Rare hiring spree is on the horizon – For the first time in five years, the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory and Argonne National Laboratory-West are ready to begin hiring in earnest.

And people early in their careers in targeted specialties could be the ones to benefit.

By KATHLEEN O’NEIL
[email protected]

http://www.headwatersnews.org/pr.ineelhires.html

Both labs need to expand their staffs with people who can work on new nuclear energy research that has recently been funded at the two labs, representatives said.

They also anticipate the growth will continue when the two labs merge Feb. 1 to form the Idaho National Laboratory, which the Department of Energy plans to make into a world leader for nuclear energy research.

"We need workers with a whole different educational background than before" for the lab’s new research in nuclear energy and national security, said Bernie Sikorski, director of human resources for the INEEL.

That’s why they’re ready to hire, she said, nine months after INEEL contractor Bechtel BWXT Idaho laid off or offered early retirement to about 200 workers.

Resumes of laid-off workers are still considered for every new position, and a few have been rehired, said Vanita Johnson, the INEEL manager in charge of hiring. The DOE requires contractors to give priority to laid-off workers.

Neither lab knows exactly how many workers it expects to hire yet because their managers are still assessing their work-force needs, they said. But the INEEL already has 88 job openings posted on its Web site.

Employment at the INEEL has dropped since 1999, when BBWI took over, from about 7,000 to about 5,000 today. Argonne-West experienced a similar drop, going from about 1,000 workers in the early 1990s to about 650 today.

Although midcareer workers are considered for some positions, the laboratories are mostly targeting those who are beginning their careers, who can learn from the lab’s older workers before they retire while bringing in new skills. The average worker age at the INEEL is 45, and Argonne’s work force has a similar profile.

"We have to be able to maintain a core of significant expertise, and I’m getting anxious about that because our core is about to retire," said John Sackett, laboratory director for Argonne-West.

Partly in response to that, Argonne began increasing the number of summer interns it takes on, to about 40 this year, in the hopes that those students will be ready to be hired in a few more years.

The internships and research programs for decades have been encouraging students to pursue advanced science and engineering education and careers in national labs, but this year, they are taking on more significance.

Many of Argonne-West’s current leaders started as interns, said Steve Aumeier, deputy lab director for engineering research who is himself an example of that progression.

Both labs say they rely upon the connections they make with college students as interns as a recruiting tool because if they have a good experience, they’ll become advocates for the laboratory.

"We like to use them as a feed pool," Sikorski said. "We can target the right skills, and depending on where they are in their degrees, we may convince them to come back."

Energy and Environment reporter Kathleen O’Neil can be reached at 542-6763.