June 9, 2025 • 18 mins
This episode is Part 1 in my look at South Dakota State University as an employer. So much goes into keeping this university functioning which requires a multitude of people with different skill sets and expertise.
Carissa Redenius is the Assistant Director of Classification, Compensation, and Recruitment. She attends all our career fairs we host for students throughout the year as well as helps recruit out in the community. She joined me for the episode to provides details on this work and the benefits of working for South Dakota State University.
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(00:03):
[Auto-generated transcript. Edits may have been applied for clarity.]Welcome to Career Connections. I'm your host, Kevin Fullerton. This episode is part one.
Am I look at South Dakota State University as an employer.
So much goes into keeping this university functioning, which requires a multitude of people with different skill sets and expertise.
To kick off this two part series,
my colleague Karissa Readiness joined me to help me understand a bit more about recruiting employees for South Dakota State.
(00:30):
Carissa is the assistant director of classification, compensation and Recruitment.
She attends all our career fairs as we host for students throughout the year, as well as helps recruit out in the community.
Hello, Clarissa. Thank you so much for joining me on Career Connections.
Uh. I have you here today to talk with me a little bit about South Dakota State as an employer.
(00:52):
Uh, we talk about it a lot as a higher ed institution, which it is, of course, but it takes a lot of people to, to keep it up and running.
So I'm thankful for you joining us to kind of explore this topic of South Dakota State as an employer.
But before we get into that, um, if you would mind state abusing yourself a little bit by a little bit of background,
basically kind of let us know how you got to where you are today. Sounds good.
(01:16):
Thanks, Kevin. So I'm Christopher Daniels, assistant director of classification, compensation and recruitment at South Dakota State University.
Um, this will be my 15th year here at South Dakota State University of Albert.
And Human Resources started out, um, kind of done a variety of different areas within human resources, um,
and recruited where we have all three, um, employee types, um, for accounting students, so recruited for most of the employee types.
(01:41):
And so now I oversee a recruitment area. Um, so, yeah, excited to be here today and, um, talk a little bit more about Sdsu as an employer.
All right. Sounds great.
So South Dakota State University, obviously, it's a D1 university in the Midwest, one of the flagship schools in South Dakota.
Uh, we we talk all the time about. You know, the degree programs in and what students can get accomplished while they're here on campus.
(02:11):
But it also is an employer. It's kind of the sort of the business aspect of of the university.
What are some of the kind of recruiting efforts that are involved with with all of that?
Yeah, right. So we are actually the biggest employer, um, in Brookings County.
And a lot of people don't think of us as an employer. They just think of us as I read education and they actually really go hand in hand.
(02:35):
Right? If we don't have employees, um, to help run the business and teach our students,
and it's hard to get, um, students, um, to come here or want to stay here.
So, um, our office is pretty heavily involved with not only just branding us as an employer.
So, you know, maybe if employees aren't looking for a job or maybe they are, or maybe they know someone,
(02:56):
um, they think of us not only as higher education, but as an employer as well.
Um, so our office does attend multiple job fairs throughout the year.
Um, this promoting our various positions we have open and then also us as an employer,
and we run different ads specific to positions and then also just branding us as an employer as well, just more generic ads.
(03:18):
Um, whether it's print ads or social media, kind of just focus on the different target markets.
And, um, what our supervisors would like for, um, promoting their positions.
Um, I also encourage employees to refer, um, other potential candidates to us as an employer.
Um, I think, you know, employee referrals are great.
(03:39):
They can share their experiences and why they like working.
Uh, CSU and then we also, um, recently launched a whole new career page that just gives some great information about,
um, the benefits of working at Sdsu. And it gives some different testimonials of why, um, employees work here at Sdsu.
So that's been a really fun and exciting page to create as well. Um, like I said, it's called our careers page and we launched that.
(04:03):
We're on our second year of that. So excited about that too. Yeah.
