Todd from Talent Acquisition
Download MP3We know our services and programs impact you, so let's talk about them. Together, we'll learn from the people behind the scenes and get to know our city a little better. From the city of Winnipeg, this is Our City, Our Podcast.
Natalie:This podcast is recorded in Treaty 1 territory, the home and traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Ininew, and Dakota peoples, and the national homeland of the Red River Metis. We acknowledge that our drinking water comes from Shoal Lake 40 First Nation in Treaty 3 territory.
Shannay:Hi. I'm Shannay.
Natalie:And I'm Natalie.
Shannay:Okay. So today's episode is a little different because we're making it for someone in a very specific situation.
Natalie:And we know this situation can, for a lot of people, be a really stressful time.
Shannay:But we're here for you, and we're gonna take it step by step.
Natalie:That's right. We're talking about applying for a job. And if you're applying to work at the city, consider this podcast your cheat sheet.
Shannay:We've got the inside scoop with Todd Demers, one of the city's talent acquisition specialists with the City of Winnipeg.
Natalie:Hi, Todd. Thanks for joining us.
Todd:Thanks for having me.
Natalie:Well, actually, we're really lucky you could fit us in. You were out at something like what? Was it a 40 recruitment events last year?
Todd:Yeah. It's been a pretty busy year for us at Talent Acquisition. Our whole team has been, yeah, doing about a 40 to a 50 events last year from career fairs, employment presentations, networking sessions. So we are always out and about, which is really nice. It really just, you know, is 1 of the things that takes up a lot of our time, but also is a big passion for us.
Todd:But it's only a portion of our job too. We really do so many different things. We work with different career groups and different employment agents to kind of help the community with how to understand what we have for jobs at the city. We just do, yeah, so very much where we're really just helping people develop into careers, grow a little bit, understand a little bit more about all the different kinds of jobs we have, and and that's just kind of the external stuff.
Natalie:And you're also supporting departments?
Todd:Yeah. We also help a lot of our departments with their hiring needs, provide them some information and support and guidance on recruitment practices. We do things like three one one has a request about HR. They usually send it to us, and we answer those or work with our departments to answer those. We help with internships.
Todd:We help with our talent pools. We're hiring summer students, like, really just we're we're nonstop for our little team.
Shannay:I'm excited for this chat because we've all been there looking for a job and wondering what the employer is looking for and how to stand out. So the plan here is to pull some of that information out of you today to help our listeners. But I guess we need to start with some context. So the city of Winnipeg is a pretty unique employer, wouldn't you say?
Todd:Yeah. Absolutely. We have, you know, around 10000 employees, which means so many different kinds of jobs and a pretty wide range of types of jobs too. Right? Like, everything from being an office worker to doing maintenance to doing finance to being an engineer to being an IT person.
Todd:It's all city jobs, which, makes it pretty interesting to work here.
Natalie:And I think 1 of the best ways to to maybe look at a career path of the City of Winnipeg is for you, Todd, to actually share a little bit, if you don't mind, about your career. You know, actually, it's funny. I, right before Christmas, met the person over at three one one who hired you. He remembers the interview and that was fifteen years ago.
Todd:Yeah. It definitely was fifteen years ago which feels wild. That was a such a it feels like such a long time ago but also that my whole career has been with the city. But three one one is definitely where I got my start and I was there for five years and I did everything I could possibly do with three one one. I was on their calls.
Todd:I was on their email team. I was on their social media team. I did quality assurance, some supervising, and then I got into training with them. And when I was with training, I kind of realized that working with our internal staff was where a bit more of my passions lied, and that helped me kind of move my career path. I think one of the best parts about working for the city is the amount of opportunities we have here.
Todd:There's so much room to grow whether you're into a different department or you're into a different position or just promoting from where you are. So when I was there, I realized that I wanted to work in HR. So I moved to our Winnipeg transit department. And I loved working with them, but it was a very short period of time because they helped me get my introduction to HR. And and then I eventually moved to our corporate HR department and our staffing branch, which talent acquisition used to be called.
Todd:And through there, I help people do things like typing tests, their Microsoft Word tests, got to see a lot of people coming down all the time. And then I went back to school and eventually got promoted in the position I'm in today. So moving into a talent acquisition specialist role, getting to do all those fun things like career fairs, podcasts, all those great opportunities, and that really just helped me really develop my career. And starting at three one one was an awesome opportunity because it helped me realize how many other departments were out there and how everybody worked together.
