Drumming up excitement and hiring good, reliable students to serve on your student staff is a task during a non-pandemic year. Creating and executing a virtual full cycle staff recruiting and interview process that proves to be impactful and successful for both those conducting the interview and those participating as the interviewee presented a huge learning curve. This process was shown to be both challenging and eye opening for our staff this year. For those conducting virtual interviews and assessment here are a few takeaways from my experience overseeing this process:
1. Make sure the student (and you) fully understands how to use and navigate the application site
I used a new-to-Heidelberg application, Handshake. It was obvious that our student applicants either had very little knowledge of the application site—which seemed to limit our applicant pool—or they did not know how to access the application site successfully by fully registering as a student user. A simple tutorial prior to applications opening would have been a great solution to this problem. If a secondary application is needed, for us it was as Handshake did not meet the full needs of our application process, make sure students are checking their emails regularly so they have every chance to complete their application.
2. Communication is key
When it comes to recruitment, application deadlines, interview registration, and day of follow up, communication across several platforms in addition to email is very helpful. This would be an area, if I could do it over again, I would have worked with my current student staff more. Information is disseminated easier through social media. This type of communication would have been the best way for updates to be initially sent out, with an email follow up. Wording of interview questions also was something that could have been communicated better. Using language that was more relatable and clear would have decreased the amount of clarifying questions we received.
3. Make assessment fun and interactive
We all know asking students to submit feedback of any kind is like pulling teeth. Finding new and unique ways to pull ideas out of students and get honest feedback is so important. Changing from our original format of using a Google Form to a Jam Board is how we are collecting data this year and it should give students a more creative outlet to give feedback.
After concluding our process, my team missed having in-person interviews. We were able to focus on the positives of access that was provided to all students to participate in our process from anywhere but hope we can return to a hybrid interview model during our next application cycle. This process is draining and tedious to navigate, but was nice to help our student applicants navigate the virtual interview space.
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