Great. And I'll make sure to share a link of that in the show notes, uh, of this episode so people can easily navigate to that if they're interested.
Um, okay. So the perception, right. Perception of self care status and employer as kind of one of the the hurdles you all are trying to tackle.
(04:25):
But what are some other challenges that you, you face um, in this role.
Certainly. So, yeah. Like you just said, one of the challenges is just thinking of, uh, uh, as thinking of us.
Excuse me, as an employer. And then, um, you know, our, our salaries, you know, we ours are competing for competitive salaries.
Um, granted, we have various weather, um, within the Midwest.
(04:47):
So, you know, we want to make sure people are comfortable with that.
But, um, I think we also have a lot of positive benefits that we can offer as well.
Um, to, um, outweigh the cons as far as, as far as having competitive salaries and, uh, um, various weather seasons here in the Midwest.
Yeah, that's that's a fair point. I think sometimes in recruiting, uh, might, might be good to always be in January February.
(05:14):
So people to get a really honest look at their what, uh, walking across campus is like in those months.
Yeah. Yeah, that's that's not true. We were pretty lucky. It was pretty nice this winter.
Yeah. Yeah, I felt so. I felt that way too. And, you know, just despite those challenges, the what?
What are some of the benefits of working for South Dakota State? Yeah.
So we have a lot of great benefits that we get to offer.
(05:36):
Um, first of all, you know, any time someone may think of, uh, employer, we have the basic benefits of the health insurance,
um, life life insurance, and then your flexible benefits that are your dental vision.
All very, very good benefits, very competitive.
Um, one thing that is, uh, really attractive to our candidates is we do get 15 days off of vacation each year,
(06:01):
and then we also get 14 days of sick leave each year.
So two separate pools. Um, and for vacation, you can actually accrue up to 240 hours.
So, you know, a lot of times we'll hear different employers say we can carry over up to 40 for us.
You can accumulate up to 240 vacation hours. And like I said, we have two separate pools.
So that's been a really, um, great thing for our employees.
(06:24):
Um, they get really excited when they hear that. Um, we also get 11 paid holidays.
So, um, you know, very generous time off between annual leave, sick leave and then our paid holidays.
We also got, um, paid family leave and paid medical leave.
Those are two fairly recent newly added benefits for all state employees.
Um, if you meet certain qualifications, you can get up to 12 weeks, 100% paid time, um, without having to use your leave.
(06:51):
So those have been really nice benefits that have been added for state employees.
Um, great retirement plan. Um, lot of lot of employees.
Um, very excited and very, um, able to do, uh, very nice retirement.
We match 6 to 8% fully match retirement plan.
Also offer offer a supplemental retirement plan. Um, and then a lot of additional programs.
(07:13):
We have an employee well-being program. Um, we have reduced tuition of qualified employees.
Um, they can get up to 50% reduced tuition.
Uh, for if they tend to classes at, uh, uh, Board of Regents University.
Um, we have an a place sister program where also public service loan forgiveness qualified employer.
(07:34):
Um, employees can earn longevity pay, um, for their years of service.
And one thing that I want to point out with that is if you are a student and you work for a board of Regents employee employer.
So that would be any of our universities here within South Dakota at the time you work as a student, um, at a Board of Regents school,
(07:55):
you that counts towards your longevity should you want to continue full time employment after you graduate.
So that's really cool. Benefit longevity counts, um, towards your years of service, which counts towards retirement,
how much you earn and leave, and then also longevity pay, which is pretty cool.
Uh, we have an onsite wellness center. We also have early childhood education and, um, care facility.
(08:18):
Um, and then I want to just add to that, I think our connection with the community is just awesome.
And we hear that from a lot of, um, employees.
The Brookings connection with SD state is so strong.
Um, and they've noticed that when they've been at other schools, it's not as strong of a connection between the university in the in the community.
And that's that's huge. Um, uh, so that's pretty good.
(08:41):
Pretty good. Um, feedback that we've gotten from our candidates, um, um, exciting to share that.
