From Courtside to Capitol Hill: Dir. of Professional Development Sarah Hughes on Career Transformation

We have a different host for this special episode of The Buzz, Pete Tseronis, founder of Dots and Bridges. He interviews Sarah Hughes, Director of Professional Development at ACT-IAC. They discuss Sarah's diverse career across industries, networking, mentorship, and career growth. Sarah shares insights from her journey, including her work with sports teams, transitions to government, and contributions to professional development. The episode also highlights the importance of building strong communities and explores various ACT-IAC programs designed to enhance professional development. Key themes include adaptability, the influence of technology on government, and the power of mentorship.

00:00 Introduction to The Buzz Special Episode
00:38 Meet Pete Tseronis and Sarah Hughes
02:45 Sarah Hughes' Career Journey
06:24 Transition to Government Contracting
12:50 Building Trust and Community in GovCon
16:15 Emerging Technology and Innovation Conference
16:55 Joining ACT-IAC: A Personal Journey
18:25 Professional Development at ACT-IAC
19:29 The Academy: Educational Training and Leadership Skills
22:30 Programs Overview: Associates, Voyagers, and Partners
27:56 Future Vision and Collaborative Efforts
31:00 Final Thoughts and Homework

ABBY

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Intro/Outro Music: See a Brighter Day/Gloria Tells
Courtesy of Epidemic Sound

(Episodes 1-159: Intro/Outro Music: Focal Point/Young Community
Courtesy of Epidemic Sound)

Transcript

Yohanna: [00:00:00] Welcome to a special episode of The Buzz. Today, I'm handing the mic to Pete Saronis, founder of Dots and Bridges. Pete knows both government and business inside out. He's talking with Sarah Hughes, director of professional development at ACT IAC. Sarah's career has taken her across industries, from working with sports teams, to leading programs that help people grow in government and business.
Yohanna: Together, Pete and Sarah discuss networking, mentorship, and career growth. And why building a strong community helps both government and industry succeed. So let's get started. 
PETE: Hey, this is Pete Saronis. I am with Dots and Bridges. I am a former federal employee. I spent 25 years across four administrations.
PETE: I finished in the Department of Energy, I worked in the Department of Education, I worked in the Defense, and for the last 10 years, I've been doing this. Meeting incredible people, like the wonderful Sarah [00:01:00] Hughes, and I've had an opportunity recently to come and join the team here at ACT I ACT on the Buzz podcast.
PETE: So we're gonna jump right in. This is my first one, so I'm a little nervous, or I appear that way. It's just those butterflies, but I'm super excited 
to be 
PETE: here. 
I feel like there's an air 
PETE: disruption like that. I should be able to 
even 
PETE: speak. Hey, hey, listen, I just wanted to establish a little credibility that I know the GALCON community fairly well, having worked in government, but again, Sarah, your, your role and what ACT I has done for me since my career morphed into the private sector, it's again, it's an honor to be here today, and I'm really excited to talk about it.
PETE: What you're doing to help augment, amplify the federal and commercial workforce in terms of professional development. So let me brag a little bit about you and not steal all your thunder. Folks, we're here today with Sarah Hughes, the Director of Professional Development at the American Council for Technology.
PETE: Sarah, she's doing incredible work and we're going to hear all about that, but I want to shout out Wheeling University. You are our, you have 
[00:02:00] it. The Jesuits. I was here when I was still a Jesuit. Okay, good. So Wheeling Cheshire University contacts. 
PETE: Okay, okay. Well, I did a little homework, but Wheeling University Sports Management, a dog named Maxine Luna and Velvet.
PETE: Okay, so we'll get into that. I have a bird noodle and I have a labradoodle name. Let's see. Phineas, Max, and the Saronis. We would have to greet her out there. The Rocky and Apollo Saronis. Because my wife's got a little bit of taffy in there. So, anyway. Hey, look. Director of Professional Development. Act. I.
PETE: Act. You know, I hope people are going to be Googling you while they're listening to this. Well, hopefully not when they're driving. But talk to us about that journey. Right? I think, personally and professionally, how did you end up here? But along the way, what influenced you? And tell that story. You know, that's just about storytelling.
