Dolores Chacon, President of DOIU/Associate Director, Strategic Management of Human Capital
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I believe the reason for our success has been the fantastic team we have become over the five years the majority of us have been together. I first became part of the NBC team on February 14, 1999. At this time my portfolio was exclusively DOIU. When I arrived, the staff consisted of 18 people, 17 of whom reported to the Director of the Training and Development Unit, part of the former Interior Service Center. Today we have grown to a staff of 51, excluding the interns who are in the various programs DOIU manages bringing the total to about 90. My leadership team composed of Vivian Clark, HR Director; Susan Leonard, Chief of Cultural Resources and Events; Lynn McPheeters, Chief of Leadership and Performance Centers; Robert Veltkamp,
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Chief of Online Learning; and Marianne Narick, Administrative Officer extraordinaire, all deserve lots and lots of credit for the success of our directorate. I am very fortunate to have the opportunity to work with such a gifted and hard working team.
In terms of programs and lines of business, we have grown from a provider of classroom training in business and computer skills, leadership training and SES career development to providing certificate programs in HR, project management, executive assistant skills; being a leader in recognizing the value of intern programs and developing three programs, (one government-wide) for the finance, acquisition, and policy and budget communities; over 2000 courses offered online, custom online course development to address Department-wide training initiatives; Executive Forums and Speaker Events in Washington DC, Denver, Seattle, and Albuquerque; responsibility for the departmental Museum and Library; and the NBC Human Resources shop with staff in Denver, Washington, Reston and Boise.
Through our fee-based customized lines of business which attract other DOI offices and federal agencies we have grown our revenue from $347k in 1999 to over $4M in 2004. In addition, our team has established a solid reputation within the federal and Training and Development communities.
DOIU was among the first participants in the E-Training initiative now known as GOLEARN sponsored by OPM. DOIU was also a charter member of the FASTRAC consortium lead by the National Security Agency. This partnership provides access to over 2000 online courses in computer and business skills to Interior employees. This initiative was in effect a good two years before the “Quicksilver” E-Gov initiatives.
In terms of future successes, I count on the continued excellent work of my leadership team and the individuals who make up their staffs. This past year we were very lucky to attract one of our Office of the Secretary Intern graduates, Shari Hanscomb, as a member of our permanent staff. Shari, Ross Allan, Cori Sabet, Joleen Macek, Rebecca Rabuck, and Felicia Hodge are our future leaders. They are all members of our under 33 club. Just recently, we experienced a baby boom in the directorate – we believe in succession planning!! Ellen Bliss, Rebecca Fields, Lucy Adams, and Susan Romero are all producing potential interns for DOIU. YEAH, team!!
Of course, another key factor in our continued success is support from above. We have had great champions these past five years including: Paul Denett, John Berry, Sky Lesher, Bob Lamb, Nina Hatfield, Lynn Scarlett, Debra Sonderman, Mike Trujillo, and of course Tim Vigotsky. Tim is one of my favorite bosses because of the freedom he gave me to shape and grow DOIU. Tim, you will be missed!!
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