recently, Dr. Kumar, 30 years old, and Avinash, 28, who uses just one name, arrived late last year from Pakistan. The men, both of whom graduated from medical school and worked as doctors in Pakistan, are interviewing for residencies in the New York City area. Discussions often revolve around cultural assimilation.
“We put the cards on the table,” Ms. Cafferty said. “We talk about shaking hands with women. We talk about food restrictions and how to deal with them.”
During that recent session, the group discussed eye contact, how to approach authority figures and how to demonstrate empathy. They debated whether a doctor should describe himself as “fun-loving and charming” during an interview.
“There’s a fine line,” Ms. Cafferty said, and Dr. Kumar continued, “between arrogance and confidence.”
Word of Ms. Cafferty has spread through the five-bedroom apartment in Woodhaven that the two men share with other Pakistani doctors The apartment is organized through the Association of Physicians of Pakistani Descent of North America, a professional group.
Ms. Cafferty works at the library two days a week and relishes when people she has worked with come in with what she mimes as the “I’ve got a job” fist pump.
Born and raised in Cedarhurst, on Long Island, Ms. Cafferty earned a bachelor’s degree and master’s in business administration at St. John’s University. Over the years, she worked in finance at the New York Stock Exchange, the former Royal Dutch Petroleum and the American Bar Association. More recently, she was finance director of the Joffrey Ballet and the National Academy Museum & School.
Ms. Cafferty said she was often one of just a few women in a male-dominated field. She tells a story about a business meeting where a male colleague, apparently assuming she was on a serving staff, asked her to fetch him coffee. She says she placed the coffee in front of him—then walked to the head of the table to run the meeting.
Sometimes, family and friends question why she now works with the library program.
“As a well-educated woman from the ’60s, I faced prejudice so often in my professional career,” she said. “Fighting prejudice, it drives me. And there are wonderful people who helped me out in my life.”
She now lives in Douglaston, Queens. When not working at the library, she runs a small financial-planning business (“I’m a tiny, mini Suze Orman,” she said), travels and walks her Yorkie, Tara. She connected with the library through the organization called ReServe, which connects retired professionals with part-time work at nonprofits.
Ms. Cafferty is “friendly and happy to help anyone, but she won’t take any nonsense,” said librarian Lauren Comito, who manages the jobs program at the library’s Central branch.
If a client is a little late for a mock interview, she scolds them. If they’re really late, she insists they reschedule.
Former colleagues described Ms. Cafferty as a straight shooter with a lighthearted side. Sitting at the library, she bantered with the Pakistani doctors, but put her foot down when they began asking her too many personal questions.
“It’s like polishing diamonds,” Ms. Cafferty said. “I can’t change the raw materials, but I can buff the edges.”
“You are a complete package for us,” said Avinash, the Pakistani doctor.
Ms. Cafferty’s face flushed. She was a bit embarrassed.
Mr. Kumar added, “The guys say, ‘Go to Nancy and you will be fine.’ ”
Write to Corinne Ramey at Corinne.Ramey@wsj.com