Empowering your Career Portfolio with Holly Rye, CDP
By Don MacGillivray,
Halifax & Region Military Family Resource Centre (H&R MFRC)
What Is a Career Portfolio?
A Career Portfolio is more than just an extension of your resume; it’s a personalized, in-depth narrative of your strengths, experiences, and competencies. It includes documentation that supports your skills, values, and knowledge, even when those weren’t earned through traditional educational pathways. Testimonials, personal stories of growth, and reflective exercises help paint a fuller picture of who you are and what you bring to the table.
“Knowledge is credentialed,” Holly explains, “but experiences are often overlooked.” A career portfolio captures the essence of informal learning—something that traditional hiring documents often neglect.
Who Is This For?
This program was designed for those in transition, including military families, individuals returning to the workforce after a long absence, those dealing with underemployment, or anyone struggling to articulate the full range of their competencies.
If you’ve ever found yourself wondering, “What’s next?”— this is for you.
- Military spouses balancing relocations and fragmented work histories
- Career changers navigating uncertainty
- Job seekers without formal credentials but rich life experiences
- Underemployed professionals searching for roles aligned with their current values and goals
This process helps uncover hidden strengths and reframes them in a new direction. It’s about shifting from simply needing a job to identifying a role that fulfills your personal and professional aspirations.
The Military Connection
The Empowered program Holly Rye has completed shares many of the same fundamentals as the original Portfolio Development Program that was offered to both military members and families experiencing career transition. Service members often accumulate a wealth of knowledge and training but translating that into civilian job qualifications can be difficult. The same can be said of military spouses. There is a wealth of skills developed in navigating the absences, relocations, and transitions of military life. Holly’s work helps bridge this gap by identifying transferable skills and aligning them with current workforce needs.
“You may not have ‘coordinator’ experience,” Holly notes, “but you’ve moved a family cross-country twice in three years —let’s reframe that.” The program provides a blueprint for what’s next, giving participants the ability to pivot their narrative and show employers the true value of their background.
Why the Portfolio Matters
A Career Portfolio is a tool of empowerment. It goes beyond simply listing where you’ve been — it tells the story of how you’ve grown and why your journey matters. It gives job seekers the ability to speak with confidence about their strengths, even when those strengths don’t come with a certificate.
“Some people don’t have formal documentation,” she says, “just a powerful narrative about how they developed their skills. That deserves recognition.”
How It Works
Through guided sessions, exercises, and personal reflection, clients begin to construct a comprehensive portfolio. This includes:
- Values identification exercises
- Documentation of informal and experiential learning
- Storytelling tools to support your career narrative
- Second-person perspective to bring objectivity to your experience
- Tailored resume and job search strategy support
It’s not just about getting any job, it’s about getting the right job, one that meets your financial, emotional, and lifestyle needs.
Holly’s Approach
Holly’s goal is to help clients “move toward a meaningful and preferred future.” As a certified Career Development Practitioner, this isn’t just a job—it’s a purpose. Holly has modernized and condensed a successful military-focused workshop to make it accessible for broader audiences, integrating it into her everyday practice. Holly’s work is grounded in ethics, standards of practice, and a genuine passion for helping people succeed. She offers not only strategic support but also a deeply human approach to career evolution. You won’t walk this journey alone.
Holly helps to reframe your story into something more powerful, something that speaks to employers in the language they understand — competency, proof, and value.
To get started, reach out to Holly Rye via email at holly.rye@hrmfrc.ca
Rediscover what you bring to the table and learn how to show the world.
