For the second year in a row, UVU’s Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) student team took home the first place title at the SHRM Utah State Student Case Competition. UVU was asked to host this year’s event after their success last year. Josilyn (Josi) Anderson, associate president of the UVU SHRM chapter, along with Carol Mausser, assistant to associate deans, organized the entire event. The state SHRM chapter president praised UVU for organizing the best state competition in the last five years. Josi and Carol created an environment where all students could be successful—as well as provided the best food—as noted by the president.

UVU’s team consisted of Matthew Kimball, Josi Anderson, Erica Pina, Jennie Hertzler, Amanda Kerr, and Jason Crittenden. This competition made Jason a four-time winner, as he was on the team last year and won both UVU-internal case competitions. Dr. Bernd Kupka, Dr. Jon Westover, Rod Lacey, and David Pugmire served as faculty advisors to the team.

“SHRM’s state-wide Student Case Competitions offer a unique opportunity for HR students to apply in-class learning to real-world HR scenarios and showcase their knowledge to seasoned HR practitioners,” said Susan Post, SHRM-SCP, east divisional director at SHRM. “These local events also enhance students’ perspectives on the value and importance of what it means to be a member of the HR community and career partners with SHRM as they embark on their HR professional pursuits.”

Each team was presented with the same business case and given 10 days to analyze and submit their executive summary. On the competition day, teams presented a 15-minute oral presentation to two separate judging panels made up of certified SHRM professionals local to Utah.

“The competition for the students was very intense,” said Dr. Kupka. “They put in a lot of time to prepare for this because they knew, as the reigning champions, that everyone would be gunning for them. They were able to apply a lot of lessons that they had learned from the new HR Analytics class taught by Michael Peterson, which helped them look at the data presented in the case and draw the right conclusions. They presented the bottom-line impact their solution would have better than any other team, and as a result, they won.”

The teams that competed in the competition were: Utah Valley University, Brigham Young University, Westminster College, and two teams from the University of Utah—an undergraduate and graduate team. BYU took second place, and the U of U’s graduate team took third.

UVU received $1,000 for taking first place, while second and third received $750 and $500 respectively.

Every member of the team has or is seeking an internship or job in the HR field. Josi was an HR intern for Workers Compensation Fund (WCF) until the competition and was recently hired as an HR admin and training coordinator for Sundance Mountain Resort. Amanda is currently seeking an HR internship; Jennie is an HR specialist at Wakaya Perfection, and Erica started an internship with Cementation USA. Matt is entering into an HR internship after the semester, and both Matt and Jason are applying to Utah State’s Master’s program.