The Origin Story of Traverse Jobs with Brad & Fraser Traverse

Episode Transcript:

Margaret: Welcome to Career Pulse DC, the podcast from Traverse Jobs, offering insider tips into Washington’s political and policy career landscape. I’m your host, Margaret Knudsen, and today we’re excited to be joined by the founder of Traverse Jobs, Brad Traverse, the company’s creator and Fraser Traverse, who serves as CEO. Over the past 25 years, Traverse Jobs has evolved from Brad’s initial job lead email list into the premier online platform connecting policy and public relations professionals with meaningful career opportunities. Join us today as we explore the origin story behind Traverse jobs, the key workforce trends shaping this industry, and the advice Brad and Fraser have for powering your career in DC and beyond. Whether you’re just starting out or already making waves, Career Pulse DC provides the knowledge and connections to take your career to new heights. Welcome, Brad and Fraser.

Fraser: Thanks for having us.

Margaret: For those who are probably millennial and older, you remember when it was just an email list. And so today we’re really excited to kind of learn about the evolution and how it started off. Brad is a 30-year political veteran of Washington, DC, having served on both on and off Capitol Hill in numerous and wide ranging capacities. The trajectory of his career spans from his roots working for two iconic senators. to executing regional and national lobbying campaigns, running two national trade associations, and starting and running the DC office of a major health insurance company. But the reason he is with us here today is because Brad is an entrepreneur who created the first ever website of political and public affairs job openings. He has helped countless Washingtonians find their first, second, and third jobs in DC over the past 25 years. Brad, what inspired you to start compiling job leads for your friends in the first place?

Brad: When everybody was looking at emails, and this was kind of early stages of emails, everybody was sending things like apartments, cars, happy hours, and occasional jobs. At that time, Bush 41 had lost re-election. So a lot of my friends were looking for jobs, trying to get out of that administration. And so I started just compiling all of the job leads that were sent to me by email, putting them on a Word document, and then sent them off to friends who I knew were looking for jobs. It was extremely informal. The subject of it was just job leads. It didn’t have my name on it in the beginning. And it kind of blossomed from there, partly because no one else was doing this. There really was no other source to find policy, public affairs, and PR jobs, primarily in the DC area. There were a couple of publications: Roll Call, Opportunities in Public Affairs. So that was it. So I began gathering them and building up a listserv. a rather extensive listserv. And I did that for free for 10 years. As I was doing that, the listserv grew. And by the end of the 10 years, there were something like maybe 1500 people on my listserv. Now, if you’ve ever sent an email with a detachment, you can imagine how laborious that was. You know, I had to BCC everybody. I could only do 25 at a time. And it was a 60 page word document, without any rhyme or reason to it. I just kind of cut and paste on the document. Again, some of these were jobs that people would send me on emails. Some of them I would hear about and just plug in. But it just got to where I was spending hours and hours to send out once a week. And it just became impossible to do. Fraser and I decided, let’s make this viral. Let’s make this a website. That way it’s up to date. That way the jobs that are posted today are viewed today. Cause obviously some of those jobs were a week old. So that’s kind of the background on it. I mentioned it was free — that I did it for free. But there was a requirement to be on the list. People had to send me three jobs, so that helped in building up my repertoire of jobs as well.

Fraser: I remember he would send it on Sundays and it was off of his Yahoo account and you could only send, as he said, like 500 at a time with this monster attachment. My recollection is that there were thousands of people on it. I think it was way more than 1500, but like Brad said, just hours and hours of sending this off. And so just to make it just easier, time wise on him and us, it made the most sense at that point to build a website. And I had a friend who I’d worked with on the Hill who was a tech guy and he just built us this really basic website with the database in it. And we’ll talk about later how that’s evolved, but gosh, it made life so much easier. And I do remember when we were trying to decide how much to charge because we were the first to do this. We needed to cover the cost of building the website. One of us said, well, people are always offering to buy me a beer because I helped them get a job. Well, a beer was about five bucks at the time. So we sort of landed on $5 a month at that time. It’s now $6 a month. And one thing led to another and it turned into a real business.

