When you do what you love it’s not work and I’m very fortunate to be in that position.
I’m Director of Workforce Development and Human Resources for a mid-size metro area Chamber of Business and Industry and economic development agency in Wilkes-Barre, PA. My 2010 goals are to create the best internship program on earth for the 5 area colleges and universities in my area of service, a Chamber affiliated human capital committee to help increment the number of area employers of choice and a Latino business council to foster growth of this emerging entrepreneurial sector in the Wilkes-Barre area. I expect it to be a wild, really fun and challenging year!
Prior to joining the Chamber, I worked as an Operations Manager turned HR Generalist with the primary accountability of super high volume, full-cycle, 3rd party unassisted, corporate recruiting. I made the change out of frustration at current recruiting practices, low quality candidates presented to me for interviews and a desire to bring top quality talent into the organization. Tasked with reducing cost per hire I turned to social media and reduced it by 40% in one year.
In my past, I have been a columnist for the Philadelphia-based Spanish language publication El Espetacular, a public service officer for WTGI-TV 61 Telemundo affiliate, and worked for over a decade in Mexico as a business owner and founder of the country’s first organization for animal welfare to receive government support, the Humane Society of Cozumel Island. I also served as a consultant to the Cozumel Chamber of Business and Industry.
From time to time I have taken on adjunct faculty positions to instruct Spanish language GED classes, Marketing and Customer Service courses and Command Spanish. I have instructed ESL and founded a local Downtown Spanish Language Club for native and non-native Spanish speakers to retain, promote, and enhance language skills through cultural dialog.
I sit on several education, diversity and workforce related boards and advisory committees and frequently speak on job seeking, recruitment and retention strategy, relationship building and the use of new media in HR and recruiting.
After hours when I’m not exercising those super powers, I develop this site’s content, experiment with the latest and greatest new media and social networking applications and hang out virtually with HR and Recruiter types where we stretch the boundaries of our professions and strive to make them better.
“Get on-board the change train and enjoy the ride” ~Karla
2010
2009
