Naval Surface Warfare Center Indian Head Division (NSWC IHD) leadership presented three employees with the Department of the Navy (DON) Civilian Service Commendation Medal and 12 personnel with the DON Civilian Service Achievement Medal at an awards ceremony at the College of Southern Maryland’s Velocity Center in Indian Head, Maryland, recently.
The Navy Civilian Service Commendation Medal is awarded to DON and U.S. Marine Corps civilians who distinguish themselves by performing well above that which is expected of an individual commensurate with his or her grade or specialty, and above the degree of excellence appropriately reflected in the individual’s performance evaluations or personnel records. The Navy Civilian Service Achievement Medal honors DON and Marine Corps civilians whose sustained performance or specific achievement equates to the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal awarded to military personnel.
DON Civilian Service Commendation Medal: Kristy Burns, Heather Nottingham and Brandy Stickel
Recognizing an increase in employee attrition, NSWC IHD Human Resources Division’s Staffing & Classification Branch manager Kristy Burns and her team executed a strategic hiring push during the fourth quarter of 2022. Under her leadership, the team utilized every viable hiring path to find well-qualified candidates for hiring managers, while maintaining a commitment to merit system principles.
As program manager for the command’s Drug Free Workplace program, Heather Nottingham coordinated and processed all drug tests for the hire of all new personnel in a single quarter. Staffing & Classification Branch Lead Brandy Stickel directed the day-to-day efforts and created plans and reports for all hiring actions. Burns’ guidance, the team hired almost as many employees in the fourth quarter as they did the rest of the year, exceeding the original hiring projection by approximately 15 percent.
DON Civilian Service Achievement Medal
Human Resources team: Joselyn Alonso, Heather Del Selva, Jennifer Hughes, Lindsey Longshore, Diana Murray, Lauren Moreland, Lisa Robey, Jill Ryan, Victoria Skelton and Lauren Trilli
The Human Resources Division’s Staffing & Classification Branch team executed their leadership’s strategic plan to overcome the command’s attrition rates and ensure their customers could hire the employees needed before the end of the fiscal year. The team also worked with hiring managers to explore viable hiring paths in search of well-qualified candidates and conducted all pre-employment and onboarding tasks for candidates.
Security team: Michelle Campbell and George Jones
NSWC IHD Personnel Security manager Michelle Campbell recognized the influx of hiring actions and created a plan to expedite processing of personnel security clearances to meet the increased demand. As the command’s Security Management Team lead, George Jones ensured his team completed the required security clearance actions and reviews for onboarding new employees. Their efforts led to a 30 percent decrease in security clearance paperwork completion time, despite an unprecedented increase in workload.
NSWC IHD — a field activity of the Naval Sea Systems Command and part of the Navy’s Science and Engineering Establishment — is the leader in ordnance, energetics, and EOD solutions. The Division focuses on energetics research, development, testing, evaluation, in-service support, manufacturing and disposal; and provides warfighters solutions to detect, locate, access, identify, render safe, recover, exploit and dispose of explosive ordnance threats.