And then there's definitely just so many opportunities to learn and grow within the university.
So, you know, um, whether you want to grow within your department or go across the university, there's,
um, just so many benefits and so much you can learn just staying right here on the university.
(09:02):
Yeah. That it's such a long list of of benefits for, for working for, for this university.
It's it's, uh. It's really fun to hear laid out, and it's a good reminder for me all the different, different benefits.
I really do appreciate you. The idea of the reduced tuition, um, and other, other ways to grow here as a professional,
uh, we have access to so much going on, like guest speakers come to campus.
(09:26):
Um, of course, athletic events are really fun, but also like, music performances,
the theater performances there, there's all sorts of ways that we can enrich our lives, uh, just by proximity.
It just being being in this space and, uh, working with each other.
Yes, definitely. And there's been periodic times where with those activities that you mentioned, my dad's athletics or the performing arts,
(09:47):
where employees can maybe get free tickets or discounted tickets to attend those events, too.
So there's this a lot of those additional side benefits as well, working at the university.
Yeah for sure. One other benefit that we recently the university recently launched.
I'm kind of curious how this is going to sort of help people on campus.
And Chris, I'm not sure if you're aware of it yet either, but, uh,
(10:11):
we do have a contract with Coursera now, and so faculty and staff have access to a lot of those modules.
And so it's not even just straight tuition courses that we have access to.
There's there's other ways to to grow as professionals too.
Yes. That's correct. Um, thanks for bringing that up. Yeah.
It's a new opportunity to just grow professionally, like I said,
(10:32):
not only with the different areas within employees, um, current positions that they work with and learn,
but also with, with all the different, um, professional training that we offer,
whether it's online training or sending staff to different conferences or seminars,
just, you know, um, just not a ton of opportunity to really professionally grow, um, how, you know, you can grow as big as you, you know,
(10:56):
as strong as you want in your career or you, you know, if you're one that just happy with what you're doing in your current position, that's fine too.
Just a lot of different opportunities. Yeah, sure.
So how can we help?
So I'm a staff member on campus here, and I guess I'm kind of thinking about how different ways that faculty and staff can, can help with this effort.
(11:17):
Yeah. So, you know, just like when you're talking to students, um, or trying to we're trying to recruit students to SCC.
We want to try to recruit employees as well. You know, so telling your story of what you like about Sdsu,
why you like Brookings or any of our other surrounding sites that we have within South Dakota.
Um, and getting others to think of us as an employer, you know, maybe they're not looking for another job, or maybe they know someone that is.
(11:42):
But when they are looking, they, um, think of us and their in their job search, um, and just wanting us to,
you know, like I said, recruit not only students but help recruit employees as well.
And and like I said, tell him why you like to be at Sdsu.
Yeah, great. You know, thinking about my own progression through my college education.
(12:04):
And it was such a specific focus that.
My professor really didn't talk about the idea of me staying there as an employee, because I was trying to go to grad school,
and it would mean basically that person would have to leave their job for me to have it.
They were going to do that quite yet. Right. So, um, I think for some students it might might not be the best fit at that at the moment.
(12:30):
But but if they go to grad school, do some other stuff.
Absolutely. Time if the timing's right, want them to come back and share their skills, their experience.
That's completely right. And, um, I think one thing, like I said earlier, that connection with the community is, you know,
maybe others will move on to further their education or want to, uh, move to a different parts of the U.S and that's great.
(12:55):
But then they've as they've gotten to experience that connection that we have with the community and,
you know, we're getting more and more people that want to come back.
They want to be a part of that experience like they had, um, with that connection when they were coming to school here.
Yeah. Great. So yeah, some really good ideas for faculty and staff that are currently here.
Uh, just ways that we can kind of help, help the, the recruitment effort.
(13:18):
In terms of, uh, recruitment. That takes a lot of support in terms of searches.
And it's a team effort, right. So faculty and staff are have, you know, a specific role as they try to recruit.
