Alumni Spotlight: Chris Burkert

What is your current position? Why were you drawn to this line of work?

Chris Burkert

Property Manager
After selling residential real estate for 3 years, I realized I am drawn to community activity and long-term investment, which lead me to property management. Here I can manage people from both sides of the transaction, offering helpful guidance and experience to make people's lives better and investments more fulfilling.

What accomplishments are you most proud of in your career/life?

Most recently, I managed transactions in such a way that the clients benefited financially and personally, which I think is the secret dream of residential real estate agents everywhere. As a technical writer, my various experiences extracting information from a process with many unrelated stakeholders was always a place to hang my hat, and guides my efforts in my current field as well.

How has your English degree from Cal Poly impacted your career/life?

The perspective gained from my degree and time at Cal Poly allows me to see big picture ideas and also how they affect each person I interact with every day. In a room of 10, there are 11 perspectives, and understanding even half of them is invaluable.

Do you have any advice for current English majors at Cal Poly?

Take your studies seriously and outperform your own expectations. No matter what field you go into, the tools and processes you gain from the work you do now will serve and define you for years to come.

Favorite author/book and why? (or if you can't choose, favorite genre?)

Some favorites are Don DeLillo, T.C. Boyle, Jonathan Franzen, and J.M. Coatzee. If they all have something in common, it is their ability to gaze unflinchingly at a topic and illustrate it and make it whole. As a reader I get the sense that they could be speaking from any side of their narrative, or no side at all, because of the balance and depth of their treatment.