Yeah. Pete, that is a, uh. That's a road that takes me to living in 13 different states, moving across the country numerous times, and landing back in D. C. D. C. 's my home for kids. So, I, you're right, I started my career at Williams Judge University. I was a student athlete for the first two years. [00:03:00] I played volleyball, and then the next two years I played golf, which is a secret amongst students.
Ask 
PETE: most big fan you, you keep a handicap. That tells me absolutely not. Okay. Not that that, so that's 
why it's a secret, not, not very many that I golf. I also got my first internship with the sports team. I was doing sports management athlete. It aligns at the time that was under. And then I was working for the ECHL, which is an ability of Pittsburgh Penguins.
So I also got a call up to do Penguin stuff on game nights. I then went to Pensacola and worked for the Ice Pilots and showed up one day. I was doing corporate sales for them and showed up one day and the doors were locked. They didn't padlock and I've heard about teams going dark before. But I, I'm like, ugh.
This isn't happening to me. And, yeah, it happens. I had a friend that was living in D. C. at the time. I had [00:04:00] never been to D. C. before. And he's like, my roommate just moved out. Come up and move. Like, the Wendy's on this circle was actually a viable place to live. It was built right back then. when I would tell cabbies when I would drop off at Union Station, that I was like, can you take me to R Street?
They're like, ma'am, where are you looking? There? And I'm like, it's a basement apartment. It's cute. I can afford it. Yes, it was like 600. It was amazing. Back in the time when breakfast was still affordable in D. C. And I was working for Lincoln Holdings on the Washington Mystic sign. I was there during the merger, so I started working for MindMail Sports in their early, early years.
I can remember when John Wall got drafted, number one draft pick. Big reception for him and, and doing the duggy and I'm sitting courtside with one of our season tickets, my very first courtside ticket I ever sold. [00:05:00] And I was just like, this is pretty amazing. From there, I went to work for SMG down in Tampa, working on our tennis side.
And then I had a private work for the Islanders, and he's my sales work, standing in our sales force. She, she still won a job with Hockey, and I'm like, 
SARAH: yeah, let's do this. 
PETE: I'm a die hard Islanders fan, which And my wife, who's from Pittsburgh, we have a lot of black girls in our house. Oh, yeah. I'll survive.
PETE: Yeah, not so much survive, just big fans. But go ahead. 
I was living in Long Beach. It was glorious. Puppy Sprock and Remi Gorky at the time. We're just living our lives. So I'm on the beach every morning. I love selling in New York. Because you would get these spicy men from Wall Street. And I would be spicy back.
And then they would get what they wanted. After I would be like, we need to talk to the manager. And, They would, like, send me flowers. I'm like, is your wife going to be okay with this? They were like, well, I was a little rude to you. And that's what they, East Coast is like that. They will be mean to you, [00:06:00] but they're also really nice.
So I have always treasured that. Yes, you can be, in your career, you can be pushy and aggressive, but you can also be nice about things because you want to progress. Business in some way. They had a big client, they were doing things, and I was just trying to sell season tickets. That is key for other things that I do later on in my 
PETE: career.
PETE: So, if I may, this journey that, like, I, look, I wanted to be a sports broadcaster when I was coming out of Villanova, and I thought I'd be on ESPN one day, and I ended up at the Pentagon, and then I'm all of a sudden, I'll age myself here, turning 58 this year. I was there before the Internet was born. Oh 
my gosh, when you have an envelope with the names on it, and then someone walking around.
It 
PETE: was sneaker debt, right? But then, no, I was there at the end of the Genesis. You did it in a lot, a lot, a lot. But it was an inflection point. My career was influenced by that technology transformation. But [00:07:00] whatever you want to call it, it was a revolution. I went back to school, and then the Clinger Cohen Act starts, and next thing you know, the federal government's saying hey, the chief information officer's thing is no longer the I.
PETE: T. or I. R. director, so my journey similar, you know, sports to, um, technology, and I'm posting the buzz, and somehow 35 years later, I'm not a geek, I'm not the smartest captain by any stretch, but there are hidden talents, and I can hear and see, knowing you, of course, and Your expert version in regards to the industry, hockey, media, and now professional development, the influence of technology on the federal government and within as well as commercial, it's just the connection to people.
PETE: Yeah, especially now as you want to constantly be in a state of building trust. Is that fair? 
