April 2022

With so many UWF units focused on hiring, we wanted to highlight some of these efforts and share strategies. Here are some of the steps the Building Services Department has been taking in the last year, as described by Interim Director Liz Gignilliat:

Application process
BSD revised some of our application processes to focus on equity and accessibility. Last year, our leadership team used the UW’s Staff Diversity Hiring Toolkit as a resource to edit the custodian job description and interview process. In addition, we re-post jobs frequently to keep the application accessible for interested candidates. 

Ads and flyers
Our department is trying new methods in 2022 to advertise about open positions. BSD is currently posting advertisements highlighting our dayshift positions on King County Metro and Sound Transit buses and light rail, as well as on the UW's Health Sciences Express. The advertisements feature current BSD staff members.

BSD also created job flyers highlighting our open positions and benefits. These flyers are distributed at libraries, community centers and other locations all over the greater Seattle area. We offer these flyers to employees as well; our department often gets great candidates from current staff referring friends and family.

Job fairs and community outreach
We’ve attended several virtual and local in-person job fairs in the last six months. With events ramping up recently, we hope to attend more in the future.

Our department started new partnerships with local community organizations that help people find, train for and apply to jobs, such as Neighborhood House, ACRS (Asian Counseling & Referral Service), ReWA (Refugee Women’s Alliance), and Mary’s Place. 

Hiring and onboarding
To better stay in touch with applicants who may not check their email often, BSD uses the UW-IT Text Messaging service to make sure they are aware of necessary communications during the hiring process. And once hired, we’ve streamlined the onboarding process so custodial staff get to their assigned work areas quicker, while still ensuring they get all their necessary training. 

These are several changes BSD has implemented to increase our hiring impact. We are constantly adapting our outreach efforts as we learn more about the current hiring landscape. Most of these efforts are completely new to BSD, but we hope this builds a foundation for future recruitment and retention work.

 

Welcome to our newest employees:  Alexander Butler, Custodian Area F, BSD; Ariel Ladrillono, Custodian Area C, BSD; Charles Mathews, Program Coordinator Records, Engineering Services; Cody Mills, Power Plant Operating Engineer 1, CEUO; Jeanne Lamont, Administrative Assistant 3, PDG; Joey Devaney, Custodian Area C, BSD; Kat Turcotte, Maintenance Zone Project Coordinator, M&C; Kate Lee, Custodian Area C, BSD; Liang Chen, Custodian Area C, BSD; Michael Lindsay, Electrician Shop 53, M&C; Patrick Finnell, Construction Project Manager, PDG; Rebeca Tesfamariam, Custodian Area C, BSD; Sean Perez, Custodian Area D, BSD; Tony LaMothe, Custodian Area C, BSD.

Congratulations to the following people on their new roles here in UW Facilities: Adam Fox, Materials Management Program Coordinator; M&C; Jeff Wilcox, Power Plant Mechanic, CEUO; Nicole Kerr, Administrator-Program Operations, Real Estate; Patrick Day, Maintenance Supervisor 2 Shop 69, CEUO. Read more about employee moves.