What are some of the things that you all do to to help support faculty and staff in that effort?
Yeah. Um, so like I said earlier, um, we're working on just really pushing us and branding us as an employer, getting that out there.
(13:40):
So, you know, um, like I said, when we go to job fairs, a lot of people think we're they're recruiting for students.
But when we mentioned no word,
the key recruiting for employees and just kind of mentioned all the variety of positions that we offer here on campus is just,
um, like I said, getting, um, people to think about we're also running a business, right?
So whether it's facility workers, it's engineers.
(14:01):
Um, we have a grants area. You know, we have finance and budget, we have human resources accounting,
just a whole wide array of positions to run a business, um, as well as higher education.
And like I said earlier as well, we attend multiple career fairs throughout, um, the year,
the season and look at constantly looking at where are we advertising our positions,
(14:23):
where we branding us as an employer, the always changing up our ads to attract candidates.
Um, and this, this July, actually I'm excited we are going to be, um,
doing some more enhancement recruitment services and streamlining the recruitment process to have only enhanced that experience for our supervisors.
But as our candidates as well, um, to try to have, you know, quick turnaround times, could postings, um,
(14:48):
and just enhance that overall experience so that, you know, if candidates maybe aren't chosen for one particular position,
they still, you know, experience a very great interview or recruitment process with SDC that they will consider us,
um, in the future for other positions that we may have open. So excited.
Those changes, like I said, are going to be implemented in July of this year.
(15:10):
And we're really excited because those will be, um, very good enhancements to our recruitment process to, um,
to increase those great experiences, not allowed to sit with our supervisors, but our candidates as well.
Yeah. That's great.
So with like position descriptions and things of that nature, do you all work with, with, uh, the hiring folks, like the hiring unit?
(15:33):
Yes. Um, so right from the very beginning stages, whether it's a new position of supervisors creating or a vacant one that they are filling,
we'll start at those very beginning stages with helping them create those position descriptions,
going through qualifications of required and preferred, and then thinking about who they are.
Want that interview process also helping establish interview questions and reference
(15:54):
check questions and and timelines to help keep that search process moving along.
So yeah, from the very beginning stages all the way through the ending stages of where we're ready to make an offer,
working with those supervisors and coaching them along that way.
So it's a seamless process for them, um, and a good experience for all involved.
That's really great. I, I have the benefit of participating in the pilot from the,
(16:17):
the enhanced recruiting process that you all were exploring, and we had a really great experience.
And so I'm glad that some of those changes are going to be implemented.
Um, because I felt like it was it was streamlined.
It was really supportive. And, um, it was nice to lean on you all when there's other things we're trying to tackle and it's like,
hey, you're good folks to tackle this stuff too.
(16:38):
And we didn't have to, you know, create things from from a blank page, like you have a lot of experience in, in this stuff.
And so it was really. Really helpful for us.
Good, good. That's great to hear. Yeah, we're really excited for those changes to come.
Um, and like I said, we just have a lot of resources that we're happy to share with our supervisors.
Um, and that not only helps our supervisors, but then it makes it a more flowing.
(17:02):
And and like I said earlier, enhanced experience for our candidates as well.
Great deal. Well, Chris, thank you so much for spent a little bit of time just to kind of explore this idea, um,
and share with our listener community, uh, about recruiting for for faculty and staff at South Dakota State University.
(17:24):
Are there some other things that you want to make sure to share? Oh, thanks, Kevin.
I appreciate the time today.
Um, like I said, it's a CAC is a great place to work, great employer, lots of variety of benefits, whether it's the professional guild,
the benefits or the benefits of the leave the and, um, health insurance, things like that at retirement.
Um, but yeah, we just ask that, um, you know, when you're thinking about Sdsu,
(17:47):
not like, think about us for higher education, but as an employer as well.
That sounds great. I agree with you, Chris. Um, thanks. Thanks. Coming.
