Can Students Contribute to the Recruitment of Staff? New Approaches to Partnership Working at the University of Worcester

In this age of change, universities are increasingly developing roles which seek to work with students in partnership. But how often do these roles demonstrate that partnership working ethos in the recruitment process?

At the University of Worcester, Library Services have started routinely involving students in recruitment. Spurred on by the development of a new role in 2015, that of Student Engagement Co-ordinator, we decided to revamp our recruitment processes, with particular reference to the work related exercises we asked candidates to undertake. Moving away from the traditional presentation, we now ask candidates to get involved in such activities as running focus groups, speed-dating and micro-teaching. Crucial to the success of these activities is student representation. Students are now invited to join these activities for the recruitment of all student-facing roles, ensuring the student voice feeds into the overall decision making process about candidates.

Co-delivered by a librarian and a student who has first-hand experience of recruiting in this way, this session will:
- Outline the kinds of activities that students have been involved in
- Showcase some of the benefits of this approach and feedback that we’ve had, from students, candidates and other staff
- Discuss the challenges of recruitment, training and management
- Discuss some of our plans for the future, including rolling out more widely across the university