In this episode of Roompact’s RA*Chat, we explore one of the most meaningful parts of being an RA with Iyanna Williams and her experience on this topic: becoming a trusted support person for residents. Beyond programs and policy enforcement, RAs are often the first people residents turn to during moments of stress, conflict, loneliness, homesickness, or personal challenges. This conversation focuses on how RAs can navigate vulnerable conversations with empathy, professionalism, and care while also understanding their role, boundaries, and available campus resources.
Guest: Iyanna Williams (she/her), Hall Director, Georgia Institute of Technology
Host: Anthony Martinez
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Roompact’s ResEdChat podcast is a platform to showcase people doing great work and talk about hot topics in residence life and college student housing. If you have a topic idea for an episode, let us know!
Transcript:
Anthony Martinez:
Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the Roompact Podcast and RA360 special. And today we’re talking about a fulfilling part of being in the RA role, which may not always be programming, bulletin boards, or even duty rounds, but it’s the moments when someone knocks on your door because they trust you enough to talk to you. Oh, how cute. How heartwarming. And so sometimes residents come to you because they’re homesick, it’s a roommate conflict, academic stress, loneliness, relationships, family struggles, or things they’ve never told anyone before. And while RAs are not counselors or therapists, that is important to keep in mind, they’re often the first person someone turns to.
So today’s episode is called Why People Come to You (And What They Really Need), and we’re talking about emotional intelligence, trust, active listening, and how to support residents without feeling like you have to fix everything. And I’m joined today by a very special guest. I’m very excited, Iyanna Williams, our Resident Hall Director with experience supporting both residents, RAs through difficult conversations and moments of care. Iyanna, if you want to introduce yourself.
Iyanna Williams:
Yes. Hi guys. So nice to meet you all. My name is Iyanna Williams. As Anthony said, I am a hall director at Georgia Institute of Technology. I just wrapped up my first year as a hall director and I love the work we do in residence life, so I’m happy to share this information with you guys.
Anthony Martinez:
Perfect. And the next question is, I want to ask what initially drew you to this work of residence life?
Iyanna Williams:
So what drew me to this work is I was in your chairs. I was exactly where you guys are. I was an RA at my undergrad institution. I was the RA, in my opinion. I thought I was the best. And pretty much it was just really getting involved, helping my residents out, building a sense of community. While I was an undergrad, I was a childhood and special education major. And then I got to my senior year and I had to student teach and I said, “Absolutely not.” And I absolutely did not like teaching, not little kids at least. So I had a mentor in my life at that time who was my associate director and she was like, “Well, you’re really good at this RA thing. You can do it full time.” And I was like, “Really?” And she was like, “Yeah, you can get a master’s in higher ed.” And then I attended LSU, so Louisiana State University, Go Tigers. I was a grad there in residence life. I got my master’s there and that was it. That started the path to residence life.
Anthony Martinez:
The rest is history. I love it. Perfect. Well, with that and all the experience you have, I want to ask, what’s one quality that you think makes someone easy to talk to?
Iyanna Williams:
I think one quality that makes someone easy to talk to is vulnerability. So being able to lead from a place of vulnerability and be open with your residents on what you struggle with, what you identify with, the things that you go through, it automatically humanizes you to your residents. Because I think when you’re an RA, you come in as this authority figure and they’re looking at you like, “Oh, I know y’all heard it before. Oh, you’re the opp, you’re the po-po, they’re the snitches.” You need to vulnerableize yourself just a little bit to make sure that they see that you’re also a student, you’re also human.
And that was one thing I did as an RA that helped me build strong connections with my residents because I let them know, “Hey, I can’t talk to you. This test is due at 12 o’clock. It’s eight o’clock. I need to get this work done. I can’t fail this class.” Or, “Hey, I’m super stressed,” or, “Hey, I got a C on this test.” I was just open with my residents. So I think vulnerability is the way to really let people know that they can come to you.
