An 'A' Educatee

Republic Fiscal's Keri Donahue took classes to motion from HR to the Web.

After spending the outset 5 years of her career as a man resources director at Republic Fiscal Network, Keri Donahue started getting fidgety for a new challenge. So five years agone, when IT executives at the Waltham, Mass.-based broker/dealer asked Donahue if shed exist willing to spend part of her time helping to implement a content direction system, she leaped at the chance.

A few months after, Donahue was offered a full-time position every bit a Spider web site specialist. She hasnt looked dorsum since.

Donahue didnt have any prior technical feel other than having taken a few introductory IT courses at nearby Bentley College during her undergraduate studies. So she started her budding career in Information technology by cutting and pasting content into a system that feeds Commonwealths Web site. In her early on days in Information technology, Donahue received on-the-job HTML mentoring and took a few HTML courses on Commonwealths dime at New Horizons Computer Learning Centers.

These would marking the outset steps in a 5-year journey that led Donahue, 32, to receive considerably more training, which has helped make her a more than constructive IT worker and a better-paid one, too.

Keri Donahue

Keri Donahue Donahue has learned a lot about HTML, Photoshop and JavaScript on the job, primarily by tapping the knowledge of more experienced peers. Republic is great in that you can go to anyone and ask them questions, she says.

3 years ago, later on Donahue had begun learning more about Spider web site usability and demonstrating more than involvement in that area, her boss gave her a list of classes to consider. After attending a series of two- and three-day courses offered by Human being Factors International Inc. in Boston, Chicago and New York, she took an online exam in March and received a Spider web site usability analyst certification. The certification helped her land a promotion, she says.

Donahue says the off-site training has also helped her to better empathise how people use Web sites and online applications and to determine the types of features and functions users want.

As an investment broker/dealer, Commonwealth develops many of its own proprietary products, such as online financial wizards for more than than 1,000 customers who are independent financial professionals, plus applications that those representatives can use to pull all of their customers data into a unmarried view, Donahue explains.

Best Places for Training
1. Commonwealth Financial Network
ii. National Rural Electric Cooperative Association
3. The Mitre Corp.
four. The Upper-case letter Group Cos.
5. Informatica Corp.
half-dozen. Verizon Wireless
vii. Creighton University
8. Academy of Miami
9. BAE Systems Inc.
ten. Securian Financial Grouping Inc.
To determine this top 10 list, we considered the following factors: Average number of training days and boilerplate cost of preparation per Information technology worker per year.

To assistance her comprehend the needs of Commonwealths internal and external customers, she has likewise taken introductory classes on mutual funds and cash management.

In developing our Web site, its important for me to understand mutual funds, says Donahue. So when someone comes to me and says theyd like to add together this slice here or change the look of this surface area, its important that I accept an agreement of what it all means and how all-time to brandish it on our site.

The classroom grooming Donahue has received has too helped her grasp the contextual nature of Web design. For instance, 1 of the courses she took focused on research and helped her discover why its a graphical no-no to place red text on a blue background.

Information technology has something to do with your eyes its a concrete thing in terms of how the brain interprets the colors and contrasts, Donahue explains. I was picking these kinds of things up from my boss, just now information technology has new meaning backside information technology.

Overall, Commonwealth provides its It workers with an unbelievable amount of training, says Donahue. I think I could take a class in one case a week and non hit every one until after vi or seven months, she says. Plus, its not a static environs. Were constantly evaluating and improving the classes what works and what doesnt, she says.

The preparation has likewise helped Donahue and her peers gain additional respect from stop users. Says Donahue, We have this credibility weve developed through all of this grooming.

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