Yes, it is. Yes, it is. And that goes, it goes into effect of what I was saying about, you know, working with season ticket holders if you work. Second lockout happened and I was like, well, what am I [00:08:00] going to do? I reached out to Coach Angela that was coaching the Mystics.
Prior to that, she was at Minnesota at the time. I was like, hey, the Seattle store has a position open. She's like, you want to move to the Pacific or Blessara? I'm like, yeah. She's like, are you sure? And I'm like, yeah, I do. And she's like, okay. I had an interview and within an hour I was accepted to the position.
I was probably scrogging. I picked up and moved. Two days later, the hurricane hit where, hurricane hit in Newark where they had the hurricane and then the big snowstorm afterwards. My apartment was in the basement of something, of like a, not something, of a London building. One of my season ticket orders was a fireman at the time and he sent me a picture and I'm like, What am I looking at?
And he's like, your apartment 12 feet under. And I was like, holy cow! I was like, I just made it out with all of my life. So I'm in Seattle. I am living in Lower Canadian. Love Seattle to death. Great food, great beer, very high alcohol content, so be aware if you go. But it [00:09:00] is lovely. The Seattle Storm is an extremely well run organization.
I will find women. So, what brought you, 
PETE: I mean, traveling the East Coast up and down, back and forth, Northeast, you know, Southeast, or out in the Northwest, what, what brought you, what brought you back? Let's, let's pivot to the, the Antioch, 
you know, let's Oh, jeez, no, we're still, there's still a rocky road to get to from there.
So, this puts us at about 2013, and my dad was getting really sick. He had cysts in the lungs. My mom was like, I just need you closer. I was like, I'll move back. And she's like, Oh, you're going to Ohio? No, ma'am. So I was like, I'll move back to DC. Let's get some flight, some drive. I moved back and I get a job at BF Stall working their sports bookings for seven hotels.
And I'm like, this is the closest I'm getting at sports. Because I was a little tired of the working every summer, working all holidays, working in sports is a grueling [00:10:00] field. You're not paid a lot, but you're working a lot. It is a work hard, play hard culture. And I was just kind of over it. So BSL was great.
And then I got a position working for Google. And I was at River Creek Club, River Creek Club, I don't know what part of the world they're in. I played that track. We have a golf tournament there. We'll be playing there in August for our age. Shout out Act. I had a golf tournament every weekend. But with that, I'm always in outwardly facing positions, and that's okay.
But I host, the Country Club set is one of, do you know who my husband is? I'm like, yeah, I do. I do unfortunately. Sorry. And it was right around the time Ashley, the Ashley Madison scandal happened. So I was dealing with the worst of the worst divorces. And there was a tipping point that happened. And I was like, I'm out.
I am out. And [00:11:00] I, one of our members was an owner of A government contracting company. And she's been working on and asking me, would you come work for me? So I'm like, yeah, I'm ready. Let's do this. Did you 
PETE: know the role? Or was it just, I want to fit into this? This next thing. Yeah, yeah. 
I still might need the role and I read up on it.
But when you read up on what a captioning manager is, Google doesn't tell you that because people don't tell you that. 
PETE: They 
just don't count. 
PETE: We'll get into that because a lot of it is translation. What does that mean? And it could be the same thing in the commercial as having worked in government. I didn't know what half of these roles were, right?
PETE: I was meeting, you know, someone from Google. And next thing you know, I'm thinking I'm buying a product from you and really there's resellers and then there's distributors and there's a whole lexicon that I was unaware until I left government and the next thing you know, we're like, whoa, whoa, this is interesting.
PETE: So, so you had a chance to become a cat hair manager. Was that the first gig? 
Yes. And I will never forget this. And this is also around the time that government. I did the [00:12:00] whole campaign around leading men to your predecessors and your succession plan people, and it was mostly focused on women at this time, because I was sitting with the CEO, and we were sitting with their business development manager for THS, and this individual looked at our CEO, and our CEO is very in the know, you know, of who is who, what ends up on.
She's very smart. And this lady looked at her and goes, I won't train her. She's too old to be in this position, and I didn't have anyone training me on my way up, so no. And that was that. 
PETE: I'm feeling the seedling of how you have come to a place where professional development and leadership and mentorship is going to be very, that experience influenced you and what you're doing today.
