AAEO Help and Support

AAEO Help and Support is a Microsoft Teams “team” that serves as a hub for all NIU departments where various forms, guidelines, and resources related to recruitment, hiring and affirmative action/equal opportunity information can be found.

SharePoint functions similarly to the File Explorer on your computer. It also gives you the ability to share editable files and documents with others. When you edit a file, it saves automatically. This allows several people to make changes to a document at the same time. Learn more about using SharePoint.

The team also houses the AAEO SharePoint folders for every college and division, which is where search process and hiring documentation should be maintained for audit-ready compliance purposes. AAEO Help and Support is a public team, which means any NIU employee can search for it and join it.

When members access the AAEO Help and Support SharePoint site from the HRS website, they will be taken to the site that shows a vertical scroll bar of colleges and departments on the far right under the “General” tab, and several sections organized according to their respective subjects that make up the main page of the site.

Join AAEO Help and Support in Microsoft Teams

1. Select “Teams” in the left ribbon
2. Select “Join or create team” in the right-hand corner of the Teams page
3. On the “Join or create a team” page, the AAEO Help and Support team may already appear as an option for you to join. If you don’t immediately see it, then type in the “Search teams” bar in the top right corner “AAEO Help and Support” and click the magnifying glass to search. Once it comes up, hover over the Team and click “Join team.”

 AAEO Help and Support Section Descriptions

• PeopleAdmin Guides: Step-by-step instructions and guidance on how to properly fill out and complete the various forms in PeopleAdmin. Please note: These guides are evolving and may be updated periodically to remain current when changes are made to the PeopleAdmin system.
• Forms: Any forms that departments utilize as part of the search process. These include templates for long and short advertisement announcements, summary narratives and applicant evaluation tools.
• Affirmative Action Plan (AAP): Documents providing guidance for maintaining compliance with the AAP, and helpful information on best practices in ensuring equal opportunity within NIU.
• Policies and Procedures: Guidelines, policies, and best practices on various aspects of the search process, which includes step-by-step instructions on how to perform certain functions in the search process.
• Resources: Various resources that departments will find helpful as they develop their plans for the search process.
• Presentations: Any presentations provided by Affirmative Action or Human Resources.

Access

Once joined, members will now have two primary ways to access the team. They are the following:

1. Use Microsoft Teams to go directly to the team
2. Use the URL go.niu.edu/aaeo to access SharePoint online.

Access to the SharePoint channel is determined by your position and level of involvement with the search.

Immediately after joining, members should email AffirmativeAction@niu.edu with their name and department they work for. AAEO will then add them to their respective college or division’s private channel within the AAEO Help and Support team/site.

Access to everything in their division's folder:

• Deans
• Division vice presidents
• Administrative support or proxies who have oversight of search process for an entire division.

Access to everything in their college/department and faculty/staff folders:

• Department heads/chairs
• Directors
• Administrative support or proxies who have oversight of search process for a specific college or department

Access to specific job search folders:

• Applicant reviewers
• Administrative support who have oversight of a specific position's search

College and Division Private Channels

As mentioned previously, every college and division has a private channel where data and information specific to that area can be found by members who work in that area. Links to departmental AAEO SharePoint folders can be found when members click on their private channel. Note: Only members who have been designated by the appropriate leadership or designee as needing “AAEO SharePoint” access for their departments will be able to access these links. Anyone who needs access should have their leadership or designee email AffirmativeAction@niu.edu requesting they be given access.