Margaret: Was the process of transitioning the email list into a full-fledged online job search platform? How did you decide what postings fit the niche? What didn’t? How did you make those determinations for moving the business forward?

Brad: Yeah, Fraser, you knew the technical side of it.

Fraser: We just sent out a newsletter one Sunday and said, “Hey, we’re on the web now. And if you want to sign up, here’s the link.” And so there may have been a transition time. I don’t really remember, but I think we just went to the web and said, if you want to see the jobs, need to sign up. And Brad just stopped sending the email version.

He was already pretty focused on what the niche was for the job board. And so Brad was really the one who discerned, you know, what goes on and what doesn’t go on. And then when we built the website, we were able to put filters on it so people could choose just Capitol Hill or just government affairs. And that part was actually pretty easy to build into the website. But the actual transition was getting all those jobs uploaded in the beginning and getting them coded and everything like that. But it was so simple and so user-friendly and people love it. And to this day, we keep it super simple so that it’s not hard to navigate.

Margaret: And Fraser as CEO. How have you focused the business on connecting job seekers with impactful policy and social change roles?

Fraser: I think we’ve done that just by staying true to our mission: that we’re going to post jobs that are in sort of this traditional… Well, let me back up. I won’t say it’s traditional, but people who have careers in Washington tend to work in a certain orbit that is generally either issue-based or industry-based. So, for example, Brad has worked in healthcare, not the entirety of his career, but a lot of it. And he has the wide-ranging experience that we have on the website. So there’s Capitol Hill, he’s worked in trade associations, he’s worked in lobbying firms. He’s been a lobbyist for specific companies. These are all things that kind of fit in a traditional Washington, D.C. political career. And that’s what differentiates the website from LinkedIn, Indeed, and other job boards.

Margaret: I would imagine that Brad, your email list predates all of those, LinkedIn and Indeed, correct?

Fraser: I think Monster came along around 2006, which is by the way, that’s how long we’ve been on the web. That was the year that we transitioned into a website. But Monster wasn’t something that people were using. They didn’t have our kinds of jobs. That’s not how you found a policy or a political job in D.C. You just couldn’t do it that way. It was literally like Brad said, Opportunities in Public Affairs, which was a printed publication or Roll Call, which at the time was only a printed newspaper. So you had to physically purchase those things. There was nothing online. Brad absolutely was the first to do it. And so that’s one of the distinguishing factors is that these are jobs that are personally collated. They’re just in the arena of policy, public affairs, communications, domestic and foreign policy, and any other jobs sort of in that orbit. So these are jobs that are sent to us. They’re legitimate, they’re real, and they’re timely. We do have jobs up for three months. So I always tell people that we keep the jobs up for three months not because they’re necessarily open, but because it gives you an opportunity to do research and see what has been open recently. Also, to see what employers are looking for in your field or whatever specific job title you might be looking for, you can use it as a research tool. But we always tell people if you’re applying for a job, you’re going to click through a link. Sometimes you send an email, but if it’s still on the employer website, technically, it should still be open. I know that’s not 100% of the time, but for the most part, that’s how you kind of can guarantee you’re not wasting your time applying to old jobs.

Margaret: How have you seen the policy and public relations job market evolve since starting the website?

Brad: That’s good question. I think there’s been a lot of melding of the two. And I also think it’s important to distinguish among three categories. Policy, which covers lobbying, well as, as policy research, on foreign and domestic policy. There is public affairs and that is a company or a trade association promoting and marketing and getting the word out on what they’re doing from an advocacy perspective. Public relations is more marketing, promoting, getting the word out on the company itself or the trade association itself. I think those are important distinctions. I also think that there’s, as I mentioned, kind of a melding of the three. You can’t do policy without being aware of public affairs and public relations, without being a good writer, without having social media savvy, without understanding what a press release is and how to get it out. So I think there’s a lot of symmetry between those three worlds.

Margaret: And Fraser, from the website, what trends have you noticed in sort of that 2022, 2023 post-COVID world to about right about now? Because we just had an election, which we’ll get into because the job market will certainly shift in different ways. But for those past two years, what trends did you see?

