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It took me a while to be able to stress the value of a liberal arts education:  analytical thinking, the ability to synthesize information and form rational conclusions, creative problem-solving, and of course, the ability to speak and write at a level befitting someone who calls him/herself "professional."   I finally landed a business manager job at a small software development company. 

Once I had the "hard skills" on my résumé, I went to business school to get the credentials to back up the skills .I was treated as something of a pariah in b-school at first ("what, you didn't study BUSINESS as an undergraduate?  What did you think you were going to do with RUSSIAN?!"); then, with the considerable vision of a new dean, the b-school began to recruit liberal arts students actively because hiring managers were complaining about the woeful lack of skills (see liberal arts paragraph) in new MBA's.  Upon graduation, I found my liberal arts/MBA combination to be extremely powerful, and the Russian degree added a bit of exotic cachet to my résumé that kept me in the "for further consideration" pile. (By the way, in a former job I managed a newly-minted MBA who had a business undergraduate degree rather than a liberal arts degree, and I found that his performance was severely compromised by skills I took for granted -- the ability to look at lots of data and draw intelligent conclusions rather than just spitting it back in raw form, the ability to come up with creative suggestions for problems, the ability to write and speak cogently and to persuade others about his opinions, etc.) 

I recently landed a consulting job *because* of my Russian degree. First, I had to explain the connections between my current work (organizational development) and my illustrious educational and career trajectories.  What seems non-linear and perhaps nonsensical to some is eminently clear to me:  I studied language/literature because I am interested in the human condition and the profound, multi-hued expressions of human experience; I chose organizational development/management consulting because I am interested in the human condition *at work*.  As I explained to this client, business is driven by analysis and planning, but people are the wild cards in the game, and therefore people are the most interesting elements to me.  The reason I landed the job is because they loved my explanation (very liberal arts view), they loved my business knowledge/training, and they loved the fact that I understood and valued other cultures because they had a Ukrainian and a Rumanian on staff who were having difficulties understanding what all this organizational development stuff was all about.

Why study Russian?  Because you love it and because it teaches you about the human condition... not because Russian study leads to x, y, or z career choices, because the trajectory is not that clear.  What helps?   Talking about the value of a liberal arts education, connecting liberal arts to the career you desire, and supplementing the "soft" (but incredibly valuable) skills you get in Russian studies with the "hard" skills you get through internships and the like.  Being a project assistant or research assistant for consulting groups would bean ideal short-term job to get the more recognizable skills on one's résumé; consulting firms love liberal arts majors!  Also, tech writing jobs (if one is inclined toward technology) are good jobs for liberal arts majors because tecchies very often can't write in "English."