New HR position created for New Mexico Air National Guard
Senior Master Sgt. Diana Sena-Melero recently became the Human Resource Office Remote for the New Mexico Air National Guard at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. In this role, she supports and researches anything that impacts the unit’s full-time members, Active Guard Reserve and technicians – the full-time military members of the ANG. She brings with her experience in all statuses; she’s been an AGR, a technician, a drill status Guardsman and a civilian employee for the ANG.
Melero believes she is the first HR remote the NMANG has had. As the HR office for the New Mexico Guard is in Santa Fe, there was a need for a person to be local, where most of the Airmen work at Kirtland AFB.
“It exists normally within the force support squadron. There are other states that have multiple wings, so they have an HR remote that sits within the wing,” Melero said. “Because we are a one-wing state, we decided to try it at the state level instead of the wing. Basically, I mean, it's new for us, because we've needed that support, right? I think we've always only had a member managing the AGR program, but we've never had an HR remote to help with both AGR and technicians.”
Melero said her daily schedule includes learning all the ins and outs of the different statuses, tracking manpower, and the different sections of the HR world. However, she is confident she will be effective in the new role.
“Success, to me – for this position, my goals, if there's anything I can leave behind – would be clarity and what I mean by clarity, I mean a standardized process for how we hire people, how we support,” Melero said. “I just think there's a lot of gray area with some of these HR actions. I think the technician side is a little bit easier, because HR already has a lot of that in place. It's just communicating it down at this level. But for the AGR side, I feel like there hasn't been much.”
As Melero moves forward in her new position, she wants everyone to know we are all on the same team, and she is here to support in any way possible.
“I tell this to everybody every day: Everybody is my boss, right? I work for everyone. I'm here for the people. I think we all want the same things. I really believe in my heart that the whole New Mexico National Guard wants the same thing when it comes to resources and hiring people and really having a solid foundation there,” Melero said.