Natalie:So in other words, you can start with one job, but you don't have to stay there.
Todd:Yeah. So we really wanna help our employees be retained here, but also grow in their careers. So we have a lot of great courses that you can take as an employee. There's a lot of great training that you can go through, and just so many different opportunities where you can grow within your own career or just grow within the city. I wouldn't do work that I don't love, so being part of the city and being part of the communities I get to work with all the time really is just 1 of the most rewarding parts of the job.
Shannay:Okay. So for the rest of this podcast, Natalie and I are gonna put ourselves in the mindset of an external candidate looking for a position at the city. And before we even get to the point of submitting a resume, we have a few things to clear up. Because some people might be counting themselves out too early. For example, say I'm a student in a specialized program.
Shannay:I'm a few months away from graduation. Do I need to wait to graduate?
Todd:So you don't need to wait to graduate. You do need to make sure that you have the actual required qualifications of the position you're applying for. So if you already have those qualifications, whether you learn them in school, whether you already had some job experience, whatever it may be, or if it's an entry level job or a post grad job, then absolutely you can apply. We usually ask that you let us know when you're graduating so we at least have that information. It's a good thing to put in your cover letter and list on your resume.
Todd:Also, when you're looking to apply, it's usually good to take about a month or two before you actually graduate to start the application process. Our recruitments can take a little bit of time sometimes. So if you're applying about a month or two ahead of time, that might be close to when we're actually doing the final hiring.
Natalie:Okay. Alright. Here's another one. What if I've spent the last ten years abroad and my professional experience isn't Canadian work experience?
Todd:Yeah. So it's okay if you don't have Canadian work experience. It's a pretty big misconception that you need to have that Canadian work experience, especially to work with us at the city and government, but that's just not true. Experience is experience wherever it's from. So we really just want you to be able to show us and demonstrate to us how you have the experience we're looking for.
Todd:Whether it's from another country, another province, doesn't matter as long as, again, you're just showing us how you really demonstrate the qualifications that we're looking for in the job you're applying for.
Natalie:And in that theme, what if I don't currently live in the city of Winnipeg?
Todd:Yeah. That's okay too. You do have to be able to get to your kind of work location. So most job postings have a designated work location listed. Usually, you have to be able to get there within, you know, maybe an hour or two.
Todd:We have a lot of people who live outside city limits and then they travel in and just come to their designated work locations. But then if you're also living far away, if you're in another country, another province, you can always let us know if you're willing to relocate.
Shannay:Okay. Nice. So now this is a tricky one. What if in the past you've fallen into trouble with the law?
Todd:Yeah. So again, a lot of people think that it's impossible to work with government if you have a conviction or a charge. It's not necessarily true. We would just look to see how the conviction or a charge relates to the job that you're applying for and also when it's from, kind of what it was, and sometimes exceptions can be made. Big thing to keep in mind about police record checks is that it's also not 1 of the documents that you need when you apply for a job.
Todd:Some people will get it a little bit too early. It does cost money, and we don't want you having to go through that process unless it's required. So we always say, if you do require it, it'll be 1 of the last stages of the recruitment usually either before we've offered you the job or if it's a condition of your offer, and we'll let you know how to go through it, when to go through it, what exactly you need so you can make sure that you only get it when it's required and you get the proper check that we need.
Natalie:Okay. So hopefully, we have more people counting themselves in and we'll move on now to deciphering that job posting. Okay. Yeah. You go to winnipeg.cacareers.
Natalie:You find a posting you know you'd be great for but you only have 80% maybe of of what the job posting is asking for. Is it worth applying?
Todd:Yeah. It's definitely worth applying but it really depends on kind of where that 80% lies. Lies. So we have different types of qualifications. Some are requirements.
Todd:There's conditions of employment, things like being legally able to work in Canada. There's specific qualifications that are required, such as having maybe a certain level of experience. But then a lot of times, we'll have things that are preferred qualifications. So if you don't have it, that's okay. But if you did, it might just be a bit of a leg up.
