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HR management and program analyst: What I do and how much I make

Alexis Avery, a 26-year-old analyst at the CDC, shares her career journey and daily tasks. She highlights the importance of customer service, analytical skills, and effective communication in her role. Alexis also emphasizes the CDC's commitment to work-life balance, allowing her to earn her master's degree while working.

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Video transcript

My name's Alexis Avery, I'm a management and program analyst at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And I'm 26 years old and I make $77,000 a year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a public health agency. I work in the workforce development and planning activities, so I have the opportunity to talk to students, talk to veterans and to be able to better staff them within positions at CDC. I love my job and I love the flexibility of it. I know there are a lot of people that they're very comfortable in a setting of whether it's like IT or even HR where they can go to a nine to five and work at a desk and they're totally fine with working at a desk or there are others that are always outside of the office, whether they're traveling all the time or they're going to career fairs, so for me I'm that person that literally likes to be right in the middle. And I get to do that with my job. Going to career fairs are a large part of my job. I get to go all over the country and I definitely get to really hone in on the schools and universities within Atlanta. I was actually a student when I started working for the CDC and so, I have the opportunity to talk to students and let them know hey, I was in your shoes. And this is what I did in order to maneuver through that process. I let them know what CDC had to offer. I also let them know these are the typical jobs that CDC has. CDC is a mega house and I let them know that you basically can work here no matter what your background is and that's what I love about it, so yes, we are a public health agency but at the same time we have a lot of different disciplines. I also have the opportunity to teach students how to find and apply to government jobs which is definitely interesting because of the USA Jobs portal that they have to apply through. I also have the opportunity to manage a leadership development program that's internal to HR for high potential leaders. We also have a survey called the Employee Viewpoint Survey and we analyze data for the survey that comes back. The data that comes back from the survey we also have the opportunity to do focus groups, to talk to employees to really get a better feel and sense of what they love about the agency, what things, different challenges, what they would like to kind of make amends to and we try really, really hard to work with their leadership and move those initiatives forward, so that's pretty much what my day to day looks like within CDC. Working at the CDC they really put emphasis on work-life balance and that is much appreciated. I have the opportunity to work from home two a days a week and I will say that that really took into play when I was able to get my master's degree and so, I was able to work from home, my supervisor was super flexible with me being able to of course work five days a week and then have that flexibility on Thursdays and Fridays for classes. I would say the skills that are needed to really do my job well, 100% customer service. That is a huge part of being a management and program analyst because not only are you talking to external stakeholders, people outside of the CDC but you're also talking to people inside of the CDC, so whether that's your supervisor, your coworkers or other people within HR or within CDC as a whole, customer service is a huge part, so also analytical skills, being able to be a team player, team oriented because just because you feel a certain way about how something should go doesn't mean that everyone else is going to feel the same way, so being able to do that and also it's also important to be able to communicate very well whether it's written communication, or oral communication because presentations come into play. Sometimes not everyone has time for you to stop by the office really quick and get your point across. You may have to say it through email or you may have to write a report. It's very important for you to be able to know your audience and to say it in the most appropriate way and to know that you can't always attach your feelings to what you're trying to accomplish but it's important that you can communicate your thoughts logically and be able to convey that to whoever your audience is.