UNICON Sources The Best Talent Regardless Of Location And Backs It Up With Strong Training And Diversity Programs
UNICON Sources The Best Talent Regardless Of Location And Backs It Up With Strong Training And Diversity Programs
By MobileWirelessJobs / MobileContentJobs
July 2006
As part of our new Q&A interview series with hiring managers, MobileWirelessJobs recently caught up with Holly Solomon, Technical Recruiter at UNICON International, Inc., to learn more about her company’s staffing, training and compliance plans. The Q&A series is a new featured column in MobileContent Careers.
MWJ= MobileWirelessJobs.com; HS= Holly Solomon.
MWJ: Is your company a supporter of affirmative action?
HS: UNICON International, Inc. is fully committed to the concept and practice of equal opportunity and affirmative action in all aspects of employment. UNICON has recently developed its first formal Affirmative Action Plan (AAP) to reinforce this commitment.
We are proud of the progress we have made on the diversity front which was confirmed by AAP analysis that showed for the overwhelming majority of our workforce, employment levels of women and minorities are representative of the recruiting population. Nonetheless, UNICON expects to continue its successful outreach efforts and to ensure that all applicants and employees are treated fairly and based on job-related criteria.
It should also be noted that UNICON was found to be in full compliance with sex discrimination guidelines and that there is no evidence of discrimination in any form against female employees.
MWJ: What type of training program does your company have? What is the goal of your training programs?
HS: UNICON offers group training to provide opportunities for employees to enhance their professional skills. The program includes workshops or seminars sponsored by UNICON for all employees, dependent upon work location. All UNICON employees are encouraged to participate.
We also offer up to $2000 per year in educational assistance reimbursement for outside workshops, seminars, professional membership fees, certifications, for-credit courses, books, and other education-related costs. This educational assistance program is intended to facilitate further enhancement of our employees’ performance and professional abilities.
MWJ: Who do you choose to handle training? Is it outsourced or done in-house? If it is in-house, who is responsible for the training?
HS: Both. In-house is performed by seasoned developers and professionals on staff.
MWJ: What methods are used to track resumes? Can you recite what sources are working for you, and which are not?
HS: We use a proprietary applicant tracking system to maintain records of each candidate including resumes. We utilize a variety of sources. Being in the IT industry, Dice seems to be very productive as well as Craigslist. We do utilize Monster and a few obscure online resources. In addition, a few of our recruiters are taking advantage of services like LinkedIn.com or local user groups to help them find new pools of candidates.
MWJ: Are resumes submitted on-line and off-line handled differently? Is it better for a jobseeker to submit his/her resume on-line?
HS: We prefer online resume submission. If we receive a paper resume, we request an online submittal so we may add them to our database.
MWJ: How quick is the turn around between sourcing the candidate, interviewing the candidate, offering the candidate a position, and hiring the candidate? Is this process any faster when the resume is submitted on-line vs. offline, or is there no difference?
HS: This varies widely dependent on the job, the client and the candidate. On-line is probably minimally faster.
MWJ: What has been your experience with job boards? Have you been more successful searching the resume database than posting jobs?
HS: We feel that attacking it from both ends works best. Going out to find best-fit candidates on the boards as well as funneling them to us through the use of online ads gets us the best return.
MWJ: Do you accept resumes from job seekers in other geographic locations outside of your office locations? If so, what amount?
HS: We accept resumes from all over. In fact, we have a few international openings at this time. We find that it benefits UNICON and the clients we serve to provide the best talent independent of the employee’s current location.
Relocation is dependent on the candidate’s location, the location of the job, and other factors. Typically we offer $1500.00 or more.
MobileContent Careers is the monthly eNewsletter of MobileWirelessJobs. Each issue contains one or more HR interviews of the top employers in the mobile content and wireless industries. These interviews help our candidates learn more about the companies listed on MobileWirelessJobs beyond what can be found in a job posting. Our research has shown that employers who participate in our HR interview receive a much greater resume response for their time and effort.