Anthony Martinez:
No, I love that. I didn’t even think of that. I think of when I was an RA, I would tell people, “Oh yeah, I was homesick.” And they’re like, “You got homesick? You seem to enjoy yourself.” I was like, “I was feeling terrible when I first moved here,” so that’s great.
Iyanna Williams:
Exactly.
Anthony Martinez:
I want to ask too, so you’ve talked about your experience. Did you see yourself to be a listener constantly or was this something you learned over time with experience?
Iyanna Williams:
So I will say I definitely did not start off as a listener. I was a talker and you would’ve thought I had two mouths because I talked more than I could listen, to say the least. I was definitely a talker. I think being an RA really showed me how to become a listener because I had to learn that my students didn’t always come to me because they needed advice. They sometimes came to me because they just needed me to listen. So I think that was what opened that mindset for me and turned on the light bulb of, like, “I need to listen more.”
And I think once that happened, I started to incorporate in my RA, and even now as a hall director, when people come and talk to me, I always ask, “Hey, are you looking for advice? Are you looking for just someone to listen or are you just looking for me to be present in this moment because you need the support?” So I think learning that balance, but I had to learn that via being an RA. And one of my students actually told me, “I feel like I talk to you, but I feel like you don’t listen to me.” And it kind of hurt me a little bit and I had to go back and say, “No, they don’t need me to always talk. Sometimes they just need me to listen.”
Anthony Martinez:
I love that. Yes, I would agree. I am also [inaudible 00:05:37], but for sure it took time. I did want to ask and move us into the next topic of people opening up is we notice in residence life that residents tend to open up to some RAs more than others. And so why do you think residents connect more deeply with certain RAs? And I know you mentioned vulnerability as one.
Iyanna Williams:
So I think it can be a multitude of things. I think it can be vulnerability. I think sometimes it can be simple identities and identity similarities, but also sometimes identity bias because you can only want to open up to this person because they’re your own identity and you don’t see somebody else as a help. So that can also be a thing. And then lastly, I think it’s sometimes presence and visibility. So sometimes the person who, and I tell my RAs this all the time, I don’t need you to connect with every single student every time you see them, but I need you to greet every student you see.
So I don’t need you to have a deep conversation, but I need you to greet them. And the reason I need you to greet them is because when they go through their hard times, they need to know, “This is the person who always say hi to me. This is the person who’s always, how am I doing, checks on me. They’re not over invasive, but they genuinely care about me.” And I think when students see that you care, they will be more willing to open up if they want to. Now don’t force that, but if they want to, you’ll become a person just simply off the visibility and the presence and the always greeting so you’re showing care.
Anthony Martinez:
Yeah, no. One thing I love about these podcasts is I always learn something new and I’m like, “Oh, I’m going to take that back with my staff. Maybe you don’t need to talk, but you need to greet them. You need to say hi. Hope I was going well. Have a good day.” No, that’s great. That’s great. And this kind of leads me into my next question is how can quieter or introverted RAs still create strong connections?
Iyanna Williams:
So the first thing I would say is lean into your introvertedness. I am someone, I’ve never, and you guys can probably tell on this podcast, I’ve never been introverted a day in my life. However, I do tell my introverted RAs and even my introverted friends, you need to lean into that because there are residents on all of our campuses who are just as introverted as you or more introverted. So I think sometimes to answer your question first, lean into that and think about how would someone connect with you. So maybe it’s not doing the large scale programming that brings a hundred people. Maybe it’s, “Hey, I’m in the lounge, I’m studying, come study with me,” because you know you’re going to pull a different audience. Or maybe it’s, “Hey, I’m going, I really like hiking and I’m an introverted RA, so I’m going to go on a hike and I’m just going to invite residents to come with me on this hike.”
And I’ve seen this happen this year in my building where one of my RAs, he was in love with hiking. I said, “So how about you do a hiking program? Take them hiking.” I don’t recommend that all the time. That can be a liability, but, “Take them hiking.” And it was one of the best programs. He felt fulfilled. And also the residents who went, he didn’t have a lot of residents, it was about five who went, but those five residents to this day still tell me about how that was the best program they went to last year. So I think it’s about leaning into your introvertedness.
