STRIVE may have been cancelled this year, but that’s not stopping us from learning a thing or two from the recruiting leaders who were set to speak! We caught up with West Monroe’s Stephanie Scott to learn more about her team’s early talent recruiting strategy, learn how she and her team are partnering with university career centers, and more.

Tell us a bit about West Monroe.

West Monroe is a national consulting firm that was born in technology but built for business—partnering with companies in transformative industries to deliver real, measurable results. Technology is who we are, it is not something we bolted on overnight, and we believe it is one of the greatest enablers of business value. That’s why we work in diverse, multidisciplinary teams that blend industry expertise with deep operational and technology capabilities to create quantifiable, financial value for our clients. Our 1,400 employees also own 100% of our business, so when you partner with us you know we are committed—because your success is our success. 

How did you get started in early talent recruitment? What interests you most about it?

When I joined West Monroe in 2008, I was hired to focus on office operations, but also got the chance to support our talent acquisition team. I quickly fell in love with all things recruiting, but especially enjoyed the enthusiasm that comes from working with college students. There is nothing more fulfilling than giving someone their first job out of college. I also like how college recruitment is always evolving— it keeps me and my team on our toes and gives us the freedom to be very creative with our approach on campus every year.

In the past year, what professional accomplishment are you most proud of?

I’m incredibly proud of my team and what we’ve been able to accomplish. In the past year, we’ve hired over 250 people into our campus programs but on top of our day job, we’ve run a very successful internship program, grew our early-identification program, expanded on our graduate internship program, and implemented several new tools in Yello. It’s been a busy year!

What is a professional goal you STRIVE to achieve?

I am always striving to make our team more efficient with our processes and technologies. I want to be able to leverage technology to take away the administrative burden of campus recruiting so that my team and I can focus on building stronger relationships with our candidates and universities.

What’s the most innovative thing your recruiting team has done this year?

This past summer we implemented our first Intern Summer Conference. This was an idea that started with feedback from our previous summer interns around bringing all the interns together during the middle of their internship. We flew in our interns from all our offices to Chicago for a two-day experience where they shared spotlights of their project work, conducted an internal consulting project, and socialized with their class. It was a big hit!

What do you see as the biggest challenge facing early talent recruiting teams?

I believe the biggest challenge my team faces today is building a unique candidate experience for our campus talent. Unfortunately, most college recruiting teams are lean but are recruiting large classes for their internship and new hire programs. This makes it difficult for campus recruiters to build rapport with all of their candidates. Our team has focused on leveraging our alumni and recent campus hires to help connect with candidates which has helped bridge the gap. 

In your opinion, how has early talent recruitment changed over the past 5-10 years?

It’s becoming more important to companies, and is a big part of their growth strategies. The war for talent is at all levels, and campus recruiting has become incredibly competitive over the past decade. This has led employers to start the recruitment process earlier, and target students who are just entering their freshman year of college and sometimes even high school. 

Describe what it’s like to partner with Yello.

Yello has been an amazing partner to work with! They’ve helped us implement new tools, but also work with us to build the best processes for leveraging our tools. Our Yello representatives are always patient, helpful, and creative. They understand our business, and are dedicated to helping us have the best campus program possible!