Todd:Also, sometimes we have equivalencies. So maybe we're looking for somebody who has a grade 12 education, but we're just looking for an equivalent combination of training experience. So you only have your grade 11, but you've done similar work or you have similar experience that gets you there, that's probably okay too. So if it's a required qualification, you need it, but there's a lot of options to kind of have a bit of wiggle room there.
Shannay:Okay. Good to know. So next up, the cover letter and resume. What are some things you've seen in these submissions that just aren't necessary?
Todd:Yeah. So a few things that we don't need are things like your headshot, your, you know, birth date, your number of children, all that kind of really personal information that just has nothing to do with us hiring you, is just not necessary. However, the things that we really do need to see are, you know, again, demonstrating how you meet those qualifications specifically.
Natalie:Another one I've heard a lot about, you know, myth or fact. What about typos and spelling errors in your resume and in your cover letter? Is that an immediate fail?
Todd:So it's not an immediate fail. It would be ideal if you can use like a spell check or just make sure that you're looking over the document you're providing to us prior to submitting your application. But it's really just important that you're double checking that you have the actual information that we're looking for. We're not necessarily gonna disqualify just because you have a typo in there. You know, we're humans.
Todd:We're reading this information. We're manually reviewing these applications. So we understand what you're submitting to us and it's really about the content that you're providing. But But again, you want it to be a professional looking document and you wanna make sure that you're providing us all the information that we need.
Shannay:Would it be fair to say one of the biggest overall tips we can offer here today is that you need to be creating custom resumes?
Todd:100%. The qualifications on the job posting, I really consider the answer key. So if you can look at that information and then customize your resume and cover letter to show us how you meet those qualifications, especially the education and experience, that's really what's gonna help you the most. Because again, we're reading these applications, we're reading your resume, and we're comparing it to those qualifications. So if we know how you meet those, that's what's getting you screened in.
Todd:1 tip that I can also provide is to get somebody you know to look over your application, your resume, your cover letter, and really compare it to those qualifications on the job posting and see if they feel like you've demonstrated how you meet those qualifications. If they're finding that there's gaps, then how can you fill those in? Or what can you do to maybe rewrite some of the information you provided us to help us, again, really understand how you'd be the person qualified for this position?
Natalie:Good tip. K. Another good refresher here. For some, it's been a while since they've had to write a cover letter and a resume. What are the differences that you you expect to see in the cover letter compared to the resume?
Todd:Yeah. So the cover letter is a good first impression to a recruiter. So it's really the first thing that we'll see that helps us understand who you are, maybe why you're applying for this job, a little bit about your experience, but it's also really focused more on the paper screen of your education experience. The resume, it's a little bit different. You're having it a little bit more drawn out for the experience you actually have, and you're listing your education, your experience, your skills so we really understand how you'd be the person that's the right fit for the position.
Shannay:Okay. Back to the application journey. So let's say you nailed it with your submission, the job posting closes, a week goes by and you hear nothing. So the person assumes, well, I guess I didn't have what they're looking for. Can you speak to that?
Todd:Yeah. For sure. So I think the first thing to keep in mind is that because we manually review applications, sometimes the recruitment process takes a little bit longer than people are expecting. I get people who ask me a week later if they've got the job yet, and, you know, usually we're still reviewing applications. Sometimes it takes about a month to three months for us to go through a full recruitment, so I ask people to be patient.
Todd:But we also have a really great new tool on our website where when you apply for a job, you can look at all the jobs you've applied to, and you can see the status of those jobs. So whether it be, you know, a position that's still ongoing, if it's been completed, you'll see those updates so you at least know kind of where things are at. And then, of course, if you're moving forward, we're gonna call you or email you, let you know exactly what to expect, what the next steps are, and that you're moving forward in the process.
Natalie:Okay, all star applicant. Here we are a few months later. You're tapped for that interview. Now tell us, Todd, how does the city go about about making that contact? What happens next?
Natalie:Also, you know, how many people get invited to this actual next stage for an interview?
Todd:Yeah. So the number of people who get invited can be a little bit different. It depends on how many positions we're hiring for. The average is about 3 to 5 people being invited per position, but sometimes it's a little bit more, sometimes it's a little bit less. We'll usually reach out to you via email.
Todd:So I always tell people to keep a good eye on their emails, check your spam folder if you've applied for jobs. Unfortunately, sometimes emails go there too. And then sometimes we will call, but it's usually via email. And then if you're being invited, you're usually being invited for either an assessment or an interview. So if it's the interview, we try to do 1 interview to kind of cover everything, and it's usually a panel interview.
