Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

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Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Corp, GUASFCU Welcome New Hires

COURTESY THE CORP Both Georgetown University Alumni and Student Federal Credit Union (left) and The Corp finished their hiring seasons earlier this week. While acceptance rates for the former remained competitive, The Hilltoss opened up 15 additional spots in the Corp for potential employees.
COURTESY THE CORP
Both Georgetown University Alumni and Student Federal Credit Union (left) and The Corp finished their hiring seasons earlier this week. While acceptance rates for the former remained competitive, The Hilltoss opened up 15 additional spots in the Corp for potential employees.

As the rigorous application season for on-campus clubs wraps up, Students of Georgetown Inc. and Georgetown University Alumni and Student Federal Credit Union are welcoming their fall 2014 new hires. While the latter’s acceptance rate continued to remain competitive, The Corp’s overall hiring rate increased because of additional positions available through The Hilltoss.

Of the around 200 applicants for GUASFCU — a higher number of potential interns than in the past — fewer than 20 were accepted.

“We are looking for someone who is passionate to learn and is looking for a great community to join,” GUAFSCU CEO Laura Krivacek (COL ’15) said. “We are not looking specifically for business school students. I’m in the college and was a biology major when I joined.”

The typical hiring process remained the same — all applicants were invited for first-round interviews and several more were called back for second-round interviews before final decisions were made. New efforts were made to give interested students a chance to experience GUASFCU culture before applying.

“We [hosted] optional coffee chats before interviews. If one of the applicants wanted to learn more about the credit union in a smaller setting, they were paired up with one of our current interns,” Krivacek said. “I believe they were a great success this year, and we look forward to continuing them next semester.”

The Corp also maintained traditional pre-interview processes, including dorm storming, passing out informational packets and putting up posters around campus, and Director of Human Resources Mike Mezzino (MSB ’15) credited Kickback, the Labor Day music festival hosted by The Corp and Welcome Week, as functioning as a large marketing push this semester.

“I don’t think we put maybe as much time into our hiring and marketing efforts as we have in previous years because we spent so much time on Kickback. But at the same time, I think it had the same result, of getting people to really turn out and get excited about joining The Corp,” Mezzino said.

Application numbers fell close to the normal range of between 360 to 380 applicants, with Corp leadership estimating 365 applicants this year. With The Hilltoss hiring more candidates to flesh out their staff, the Corp’s overall acceptance rate increased to almost 18 percent, up from last year’s 13 percent acceptance rate.

“The allocation of people to services was kind of different, depending on whether it was a bigger store or a smaller store. I think our smallest hiring class was IT, which was just two people, and the largest one was Hilltoss with 15. The second largest was Midnight Mug, which was 11,” Mezzino said.

Different storefronts were more selective, however, including Vittles, with 150 people applying for nine spots — a 6 percent acceptance rate — primarily because it is one of the more visible places on campus, Mezzino said.

Different services also sought different types of candidates that not only promised to be a good fit for The Corp, but for that service’s specific culture. Along with store fit, professionalism and a sense of commitment were also taken into consideration across departments.

“The director of personnel organizes hiring process for each storefront. Their staffing needs are different,” Mezzino said. “The director of The Hilltoss has a term where she likes to say, she’s looking for someone with bright eyes. She’ll go into detail and explain that just means people that are really motivated, really excited to be there, that are going to really commit and become part of the team.”

After rounds of putting up flyers, hosting coffee chats, receiving applications and interviewing, both Mezzino and Krivacek are looking forward to their welcoming their new hires to their respective organizations.

“It was definitely a really successful season for us. We’re really happy about the results, really happy about all of our new hires. I’ve had the opportunity to meet a few of them and I think it’s going to be a really great semester,” Mezzino said.

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