The Finance Committee met 01/24/2022. Most of the meeting was taken up with discussion about the city brand study and Resolution #2-R-22. They did, however, also discuss the status of the recruitment process for a new Public Works Director and a request from the Human Resources Department to use $35,000 in carryover funds from 2021 to hire a consultant to help fill the Public Works Director position.
Human Resources Director Jay Ratchman gave some background on the request to the committee. They started recruitment for the position on December 10, 2021 and held the application process open for over 6 weeks, closing it on January 16, 2022. A total of 10 candidates applied. One candidate met the qualifications, but there was a question on their background as to whether or not they had the actual experience for the position. That applicant ended up withdrawing, leaving no other candidates that the city considered to be qualified.
Director Ratchman said, “It’s very unique from the standpoint when I compare it to other director level positions. We have recruited over the past 12 months for a health officer, HR director, an IT Director, and we’re currently in interviews—well, we have interviews scheduled for the Finance Director position. In each of those hiring processes we had candidates that we wanted to consider for the position. Even the health officer position—I know that was open for a fairly long period of time—but even throughout that process, we had a good pool to consider. I think if you listen back to HR/IT committee, I was always filled with optimism and excitement about the candidates that we were interviewing.” This situation, however, was unique in that they didn’t have a list of candidates to interview. They could readvertise the position, but they already cast a wide net for the position and actively reached out to candidates that members of the HR Department or Public Works hoped would apply. that members of our department or from Public Works really admired and were hoping would apply.
The HR Department was now recommending that they take a more aggressive approach and contract with Employment Resource Group. That company would function like a headhunter. They would have three people who would work to bring in candidates for Appleton to consider.
He then offered to answer any questions
Alderperson Chad Doran (District 15) who was not a member of the committee said that throughout the hiring process for the Health Officer, Director Ratchman had expressed a lot of optimism about candidates and had expressed that that process went slowly because the timing wasn’t good. Given that they had only spent 6 weeks thus far on the Public Works Director position, Alderperson Doran wondered why the timing wasn’t going to change for this as it had for the Health Officer, particularly given that Director Vandehey was still going to be working for a few months and there were some Deputy Directors who could potentially fill in as an interim if the search went on past her departure date.
Director Ratchman said that the difference between the Public Works Director and the Health Officer positions was that with the Health Officer position they always had a strong pool to draw from. They had good candidates submit applications, and they had good candidates they interviewed who for various reasons decided to drop out. They reached the final stages of the hiring process with 4 different candidates.
The Public Works Director position was different because they didn’t have a candidate pool to even pull from and consider. They received over 40 applications for the Health Officer position and held over 14 different interviews, so even while they were losing candidates he could always look and see that there were still other people coming forward that were strong candidates. He could not say that about the Public Works Director hiring process.
He said that they could certainly readvertise, but in his professional opinion, he thought they would get a very similar outcome to what they had already experienced which is why he wanted to get more aggressive.
Alderperson Vered Meltzer (District 2) who was a member of the committee asked if the issue was that the candidates didn’t have sufficient qualifications or that there was just not sufficient interest in the position.
Director Ratchman said that for the candidates who applied, the problem was a lack of qualifications. As to why candidates were not applying, he couldn’t answer that other than to point out that this position required a really unique skill set. They were looking for candidates who have public works experience, an advanced degree, and preferably an engineering background. That was very different than when they were searching for an IT Director which is a position that exists both in the corporate world and the public sector, so they were drawing from a much larger pool.
Alderperson Doran asked if there was anything that prevented city staff from doing what this firm would do and go and seek candidates that were employed elsewhere. He recognized that they might not do it quite at the level of the employment firm, but had they thought about attempting it?
Director Ratchman said that from a time standpoint that would be really difficult. Firms like ERG network daily and would have three recruiters targeting candidates. The Human Resources Department didn’t have the resources to do that, particularly on top of the 2 pages of other positions they were recruiting for, dealing with employee relation issues, and Covid.
Alderperson Denise Fenton (District 6) who was not a member of the committee said that she had a conversation with Director Ratchman and discussed some of the things that were now being discussed in the committee. She had noted their optimism during the Health Officer process, so now if the HR Department was saying they didn’t have the resources to do this, she believed them. She noted that even large corporations that have large human resources departments make heavy uses of these types of firms to fill specific positions. She thought it was probably a testament to Director Vandehey that her shoes were so difficult to fill.
Alderperson Joe Martin (District 4) who was not on the committee praised Director Vandehey and her work over the years. He noted that she belonged to a few professional associations and wondered if she had shared with Director Ratchman the names of any people within those organizations.
Director Vandehey said that she had. She said that staff members had also been personally reaching out and meeting with people that they knew who they thought would do a good job as Public Works Director, but those efforts had not been successful.
Alderperson Martin asked if this position could be a co-position.
Director Ratchman said that was a discussion that was above his level. He was not overseeing the Department of Public Works so he didn’t know what collaborations could be created with another organization. He did know that before the city fills vacancies there is a lot of discussion about the best way to go about filling the position, she he assumed some of those conversations had already taken place at the mayor’s level and including Director Vandehey. He HR Department’s involvement begins once those discussions had been gone through and they determined the best way to fill the position. In answer to Alderperson Martin’s question, he didn’t know what a collaboration for that position would be, but he did know that those discussions happen before the city moves to fill vacancies like this.
There was no further discussion and the committee voted 5-0 to approve the use of $35,000 to hire a consultant to help find more candidates for the Public Works Director position.
Although I haven’t recapped the discussion, the Human Resources and Information Technology Committee did also vote to approve contracting with Employment Resources Group, Inc to provide those services.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=921479&GUID=F3E54127-9E2B-4E8F-8D2A-13B9B918D3F1
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