Thank you for listening to Career Connections.
Please follow our podcast to your thoughts on other related topics and for topic suggestions or questions,
you may contact me at Kevin Fullerton at SD state that Edu and for more information about my office, please go to careers that state that Edu.
[Auto-generated transcript. Edits may have been applied for clarity.]Welcome to Career Connections. I'm your host, Kevin Fullerton. This episode is part one.
Am I look at South Dakota State University as an employer.
So much goes into keeping this university functioning, which requires a multitude of people with different skill sets and expertise.
To kick off this two part series,
my colleague Karissa Readiness joined me to help me understand a bit more about recruiting employees for South Dakota State.
(00:30):
Carissa is the assistant director of classification, compensation and Recruitment.
She attends all our career fairs as we host for students throughout the year, as well as helps recruit out in the community.
Hello, Clarissa. Thank you so much for joining me on Career Connections.
Uh. I have you here today to talk with me a little bit about South Dakota State as an employer.
(00:52):
Uh, we talk about it a lot as a higher ed institution, which it is, of course, but it takes a lot of people to, to keep it up and running.
So I'm thankful for you joining us to kind of explore this topic of South Dakota State as an employer.
But before we get into that, um, if you would mind state abusing yourself a little bit by a little bit of background,
basically kind of let us know how you got to where you are today. Sounds good.
(01:16):
Thanks, Kevin. So I'm Christopher Daniels, assistant director of classification, compensation and recruitment at South Dakota State University.
Um, this will be my 15th year here at South Dakota State University of Albert.
And Human Resources started out, um, kind of done a variety of different areas within human resources, um,
and recruited where we have all three, um, employee types, um, for accounting students, so recruited for most of the employee types.
(01:41):
And so now I oversee a recruitment area. Um, so, yeah, excited to be here today and, um, talk a little bit more about Sdsu as an employer.
All right. Sounds great.
So South Dakota State University, obviously, it's a D1 university in the Midwest, one of the flagship schools in South Dakota.
Uh, we we talk all the time about. You know, the degree programs in and what students can get accomplished while they're here on campus.
(02:11):
But it also is an employer. It's kind of the sort of the business aspect of of the university.
What are some of the kind of recruiting efforts that are involved with with all of that?
Yeah, right. So we are actually the biggest employer, um, in Brookings County.
And a lot of people don't think of us as an employer. They just think of us as I read education and they actually really go hand in hand.
(02:35):
Right? If we don't have employees, um, to help run the business and teach our students,
and it's hard to get, um, students, um, to come here or want to stay here.
So, um, our office is pretty heavily involved with not only just branding us as an employer.
So, you know, maybe if employees aren't looking for a job or maybe they are, or maybe they know someone,
(02:56):
um, they think of us not only as higher education, but as an employer as well.
Um, so our office does attend multiple job fairs throughout the year.
Um, this promoting our various positions we have open and then also us as an employer,
and we run different ads specific to positions and then also just branding us as an employer as well, just more generic ads.
(03:18):
Um, whether it's print ads or social media, kind of just focus on the different target markets.
And, um, what our supervisors would like for, um, promoting their positions.
Um, I also encourage employees to refer, um, other potential candidates to us as an employer.
Um, I think, you know, employee referrals are great.
(03:39):
They can share their experiences and why they like working.
Uh, CSU and then we also, um, recently launched a whole new career page that just gives some great information about,
um, the benefits of working at Sdsu. And it gives some different testimonials of why, um, employees work here at Sdsu.
So that's been a really fun and exciting page to create as well. Um, like I said, it's called our careers page and we launched that.
(04:03):
We're on our second year of that. So excited about that too. Yeah.
Great. And I'll make sure to share a link of that in the show notes, uh, of this episode so people can easily navigate to that if they're interested.
Um, okay. So the perception, right. Perception of self care status and employer as kind of one of the the hurdles you all are trying to tackle.
(04:25):
But what are some other challenges that you, you face um, in this role.
