Commitment to Learning
The Success Story of Dylilah Hill


How do you go from a college Radio, TV, & Film major to a highly responsible position within the leading global information technology services company? Luck has little to do with it. If you asked Dylilah Hill, an EDS Information Specialist functioning in a Client Delivery Executive Support Leader role based at the Saturn plant at Spring Hill , Tennessee , she would say “the love of learning is the most important key. People don’t know what to expect when they get out of school – it is hard for them to set a career path. What you must expect is to be the very best you can be!”

Dylilah had virtually no background in the Information Technology arena before she went to college–the closest she got in high school was a typing class! During her freshman year at the University of North Alabama , she happened to take a basic course in computer programming, and from that moment on, she was hooked. Fortunately for Dylilah, her university’s format for IT students was to conduct a business project (a full-blown system project with codes, specs, flow charts, etc.) during the whole senior year; this gave her the opportunity to live the business/IT connection before graduating. With her Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Information Systems with Magna Cum Laude distinction in hand, she found her first IT job at Southwestern Great American, Inc. as a junior programmer, designing and coding small systems and performing on-call duties for the direct-mailing system. The second year there, she was promoted to a Junior Analyst which gave her an additional set of educational, business circumstances: direct interface with her company’s customers and senior corporate management, responsibility for all direct-mailing system design activities SME, and mentoring junior programmers. “Having a computer business degree helped me - Accounting, Economics, and other subjects helped me see the business side of things”, Dylilah emphasized. “The degree, my senior project, and my grades got me the job at Southwestern.”

Her search for additional learning and career advancement opportunities led Dylilah to EDS. This company of 130,000+ employees had the challenging environment she sought: a mentoring system for new employees; a proven track-record of investing in their employees, company support for furthering formal education, a policy of encouragement for employees to set goals and establish the tools to reach those goals, and a global structure of information technology, applications and business, and IT transformation services, supporting a client base spanning 34 different industries.

Dylilah’s expectations for opportunity were realized. EDS’s training, mentoring and recognition programs, her philosophy about learning, and her own hard work enhanced her skills set foundation and prepared Dylilah to provide valuable and highly-successful support to her client, the Saturn Service Parts Operations Information Systems and Services Group. She moved from her first EDS position as a Warehouse Systems Developer to Team Leader, to Project Leader, and then to her current position as Client Delivery Executive-Support Leader, responsible for business management of an $8m annual revenue book of business. She is the Project Manager responsible for 1) integrating and implementing an outside vendor’s Forecasting and Scheduling System and Saturn’s forecasting system for parts to suppliers, and 2) development and implementation of a systems method to allow raw, unpackaged parts to be shipped from the warehouse and packaged as part of the shipping process, thus reducing inventory handling and unitizing costs by $70-$100k annually. She is now recognized as a Warehouse System Subject Matter Expert. As a result of her experiences at EDS, Dylilah’s enhanced skills set now includes client delivery expertise, project and program management, leadership, business and financial management, new business proposals and contract management, multi-site resource management, mentoring and coaching, as well as technical programming and design experience.

But Dylilah has not rested on her business environment achievements. She obtained a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification in 2003 through the Program Management Institute. And, her business and IT acumen has captured the attention of regional educational institutions: she developed and taught an Introduction to Computers course at Columbia State Community College; she was selected as an Advisory Committee Member for the IT Department at Nashville State Community College (NSCC); she participated in a successful partnership between her Saturn client and an NSCC systems design class for the Corporate Scholar Solutions (CSS) program’s pilot project, under the auspices of the Center for Information Technology in Tennessee; and, she was one of the business advisors selected to participate in the National Science Foundation-Advanced Technological Education program’s annual proposal review process.

“It’s different in today’s IT world than it was when I graduated twelve years ago”, Dylilah says. “What was being taught at my school then would not cut it now. I wouldn’t have a leg up, over someone in, say, India . They have various certifications, multiple college degrees, etc. IT no longer has room for a coder who just sits in the back office. There are a lot of ways to be successful, but you have to expect to always be learning something new to keep up with the global industry demands.” Dylilah’s advice for technology workers entering the IT field today:

• Expand your mind set – be flexible, and avoid being pigeon-holed or pigeon-holing yourself
• Look for a good mentor and learn all you can
• Develop critical thinking skills to complement your multiple technical skills
• Set a goal to grow your skills and keep re-skilling every year
• Realize that communication, leadership, and project management skills are assets for every IT worker
• Stay marketable by choosing to improve skills the employers want
• Understand that well-developed presentation skills are a must - leadership requires it!

So, how does Dylilah’s life path serve as an example to the current and future Information Technology worker? Well, in the global market place of today, competition for IT jobs is fierce, and off-shoring is a real option for companies. “If I were looking for someone, it would be a quick learner – someone who could sit down with the customer and translate, who could act as a liaison between countries’ solution centers”, states Dylilah. “Right now, U.S. businesses have not totally mastered having their projects done completely remote and being successful. There will always be a need for U.S.-based IT workers, especially in project management, client interfacing (with executive positions), and hardware support (the things for which you have to be on-site physically); however, these will have to be people who can work well with a global workforce and pull together within a virtual team from other countries and make it work.”

“I know that communication and leadership skills have been my biggest assets, then project management skills”. “I’m valuable”, she says, “because they can put me anywhere; I’ve moved a lot and I am willing to try most anything – versatility is an asset! Information Technology changes so rapidly, you just have to constantly be learning and challenging yourself. If you’re not willing to do this, the current IT market place is not for you.”

If you are, look to Dylilah Hill – the love of learning IS the key to success.


Margy Bredemann
Staff Writer