Yeah, I'm feeling like, okay, so I'm like, so we pivoted. I took over all of the events, took over all of the sponsorship, and I was tasked with the idea of building the bridge between delivery and headquarters. [00:13:00] At the time, there was a lot of people at delivery on specific sites that were like, I work for this agency.
No, you do not. You're a contractor. For our company, working on a contract that was awarded to us by the government. So, you're, you're, if I may, when I 
PETE: was a federal employee, I always like to not treat the contractor community as well. You're not part of the family, the kind of arts. They were part of the team.
PETE: It was clearly, they were there to help support our mission. And then on the federal side, whether it was policy or governance or what have you, you had to jib. It's like 
the substitute teachers. You know, they're just coming in helping Right, okay. So full revamp marketing all the things asking the pms what we need What what trainings you need and we got our training certificates up to I want to say it was 80 percent by the time I left we did more [00:14:00] culture against things We would go to sites that were close to, like, you know, our sites were all over the DMV, like, you could go to the mountain, you could go to US Contino, down at the, the building down in the district, just, we were just spread out so far.
So, like, it was just a calculated where and when and how do we connect. And it was a success. It was a big success. 
PETE: So, if I may, you're, you're doing this thing, you're, you're, you're learning or learning on your own in some cases, but I would imagine there was some, some folks did come into your life, but, you know, you mentioned capturing it, business development, you know, running events, sponsorships, delivery, these are terms that some feds, at least I'll speak for my physical, what does all that mean?
PETE: I'm just trying to connect with somebody who can be the provider of services. And help me understand this people because that was me as a technologist. I need that partnership with industry. And that's what I think what I love about [00:15:00] You know, how does the gov con community when they say build trust and partnership and anybody go read the mission of that diet, it is a safe harbor.
We've been around for 40. 46 years now. Yeah. I mean, it's 
PETE: the go to if I may say so myself. So, so, well, let's bring it to that. Let's kick it into, you know, when did you arrive here? Like all the experiences you've had. I'm sure you can give us a litany of great stories, but you showed up here one day. What attracted you to the ACT I family?
It supports the mission of America in a way that people come together as a community. I love working with the team here when I was at BAM Big Bird. I worked with Carol when I bought Sponsored. It was fun to go shaming with Carol. Carol Miller. Carol Miller. I love working with April, our director of membership.
Shout out to April. And April's turned into a very dear friend [00:16:00] of mine, too. She'll call me in the, like, way in the bedtime of nighttime and be like, How are you doing, girl? Haven't seen you in a while. I'm like, Keisha, I've known Keisha for years as well. Shout out to Keisha. Shout out to Keisha. We're going 
PETE: to lose to everybody.
PETE: I'm just kidding. We really are. 
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But working with them and wanting to work for an organization that supported them [00:17:00] on in a such a positive way, this stellar reputation that we have.
It was something that I wanted to follow. 
PETE: Well, you also mentioned, you know, this, this term bridges and, and hey, you know, my company Dots and Bridges is that symbol. Connect Dots and Build Bridges. And I looked at ACT I when I was in government and outside, it was part of the ACT community, you know, Council for Technology is that, and coming out of the Industry Advisory Council is brilliant.
PETE: It's, it's been decades. It's been four decades. What a great place to be. And, and when you get here and you see the programs and again, folks, you know, ACT. IAC. org, I believe, is the website. You know, there's a lot you can consume when you go there. Yes. But it's not like there's a million people running this organization.
PETE: Shout out to Dave Wannigrant, and Tom Scanlon, and I can list everyone else. But you're here now. And when you came, You adapted and figured out, I would imagine, where can I fit in? I mean, was that, is that fair to say? 
That is fair to say. I have a lot of energy. I'm an Aquarius. I am 
PETE: [00:18:00] I didn't get that sense that you have a lot of energy.
PETE: No, not at all. You're talking too much. I 
live off of caffeine. 
PETE: Okay. Green tea is mine. Alright, so go ahead. 
You 
PETE: know, 
I'm an Aquarius. I think outside of the box. I was made by dyslexia and ADD. So I see how things are shifting. This let's say it was such like an Italian term when I was growing up, like, I learned differently.