And I know this wasn’t a part of the question, but I’m going to add this. One of the biggest advices I give my introverted people, do not try to force yourself to be extroverted because we all see that you are uncomfortable and you cannot build comfortability in uncomfortability for other people. That doesn’t correlate. It’s okay for you to be uncomfortable and get comfortable in the uncomfortable, but not in the sense of when we’re trying to have you build community because you won’t know how to do it because you feel in your uncomfortability at that moment. So please do not think you have to be this extrovert because you’re an RA. We know as professionals, we’re looking for introverted, extroverted and all the different things because our residents should be a representation of the staff that we select.
Anthony Martinez:
Yeah, that’s great. No, thank you. Thank you for mentioning that. I hope our RAs listening who do feel a little bit more introverted, hopefully you feel seen and you know that we’re here to support you as well and we value you deeply. But with that, I’m going to move us on to the next topic of this, which is the response once we’ve started to build these relationships. And so a lot of RAs will see you feel pressured to know exactly what to say in difficult conversations. I know there’s behind closed doors that happens at certain institutions, role-playing going on to ensure you know what to do in these exact scenarios, but you can’t practice for everything. And so how should an RA respond when they genuinely don’t know the answer or don’t know what to say?
Iyanna Williams:
I don’t know. That’s what you start with. You start with, “I don’t know.” Now what you follow up, I don’t know with is, “But I will find out,” or, “I will follow up.” But it is okay to say, “I don’t know something.”
Sometimes we think because we’re in these positions, we have to know everything. In reality check, it doesn’t matter what supervisor you have and anywhere you’re watching this video, I can guarantee you they also don’t know everything. Sometimes we just don’t know. I think it’s all about when you don’t know, be vulnerable in that moment and say, “I don’t know, but I can follow up,” or, “I will try to get the answer,” or, “I will look into this.” But it is no shame to say, “I don’t know.” And that goes for anything. That goes for resident conversations, that goes for hall director task and things, whatever it is. If you don’t know something, let people know so that we can help you. The worst thing you can do is fake like you know or give misinformation, especially when it comes to residents because you’re putting your level of trust in a weird space because now you’re giving them incorrect information instead of just saying, “I don’t know, let me find out.”
And I think sometimes a lot of RAs, my RAs are going to watch this video, so shouts to them. A lot of people just say things and I’m like, “Guys, just say you don’t know. It’s okay to not know.” It is totally normal to not know. We do not know everything. You are student leaders juggling a thousand things with this position. It is okay to not know or just not remember. Say that and be honest.
Anthony Martinez:
No, I agree. The honesty is so important and yes, perfect response. And I wanted to ask, what are examples of supportive responses that don’t pretend to fix the situation? I know you said, “I don’t know. I’ll look into it,” but I didn’t know if you had anything else you wanted to mention.
Iyanna Williams:
I would say some things I do too, always, “I understand where you’re coming from.” I think that is a good one because you’re not saying it from a sense of you’ve been through it, but you’re saying, “I understand where you’re coming from.” So you’re putting the ownership of their situation on them. I also think saying, “I hear you.” I hear you. “What do you need from me in this moment?” I think just being supportive and sometimes, and I tell any RAs this, go the extra mile to do the follow-up. You might not need to do every part to help a student, but I think sometimes just offering your presence, offering your support, offering that comfortability.
So if you’re dealing with a hard situation and the student needs to go to the counselor, I’m not saying you need to sit in the counseling office with them, but I know when I was an RA and even as a hall director, I would sometimes ask the student, “Do you want me to walk over there with you? I’ll walk with you.” And if I can’t do it, I can talk to my hall director. This is when I was an RA, but I can talk to my hall director and get permission or have someone else walk with that person. So it’s like offer the support, be there as the person, but also remember follow up.
