Princeton recently launched a new career website and talent acquisition system for staff positions, supporting the University in recruiting a broader range of candidates and improving the experience for both applicants and hiring managers. At the same time, a new hiring application for faculty and academic professionals was introduced to better meet the needs of the academic community.
The Office of Human Resources' careers website features engaging information about working at the University and access to current job postings through a new application system for internal and external applicants. Hiring managers for staff positions can more efficiently manage their department's searches through the application system. The website and application system both have a responsive design for computers and mobile devices.
The careers website and application system are part of a broader, long-range effort by Human Resources (HR) to redefine how the University finds, attracts, hires and retains staff. The talent acquisition initiatives were developed by HR in partnership with the firms of Riviera Advisors, iCIMS, exaqueo and Groupbrand, and included extensive research through surveys, focus groups and interviews. Several committees of University staff also advised different stages of the initiatives.
"We have been working over the past two years to develop a long-term strategy to meet the University's current and future talent acquisition needs, as well as the needs of our internal and external job candidates," said Claire Jacobs Elson, assistant vice president for human resources. "Our goal is to promote Princeton as an employer of choice to find, attract, hire and retain highly talented, competent, diverse and engaged staff."
Centered around the message "More Impact Than You Can Imagine," the new careers site focuses on how every staff member has the opportunity to play an important role in supporting the University's teaching and research mission.
"We want the careers website to genuinely convey what it's like to work at Princeton. We feature personal stories from staff members about what they do and why they think working at Princeton is meaningful," Elson said.
She said the site will continue to evolve, with more content and functionality added over time.
"We view the launch as a foundation of our ongoing work to reach a wider group of applicants across the country and to improve the recruitment experience for both candidates and hiring managers," she said.
The application system makes it easier for candidates to apply for jobs, update their professional information in the system and monitor staff job opportunities at the University. Interested candidates can visit the careers website to join the University's Talent Network to receive updates about working at Princeton, and anyone can refer job postings directly from the application system to colleagues and friends.
For academic hiring, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty (DoF) recently launched the new AHIRE website for faculty and academic professional positions.
"AHIRE was a successful collaboration between my office, the Office of Information Technology (OIT) and the academic departments," Dean of the Faculty Deborah Prentice said. "I am delighted we were able to work together to develop a new hiring system that meets the needs of our community."
DoF and OIT developed the new website and application system so it was flexible for departments in all academic fields to use.
"Academic hiring is often managed differently than for staff," said Assistant Dean of the Faculty Lisa Scalice, who oversaw the AHIRE project with OIT. "The process may involve a single faculty member or academic professional, a committee or multiple academic units. A faculty committee within an academic unit, for example, usually works together to review candidates for faculty positions. This means that we need a system that provides functionality to sort, filter or rank qualified candidates."
Scalice added that academic units also have varying processes for how they manage applications.
"It was important to have a system that supported not only collaboration in reviewing candidates, but also customization to meet the particular needs of each unit," Scalice said.
She said AHIRE offers an improved experience for all users. Job candidates have just one page to complete in the initial online application, while academic administrators and faculty have an easier-to-use interface and greater capabilities for searching, sorting and reviewing applications.
The AHIRE software was based on a hiring application developed by the Department of Computer Science. To build a University-wide system, Scalice said the project team held focus groups with faculty and academic administrators, collecting input from approximately 60 academic units.
"Computer science offered us a great start," Scalice said. "We were then able to solicit feedback across campus and build a new site that gives academic units the flexibility and customization they want, while also maintaining overall University compliance."
Scalice said her office and OIT continue to collect feedback from academic units to update and add features to AHIRE.