I got to do videos, I audiobooks. 
PETE: So, what was the first role you had here? Let's get into what It was manager of professional development. Okay, and you're official type. Yes. 
I am, I took over As a department in January, I'm the director of professional development. So after that, I manage the entire department and I run our partners and associates.
And we're going 
PETE: to get into that because there's more programs in the academy. Absolutely. This role that you had, just, you know, maybe briefly, the influence you had, were you given a, as I like to say, a blank canvas or a paint by numbers? Was Dave saying, make it your own? [00:19:00] 
Absolutely. 
PETE: Okay. 
He likes the way that I had shifted associates and voyagers.
Because those are the two programs I was running as a manager. Even in the middle of my tenure when I got promoted to senior manager, Christina Binhack, our director of Shout out to Christina. Shout out to Christina. My wife. My wife. We, we were given the task to reimagine the academy. The academy is important for academic professional development because it has those fun little tidbits of extra learning capability.
And I know we're going to touch on that in a bit. Well, 
PETE: no, let's jump right in. I mean, look folks, the academy is all about educational training, the management and application of technology. Intentionally there to improve this exactly leadership skills. If you read the definition of it, but he has now break down, break that down to its value 
proposition 
PETE: for 
sorry proposition for the academy is a place where, you know, and.
Be educated on certifications on things you need as a business, like succession planning and things that you just need to know about, like, you know, we have AI [00:20:00] workshops, we have succession, a succession planning course coming up that is focused on your succession planning for your department, but then we have an add on staff for town on how do you make the blueprint for succession planning.
In the talent sector, how are you looking to replace yourself or replace your CFO when they decide to retire with the proper talent and keep them in line 
PETE: and skill sets that need technical more technologies and some of that, you know, yeah, yeah, the part that I am. Institutional knowledge. So that's a, that's wonderful.
There's a story that came out of the Department of Commerce Succession Planning Conference last year that there was a CTO out of an agency that had their Succession Planning person in place to go. And that person was 15 or 10 years away from a retirement. They had some major family emergency happen.
They retire before the succession planning retire person did. So [00:21:00] it's not just one level of succession planning that you need. And our succession planning course goes into that. You need multiple levels so that you have that type. And you know that your company has the personnel in there that will 
PETE: be there for you.
PETE: So how, how does one become a part of an academy course? Is it for government and industry? Yes. Okay, so it's it's like an immersive experience for people who are part of the Academy of Discourses. Again, I mentioned it's, correct me if I'm wrong, Small Bites, B Y T E S, Succession Play, and Talent Media. 
Yes, so Small Bites are our own little, little nugget.
Those are one off events. So we'll have, you know, a three hour event on AI for Talent Review that's actually coming up in June. We're partnering up with Jamstwo on that one. Because they have this great platform that they are launching. 
PETE: And that, this one though is coming up in March, correct? March 20th?
PETE: No, we've actually had 
to move that. Okay, okay. We've had to move that because of the current trends. Okay, so. [00:22:00] And that's not, that's not abnormal for, for the design we are right now. We're shifting a lot of things, reimagining things. We're just redeveloping things so that they're more relevant for what is happening right now.
And that's another great thing about ACT I. ACT is a faculty pivot. And we make things for our members and for our community of 
PETE: preference. Yeah, it's a constant transition. Yeah, it is. Right, okay. So, so the academy, great courses, educational training. Government industry experiential learning. Love it. Let's go to your one.
PETE: I'm going to say three programs that I know about, but maybe you can give us the distilled version of partners, voyagers, associates, and maybe bring in that fellows, those titles that affiliate with each one. So let's start with the associate 
associate when I redid all the program. I kept the associates.
Semi selfishly, they are one to seven years into their careers, and they are bright eyed, they are not cynical yet, and if you've been in government for a while, [00:23:00] you will know that burnout and cynicism is a real thing. And they just have so much light that I was like, I'm keeping the associates, they were fun.
I also like to watch them progress in their goals and in velocity. For example, Arlene, our new manager of professional development. Shout out to Arthie. Shout out to Arthie. She was one of my associates last year for 24. She graduated in January. She was a little timid, a little You can see the confidence just right at the surface, but she just didn't have the build up yet.
And now, she's running Voyager, she's running the academy certifications side of things, and she's developing a new program for us for PD. 