Fraser: So immediately post-COVID we added a new feature that we had never had on the site before where we had employers tell us whether it was a fully remote job, whether it was entirely in the office or if it was hybrid of those two. And we’ve continued that to this day. So that was data that we only just started collecting mid-2020. In 2021, almost half — 44% of our jobs — were work from home. And then only 30% were in the office, which I would argue was probably a little bit higher than the national average just because of the nature of the work here in DC. And then the hybrid jobs were 25%. The remote jobs by 2022, though, had gone down to 20%. And so that, you know, is obviously more than half of what they were the year before. So DC went back to work pretty darn quickly. And the fully in the office jobs were up to 60% by then, just a year later. Now, only 15% of our jobs are remote, and only 45% are fully in the office and then 40% are hybrid. Personally, I love seeing that hybrid number higher. I think giving people flexibility to work from home a little bit is fantastic. And especially in the jobs here where people work really long hours. And so to be able to work from home for a couple hours a day or two a week or whatever it is, I think it’s a really great workforce trend. And I’m really happy that it’s happened here because I think when when COVID first happened, everybody said, no way will DC ever be a remote or hybrid town because so much of what people do is interacting and networking. And, you know, you have to actually march up to Capitol Hill and meet with a senator or congressman. That’s completely changed now. And so I’m thrilled to see the change in the trends.

Margaret: What trends do you expect to emerge in the post-2024 election environment? This is a question for both of you.

Fraser: Well, I can tell you that we always have — especially when an administration turns over, like when the presidency turns over — every two years we always see a certain amount of movement as congressmen and senators move in and out of their jobs. But when we have an actual change of the presidential administration, there’s a lot of upheaval. And you have a lot of people transitioning from the private sector into the administration and obviously from the administration out because of all the political appointees and even civil service turns over to a certain extent. And so in 2025, you’re going to see a lot of movement. The job market is a little bit tight right now, which is actually another point. It’s very typical to have the number of jobs that we’re posting and just the job market in DC in general kind of slow down for the four to six months before the election. People are kind of, they get into this sort of wait and see mode. And so we’ve had some contraction in the market. But now that we’ve got a change of administration, we’re going to see huge numbers of jobs opening up and people moving around. So that’s always an exciting time for us.

Brad: I think another trend we’re going to see with the new administration is a greater need on regulatory affairs, analyzing regulatory policies that are coming out of the various agencies. I know a lot of lobbying firms and trade associations are going to be focusing on that. That’s going to be a high demand job.

Margaret: Great. So for those folks who are potentially interested in maybe moving into that space, what advice do you have for them?

Brad: Be nimble, do your homework, strengthen your network and start making those calls now.

Fraser: I agree. I think because I think that employers are going to be receiving so many resumes and applications for their jobs. It really helps to have somebody make a call on your behalf. If you know somebody — not necessarily somebody who works at the company — but it could be somebody who is in that industry at least or well respected in that industry and just is willing to call and say, “Hey, you know, I think it’s worth looking at this resume.” And that can help you get kind of to the top of the pile, at least be looked at for more than 30 seconds, which is sometimes what happens when people are reviewing a lot of resumes. But I agree with Brad, being really clear about what the requirements of the job are and really speaking to that on your resume and explaining really clearly why you think you can do a good job in the role. And along those lines, I would also add, like, don’t think that you have to have every requirement of the job. As long as you have two or three of the stronger parts, people are willing to look at candidates who they can train quite frankly, or who can learn on the job. You don’t have to tick every single box. The last thing I would say is, and this has been kind of a buzzword the last year or two, but just being authentic and not trying to sell yourself for something that you aren’t, because that’s not only going to hurt the employer, but you’re probably not going to enjoy your job a whole lot. You’re trying to be something that you’re not. I tell younger people this a lot when they’re doing networking because if you feel paralyzed about having a networking meeting with someone or meeting somebody for the first time, don’t think of it as asking somebody for a job every time. Just think of it as sitting down and having coffee and learning about what they do and how the industry works or how their company works or what are the trending issues of the day in this specific sector. Just think of it as a learning opportunity and not necessarily an opportunity where you have to sell yourself and be something that you think that they’re looking for.

