3 Values I Learned at Dcode
The transition from choosing college classes to choosing a job can be difficult, especially if you’re shifting career paths. I should know, I am leaving journalism behind to explore interests in people operations! In the last year, this meant I had to find a company that was willing to tap into my potential and honor my transferable skills. During my recruiting process at Dcode, I looked through the company’s Instagram account, the Dcoding HR blog, and team gifs, concluding that this company’s authenticity and values are unmatched.
I loved interning this summer so much I am now a fall intern, and my time at Dcode has shown me how trust, transparency, and support are critical to establishing meaningful employee connections and are values I want to take into future roles.
Trust
I took a gamble in switching my career path, but my team’s trust in my abilities grounded and inspired me to continue growing as a professional. Their confidence in me to work on employee engagement, recruiting and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives helped me become a more self-assured worker, showing me that having trust in your teammates is essential for building employee connections.
One of Dcode’s main company-wide goals is to be known as the best place to work in D.C. by recruiting and retaining a world-class team. As the talent operations intern, I have the opportunity to review resumes, share input on candidates, and create and customize interview question templates. Understanding a company’s hiring needs and fulfilling those needs with new candidates is a skill I’m learning, but the trust my team has in my ability to provide valuable input pushes me to continue!
Trusting each other to get the job done is a value I see across Dcode, not just my team, and I’ve loved seeing the company culture develop around this. I see the government team work with the product development team and circle back to our head of marketing, creating a strong employee connection and efficient work process. I’ve personally helped with our diversity workshop and employee engagement ideas, organizing a company-wide DEI discussion on micro-aggressions as well as co-leading a mad-lib session for a culture event, further helping build one awesome Dcode through trust!
Transparency
Transparency is another value I’ll carry from Dcode. I look forward to our daily All-Hands meetings, weekly Kickstarter meetings, and quarterly business reviews because Dcode ensures everyone gets a chance to speak on tasks and achievements related to the company’s growth. As an operations intern, I work internally with the same team, so these company-wide meetings are also really helpful in understanding cross-departmental externals. Transparency helps build one awesome Dcode and aligns our company vision and goals.
I also appreciate Dcode’s honest, transparent feedback because it has helped me improve professionally. In a check-in with my manager, Michelle, she gave me the feedback that I needed to better follow through on and not forget about the tasks that had previously been deprioritized. Directly addressing areas for improvement, instead of leaving me to guess, gives teammates the opportunity to fix what’s going wrong and learn how to give and receive constructive feedback.
Dcoders also get a chance to share what did not work for them during the week and how it can be improved upon in the future. Valuing transparency ensures everyone is on the same page, helps Dcoders grow professionally, and fosters a culture of trying new processes and iterating.
Support
In my first two months as an intern, I saw firsthand how Dcode invests in its employees, providing professional development and support to all Dcoders. I had this preconceived notion that tech companies wouldn’t be so invested in their people, but Dcode has shown me otherwise.
For example, Michelle recently spearheaded the creation of Dcode University (“Roger That” as it’s lovingly called after a former teammate), which includes LinkedIn Learning courses, LifeLabs manager training, and Innerwill executive development. Thanks to these resources, we now have thousands of courses at our disposal that will not only improve skills relevant to our current jobs, but offer new skills Dcoders want to learn that they otherwise might not. As an intern, I took a recruiting course to further develop my skills in screening candidates and negotiating compensation.
In addition to professional development, I have also experienced what we call “the Dcode hug,” an act of welcoming, encouragement, and support. An example of this is when my team sent me a self-care gift box for National Intern Day (not to mention the branded swag box that all of us and our customers get when they sign onboard with Dcode).
Throughout my internship, I’ve experienced genuine interactions with every Dcoder and have seen their commitment to driving commercial innovation in the federal market.
My experience at Dcode has been such an enjoyable, challenging adventure, and it has set the standard for how I measure a company’s dedication to its employees and mission. Dcoders showed me trust, transparency, and support as the foundation for a successful work environment.
Stefany Alvarado is the fall 2021 talent operations intern, supporting talent acquisition, employee engagement, and diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. When she isn’t on a Zoom call or drafting documents, she can be found caring for her six chickens, three ducks, and two dogs.
