Every career advisor talks about bridging education to work. Brandon Busteed has spent his career building that bridge - by tackling challenges to solve.

What struck me most in Brandon's recent LinkedIn post wasn’t just the impressive list of organizations he’s led - it was the realization that his career, like so many others, has been guided by challenges to solve: 

1. Challenge: Address the epidemic of binge drinking that was holding back the potential of so many college students’ opportunities. (Outside The Classroom)

2. Challenge: Help the world understand what the magic ingredients of education and work success really are (Gallup).

3. Challenge: Build the future of education and workforce development with leading universities and companies (Kaplan).

4. Challenge: Solve for the fact that internships and other work-integrated learning experiences don’t scale (BrandEd Holdings).

If you work in higher education or career development, you’ll want to follow Brandon for his insights on the intersection of education and work.

In his own words:

As Brandon put it so well, this approach “forces us to redo all the maps.” Career paths are no longer linear, and perhaps they never were. When students start with a challenge - something meaningful they want to impact - they open up possibilities they never knew existed.

That’s why I believe the Challenge mindset isn’t just for students. It’s a framework that can reenergize educators, advisors, and professionals at every level. When we reconnect with the challenges that motivate us, we find renewed clarity, purpose, and direction.

I’m grateful to Brandon Busteed for seeing and articulating this so powerfully, and to Rich Feller for introducing us.

It’s inspiring to see how a shared focus on challenges can bring together people from different corners of education who are working toward the same goal: helping others do meaningful work that matters.

Let’s keep building those bridges one challenge at a time.