I think a lot of times where we mess up our relationships is we don’t follow up. We have these hard conversations and then we just act like it’s gone. We act like it never happened, we move on. And follow up doesn’t have to be this big thing, but it can just be like, “Hey, I know we talked last week. How are you doing this week?” Or sometimes if you know this is a student that’s continuously going through issues, sometimes it’s how you ask a question, “Hey, what’s one thing that happened this week that made you happy?” So it’s sometimes getting them to see that we don’t need you to be perfect. We just want to see 1% better every day, and that’s the goal in this. So that’s what I would tell the RAs.
Anthony Martinez:
No, that’s perfect. And that’s great. That leads me into my next kind of segment, which is helping versus fixing. And so what do you think is the difference between helping someone and then trying to fix them when these RAs are having conversations with the residents on their floor?
Iyanna Williams:
So I think the first thing is your job is not to fix. First, we do not pay you enough to fix anything. We do not pay you enough. You are a student. We do not pay you to fix things. What we pay you to do is to try to assist. So fixing to me is you taking this problem and you taking ownership of it and you say, “I’m going to solve this.” That’s not what we want to see. What we want to see is, “Hey, this is your problem. I’m here to support you. Let me help you by using our resources, whatever we have to assist you in this problem that is yours.” Fixing makes you take ownership of the problem, and we do not want you taking ownership of other students’ problems. We want you to point them into the right direction and also give them the resources that is needed.
However, what I will also say with this conversation is sometimes trauma can be passed on. So also in this moment, we need you to be able to recognize when you are not the correct person to help someone. And that is also okay. It is okay to say this situation, “Hey,” and I’ll give a perfect example right now, “Hey, I understand what you’re going through. This situation is even a lot for me to handle, but let me get you someone who I think can support you in this moment because I’m not the person to help in this situation.” That’s how I would have that conversation. But sometimes I think we focus on trying to fix things too much or we try to help when we’re not even checking our self-regulation to make sure that we are able to help this person. So I think those are the differences. And just remember, if you remember anything I just said, we don’t pay you enough to fix it.
Anthony Martinez:
No, perfect. I think you summed that up greatly, Iyanna, so thank you. My next question is on a difficult balance. It can be a difficult balance in validating someone’s feelings without overstepping your role. And so how can RAs validate residents while still maintaining their healthy boundaries? I know you have already gone into that a little bit, but if you had anything else to say.
Iyanna Williams:
I would say it’s all about language. So language is your biggest thing when it comes to validating, but not overstepping. So I think notice when I said, “I understand where you’re coming from.” I’m not saying I understand because I went through this or I’m not saying, “No, that’s not a big deal,” or, “That is a big deal.” I think sometimes when we get to the going past our position is when we’re trying to justify or minimize or maximize that person’s emotion, and we don’t need you to do that. We need you to listen and help, but not necessarily gauge where they should feel on it because that’s their emotions, that’s not your emotion.
So I think that’s where we start, but it’s all about language. Just remembering, and if you don’t know what I mean when I say language, just think to yourself, am I taking ownership of this or am I leaving the ownership with them? And if you feel like you’re starting to take ownership of it, you know you’re going beyond your role because ownership of another student’s problem is not your responsibility. That was a bar that I didn’t even know I was going to say.
Anthony Martinez:
Yeah. Yeah, it was.
Iyanna Williams:
Sorry, I just thought of it after I said it. Okay.
Anthony Martinez:
And it’s all perfect to everyone listening. We got it on recording.
Iyanna Williams:
Literally.
Anthony Martinez:
No, perfect. Thank you for that. And then with that, what advice with all these RAs, they’re thinking about language, they’re having these conversations, it may be their first time if they’re a new RA. So what advice would you give an RA who’s worried about saying the wrong thing?
Iyanna Williams:
Don’t be worried. We literally, you have to remember, and this is what I sometimes tell myself as well, most things you say are not life and death and we can always walk them back. So if you’re in your head in a conversation and you feel like you said something wrong, say what you need to say. And if you thought it was wrong, follow up with your hall director and say, “Hey, I said this. I don’t think this is the right thing to say. How should I go about correcting it?” Or, “Hey, I feel really uncomfortable.” And I think that’s something that I had to do with my RAs. A lot of them struggled with having these hard conversations, so it got to a place where they would tell me and I would say, “Okay, this is happening on your floor. Let’s go have this conversation together.” And we would sit in a room and have it together so they can see the way my language is, the way their language is, how to learn from it.