Certainly. So, yeah. Like you just said, one of the challenges is just thinking of, uh, uh, as thinking of us.
Excuse me, as an employer. And then, um, you know, our, our salaries, you know, we ours are competing for competitive salaries.
Um, granted, we have various weather, um, within the Midwest.
(04:47):
So, you know, we want to make sure people are comfortable with that.
But, um, I think we also have a lot of positive benefits that we can offer as well.
Um, to, um, outweigh the cons as far as, as far as having competitive salaries and, uh, um, various weather seasons here in the Midwest.
Yeah, that's that's a fair point. I think sometimes in recruiting, uh, might, might be good to always be in January February.
(05:14):
So people to get a really honest look at their what, uh, walking across campus is like in those months.
Yeah. Yeah, that's that's not true. We were pretty lucky. It was pretty nice this winter.
Yeah. Yeah, I felt so. I felt that way too. And, you know, just despite those challenges, the what?
What are some of the benefits of working for South Dakota State? Yeah.
So we have a lot of great benefits that we get to offer.
(05:36):
Um, first of all, you know, any time someone may think of, uh, employer, we have the basic benefits of the health insurance,
um, life life insurance, and then your flexible benefits that are your dental vision.
All very, very good benefits, very competitive.
Um, one thing that is, uh, really attractive to our candidates is we do get 15 days off of vacation each year,
(06:01):
and then we also get 14 days of sick leave each year.
So two separate pools. Um, and for vacation, you can actually accrue up to 240 hours.
So, you know, a lot of times we'll hear different employers say we can carry over up to 40 for us.
You can accumulate up to 240 vacation hours. And like I said, we have two separate pools.
So that's been a really, um, great thing for our employees.
(06:24):
Um, they get really excited when they hear that. Um, we also get 11 paid holidays.
So, um, you know, very generous time off between annual leave, sick leave and then our paid holidays.
We also got, um, paid family leave and paid medical leave.
Those are two fairly recent newly added benefits for all state employees.
Um, if you meet certain qualifications, you can get up to 12 weeks, 100% paid time, um, without having to use your leave.
(06:51):
So those have been really nice benefits that have been added for state employees.
Um, great retirement plan. Um, lot of lot of employees.
Um, very excited and very, um, able to do, uh, very nice retirement.
We match 6 to 8% fully match retirement plan.
Also offer offer a supplemental retirement plan. Um, and then a lot of additional programs.
(07:13):
We have an employee well-being program. Um, we have reduced tuition of qualified employees.
Um, they can get up to 50% reduced tuition.
Uh, for if they tend to classes at, uh, uh, Board of Regents University.
Um, we have an a place sister program where also public service loan forgiveness qualified employer.
(07:34):
Um, employees can earn longevity pay, um, for their years of service.
And one thing that I want to point out with that is if you are a student and you work for a board of Regents employee employer.
So that would be any of our universities here within South Dakota at the time you work as a student, um, at a Board of Regents school,
(07:55):
you that counts towards your longevity should you want to continue full time employment after you graduate.
So that's really cool. Benefit longevity counts, um, towards your years of service, which counts towards retirement,
how much you earn and leave, and then also longevity pay, which is pretty cool.
Uh, we have an onsite wellness center. We also have early childhood education and, um, care facility.
(08:18):
Um, and then I want to just add to that, I think our connection with the community is just awesome.
And we hear that from a lot of, um, employees.
The Brookings connection with SD state is so strong.
Um, and they've noticed that when they've been at other schools, it's not as strong of a connection between the university in the in the community.
And that's that's huge. Um, uh, so that's pretty good.
(08:41):
Pretty good. Um, feedback that we've gotten from our candidates, um, um, exciting to share that.
And then there's definitely just so many opportunities to learn and grow within the university.
So, you know, um, whether you want to grow within your department or go across the university, there's,
um, just so many benefits and so much you can learn just staying right here on the university.