Margaret: This will be the first transition of an administration where there is such a prevalence of AI, particularly within the writing space. So I would be curious, Brad, from your perspective, how do you see AI things like chat GPT, how is that going to change the hiring process when now it is just so easy to go into chat GPT with your parameters and say, write a cover letter for me?

Brad: Yeah. Well, people are going to be using it. There’s no, there’s no question, but when it comes to the interview, you’re not going to have AI as a backup. you still need to understand and learn it. It’s to your benefit to not rely on it too heavily.

Fraser: I would agree with that. I was talking to a group of college students last spring and I said, look, use it. It’s a wonderful starting point. If it gives you a framework for your resume or for your cover letter or you know, whatever you’re writing, I say go ahead and start with that, but be sure to put your own voice on it because I have to be honest. It’s really easy to spot now. And if you’re using just all of that generic language that AI spits out, I can tell you that the reader can tell or the recruiter can tell. And so I would say it’s a great starting point. Just don’t use it verbatim.

Brad: Yeah. It reminds me of how important in this world that writing is. Whatever you do in any of these jobs, you’ve got to be a good writer and you’ve got to be a good synthesizer of information. That means not relying on AI.

Margaret: Do you think now with the prevalence of AI, will cover letters go to the wayside? Do you think eventually it’ll just be resumes only or do you think the cover letter still is a place in the modern workplace?

Fraser: I think they do. I think it’s a way of introducing yourself in an, again, to use the word authentic way. I rely on them heavily. I like to get to know somebody. And honestly, to Brad’s point, I like to know if they can write and if they can present themselves well on paper. I suppose the answer to that question is it depends on the job. But I would think in certainly in the lobbying world and in the PR world, there will still be cover letters. Maybe Capitol Hill, maybe campaign, maybe a foreign affairs potentially, you could start losing some of that because they might be a little bit more skill-based. Admin jobs probably don’t need a cover letter necessarily. But for the most part, I think because we’re such a people world here, a people industry, a people-centered industry in DC, I think cover letters are still really relevant. I’m still seeing them in the jobs that we post requiring a cover letter and or encouraging one. And writing samples too.

Margaret: In a post-election environment, how has the demand for Traverse Job Services changed as job seekers and employers adapt to new dynamics?

Fraser: Well, it’s interesting because, like I said earlier, there’s always an uptick in job posts as people are sort of preparing for the next legislative session to start. And for our younger audience out there, I will remind you that we have three times a year where internships really spike. February, March are for the summer applicants, and we have June and July for the fall. And October and November are the big times when we see the listings for spring internships. So for people who are considering that as a really strong way to get their foot in the door, please be looking early. In January and February, we had a huge uptick in campaign jobs, obviously. And then after the primaries in May, there was another uptick. So these are the kind of regular cycles that we see. And as we talked about earlier, the advocacy and the Capitol Hill jobs, obviously, for the next two months. three months, four months even, will be really off the charts. Brad spoke about the regulatory, the agency work. That can take a little bit longer. So if you’re interested in working in an agency, I would encourage you to apply early for sure. But that takes a much longer time to fill those positions. There are so many positions that the new people who are coming into the administration are working their tails off for the first couple of months of the year. And they’re interviewing but they kind of start from the top down, right? So they they’re kind of focused on the senior and executive level and if you’re at that level you absolutely should have your resume in now. But don’t give up hope if you know we’re coming into April and May and you haven’t heard anything. Those those mid-level positions take a lot longer to get filled. Then, as people move into those positions, we’ll have the private sector positions open because it typically will be people leaving private sector and going into government. And so you just need to keep an eye on it and be patient. I there will be extensive turnover again, at least up to next summer.

Brad: Yeah, the government agency application and approval process is laborious. And it’s gotten better, but there are still hoops that have to be covered. So go to USAJOBS and there are resources they have available, videos that show you how to tips and how to apply for those jobs.

Margaret: What advice do you have for those who are uncomfortable with networking or just have never really had to do it in order to get a job? What’s the best way to go about it?

Brad: Well, I should define what networking is. It’s not just going to parties and talking to people. It’s not just the one-on-one. I always encourage people, you’ve got a list in your phone of all your contacts. You need to go through that. Find the connections that you have on LinkedIn and start listing the names of people you think would be willing to help you and categorize them. High priority for those who are in a position to influence, but also willing, you think, to go to bat for you.

