Most Important Skills for a Director of Recruitment and Operations at Galileo Learning
Shayne, a Director of Recruitment and Operations, emphasizes the importance of "people skills and relatability," alongside the ability to "operate in gray space" and think critically. This is complemented by strong operational skills, using systems and data analysis to remove impediments for their team, and the crucial ability to shift perspective from a "10,000-foot view" to granular detail, a skill particularly valuable in balancing strategic vision with execution.
People Skills, Problem-Solving, Data Analysis, Strategic Thinking, Operations Management
Advizer Information
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Job Title
Company
Undergrad
Grad Programs
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Shayne Walton
Director of Recruitment and Operations
Galileo Learning
UCLA
Relay Graduate School of Education - MA, Teaching, UCLA Anderson - MBA
Political Science, American Studies
Education
Human Resources (HR)
Worked 20+ Hours in School, Greek Life Member
Video Highlights
1. Excellent people skills and relatability are crucial for interacting with team members and addressing challenges effectively.
2. Strong operational skills, including proficiency in data analysis tools like Excel and pivot tables, are essential for managing tasks and removing impediments for the team.
3. The ability to switch between a high-level strategic view and a detailed operational focus is vital for effective decision-making and problem-solving in a dynamic environment. This involves strategic vision development and the capacity to zoom in and out of various levels of detail as needed.
Transcript
What skills are most important for a job like yours?
My job as a people manager, recruiter, and operations/data person requires a variety of skills. The number one overarching skill is people skills and relatability.
Something that goes hand-in-hand with people skills is the ability to operate in gray space. This means there isn't always a black and white answer or a manual telling you what to do if something happens. You have to be able to think and pivot on the fly.
As I mentioned, one of your direct reports might come to you one day saying, "Hey, I totally broke this Excel sheet, we need to do something about it." It's like, "Cool, that has to go to the CEO in an hour. Let's go fix that." Or you might decide that's a task to push to the next day.
It's really about understanding your people, relating to them, and handling the problems that come in. I also think there needs to be a really strong operational system. Being in Recruitment and Ops, I basically have a tracker for everything. I love color coding, drop-down menus, and a good VLOOKUP and pivot table.
Basically, I'm trying to remove impediments for my direct reports to allow them to take action. The last big skill is being able to go from a bird's-eye view, like a 10,000-foot view, into a 10-foot view.
You'll be like, "Okay, let's think about this one exact email," and then zoom back out to think about our entire marketing strategy. Then, you zoom back in to see if this conveys the culture we want and how it connects to LinkedIn. You have to have that strategy and vision development skill, which can be really hard to figure out at times.
Some people are better at being in the weeds, while others are better at the 10,000-foot view. But the ability to zoom in and out significantly has definitely helped me a lot, especially with this large of a task and managing a relatively small team to take on a relatively large task. You have to have that strategy and vision at all times.
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