So when Dana talks about Skyline’s commitment to values and how that extends to its associates and clients, she’s speaking straight from the heart.

“Skyline is very good about putting family first,” Dana says. “That’s one of the values that I truly appreciate.”

Dana and her husband Brad, with their sons Conor and Isaac, live in Freedom, Wisconsin, a cozy rural community midway between Green Bay and Appleton. It’s where the couple grew up. Their parents still live just mile away in either direction.

A graduate of the Milwaukee School of Engineering who studied business and computer systems, Dana began her professional career working for a Milwaukee-based firm. Her work took her around the state, to Madison and Merrill, and around the country, to Dallas, Chicago, and Phoenix. But after three years, she felt the call of home and family. So when she joined Skyline seven years ago, it was a perfect fit.

“Of course, I wish I could spend more time with the children and certainly try to make sure that I get home at a decent hour, but if I need to do some additional work in the evening, I can do that from home,” she says. “Or if one of the boys is sick and I need to stay home with him, Skyline is very understanding.”

Serving the Client

Dana works offsite as a project manager, serving a client company that has international scope and thousands of employees.

One of the challenges of working offsite for any associate is adapting to the client’s corporate culture. All customers expect the offsite specialist to learn their systems and their own methodology. Dana jokes that she fits so comfortably into her client’s workplace that many of her friends and co-workers may not be aware that she’s actually a Skyline associate.

In fact, she feels a strong sense of pride that, in doing her job well, she is helping the client succeed.

“I am project manager of the team that is responsible for onboarding the new client. Obviously each time you have a project and the implementation goes successfully, that’s very rewarding. There have also been little projects that helped improve their customer service, that have saved them some time in their daily activities.”

Blending talents

Because Dana understands software and its capabilities, she is able to use her business background with her technical training to apply her clear view of a client's business needs. “I can help to streamline the process of onboarding to applications. The end goal is to reduce manual effort and to improve efficiency.”   Like many of her Skyline peers, Dana is comfortable working as part of a team or working on her own to answer a client’s needs.  

“I like to work in a team because multiple views and thoughts emerge to come up with the best solution possible. It’s like bringing our minds together. Everyone comes together with certain skills and talents, and you’re working with different resources and different approaches.”

Her work at Skyline provides plenty of opportunities to demonstrate those talents. At any given time, she may be working on seven or eight projects on behalf of Skyline’s client.

However, her service goes beyond one big client.

“I also like to work on individual projects because they provide a definite sense of accomplishment when they are completed,” Dana explains.“I do like to have more than one project going on at a time; it actually helps me to stay focused. Also, with the types of projects that I manage, when one project is winding down, another is getting up to full speed. It’s a good balance.”

Among the professional achievements of which she is most proud is her contribution to Skyline’s development of “buildmyownsite.com,” a program that allows businesses to plan, build, update and promote individual Web sites. It truly helps every client, regardless of size, to unleash the potential of the World Wide Web.