Payton's Intern Guide to SPD

Hi Everyone!

These past couple weeks have been filled with many different projects and activities! After wrapping up the I-9 project with the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT), we got started on breaking down the Indiana School for the Blind and Visually Impaired (ISBVI) career fair metrics. This project consisted of recording and organizing data from the past two year’s career fairs. After recording the data we focused on deciding which data was useful and how we could turn that into helpful information. Our overall goal was to show what has been making the career fairs successful and how we can continue improving them. I really enjoyed this project because we got to use the information we learned from the system consultant last week and try to implement that in our own way.

The past couple weeks also consisted of two Agency Leadership Panel Discussions, which were planned for all the summer interns. This gave us the chance to listen to and learn about multiple different professionals. We received some great advice from everyone to help us with our journeys to the “real world.”

Finally, Shae and I got to wrap up the recruiting for the fall internship position! The past two weeks we helped with interviews for all of our chosen candidates.  It was a great experience to sit on the other side of the interview! It was so great to see all of our work recruiting for this position come together.

Our next two weeks will be spent at a different agency, the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV), so don’t miss out on the next blog!

Payton Reardon

HR Intern

Intern Words of Wisdom - by Shae

Last week, I participated in a lunch and learn hosted by our data analytics manger. His project is to provide relevant data to Human Resource Professionals within State Government. The main goals of using analytics are to drive the mission, find priorities, and analyze the impact of HR within the business. Allowing data analytics to show us quick wins in business processes allows us to reach these goals. These quick wins answer smaller questions such as turnover rate or find correlations between factors such as distance from work and retention. The quick wins don’t necessarily dictate projects, but they do influence choices. Moving forward, we want to use our HR data to forecast future trends which will allow us to become more proactive. This allows us to refine processes to improve the Indiana State Personnel Department as a whole. The better processes we have in place, the more efficient the HR staff will become. Gaining this data is a way to accurately measure the successes of the HR team. We are proving our worth one drill down at a time. We must remember to always have a benchmark to measure our success, as a number is only worth as much as its relativity. It was a joy to sit in this meeting, as I am always looking for ways to grow and improve.

Shae

Intern Words of Wisdom - Shae

As promised, I am going to share words of wisdom that I have received from my colleagues during my summer internship with the Indiana State Personnel Department. This past month has given me such rewarding and valuable experiences. I am unsure if I can really capture it all in words. For you, I will try. In the past few weeks, I was sent to several different agencies to complete human resource type projects for them, such as I-9 audits and documentation of past employee relations investigations. This allowed me to job shadow HR Generalists, HR Managers, and Employee Relations Managers. Given I just graduated, it is time to start figuring out which avenue I would like to take in my career path. Sitting in with these individuals gave me insights and first hand experiences that have really swayed my decisions. It has also opened my eyes to the fact that there are so many opportunities in State Government. All of these individual agencies need personnel to sit in the central office as well as some in the field all over Indiana. Many of the individuals I have met started in one agency, say Department of Corrections, and then moved to an HR Generalist role for Bureau of Motor Vehicles. Lateral moves happen all the time which allows these individuals to grow and understand a completely different avenue of the public sector, growing their public sector acumen.  Employees are aiding in the efforts to make the State of Indiana a better place to live and work. From my seat, they are succeeding.

During each meet and greet, my colleagues left me with some insight into the professional HR world. I would like to share some paraphrased accounts of them with you.

2.       Business Acumen

One must understand the business that they work for during their employment. You should understand the key metrics and performance measures that drive the company.  You should know the goals of your colleagues, which may mean adapting to their behavioral style in order to learn. This is important because not one gear turns the wheel. In order to gain this tacit knowledge, you must build relationships. This will include creating, cultivating and fostering relationships with many different colleagues.  Gaining their trust will excel your knowledge sharing even further. How do you gain this trust? You must jump in, stay accountable, get feedback, get better and top yourself. You will have shown your worth by building and showing your personal brand. Whatever you are, be a good one.

I am here to say, I am jumping in and ready to top myself. Are you willing to do the same?

Shae 

Payton's Intern Guide to SPD

Hello Everyone!

During the past few weeks I have had the opportunity to work on multiple projects in the Talent Acquisition (TA) division as well as travel to different agencies to see what their HR professionals did from day to day.

Throughout the past few weeks my fellow intern, Shae Siokos, and I have been continuously working on a Social Media plan for TA. Working on this has given me the chance to view social media as a recruiting tool rather than just for personal uses. We also have been working on recruiting for different jobs for TA.

Two weeks ago we visited with the Indiana School for the Blind and Visually Impaired (ISBVI). When we arrived I was amazed at how beautiful the school’s campus was, and felt lucky to visit there for the day. We shadowed the school’s HR director and had the chance to learn about the different tasks and challenges she faces regularly. This helped a lot because it put into perspective what a typical day in the HR world could look like. We also helped recruit and get the word out for the school’s career fair! Next week we will get to go to the actual career fair and see how it works from an employer’s side.

Earlier this week we met with a System Consultant. This was a very interesting meeting because we learned about HR metrics and how important they are. We learned how data can really improve a business or organization’s effectiveness and efficiency when you ask the right questions and observe the right correlations. Before this meeting I didn’t realize how much metrics could help the different departments in HR, but afterwards it sparked my interest and caused me to think of HR from many different perspectives. 

This past Tuesday we visited the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT). We job shadowed the HR Manager and the Executive Recruiter, and learned what they do from day to day. We also got the chance to start I-9 audits, which was an interesting project to work on. There were four binders full of I-9s that needed to be checked for completion and separated from the employees that currently work for INDOT, and from the employees that have separated from the state. I’m looking forward to going back next week to finish these audits!

I’m so grateful for everyone who is bringing us interns in, letting us tag along and giving us important advice, it helps a lot! I can’t wait for the next few weeks!

Payton Reardon

HR Intern

State Personnel Department 

SPD Welcomes Intern Payton!

Hello Everyone!

My name is Payton Reardon, and I am the summer intern for the Indiana State Personnel Department (SPD). I am from Avon, Indiana and have lived in Indiana for about 13 years. I will be a junior at Indiana University this coming fall, majoring in Human Resource Management with a minor in Business.  I plan to graduate May of 2018 and pursue a career in Human Resources. After I finally locked down my major in HR, this past year was when I really grew a passion for HR and started searching for internships. I found this summer internship opportunity through the School of Public and Environmental Affair’s career website. What really attracted me to this internship was all the different projects and departments in HR I would be exposed to. During my interview I learned more about the projects I would be doing and the culture I would be exposed to, and I decided it was the perfect summer job for me.

            Looking back at my first two weeks I am amazed at how much I have already learned. Within the first week of this internship I had the opportunity to have multiple meet and greets with the different directors within SPD and learn about what they do. By the second day I already had my first recruiting project in the Talent Acquisition division. During the first two weeks, I also had the opportunity to job shadow the Employee Relations and Benefits division, and through that I was able to meet their teams and learn about their day-to-day schedules.  

            In the two weeks I have been interning at SPD, I already feel like I have learned so much. It has been satisfying to be able to use what I have learned in classes and bring that knowledge into a real world experience. I am beyond excited to see what other opportunities I will have throughout the summer as I continue with my internship.