(09:02):
Yeah. That it's such a long list of of benefits for, for working for, for this university.
It's it's, uh. It's really fun to hear laid out, and it's a good reminder for me all the different, different benefits.
I really do appreciate you. The idea of the reduced tuition, um, and other, other ways to grow here as a professional,
uh, we have access to so much going on, like guest speakers come to campus.
(09:26):
Um, of course, athletic events are really fun, but also like, music performances,
the theater performances there, there's all sorts of ways that we can enrich our lives, uh, just by proximity.
It just being being in this space and, uh, working with each other.
Yes, definitely. And there's been periodic times where with those activities that you mentioned, my dad's athletics or the performing arts,
(09:47):
where employees can maybe get free tickets or discounted tickets to attend those events, too.
So there's this a lot of those additional side benefits as well, working at the university.
Yeah for sure. One other benefit that we recently the university recently launched.
I'm kind of curious how this is going to sort of help people on campus.
And Chris, I'm not sure if you're aware of it yet either, but, uh,
(10:11):
we do have a contract with Coursera now, and so faculty and staff have access to a lot of those modules.
And so it's not even just straight tuition courses that we have access to.
There's there's other ways to to grow as professionals too.
Yes. That's correct. Um, thanks for bringing that up. Yeah.
It's a new opportunity to just grow professionally, like I said,
(10:32):
not only with the different areas within employees, um, current positions that they work with and learn,
but also with, with all the different, um, professional training that we offer,
whether it's online training or sending staff to different conferences or seminars,
just, you know, um, just not a ton of opportunity to really professionally grow, um, how, you know, you can grow as big as you, you know,
(10:56):
as strong as you want in your career or you, you know, if you're one that just happy with what you're doing in your current position, that's fine too.
Just a lot of different opportunities. Yeah, sure.
So how can we help?
So I'm a staff member on campus here, and I guess I'm kind of thinking about how different ways that faculty and staff can, can help with this effort.
(11:17):
Yeah. So, you know, just like when you're talking to students, um, or trying to we're trying to recruit students to SCC.
We want to try to recruit employees as well. You know, so telling your story of what you like about Sdsu,
why you like Brookings or any of our other surrounding sites that we have within South Dakota.
Um, and getting others to think of us as an employer, you know, maybe they're not looking for another job, or maybe they know someone that is.
(11:42):
But when they are looking, they, um, think of us and their in their job search, um, and just wanting us to,
you know, like I said, recruit not only students but help recruit employees as well.
And and like I said, tell him why you like to be at Sdsu.
Yeah, great. You know, thinking about my own progression through my college education.
(12:04):
And it was such a specific focus that.
My professor really didn't talk about the idea of me staying there as an employee, because I was trying to go to grad school,
and it would mean basically that person would have to leave their job for me to have it.
They were going to do that quite yet. Right. So, um, I think for some students it might might not be the best fit at that at the moment.
(12:30):
But but if they go to grad school, do some other stuff.
Absolutely. Time if the timing's right, want them to come back and share their skills, their experience.
That's completely right. And, um, I think one thing, like I said earlier, that connection with the community is, you know,
maybe others will move on to further their education or want to, uh, move to a different parts of the U.S and that's great.
(12:55):
But then they've as they've gotten to experience that connection that we have with the community and,
you know, we're getting more and more people that want to come back.
They want to be a part of that experience like they had, um, with that connection when they were coming to school here.
Yeah. Great. So yeah, some really good ideas for faculty and staff that are currently here.
Uh, just ways that we can kind of help, help the, the recruitment effort.
(13:18):
In terms of, uh, recruitment. That takes a lot of support in terms of searches.
And it's a team effort, right. So faculty and staff are have, you know, a specific role as they try to recruit.
What are some of the things that you all do to to help support faculty and staff in that effort?
Yeah. Um, so like I said earlier, um, we're working on just really pushing us and branding us as an employer, getting that out there.
