Intern Success Story: Annelise Prucnal
By Meagan Brown, Process Improvement Intern
September 21, 2017
Annelise Prucnal has fond memories of her time as a Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) intern in the Office of Process Improvement (OPI). Prucnal, who prefers to be busy, juggled working at OPI with consulting at Booz Allen Hamilton and attending graduate school at night.
Sustainability Efforts and Public Policy
Prucnal received her undergraduate degree in environmental studies and international relations from Cornell College, and she completed her master's degree in public administration with a concentration in environmental policy in May 2017. She credits her time as an intern with CDOT for helping her make a connection between process improvements, transportation, and sustainability. She also enjoyed gaining real-world knowledge about working in the public sector.
Photo of Annelise Prucnal (left) giving a presentation
Internship Highlights
Prucnal praised OPI Director Gary Vansuch for helping her develop important soft skills, such as reaching out to people that she normally wouldn't. She said she learned to communicate more effectively with a variety of people and how to better draw out information from them.
She was the primary writer and editor of two publications, one of which—the newsletter "Ideation"—tasked her with contacting people across the state to learn about process improvements and innovations. She then disseminated information to different offices to help spread the word about their successes.
While working on a publication about the Transportation Lean Forum, Prucnal set up a Zoom video conference and created a newsletter highlighting CDOT's Lean process improvement efforts, as well as the efforts of other states and some Canadian Provinces.
She enjoyed working with Mary Frances Nevans in CDOT's Office of Policy and Government Relations. Through Nevans, Prucnal learned how rules and policies operate in public agencies and presented to the community a repeal of three CDOT rules. She credited Vansuch with helping interns develop their areas of interest.
Real-World Experience
Prucnal said her internship was a real-world class for working in the public sector, which enhanced her competencies for her current position at Booz Allen Hamilton as a senior consultant working with various federal clients and agencies. Now, she can apply skills from her time at CDOT toward helping her clients develop and implement more efficient processes. She sees how process improvement and change management can be applied to anything.
Prucnal said it was exciting to work with agencies in a relatively progressive state, a fact she credited with making adjustments based on environmental concerns feasible and more expedient. And, she said, she was inspired by CDOT's agility in addressing Coloradans' needs.