PETE: So Associates is meant for, yeah, I think you mentioned, 1 to 7 year, 6 year folks who are just kind of, You know, being out in the field with government and industry and you have the confidence there and you help amplify that, so you have that confidence.
PETE: Okay, what's [00:24:00] next? What do you do if you're a little more advanced in the federal? So then 
you have 7 to 14 years in your career, or a GS 12 to a 14. Okay. And because government is moving into a new era, we also can do GS 15s. Based off of your personal preference. Okay, what I say personal preference is if you are really a point of GS 15 and you are still early on enough in your career that you want your network to grow with you and not retire 10 to 15 years before you do where your system is the landing place for you.
If you are newly, if you are a GS 15, but you've been in that position, And you are about to retire in 10 to 15 years of Partners, because that's pretty exciting. So, when you build your community, prepare Black for Voyagers and Partners, and then you become a fellow, you want that network to 
PETE: grow and see what it's into.
PETE: What's the fellow correlation to the program? 
The fellow correlation is where you graduate into. [00:25:00] So, once you graduate, you become a fellow. And we stand 1400 strong and about, I want to say 980 of them are active and that goes true to case because the partners program launched in 1997. So you're going to have people that left the industry.
Retired. But that's what happens when you have a program that's been around for 28 years, but look at that then. 
PETE: So a program like Voyagers and Partners and Associates, is there a curriculum? I mean, do these folks, I mean, what are they getting out of what I would imagine is a ridiculous opportunity to meet, you know, past and present leaders, mentors.
PETE: But, but how long do these programs last? 
So, Associates runs from March, April until January of graduation. Voyagers runs from September until May, graduation and emerging tech. And then Partners, and this year is a [00:26:00] little different. We have a contingency plan in place for Partners because we have to pause it because their applications were due right around the time Wall Street Fish was starting.
So we have PAWS partners. I have a contingency plan from Dave. He has a group. Dave Wettergren. Dave Wettergren. Big 
PETE: time shot. Dave, our CEO. 
And we are collecting data from the partners, applicants. You know, Dave Davis, so like, he was a former CTO of NAMI, so he's very techie. So like, he wants, we want to make a data driven decision.
Not based off of guts, or what we're hearing at OPM, or GSA, or White House. We want to make an educated decision what's going to be best for the partners. Will this year with partners be the one to one government industry? I hope, but it doesn't need to be because we have great leaders. On the industry and both government side that can support us in other ways to get that same interaction.
So partners 2025 will be shifted. So, June launch, hopefully from our [00:27:00] data. Driven decision and our data we're collecting and you will end November after. 
PETE: Executive leadership conference in case we throw a buzzword out there, even though ELC stands by itself. So forget what does it actually say? Remember 
it used to stand for.
Executive leadership conference, but now, because we are handling more of the, we have 12 associates come last year. We have, we have 16, 17, 17 board members from this year ago. So, it's just across the board now when it comes to. Who's going to, to ELC? 
PETE: And that's just one of many events. For us, you know, if you go to ACT I, Don's working, you're going to see multiple opportunities to join, be in communities of practice and interest, etc.
PETE: So, so, okay, so you're here, you're running professional development, you're making your mark, and we are always thinking about the future, even though we're never promised tomorrow. If you can briefly, you know, how do you see [00:28:00] The next one or two years your influence on the programs. Do you have ideas that you have to share your secret sauce?
PETE: Are you already just a few months into thinking about how you're going to see these programs evolve? 
Yes. Okay. With the way government has shifted, we no longer as a professional development portion of these things to go on. We can no longer dictate what we're doing. We need to go to the table of government and say, how do you envision this to look?
How, how do you want your people to be trained? And it's going, and I mean, if I'm going to a, if I go to a CFO of say the DOT and say, what do you see first us? What's important for you, for your gubbies to do? And get out of this program. Is it more emotional intelligence? Is it more technical skill sets?
Yes. What do you, what do you want from that? How can I help? What can we do? And it's no longer being like, this is it. 
PETE: [00:29:00] So it's a, it's a, it's truly a collaborative informing your agenda and I love that it's not dictated as I call it the pay by numbers, but you're working with your government customers as well as industry to say what's going to be the right fit because the 
industry you're going to want to follow suit as to what government is doing.