Todd:So they'll usually be somebody from the HR department and then also somebody from the hiring team. So maybe a supervisor that you're gonna be working with or a subject matter expert that's actually on the job. And we do a lot of different things in interviews. Usually, though, it's a behavior based interview where we're asking you to tell us a bit of a story about what you've done in a previous situation to help us understand how you would deal with a similar situation going forward.
Shannay:Alright, everyone. If you're still with us on this, this would be a good time to get out a pen and paper. These are things I've always wanted to ask someone like you in the know. So how are we going to ace this interview?
Todd:Yeah. So the biggest thing to keep in mind for acing an interview, especially if it's a behavior based interview, is the STAR model. Remember STAR. You wanna be a STAR, answer with a STAR model. What we do is we tell people to give us the situation they were in.
Todd:So that's the s. So what were you doing in this story you're telling us about and kind of how were you a part of the story? Then the t is the task. So what were you actually doing in the role? What was your assignment?
Todd:How were you helping somebody if it's a customer service job? Just what specifically was your duty? So the A is the biggest one. The A is the actions because we wanna focus on what you did and what specifically your actions were. So again, the situation's kind of setting the stage and the t is telling us how you were involved but the actions are really all about what you did, how the story came together based on what you were doing, and not necessarily what everybody was doing.
Todd:You know, it's not what your supervisor did or what your coworker did unless it's really relevant to the story. But we wanna focus on you hearing how you were a part of this and how you really kind of brought it to the end which brings us to the r which is the result. We need to know how the whole story wrapped up. So a lot of people like to gloss over. You know, they tell us the full story but then I don't know how it ended and it's really important to know how it ended too.
Todd:So tell us that result and tell us really what you did and if you can tell us that full story, that's really what's gonna help you the most in the interview.
Natalie:Say you're, you you know, you're nervous or or or, you know, you need some kind of accommodation, is is is are these things you can ask for?
Todd:Absolutely. So if you're nervous, you know, we've been there. We've gone through interviews. We've all been interviewed at the city to get the jobs we're in. So we know what it's like and we're not there to stress you out.
Todd:We don't wanna make you anxious or anything like that. We wanna just make sure that you're comfortable. So if it's something as easy as getting some water or taking a few extra moments to think about your answer, that's perfectly fine. If you wanna skip an answer and come back to it and think about it later, that's okay too. And then if it really is an accommodation, if you need to, you know, maybe you have anxiety and you want the questions printed out for you so you can read along with them, you can absolutely ask for that.
Todd:There's so many different types of accommodations that people might need, really just depending on personal needs. But I always say that if you have an accommodation and you think there's something we can do for you, just ask. We're people. We're trying to make this work for you, and we want to hire you. We're not trying to trick you or something.
Todd:We wanna make sure that this is a comfortable situation. We wanna make sure that you're the successful person because everybody we're interviewing, we hope is successful. And if we can do anything to make that easier, please let us know.
Natalie:Okay. On those those tricky kind of questions, this is when you might Google and find or or see on a television show. Tell us about your great weakness. You ask that kind of question?
Todd:We don't ask that kind of question.
Natalie:I never know what to say.
Todd:For sure. It's a tough question and we don't usually ask those kind of questions or questions like, what kind of animal would you be if you were an animal? Those kind of things. What we're really doing is we're asking questions based on, again, the qualifications of the job. I've said qualifications a lot during the our time talking today, but the qualifications are absolutely the key.
Todd:And if you can demonstrate how you meet those qualifications, that's how you're being successful. And the interview is no different from the resume and cover letter in that we're looking for the same qualifications listed on the job posting. So when you're preparing for an interview with us, read over the job posting, ask us for a copy of the job posting if you don't already have 1 and then you can use that to kind of brainstorm to think about the types of situations you might wanna talk about or the type of experience you might have to try to really demonstrate during the interview.
Shannay:K. So years ago before my interview with the city, I was advised that it was important to know the city's core values. Is that still a thing?
Todd:It's not quite still a thing. We still, of course, have core values and it's always really important to, you know, look on our website and try to understand the values of the organization you're applying with. However, our core competencies used to be listed on all of our job postings, and they're really built into all of our other qualifications now. For instance, if you were applying a three one one looking for something like customer focus and customer support, that's gonna be built into your customer service experience.
