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Jana Scopis fell in love with event planning while she was in college. As a hotel management major at Central Washington University, she scooped up an internship in the catering department of a historic hotel in Texas, where she helped plan swanky weddings and plush parties. She spent the next decade working her way up the hotel-catering food chain, and in March of 2007, she became the director of catering and convention services at the W Seattle>, a position that involves selling, schmoozing, keeping dozens of balls in the air and planning some of Seattle's most lavish parties.
Now: Homebuilder. Then: Home-building student.
The median pay for an attorney in the Seattle area is $93,100 annually, with most earning from $73,900 to $117,000 a year.
Out of work at age 63, Michelle Hartman found herself on the wrong side of the digital divide, able to use a computer to search the Internet but not much else.
At first glance, Dr. Renee Gilbert doesn't seem like the sort of person who should teach a seminar called "The Art of Schmoozing." She speaks in a quiet voice, and stray sentences trail off to a shy whisper.
In fact, the 48-year-old Seattle psychologist concedes that she was "the kind of person who sat by herself at parties." But in front of this class she manages to exude wit and charm as she jokes, smiles and coaxes students to respond to her questions. Not a born schmoozer herself, she said she relies instead on willpower and practice. Gilbert, therefore, turns out to be the perfect role model for the 18 men and women who took her class to polish their schmoozing skills.
Like many English majors, Laura Vanderpool found gainful employment working in corporate communications. During her six-year tenure in the marketing division of a Big Five accounting firm, the University of Washington alum cut her teeth writing "dry proposals and reports." When a corporate restructuring prompted her to jump ship in 2000, she landed in public relations, first at a doomed dot-com, then at socially progressive Parsons Public Relations in Seattle. In 2004 she became senior account manager of the nine-person, three-canine PR team, a job that entails acting as the agency's lead writer and helping environmentally conscious clients spread the word about their products and services.
The median pay for an executive chef in the Seattle area is $60,900 a year, with most making from about $52,700 to $70,500 a year, according to PayScale, a Seattle company that tracks compensation and benefits.
Now: UW Alumni Association CEO. Then: home-driveway parking attendant.
Sometimes just the word "communal" is enough to set co-workers on edge. Add "fridge," and they start spewing stories. That time Matt from marketing brought fish and stunk up the breakroom for a month. That lady Sofia, who tosses everyone's leftovers after less than a week. That guy who hogs a whole shelf with his grocery bags. That woman who borrows salad dressing and peanut butter. Whoever is taking bites from sandwiches and swiping Cokes, V8 and Vitamin Water. What is it about the office fridge that tempts its users to behave so badly?
Now: Charity executive. Then: Yogurt sales.
The average pay for a nurse anesthetist in the Seattle area is $135,000 a year, with most making from $103,000 to $162,000 a year, according to PayScale, a Seattle company that tracks compensation and benefits.
Roberta Browne grew up on what she refers to as "a steady diet of Looney Tunes cartoons and 'The Wonderful World of Disney.'" All her spare time in high school was spent drawing cartoon characters, and all her notebooks were covered with doodles. After getting a commercial illustration degree at Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, she tried her hand at freelance illustration for two years – and wound up earning the bulk of her income by waitressing and bartending. Feeling off her game, she returned to school for animation and, upon graduating, landed her first job as an animator. A decade later, in May of 2007, Browne joined Bungie Studios in Kirkland, where she works as a lead animator, a job that involves everything from 3-D software to brainstorming sessions to pratfalls.
Now: President and CEO. Then: Sales clerk.
The average pay of a transit bus driver in the Seattle area is $21.64 an hour, with most making from $18.60 to $24.36 an hour, according to PayScale, a Seattle company that tracks compensation and benefits.
