Podcast Transcript – Gabriel Mireles

Today’s podcast features an interview with UNT alumni, Gabriel Mierles. We asked him a few questions related to his program and to talk a little bit about his postgraduation career path. We hope you’ll stay tuned.

My name is Gabriel Mierles . I graduated UNT in May of 2019 with a bachelor’s in Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management, and I am currently a people development coordinator at Ryan. When you started at UNT, what were your plans for after graduation? Have these plans changed, if at all?

You know, when I started at UNT, I knew I wanted to do business. I just had no idea what in business I wanted to do. I tried a little bit of everything. I tried to finance. I tried accounting, just didn’t fit, jumped around. Some student organizations realized I really, really liked the UNT SHERM organization, really got deep into that, got involved, eventually became the president of the organization. And they changed simply from an aspect that I knew I wanted to do business.

And then I truly found what it was that I wanted to do every day, which was H.R. I ever since I’ve kind of ran with it and I’m really excited and really happy to be at right now doing exactly what it is that I wanted to do. How did your program at UNT help you feel prepared for this role? So one of the biggest things that I loved about UNT is that especially in the College of Business, the professors push you to be more than just a student.

They really want you to get out and do more than just the schoolwork in the classroom. A lot of my professors early on always encouraged me to get involved, get involved and get involved. So I truly did take that to heart. I got involved outside of the classroom, started applying some of the things that you do learn in the classroom, and then took on some leadership roles, volunteered and eventually. Had I’m not going to say I had all the the things one needed to be a leader, but definitely a lot of what I learned and a lot of what I did in putting myself out there really did help me to to whether it was.

Whether it was how to speak or what to do or what to say, things of that nature, just just the I guess the the impact the professors have here at UNT on the students is truly what made a difference and which really helped me or has helped me get to where I am today. What advice do you have for current students as they decide their next steps after graduation? So one of the biggest things about internships and just any kind of job in general.

I definitely say it is the experience that you can get. And I’d say my biggest piece of advice, whether it is you’re getting an internship or or you’re getting a new job, is to be a sponge. Take it all in as many questions as you possibly can and be curious. Don’t hold back. Don’t feel like, oh, because I’m an intern, I feel like I can’t do this or that and I’m limited in what I’m doing. I definitely say going with a curious mindset and and try and soak it all in.

How has the career center helped you? Just all of the workshops at the career center puts on, so whether that’s a resume building networking, because it’s one thing to to learn about it and to read about it, but it’s definitely another thing to actually put it into practice. And one of the things that that the career center did for me, at least, was in the networking workshop. It really helped me practice what it was I was going to say, what it was I was going to do, how to act, because then I then had that experience to learn.

And then later on, through networking experience came up, I was able to execute everything that I had learned. So definitely the workshops that they put on, all the tips that they can give you, it’s definitely a resource that I use and resources that I recommend. Tell us about yourself. In high school, I was just a student. I didn’t necessarily care of of doing the work, I was just kind of there and my aha moment persay was my senior year of high school.

I met with the counselor and it was that transition meeting with your counselor was like, well, what are you going to do after high school kind of thing? And. When I had that meeting with her, she kind of, in a way, was like, it’s OK to not go to college, it’s OK to to just kind of go be a Labor Day, which there’s nothing wrong with that. But it really just kind of put it into perspective to me, that it was like I’m more than that.

I feel like I can I can make an impact on not only the world of business, but the world itself. So that’s really what kind of made it all clicked for me. And ever since then, my goal was, was I need to get to a school, I got to UNT and from that moment on, it was really just. There’s only one option, and that is to to give it my best. It wasn’t always to succeed because you’re not going to succeed in everything that you do.

You’re going to fail sometimes. And that’s OK. But as long as you put your best foot forward and you leave nothing else on the table and you essentially can give it your all that to me was was the biggest thing. And it doesn’t matter what kind of situation you’re in. So, for example, I’ll give you my my internship. There are moments where they were relatively tough and jobs that I had throughout school as well that were relatively tough, not necessarily things that you want to be doing, but there were things that no matter what situation you’re in, just try and take a step back and learn from it.

And that was my biggest thing, which was essentially learning from every experience, whether it’s good or bad. And and I’ve taken that to heart. I’ve applied that each and every day. And and that’s what I can say, even though I’m I don’t feel like I’m anywhere near where I’m going to be in a couple of years. I’m definitely on my way there. And that’s that’s what helped me get there.