Daniel DeRosia - A Look Inside GIS

Daniel DeRosia serves as the Vice President of Base Services and an active member of the GIS Leadership team. Over 22 years of service with the same company has given Daniel a valuable insight into GIS’ services as our organization has expanded over the decades. Daniel first started his career as a young man in the Fabrication Division as a helper in 1985. He is a second-generation employee, as his father, brother and many family friends having already made GIS their workplace of choice.

“GIS is really one big family; the majority of our employees have been working here for several years and many of our own family members have also worked here at some point.

This in many ways helps new team members get acquainted with our services and work culture more easily. We are a top employer here in the Southern States, and we take pride in that as well as our team relationships.”

Teamwork

Daniel and his team have responsibilities that reach across many GIS divisions supporting our operations through our corporate-owned facilities within Fabrication, Environmental, Scrap Metals, Civil, Logistics, and Dock Services. With more than four hundred people to support, Daniel shares the GIS secret to success:

“I truly believe that a positive work environment is the foundation for excellent results and of course, staff retention. ‘Putting People First’ is our motto and we don’t just say it, we stand by it. Without our employees, we cannot do our job effectively and our client reputation is very much based on our staff’s performance.

The Base Services team strives to recruit and manage the best people for the task, and we’ve found over the years as a result from the great environment and pleasant working atmosphere, this has been a success. Our operations team are in constant communication each week through Team Leads to help understand any challenges and roadblocks to provide any assistance as needed, including working together collaboratively as one team.

I know from experience that camaraderie is essential especially when personnel are working within the same location. GIS’ range of services and expertise is wide-ranging. As individual teams, we know our specialty capabilities very well, and coming together as a team to build on each other is what helps to separate us apart.”

Training & Development

And to ensure the task is always up to the GIS high standard, each new employee is put through initial training. Our dedicated, company-owned facility in Galliano, Louisiana—Industrial Training Educational Center (ITEC), is accredited by numerous organizations recognized by the petroleum industry, as well as certified as an NCCER Accredited Assessment Center. ITEC is designed to offer training required to comply with all workforce personnel and provides custom-tailored training services not only to GIS, but to other companies as well. With a list of over 100 course offerings, our qualified staff and state of the art facility provides the most up to date training available, well above and beyond the commonly accepted industry standards. Training is continuous says Daniel, as GIS strives to help staff in their career development while on-the-job:

“I believe our employees are very well supported. We have a large team of mentors who are on hand to teach and guide our new employees within GIS processes and procedures. At GIS, we have confidence in every piece of work in our industry. We have rigorous requirements on how we achieve each task to ensure we comply with each of our client’s requests.

GIS values that we are also a quality-focused company, and we ensure we strive to produce quality work, nothing less. Having a team of mentors to help new recruits get trained up from the orientation of their employment, we are able to make efforts to build their skills and confidence within each of their roles.

In fact, career development spans across our organizations—all departments and divisions. In the earlier days of GIS, from starting off as a welder and now holding a leadership role, I have been able to personally experience this career development to help grow professionally. It’s a common occurrence here. For example, one our best welders who is now, in fact, running one of our fabrication yards, first started as a helper in the Kitchen and through a training and mentoring plan, we have been able to develop and expand his career over the years.”

Cultivating Talent

You could declare GIS top class for producing homegrown talent! Daniel and the Base Services team, together with the Human Resources department put all their efforts into producing and retaining the best team possible. As Daniel emphasizes, GIS has standards of excellence, and quality of production and processes is of the highest importance:

“We have achieved ISO 9000 Quality Assurance standards in many areas of the organization and it is imperative that we do our work in a correct and safe manner, each and every time. We have a great Quality Director who helps keep us all on the right path and our people are proud to produce quality work.

Of course, there are always areas for improvement. We regularly conduct in-house audits to check for any weak areas or errors. It has helped us build trust with our clients over the years who expect excellence one hundred percent of the time. And by offering the best service possible and routinely monitoring our standards and processes, well, it helps us grow as individuals and a business, and gives each employee greater job satisfaction.”