PETE: Yeah, and you made a great point. I think for the audience and this is like you have an opportunity with the world that's just constantly in the state of Bush, whether it's administration change or the internet influence or the AI influence. You're constantly thinking about how can the agenda for these programs, the academy, shift so that it's still going to benefit and augment the workforce, the professional development agenda.
Right. So, as part of what we have, 1W this year, and for our associates, is from the DoD, which the DoD is something that has been like, you know, we want more DoD, we want more Co2, we want more THS. 
PETE: The government's large. Lots of mission. We do. We have 
lots of missions. 
PETE: Go to the Federal Register folks and type in how many agencies there are.
PETE: You're going to find. There's so many. Yeah, different [00:30:00] missions. 
But it's like, how do you focus on all of them and not just focus on the few that Already know and love us. We want everyone to claim the full. So when he did submit, I was like, Are you in? Are you good? And he's like, I emailed his sponsor, and his sponsor was like, I love the fact that he gets all these CLP points.
Associates, before I took over, were getting 20 continuing learning points. It's up to 40. And then with them getting networking points, They can get up to last year. Someone had 58 earning points and that goes into the point of, you can, you can transition those learning points into continuing education points for your PMP for your scrum master for your certification certification that are required for government for contracts.
PETE: That's another bonus of just developing the individual from whatever career and as you you've shared and I have a checkered one too where it's like how did I go from here to there and then end up as a CTO. All right, look, I can talk to you for hours. [00:31:00] I love it. I always like to finish with, you know, whether it's, what's a parting shot, what's something you want to leave with anybody who listens to this about this discussion that you can either give, as I say, some homework to or just to feel good about.
Yeah, I have, 
PETE: I have two. Go for it. 
So one is your homework for the day. Is it read or listen to? Because listening to an audiobook is still the same as reading. The energy bus. Because, right now, we can only control what we can control. So, you need to put your energy into what fills your cup, not just what is draining it.
So, so listen and read that. And then, I want you to sit in my path. My path was a big believer in this, so. I want you to sit and think about when you are having a really dark and dreamy, scrawly day. I want you to sit back and put yourself into the position of, it's a wonderful life, as you and this main character, and then take yourself out.
You have your angel and you're sitting there talking to them. Who [00:32:00] around you isn't going to have those things in their life that makes it better? Who is unmarried because you never put them together. Who, I don't know, didn't take your career advice. Or, I know that's really drastic, but like, you don't realize the little things you do.
Or, if you just tell someone, like, Oh, I love your hair! And you just draw, draw me by them. Not knowing that they're having one of the worst days. You 
PETE: never know the impact you're having on somebody or influencing that until you can kind of see it from a distance. And I'm getting a sense that your professional development program and DIAAC is, again, safe harbor for come here.
PETE: We're a family. We have an opportunity to help you think about where is your next step because this journey you're on is continual. So 
it's not even your next step in your career. Yes. Our associates, when they are done with our programs, they, none of them get new positions within their companies. None of them move to different companies.
All of them, most of them have gotten places. Then that's impact. [00:33:00] It's impactful. And their sponsors are happy because, you know, they keep on sending and I keep on getting, oh, someone from, you know, CGI just told me they should do this, but they're a small business. You know, we partnered with them and they said, this is great.
Here are two people for our associates. Or, right now, our Voyager's class is in the thick of it, like, our gummies can't travel right now, and they were on our screen yesterday, and there was tears, there was laughter, there was also, hey guys, we can do this together, you know, and 
PETE: I think that's a fostering partnership, and shout out to Aetheic for doing that.
PETE: Hey! Thank you for humanizing you for the role that you have here at ACT IAC and, you know, I look forward to seeing this program evolve and if you're interested in any of this. Sarah Hughes, and she said, thank you again for, and hopefully listening and doing your homework. Thank you, Sarah. 
Yohanna: Thank 
you. 
Yohanna: This has been such an insightful [00:34:00] conversation.
Yohanna: Thank you for sharing your journey and experiences with us. And to our listeners, if you're interested in learning more about ACT IAC's Professional Development Program, be sure to check out actiac. org slash professional dash development. Until next time, keep learning. Keep growing and we will see you in the next episode.