Insights

Despite comprising about half of the U.S. workforce, women are vastly underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers. A report from the American Association of University Women found that women make up only 28% of the workforce in STEM fields, with an even wider gap in occupations related to computers and mathematics (25%), and engineering and architecture (17%). While some progress has been made over the past fifty years, there’s still a long way to go in achieving gender parity in STEM careers. Entry-level recruiters — and the companies they work for — play a pivotal role in recruiting women into STEM and providing opportunities for advancement and success throughout their careers.

Recruitment events are a critical component of any campus recruitment strategy — and benefit both recruiters and candidates alike. Events allow recruiters to meet and engage with top candidates either in-person or virtually, and help candidates learn more about your company and get excited about starting a career in your industry. They open the door for you to connect with candidates and follow up with resources and applications, and give candidates a friendly, human connection to your company who they can feel comfortable reaching out to with any questions or concerns they might be grappling with.

RippleMatch is proud to recognize Kayla Woitkowski, Director of Early Career Talent Acquisition at SAS, as an Outstanding Leader in the Campus Recruiting Community! Kayla has spent the majority of her career honing her skills as an early career recruitment specialist in the tech/software industry. She has over a decade of progressive experience, including strategy development for an award-winning intern program, university and diversity outreach strategy development and execution, recruitment technology implementation, data driven decisioning, global UR consulting, and a dedication to developing team members to achieve their full potential.

Despite how far we’ve come in terms of workplace inclusivity and supporting the professional advancement of women, they still remain underrepresented in corporate leadership — especially women of color. While women now account for almost half of the workforce in entry-level roles, according to a recent McKinsey & Company study of more than 65,000 women (and 423 companies employing more than 12 million people), they filled only 24% of C-suite positions in 2021 — just a small increase (from about 19%) from 2016. The study also found that women only made up around 30% of senior vice president and vice president roles in 2021, a gain of just a few percentage points from 2016.

When I started at RippleMatch in March 2021, I was the 46th employee to be added to our thriving company Slack channel. Since then, I have watched our exceptional team expand nearly as fast as our product has grown. And while there’s a lot of change happening here at RippleMatch, one thing has remained the same: the environment is one that makes everyone feel valued and celebrated, and everyone is motivated to make a difference for job seekers and employers everywhere.

As companies continue to prioritize diversity in hiring, many organizations are approaching Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) with the goal of reaching more Black talent. But the strategies that have proven successful for recruiting students at Primarily White Institutions (PWIs) are not necessarily going to garner the same results at HBCUs — and recruiters are beginning to discover just that.

“The difference between a job and a career is finding your passion.” That’s the mantra of Aerialle Crawford, MHR, the Talent & Culture Manager at Stanley Black & Decker. Aerialle is a native of Mullins, SC and a graduate of the University of South Carolina,where she obtained both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in HR Management. She has excelled in her human resources career over the last eight years, hiring thousands of candidates nationwide across a variety of industries. In her role as Talent & Culture Manager, Aerialle designs enterprise employee engagement, talent development, change management, talent acquisition, and culture transformation initiatives at Stanley Black & Decker.

As employers navigate new working models in the wake of COVID-19 — such as remote-first, fully on-site, or hybrid — showcasing company culture to prospective employees has been more challenging than ever. Recent research from RippleMatch’s What Gen Z Wants report shows that company culture remains a key factor in the Gen Z job search, indicated by the value that these candidates place on work-life balance, a sense of community at work, and how companies have supported employees’ well-being during the pandemic. Our data further illustrates that company culture is not only helpful for recruiting new talent, but also for retaining interns for full-time positions after graduation.

It’s no secret that it's a candidate-driven market. A recent report from the U.S. Labor Department found that as of December 2021, there are 10.9 million job openings across the states – an increase of 4.1 million vacant jobs compared to just last winter. At the same time, more companies are joining the race to increase their Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) efforts, and the market for securing Black talent is becoming even more competitive as employment opportunities continue to grow across the board. However, despite investments into securing diverse talent, many companies still haven’t improved their workplace culture, made efforts to manage biases, nor found success in retaining Black talent at the higher levels. In fact, Black workers remain underrepresented in booming industries such as science and tech, and account for just 3.2% of senior roles at Fortune 500 companies and less than 1% of CEO positions at those organizations.