My Skillbridge Internship at CDOT and CDPS!
By Nellie Aquino, Operational Excellence Intern at CDPS and Process Improvement and Change Management Intern at CDOT
December 22, 2023
I had a unique opportunity when I joined the Colorado Department of Transportation’s Office of Process Improvement in August 2023. I came on board as a Skillbridge intern for the Colorado Department of Public Safety’s (CDPS) Operational Excellence Team as part of the Department of Defense Skillbridge program. This program allows active duty military members to partake in an internship up to six months before separating to gain private sector experience and aid the service member in the transition when leaving military service. As many interns learn throughout their internship at CDOT, CDOT collaborates on many projects and efforts with other state agencies. Due to the strong partnership between CDPS and CDOT, I was able to share my internship between both state agencies, contribute to both alike and be CDOT’s first Skillbridge intern.
Left to Right: Daniel, Rose, Nellie, Jamie and Remy
Although I have previous experience teaching electrical systems in the military, I am glad that I had the opportunity to use those skills to facilitate and teach new topics within the Colorado state government. In collaboration with Daniel Cieraszynski, a fellow CDOT intern and Corey Niemeyer, Director of the Operational Excellence team at CDPS, we facilitated a virtual class “Introduction to Pivot Tables for Data Analysis.” Navigating and learning new tools is known to be overwhelming. It was such a fun experience to create a welcoming and educational environment for state employees to learn about pivot tables and their capabilities as a tool and how pivot tables can be used to display data in a more efficient and effective way. We received such great feedback from employees who attended the class that a second class was scheduled!
Nellie in a virtual class discussing pivot tables
I had the opportunity to collaborate with CDPS and CDOT and co-present at the 2023 Colorado Lean Network where I presented tools and techniques to process map current state and future state effectively. This was presented to our audience in a fun and interactive way and our audience went through the process of making a PB&J sandwich. With no direction or poor communication, something as easy as making a PB&J sandwich can become a difficult process when many steps and people are involved. After the PB&J simulation, we discussed WASTE and how to identify pain points in their PB&J process. This discussion allowed our participants to develop solutions for the identified pain points to improve their process. This was a chance for me to learn more about process mapping and be able to apply it to real world processes.
Left to right: Jamie, Nellie, & Corey
My favorite project I worked on was the Intern and Fellow Lunch & Learn sessions. Gary connected me with former CDOT interns, some of which took permanent positions at CDOT and some of which moved on to work at other organizations.Through this outreach, I organized monthly sessions where fellows and interns had the opportunity to speak with different former CDOT interns. This created a platform for CDOT interns to ask questions and learn from former CDOT interns, their experiences during their internship and also how those experiences propelled them into their current career paths. These sessions were a great opportunity for all current interns and fellows to gain insight from people who at one point were in similar stages in their careers. It was comforting to know that everyone starts somewhere.
There are so many other opportunities I was able to contribute to during my four month internship at CDOT and CDPS. I know there are ongoing efforts for CDOT to become an industry partner and host interns for the Department of Defense Skillbridge Program and I look forward to hearing all about it. The culture that Team OPI fosters for their interns encourages them to learn, grow and achieve success.