By Pat Shaver
WEST LIBERTY—As a recruiter, Jaime Parizek has flipped through many resumes.
Her personal resume shows she took a less conventional way of getting to where she is in her career today. Ms. Parizek did not immediately attend college, but managed to work her way up at a telecommunications company in Arizona.
Ms. Parizek is a certified senior human resources professional with more than 12 years of HR and talent acquisition experience in the hospitality and telecommunications industries. She received a bachelor’s degree in organizational management from Ashford University in 2008.
Originally from West Liberty, she moved to Arizona and then found a job as a telemarketer. After a few months, she was promoted into an office job and not long after was given the opportunity to perform human resources duties for one of the company’s facilities.
“Everybody has to start somewhere,” she said. “It’s about getting that opportunity to be able to show your skills.”
After about 10 years in Arizona, she made the decision to move back to West Liberty to be closer to family. She spent the past eight years working for West Liberty Foods, a majority of them in HR roles. West Liberty Foods is a food manufacturer with locations in West Liberty, Mt. Pleasant and Tremonton, Utah.
In 2012, she began researching franchise opportunities and she eventually found the perfect fit. Ms. Parizek is a local franchisee and regional recruiting manager with Patrice & Associates, a nationwide network of 50 regional offices, with a database of qualified restaurant and hospitality management candidates, and more than 600 hospitality management jobs to fill at any one time. The company was founded by Patrice Rice in 1989 and is based in Maryland.
“I think I’ve always been an entrepreneur and had that desire,” Ms. Parizek said. “I wanted to find something that suited me and the opportunity to spend more time with my family.”
In October, she officially opened for business as a franchise owner. She works out of her West Liberty home.
“When I started looking for opportunities, her (Ms. Rice’s) philosophy matches my philosophy,” Ms. Parizek said.
Her focus is on finding qualified candidates for jobs in restaurants, hotels and casinos. Since Patrice & Associates has an established database of candidates, Ms. Parizek has a leg up. However, her goal in the beginning stages of her business is to grow her own local list of candidates.
Patrice & Associates has several national chain clients with locations locally, which has helped keep Ms. Parizek busy.
“She has a great client base and I have the opportunity to build my own client base here,” she said.
In only a few months, Ms. Parizek said she is learning every day about the hospitality industry.
“As a patron of a restaurant you don’t realize everything that goes into what they do. It’s unbelievable,” she said.
For those seeking jobs, Ms. Parizek offered some advice.
“Make sure you show your accomplishments. A lot of what I see is people that list all of their job duties but certain duties are expected. What have you done above and beyond? Sometimes jobs aren’t advertised at all; that’s another aspect a recruiter can help you with,” Ms. Parizek said, adding that in most cases it’s free for an individual to use a recruiter.
In her corporate HR career, Ms. Parizek has experience working with recruiting consultants, which has helped shape how she works.
“With my background, we did a lot of in-house recruiting, but there were also positions we knew we couldn’t fill,” she said. “I’ve been on the other side. Having experience on both sides, it’s really important to me to understand a client’s business. It’s more than just, ‘here’s a candidate, here’s a candidate and here’s another candidate.’”
During the next few years, Ms. Parizek hopes to be able to hire recruiters and staff of her own.
“It’s not just about money. I want to feel good about what I do. Being able to give back to the community, that’s important to me. I like helping people, that’s how I got into HR in the first place,” she said. “I don’t want to go out and make a sale; I want to build a relationship.”