Margaret: And what advice do you have for those who aspire to beep on the Hill? So the LCs, the staff assistants, those who may not have a network yet, what’s the best way to start one?

Fraser: Well, you always start with your hometown congressman, your state senators. Those are great because they always say, know, Pennsylvania ties preferred or wherever they’re from. So that’s sort of a natural in and starting point. But then again, there are probably people in your hometown, from your hometown government maybe even, who have a relationship with a congressman. And maybe they would be willing to call for you. But on the Hill in particular, it’s really tough. I mean, they’re getting, oftentimes they’ll get 200 resumes and they’ll email us and say, hey, can you take the job down? We need to pause and go through what we have. And it’s, as soon as you see that job pop up on our site, apply right away. And then try to get somebody to call for you.

Brad: Fraser mentioned this before, but internships. I’m willing to say half of the staffers who work for a member of Congress began as an intern. And unfortunately, it’s gotten to the point where it’s not just one internship. Sometimes it’s multiple. Hopefully you’ve done that already. If not, there are plenty of opportunities. And the nice thing about internships too, is that I think most of them are paid now. Five years ago, most of them were unpaid. And they pay pretty well, at least at a minimum minimum wage.

Margaret: What about resume banks? I know that the Senate has one and other companies have resume banks as well where you can send in a resume and hope someone looks at it. Do you think there’s value in targeting outreach to organizations that have resume banks or is it best to try for a specific position?

Fraser: From a technical standpoint, so from my side of the business as a recruiter, I can tell you that resume banks are really hard to do well. And my hesitation in recommending them to people is that you get a lot of spam and your contact information is then out there. Now this advice probably has changed a little bit because of course, if you’re on LinkedIn, your resume is basically online and searchable, whereas, historically, you put your resume in a resume bank, and there were people who pay to access that. And then you will be inundated with sales jobs and things that probably aren’t necessarily in your niche. Having said that, I think the political ones are fine. They’re probably not going to be spamming you with too much, especially now that the campaign’s over. And in fact, they are, both the Republican and the Democrat sides, encouraging people to submit their resumes to their resume banks. So yeah, I would say go ahead and do the political ones, but any of the other ones, I don’t know of any that are really doing it so well that it’s filtering out the junk.

Brad: Senior level staffers tell me that they do rely on the Senate and House resume banks and they have hired from it. So political ones. The political ones. Yes. Yeah.

Margaret: What accomplishments are you most proud of in the recent years?

Fraser: I did feel really good after COVID where we were really a lifeline for a lot of people who were looking for new jobs and specifically remote jobs. And I felt like we did a really good job and people felt like there was hope when when they needed to be home and we had that increase when up to 44 % of our jobs were remote. I felt really good about how we handled that. And then it’s also been gratifying when we’ve had congressmen join our site looking for jobs. It makes me feel like, we’re actually really known. And of course we’ve redone the website a number of times. And so that’s always fun to have like a new fresh look and feel like, you know, we’re meeting people’s needs better.

Margaret: Those who would like to learn more, possibly become subscribers, how can they, how can someone do that? Well, it’s pretty simple. All you have to do is go to TraverseJobs.com. That’s T-R-A-V-E-R-S-E-J-O-B-S.com. And the subscribe button is right there on the front page. And it’ll take you to a landing page that asks if you’re a new subscriber, which hopefully lots of you will be. The website also has an explanation of all the different kinds of jobs on there and there’s a video explaining exactly what you’ll see on the back end once you log in. So I hope people will take the opportunity to do that. It’s $6 a month. On the first month, you will be charged a $10 registration fee. If you already work for the government or you’re a member of the military or a veteran, the $10 registration fee is waived. And I would add for those who are looking to post jobs, it’s free. There’s no cost associated with posting jobs. And that’s easily done on the website as well. The website also houses resources for job seekers. And you can also find Traverse Jobs, Fraser and Brad on LinkedIn for more content knowledge or highlights of specific jobs that had been posted that week.

Margaret: Thank you so much for joining me today, Fraser and Brad. This has been Career Pulse DC. Thank you for listening.