Building Global Teams with Psychological Insight

From revamping interview processes with data-driven tools to successfully managing geographically separated teams around the world, this impressive alumna shares how she is utilizing I-O psychology in recruitment initiatives to enhance team performance and develop smarter and more effective workplaces.

Can you share a bit about your background and why you chose to pursue a career in I-O psychology?

I chose to pursue a career in I-O psychology because psychology has always been a passion of mine. Even as a kid, I spent my summers reading behavioral psychology articles and watching related videos. Growing up around healthcare professionals and entrepreneurs, I was drawn to the idea of combining psychology with business. While I knew clinical psychology wasn’t the right path for me, I was always fascinated by human behavior patterns and wanted to explore how they could be applied in a business context.

What does a day in the life as a Talent Acquisition Manager at Atheneum look like?

A day as a Talent Acquisition Manager at Atheneum involves a mix of strategic planning, hands-on recruiting, and cross-functional collaboration. I start by reviewing open roles and candidate pipelines, then connect with department leads to ensure we’re aligned on hiring needs, role scoping, and interview strategies.

I also regularly check in with my direct report in Santiago, Chile, supporting her as she leads our hiring efforts in that market and ensuring consistency across regions. My daily responsibilities often include interviews, debriefs, and reviewing data to improve our processes. I collaborate with global colleagues to share best practices on an ongoing basis as well.

Each day brings something different, and I enjoy the balance between strategy, execution, and team development!

What are some of your favorite and most challenging aspects of your role?

One of the most challenging aspects of my role is ensuring global alignment across our hiring practices. With offices in different cities, and my own supervisor based in Latin America, navigating cultural differences and varying expectations around communication, timelines, and candidate experience requires someone like me to be mindful and respectful of local norms, while still maintaining consistency in our processes. Another challenge is ensuring that all hiring teams are leveraging the same criteria to better evaluate candidates. It can be easy for different departments or regions to prioritize different qualities of a potential employee, so part of my role is creating clarity around what “good” looks like and reinforcing those standards throughout the interview process. For example, an ideal candidate can quickly understand clients’ needs and think critically under pressure.

Additionally, one of my favorite parts of this role is being able to help people land their dream job and guide them through the process step by step. It’s incredibly rewarding to support candidates as they navigate the often-chaotic job market and help them find the right fit to advance their career.

How do you apply psychological principles when creating data-driven strategies for recruitment? How do you leverage psychological research to assess the ideal candidate for a job?

When I started at Atheneum, one of my main goals was to make every stage of the interview process measurable. Drawing from I/O principles like standardization and objective evaluation, I focused on reducing bias and improving consistency across hiring decisions.

For example, I revamped the second stage of our interview process—an assessment—by introducing a scoring system. Based on 100%, we began to use 70% as the benchmark to indicate if a candidate had enough potential to move onto the next step of the interview process. I applied the same approach to the mock call and final interview stages, creating structured evaluation forms with clear scoring criteria. The goal was not only to evaluate candidates more fairly, but also to collect data that we could look back on after someone was hired. This allows us to identify patterns and potential success indicators over time, helping to refine our strategy and enhance our hiring outcomes overall.

How did your Touro I-O training help propel your career? What skills from your graduate education do you use on the job?

My I-O psychology training at the Touro School of Health Sciences really set the stage for how I approach my work today. It taught me how to think critically about workplace behavior and how to use vital data to back up decisions, whether that’s in hiring, training, or improving team dynamics. One of the biggest takeaways for me was learning how to structure people-focused processes in a way that’s both fair and measurable.

I use these skills all the time on-the-job, especially when it comes to building interview processes, setting consistent evaluation criteria, and advising hiring managers. Touro’s program gave me a strong foundation in understanding what drives people at work and how to align that with business goals, and enabled me to combine my interest in psychology with the fast-paced, ever-changing world of talent acquisition.

What advice would you give to current I-O Psychology students interested in a career in recruitment or HR?

My advice to current I-O psychology students is to focus on applying what you’ve learned in real-world situations. While it’s important to understand the core principles of recruitment including assessment, performance measurement, and organizational behavior, it’s also imperative to adapt them to the challenges you’ll face in hiring talented individuals such as employee development and building a strong company culture. Also, try to get as much hands-on experience as possible, whether through internships, projects, or research. Being able to take what you’ve learned and turn it into practical solutions is key.

Lastly, don’t forget to be proactive! When I was looking for my graduate school internship and couldn’t find one, I decided to reach out to Touro’s Internship Supervisor Adam Zeiff. We talked about his company and whether they had any job openings and because of that conversation, the company ended up creating a personalized role just for me. So, don’t be afraid to take the first step in reaching out to your network as most people are happy to help if you show interest, professionalism and that you are willing to put in the effort required to succeed.