From Campus to Clearance

The critical missions of tomorrow are driven by today's future leaders, which is why we are dedicated to offering opportunities at every career stage and developing our early in career professionals. From campus to clearances to chiefs of staff, GDIT is committed to supporting career growth. Starting with GDIT as an intern, Neslie Christofferson knows firsthand about this dedication to internal growth and development.

“Over the four and half years I’ve been with GDIT I’ve had three different roles. After my internship, I started full-time as a Business Process Analyst in our CIO Services Department. From there, I moved into the program side of our Federal Civilian Division as a Business Operations Analyst and I’m currently working as a Growth Operations Analyst for our Federal Civilian Growth team.”

Providing opportunities to work across different functions and groups, our goal is to be not just a job, but a network that helps shape a professional’s career.

“My best day at work was about a year ago. I was sitting at my desk and my now boss came up to me that afternoon and let me know that someone on their team was moving to a new role. That someone had also recommended me for their role.”

“I remember being so excited and kind of overwhelmed at the same time. I knew the work that I had done really spoke for itself but to hear from someone else that they had recommended me for this assignment was beyond exciting. And here we are a year later, and I’m currently in that role.”

Meeting aspirational goals head on

“GDIT offers assistance in many different ways, and I speak from the experience of being an early career professional. One of the biggest ways is through our Employee Resource Group (ERG), Aspire, where we’ve built a community for early career professionals that has really helped us understand what resources are available to help build our careers.”

Neslie leads Aspire across the company and has spearheaded content series around hot topics for early career professionals.

Aspire’s mission is to assist early career professionals in aspiring towards their goals. The ERG offers support for these professionals through different programs, a speaker series and professional development workshops.

Last summer, Aspire developed and launched the Aspire Mentorship Program pilot, which is the first mentorship program led by an ERG at GDIT.

Neslie shares, “Our program matches early career professionals with senior level employees at GDIT and really is helping them develop their career and themselves, while making them feel more connected to GDIT by pairing them with a mentor.”

“The program is the most impactful thing I’ve gotten to work on as a part of Aspire because it has real concrete business impact. We’ve now built a program for mentorship that can be used by other Employee Resource Groups, other divisions, and across the organization. And seeing something that we built be scaled across the organization is really exciting. I would not be in the role I am today without many mentors that I’ve had in school and, of course, at GDIT.”

Owning your career at any level

By creating different supportive platforms and resources, not only are we building a community for early career professionals, but also giving them a chance to impact our work with customers and our own company initiatives.

“It’s a very comforting feeling knowing that your co-workers want you to succeed and your team members want you to be successful. It’s all about the people for me. And I think it’s the resources that we provide to our employees that really make them feel that community and sense of belonging.”

GDIT professionals also have the opportunity to advance their education through the educational assistance program as well as support for certifications. Neslie completed her master’s degree with the help of GDIT and has found continued opportunities to grow.

“Whenever I wanted to try something new or whenever I was ready to take on a stretch role, those options were there for me.”

Explore opportunities for early career professionals and see how you can own and grow your career.