Kris Olson

Director Career Center

Kris provides leadership to the Career Center to ensure staff are in a position to provide the best possible support to students so they can achieve their professional and personal goals. She also ensures that services provided to students are aligned with best practices within the field of career development and the college as a whole.

Kris graduated from Luther College with a degree in communications and health. She also received a master’s degree in education from North Dakota State University. Kris is certified in several personality and behavioral assessments, which she finds interesting to facilitate and has had the honor of serving and being recognized on various nonprofit boards.

Kris began college not knowing what she wanted to major in. At one point, she thought she wanted to major in education but really enjoyed some of her communications classes, so she stuck with that. Her first job out of college was as an admissions counselor. Kris explains, “Admissions work was really about connecting and ‘selling’ the school. I took those transferable skills and started a job in talent recruitment at Cargill, Inc. In that role, I was recruiting new hires to come work at Cargill.” Within Cargill, Kris was a human resource generalist, worked on a global realignment team project, and served as a corporate training consultant. Eventually, she took a leap of faith and started her own consulting business focused on designing and deploying training solutions for a variety of companies including Cargill, Pfizer, EY, Hill Rom, Solvay, ESPN, JBS, and Port of Long Beach, to name a few.

In speaking about her professional accomplishments, Kris says, “I am quite proud of the fact that I was able to start my own business and successfully operate it for 14 years prior to being called back to Concordia. I am also proud of all the stamps in my passport that my job enabled me to experience.”

Kris loves to work out — whether it’s cycling, HIIT, or running. She has two grown sons and a daughter-in-law with her husband, Darrell, who is an assistant football coach at Concordia, and they are going to be grandparents soon. She loves to spend time at the lake and travel with family. 

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Kris Olson

Director Parke Student Leadership Center, Knutson Campus Center