Shannay:What is your opinion on follow ups after an interview? If I were to reach out after and just thank thank you for the time and, have any follow-up questions. What's your overall opinion on that?
Todd:Yeah. I mean, if you're following up just to thank us or if you have specific questions that you need answers to, you can, of course, always do that. You can reach out to the person who invited you for the interview. But generally, we're not able to give, like, a bit of an update at that point. Usually, we're still in the decision making process for deciding who that final applicant is gonna be, and we usually can't give any feedback until the final process has been completed.
Todd:So if we're looking for for feedback and you're not successful through the interview, we'll always let you know as well even if you are not successful. And then at that point, if you have additional feedback you're looking for, you can always come to us and ask.
Natalie:I have a bit of a a human resources industry question and that is, you know, the whole interview task is is kind of universally nerve wracking. And and, you know, in recent years, some have criticized it as not being the best assessment tool. Where's the city on that?
Todd:Yeah. So I think that the interview is a good tool depending on the type of qualification that you're assessing. It's not always the best tool for every qualification, but we try to do a lot of different types of assessing through the whole process. Whether it be through their screening, through your resume, that's good for your education and your experience. But then some things we're gonna ask you those behavior based questions on and the best way to assess it is by talking to you directly.
Todd:But a lot of times we'll also do assessments. So maybe it's a typing test if you're gonna be doing typing as part of your job. Maybe we're gonna assess you on doing coding if you're an IT position. We really want to actually see you do some of those things and just asking you about them isn't always gonna be the best tool so using our assessment methods really can help along the way too.
Shannay:Okay. So let's say I've made it to the last step. Am I hired? Can we expect that that's something you'll find out during the interview?
Todd:So during the interview, you usually will not find out if you're hired. Again, we're usually interviewing a few people, so we have to go back and assess to see who is the best qualified candidate. But we will let you know afterwards even if you were successful. If you weren't successful, we'll let you know for sure. If you weren't successful, you can always ask us for some additional feedback.
Todd:And if you were, then we'll let you know the next steps. Sometimes it's getting your police information checked. Sometimes there's reference checks or we'll let you know when you start the position, everything like that.
Natalie:And and, you know, final question. If you you don't make it through this process, you're not hired, what about applying to jobs more than once?
Todd:Yeah. We absolutely encourage you to apply for multiple positions. There's no limit for the number of jobs you can apply to as long as you're applying to positions that you're qualified for and interested in. The other thing to keep in mind too is that if you've applied to a job already and you weren't successful, it's totally fine for you to reapply. There's lots of people who have been in with the city who didn't get it on their first try, and that's totally fine.
Todd:Every recruitment is a little bit different, and we wanna make sure that if you're successful in moving forward in that process, that we're giving you a fair shot every time.
Natalie:Okay. And and that is it for for our discussion of the the journey into to acquiring a job here at the city of Winnipeg. But, Todd, before you leave us, really broad question, but 1 we love to ask everyone as their final question is, if you could share, 1 thing about Winnipeg that you wish everyone knew.
Todd:So I'm a bit of a city job nerd. I'm always really fascinated by all the kinds of different jobs that we have through the city and the different types of positions and work people can do here. So 1 job that I think is really interesting that probably not a lot of people think about is the buyer. And usually, I think when you think of buyers, you'd probably think of the person who buys office supplies for all the city offices. But these are the people who buy things like helicopters or all the things you need to build a bridge.
Todd:You know, they buy fire trucks and buses. They also buy trees for all the city trees that we have that need to be planted, playground equipment. So I I think that's 1 of the neat jobs at the city that a lot of people probably don't think about.
Natalie:That's a great place to leave it. Well, thank you so much.
Shannay:Yeah. Thank you, Todd. And listeners, we look forward to working with you.
Natalie:Coming up on the next episode of our City, Our podcast. Alright. It's Feb. It's cold.
Natalie:But it sure is nice to think about getting out and getting active.
Shannay:Mhmm. I'm so ready to get outside. Let's talk active transportation on next month's podcast.
Natalie:And before we go, we'd love to hear from our listeners. What programs and services impact you most? Email us at city-podcast@winnipeg.ca with suggestions for future episodes. Thanks for listening.