So I think just don’t be afraid to say the wrong thing. And sometimes you will say the wrong thing and it’s okay because your supervisor’s going to come in and help you or show you how to backtrack what you said in the right way. So don’t be afraid to, you have to have the conversations. We know you’re not perfect. None of us are. You just have to admit to it and let it be known so that someone can help you.
Anthony Martinez:
No, that’s great. And then I wanted to ask, we’re running close on time, and so what’s one conversation you’ll never forget and why did it stay with you, particularly in residence life?
Iyanna Williams:
One conversation I would never forget is when I was an RA, my associate director pulled me to the side and she said, “You need to learn to listen more than you speak.” And I said, “No, because everybody needs to hear what I’m saying and hear my opinion.” And I think the moment that conversation was had with me and in the way it was had, she was a very direct person, so it was very much like you’re going to lose out on so much knowledge and opportunity because you don’t know how to absorb what you’re going through. So sometimes it’s about sitting back and just listening. And if you’re a processor, I am a processor, I will listen to something and it takes me two days to dissect it because I’m going to have opinions on it for the first hour before I even let it go in.
So if that’s you, that’s okay. But understand that sometimes it’s okay to sit back, listen, understand perspective and not always give an opinion. And I think if you do that with your residents, you’ll be much, much better. But also if you do that with your hall director, you’ll start to think from a more larger perspective than just your RA perspective, which will help you when you get into the job field because you’ll need to think from a bigger perspective than just your role, especially when you think about moving up.
Anthony Martinez:
No, thank you. Thank you for sharing that. I appreciate it. I just wanted to say to everyone, this has been an important conversation because sometimes the biggest impacts that an RA can have is making it through simply being present for someone on your floor or your peers or whoever you meet on campus. And often what residents need most isn’t a perfect answer. It’s someone who listens and validates and is vulnerable and helps them connect to those resources to provide support. And so before we wrap up, I wanted to give you one last chance, any final message you have to the RAs listening or for something for them to remember and how can they connect with you after?
Iyanna Williams:
Yes. So the message I would have to you guys is you’re in this position for a reason. You were chosen out of a bunch of other people who wanted this position, so take pride in it, do your best. And if your best is not 100%, that is also okay. Just try to be 1% better each day in this role and you will be perfectly fine. We want to see progression, not perfection. And I think sometimes a lot of RAs, you guys focus on perfection so much and we’re not even perfection, so it is okay to not be perfection. Just remember progression.
And then that’s for the RA role. I got to leave y’all with something for life as well. Your crown is waiting for you. You just have to be okay with accepting it and putting it on. So that’s beyond this role, that’s beyond anything. Just remember, you are royalty, you are worthy, you are enough. And once you’ve normalized that to yourself, wear your crown and wear it on your head and put your head up high because you deserve to be in every room that you step in.
To stay connected to me, please add me on LinkedIn. If you want to have a conversation, message me. I also do have an Instagram. It’s called The First Gen Voice. You can kind of follow my higher ed lifestyle on there. I post a lot about the things we do within my work, whether that’s professional or just in my hall. So if you want to have a conversation and if you need more tips on how to connect with your residents, talk to the people on your campus, text me, message me. I do reply, I follow back, all of the great things, but it would be lovely to connect with any of you all.
Anthony Martinez:
Oh, my gosh. Thank you so much, Iyanna. You have been amazing. I appreciate your wise words. I really enjoyed this episode and I know I’ve taken away a lot, so I know the students will as well. And to everyone listening, remember that you do not have to carry every problem on your shoulders to make a meaningful difference. Sometimes just showing some care, listening and helping someone feel less alone is far more powerful than you realize. We’ll see you next time here on the RA360 episode of Roompact. Bye.
