About Hasbro
Industry: Play and entertainment
Location: Pawtucket, Rhode Island
Company size: 6,800+ employees
Website: www.hasbro.com
Q&A with Sue McPoland, Former Director of Global Consumer Insights
Q: How is the Northeastern corporate residency different from other internships you support?
A: What we especially like about the Northeastern program is the fact that the students are with us for a longer period of time—typically six months. I've found in working with these students that they are eager to learn and want to make a real impact, and the extended time we have with them allows them to become true contributors on their respective teams.
We've had a relationship with Northeastern for about eight years now, and we've been impressed with the knowledge and skills the residents bring to their roles.
Q: What specific qualities do you associate with Northeastern student residents?
A: Diversity is a real advantage that Northeastern brings. Their student body is diverse to begin with, which is great, but many of the students in the Full-Time MBA program are also in the process of switching career paths, so they often have wide-ranging backgrounds. For a company like Hasbro, it's good to have fresh thinking, and employing those with a diversity of perspective and background can be an advantage in driving innovation.
Q: Do you rely on your student residents?
A: Absolutely. A recent trend in the insights industry is that companies are bringing capabilities in-house for efficiency. Our tools at Hasbro have become more user-friendly, which allows us to do work ourselves that we previously would have done with external partners. But in order to be successful at that, we need the right people, so that's where we turn to our Northeastern residents. They help to manage research using our in-house tools, including the design, programming, analysis, and reporting of projects. They're involved in all phases and they get the complete experience of seeing a project through from start to finish.
Q: What's the return on investment for Hasbro to partner with Northeastern?
A: Northeastern has been putting a big emphasis on data analytics in the past couple of years, and I think most companies would agree that's an increasingly important skill set that we look for in a number of areas across our organization. That emphasis has aligned to our needs at Hasbro. Our Northeastern residents give us agility and flexibility that ultimately results in cost and time savings.
Also, a number of residents have been hired here and risen through the ranks, which is really nice to see.
