Courtesy Photo | Karron Small (left), executive director of the Defense Contract Management Agency...... read more read more
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LOS ANGELES - Defense Contract Management Agency representatives recently attended the Society of Women Engineers WE14 Career Fair in Los Angeles to interface with potential employees and educate them on engineering opportunities within the agency.
“This was a great opportunity for engineering students and recent graduates to hear about DCMA and discuss the various engineering and technical careers in the agency,” said Karron Small, executive director of the Engineering and Analysis Directorate. “I was very impressed with their questions, technical training and enthusiasm.”
SWE is a not-for-profit educational and service organization whose goal is to empower women to succeed and advance in the field of engineering. Each year, it hosts a career fair where over 250 government and civilian organizations recruit and network with female engineers for positions ranging from interns to executives.
Linwood Smith, the Western Region recruiter with the Human Capital Directorate Recruitment Division, said the women engineers representing DCMA at the fair made a strong, positive impression on the attendees.
“We had representation from Keystones to senior leadership discussing their roles and experiences with the agency,” Smith said. “Many participants now envision themselves from being in school or a young professional to reaching Ms. Small’s level.”
Smith said many of the participants didn’t know engineering positions existed in DoD agencies, let alone at DCMA. “They assume we only do contracting because of our name,” he said. “To have so many positive female role models in leadership positions across our agency strengthens the fact DoD supports diversity.”
Small, who was a keynote speaker during DCMA’s information session, said engineering is a great career field for individuals with strong technical skills, whether male or female. However, “there are certainly more female engineers in the workplace than there were 20 or 30 years ago,” she added.
Although DCMA’s core work revolves around contracts, engineers provide guidance and support to many areas within the agency.
“They provide assistance to major program support, quality assurance, contracting and overall engineering systems surveillance,” Small explained. “The engineers perform the higher level of technical review and analysis needed to provide actionable acquisition insight to our customer.”
The value engineering brings to the table can be seen throughout the agency, including DCMA San Diego where Ericka Jordan is an Earned Value Management team leader with the Engineering and Manufacturing Group. Jordan assisted the recruiting team at the SWE event this year because she strongly believes in helping other women enter the workforce, especially within the government. She’s especially fond of engineers and said they’re a vital part of major programs and the team she heads at her contract management office.
“Engineers assess contractors’ engineering processes and ensure products are being developed in accordance with contractual requirements,” said Jordan. “Their roles are very important to the overall agency mission.”
Kathy Butera, Human Capital Directorate executive director, also attended the fair to support her recruiting team and was pleased with the turnout both at the fair and at DCMA’s information session. “They had hundreds of options, and they chose DCMA,” she said. “I was very impressed with each person I spoke with. They were smart and eager to work and learn. Events like these provide us with an opportunity to recruit the best and brightest for the agency.”
According to Knute Headley, director of the HC Recruitment Division, “the information session yielded overwhelmingly positive comments from potential job applicants who previously had no idea who DCMA was, or what we did prior to attending. They asked great questions and were very receptive to what the agency has to offer as an employer.”
Butera believes a big part of agency’s success at the event, especially at the information session, was due to the employees who attended and helped tell the DCMA story. “Ericka Jordan, Angela Racoosin, Trang Nguyen and Patrick Corr were a fantastic representation of our agency’s workforce,” Butera said. “Ms. Small and I were both very impressed with them. They demonstrated what it means to be ‘one team, one voice.’”
Smith said SWE broke a record for attendance this year with nearly 10,000 people attending from around the world and 290 participating organizations.
“There will probably even more next year in Nashville,” he added. “Our goal is to keep attending these events and continue branding the agency so that professional and educational organizations know about DCMA.”
| Date Taken: | 12.17.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 12.22.2014 13:57 |
| Story ID: | 150937 |
| Location: | LOS ANGELES, CA, US |
| Web Views: | 139 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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