Developing With Dell Technologies: Zia's Experience as a MDP Buddy on a Global Team

Zia K. | Career & Site Analytics Lead | Boston, Massachusetts 

Originally Published: March 17, 2023

Please share a bit about who you are and your current role. I started at Dell Technologies in November 2021 as the Career Site & Analytics Lead. I am part of the Employer Brand Team, where I also help manage our global media. I work in partnership with all our Regional Leads on the team to ensure everything we do is truly global. What is your favorite part of working at Dell Technologies? My favorite part of working at Dell is the team that I’m on. Even though my team is remote, we interact  on video calls at least once a week, so we can all stay connected. I love working on a global team and getting to know my coworkers across the world.

Outside of work, what do you enjoy doing? I love traveling, cooking, and spending time with my friends and family. When Covid first hit in March 2020, I started gardening and have grown tons of vegetables now! I’ve learned how to pickle my homegrown cucumbers and am getting better at it every year. What is a Marketing Development Program (MDP) buddy? What is the purpose and main expectations of this partnership? As an MDP buddy, I am the person on the team that provides daily support to the MDP’ers. I support their onboarding experience, such as helping to build out their 30-60-90-day plans and providing guidance if any questions come up. I ensure the MDP’ers are engaged with the broader team’s activities and can provide exposure to other business units that are relevant to their roles. The purpose of the buddy is to be the go-to person for anything they need and act as a liaison between the MDP’er and their manager. The biggest expectation I have (and what my MDP’ers should have for me) is to be open and ask questions as they come up.

What inspired you to become an MDP buddy?

Personally, I was asked if I wanted to be the MDP buddy for my team. It was a natural role for me to take on because I was going to be training our first MDP’er, which meant spending lots of time together during their first 30 days in the role. Before I came to Dell, I managed a team and was excited to get back into the flow of training, onboarding and being there for others on my team.

 Can you share any success stories from your time as a buddy? How has your mentee grown and created a lasting impact over the course of their rotation due to your mentorship?

In my role, I manage the Dell career site and the analytics for our site. I’ve loved teaching our MDP’ers new skills, such as creating/publishing pages through a CMS (content management system), changing colors within HTML code, and embedding videos onto a page. I’ve also made it a point to teach transferrable skills, such as reading through performance and understanding what can be improved by following the story the metrics tell us. Lastly, one of the most important skills I’ve been able to teach is organization. I think having an organized inbox and understanding priorities is invaluable. I always encourage new ideas to continue improving our site and new ways of sharing employee stories. I have loved seeing our employee stories grow since the MDP role came to our team.

How does the Buddy Program support the ongoing development and career paths of MDP members in future rotations and after graduating the program?

To learn more about graduate programs at Dell, visit jobs.dell.com/graduates.