City: Carmel, Indiana

Reporting to: Chief of Staff

The Challenge

Thanks in part to the work of its police and fire departments, Carmel consistently ranks at or near the top of lists of “safest cities” and “best places to live.” While these agencies do a good job of keeping residents safe, their recruiting and hiring processes need improvement. It takes four months for the police to bring on a new officer, after which they have a probationary period; for fire, it takes more than twelve months. A slow hiring process not only adds cost to the work, but it can also result in qualified candidates dropping from the process. Part of the issue is that the city does not gather or use much data to accelerate the hiring process or inform decision making.

Carmel leaders hope to change that. As part of her participation in the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative data track, Mayor Sue Finkam has brought together a group of leaders from the mayor’s office, IT, and the police and fire departments to work with expert coaches on improving data practices. Their goal is to modernize and bring efficiencies to public safety hiring. Traditionally, for example, Carmel’s approach has been to cast a wide net: If one hundred applicants could not fill twenty positions, they would try to get two hundred the next time, doubling the number of candidates to vet. Instead, Carmel hopes to be able to identify and use data on backgrounds of successful recruits from the past and use predictive modeling to recruit similar people using targeted approaches. The goal is to shorten the hiring processes and achieve cost savings without compromising the quality of individuals the city hires.

By spring 2026, the Carmel data track team will have 1) identified available and needed data, 2) determined what elements of analysis are required, and 3) determined areas within recruiting, hiring, and training to focus efforts on. Going into the summer, some hiring changes will be underway based on the work thus far, and others will require additional data collection and analysis.

Key questions include:

• How can data collection opportunities be inserted into current recruit touch points?
• How can data be used to predict recruit success at completing the process?
• How can data be utilized to identify and prioritize additional changes needed?

What You’ll Do

The fellow will build on the previous data track work to implement new data-driven hiring changes and prioritize the next set of upgrades. The fellow will gather and analyze data from previous hiring processes for insights that can fuel predictive modeling and other approaches to get smarter about recruiting. This will entail regular collaboration with the individuals at the Carmel police and fire departments who are associated with the recruitment, hiring, and training of new officers. City leaders hope that the public safety agencies will set an example for other agencies about the value of using data to make informed decisions.

Key deliverables will include:

• An analysis of whether written test scores for police officers correlate with job success, and recommendations based on findings.
• An updated recruitment outreach strategy informed by data analysis of previous sources of successful recruits.
• Tools and communication strategies for keeping fire recruits engaged during the application process.

What You’ll Bring

The fellow will be expected to possess the following skills:

• Data Analysis
• Data Visualization
• Design Thinking
• Policy Analysis
• Qualitative Interviewing and Analysis

Apply here

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