(13:40):
So, you know, um, like I said, when we go to job fairs, a lot of people think we're they're recruiting for students.
But when we mentioned no word,
the key recruiting for employees and just kind of mentioned all the variety of positions that we offer here on campus is just,
um, like I said, getting, um, people to think about we're also running a business, right?
So whether it's facility workers, it's engineers.
(14:01):
Um, we have a grants area. You know, we have finance and budget, we have human resources accounting,
just a whole wide array of positions to run a business, um, as well as higher education.
And like I said earlier as well, we attend multiple career fairs throughout, um, the year,
the season and look at constantly looking at where are we advertising our positions,
(14:23):
where we branding us as an employer, the always changing up our ads to attract candidates.
Um, and this, this July, actually I'm excited we are going to be, um,
doing some more enhancement recruitment services and streamlining the recruitment process to have only enhanced that experience for our supervisors.
But as our candidates as well, um, to try to have, you know, quick turnaround times, could postings, um,
(14:48):
and just enhance that overall experience so that, you know, if candidates maybe aren't chosen for one particular position,
they still, you know, experience a very great interview or recruitment process with SDC that they will consider us,
um, in the future for other positions that we may have open. So excited.
Those changes, like I said, are going to be implemented in July of this year.
(15:10):
And we're really excited because those will be, um, very good enhancements to our recruitment process to, um,
to increase those great experiences, not allowed to sit with our supervisors, but our candidates as well.
Yeah. That's great.
So with like position descriptions and things of that nature, do you all work with, with, uh, the hiring folks, like the hiring unit?
(15:33):
Yes. Um, so right from the very beginning stages, whether it's a new position of supervisors creating or a vacant one that they are filling,
we'll start at those very beginning stages with helping them create those position descriptions,
going through qualifications of required and preferred, and then thinking about who they are.
Want that interview process also helping establish interview questions and reference
(15:54):
check questions and and timelines to help keep that search process moving along.
So yeah, from the very beginning stages all the way through the ending stages of where we're ready to make an offer,
working with those supervisors and coaching them along that way.
So it's a seamless process for them, um, and a good experience for all involved.
That's really great. I, I have the benefit of participating in the pilot from the,
(16:17):
the enhanced recruiting process that you all were exploring, and we had a really great experience.
And so I'm glad that some of those changes are going to be implemented.
Um, because I felt like it was it was streamlined.
It was really supportive. And, um, it was nice to lean on you all when there's other things we're trying to tackle and it's like,
hey, you're good folks to tackle this stuff too.
(16:38):
And we didn't have to, you know, create things from from a blank page, like you have a lot of experience in, in this stuff.
And so it was really. Really helpful for us.
Good, good. That's great to hear. Yeah, we're really excited for those changes to come.
Um, and like I said, we just have a lot of resources that we're happy to share with our supervisors.
Um, and that not only helps our supervisors, but then it makes it a more flowing.
(17:02):
And and like I said earlier, enhanced experience for our candidates as well.
Great deal. Well, Chris, thank you so much for spent a little bit of time just to kind of explore this idea, um,
and share with our listener community, uh, about recruiting for for faculty and staff at South Dakota State University.
(17:24):
Are there some other things that you want to make sure to share? Oh, thanks, Kevin.
I appreciate the time today.
Um, like I said, it's a CAC is a great place to work, great employer, lots of variety of benefits, whether it's the professional guild,
the benefits or the benefits of the leave the and, um, health insurance, things like that at retirement.
Um, but yeah, we just ask that, um, you know, when you're thinking about Sdsu,
(17:47):
not like, think about us for higher education, but as an employer as well.
That sounds great. I agree with you, Chris. Um, thanks. Thanks. Coming.
Thank you for listening to Career Connections.
Please follow our podcast to your thoughts on other related topics and for topic suggestions or questions,
you may contact me at Kevin Fullerton at SD state that Edu and for more information about my office, please go to careers that state that Edu.
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