How an Interim Service Management Director Turns Change Into Opportunity
Something most people don’t know about Monique Durgin is that she has a lot of skeletons in her closet.
Seriously.
Stroll through her 100-year-old home in North Fargo’s historic Holes neighborhood, and chances are that if you go looking for an umbrella, a jacket, or the vacuum, you’ll suddenly find yourself buried in prop skulls, bones, and cobwebs instead.
You guessed it. Durgin lives for Halloween.
And she doesn’t wait until October to prove it. The second Sept. 1 rolls around, the transformation begins. Storage bins get dragged out from every corner of the house, lids fly open, and one piece of décor after another emerges from hibernation. Amid the chaos, Durgin usually finds herself putting on a piece of the previous year’s costume and turning on a scary movie in the background.
She just can’t help herself.
While in decorating mode, Durgin tears into each box like a kid on Christmas morning, pulling out gothic candle arrangements, bat-covered wreaths, and enough Hallow’s Eve swag to turn her digs into a bona fide haunted house. Nearby, her English bulldog, Winston, watches from her cozy doggy bed with the same look of astonishment she’s had while witnessing this annual ritual for the past 12 years.
And every fall, as Durgin decorates her house, Fargo begins its own transition just outside the front window. The air carries that first hint of woodsmoke. The days grow shorter. The leaves begin to turn. And somewhere down the road, winter is waiting its turn.
Durgin loves every bit of it.
Maybe that’s because change has never been something she runs from. Whether it’s learning the ins and outs of new laptops her team is rolling out across the state, adapting to fluctuating digital storage costs, or navigating any of the countless other pivots that come with working in hardware and technology, Durgin approaches it all the same way—with curiosity, positivity, and enthusiasm.
Because to her, like Halloween, change isn’t something to fear. It’s an opportunity for something great.
That mindset is serving her well as she steps into a new role at NDIT: Interim Service Management Director. She’s adding the leadership responsibility to her existing role heading the End User Compute and Collaboration (EUCC) team.
It’s an unexpected upgrade. A new challenge. A big change.
True to form, Durgin is thrilled to death about it.
Change is part of the fun for Monique Durgin. Just as she transforms her home for Halloween each fall, she embraces the twists, turns, and new opportunities that come with a career in technology.
It’s a Hardware Life
If you’ve ever picked up a state-issued laptop, plugged in a monitor at an agency office, joined a Teams meeting, or called someone to figure out why your webcam won’t connect, there’s a good chance Durgin’s team had a hand in it.
The EUCC team equips team members across the state with the technology and behind-the-scenes support they need to carry out their missions and serve North Dakota citizens. That includes everything from hardware and end-user support to the collaboration tools that keep people connected, including Microsoft 365, Teams, Copilot, Azure, Intune, virtual desktops, and other emerging technologies.
It’s not always glamorous work, but it’s essential, and Durgin has spent years empowering her team to do it well. Now, as she steps into the interim director role overseeing service management, she’s doing what she always does when something new lands on her desk: powering onward.
“Change can be really exciting,” Durgin says with an eager smile. “Especially when it moves the State of North Dakota forward.”
Every great leader needs a trusted sidekick. For Durgin, that’s Winston, her bulldog bestie, who can usually be found lounging in her home office. She’s always within paw’s length for moral support—and the occasional selfie.
From Temp to Team Lead
The road to becoming a champion of change has been a winding one for Durgin.
Thirty years ago, fresh out of college with a degree in computer science, she moved to Bismarck and took a temp job doing desktop support for the Department of Transportation. Then opportunity came knocking.
When her former director left to lead IT at what is now the North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services (NDHHS), he asked Durgin to follow him to Fargo and support the Southeast Human Service Center, the largest human service center in the state at the time, along with several satellite offices.
She said yes, and stayed for 20 years, gradually taking on more responsibility until she was supervising every regional technician across the Peace Garden State.
Then, in 2019, life shifted again. North Dakota’s technology teams were strategically centralized under NDIT, and Durgin, like many around her, suddenly found herself working for a different agency. It was a time of uncertainty, but she saw an opportunity to help her team navigate it together.
“Our team is going to play a huge role in making this unification effort successful,” she remembers telling them. “Give it your all. Make it work. Keep your minds open. And, most importantly, know how truly proud I am of each of you.”
It was a good pep talk—because it came from the heart.
Durgin came to NDIT as a team lead with her group fully intact and on board, moved into the EUCC Manager role in 2022, and today finds herself helping shape how technology services support North Dakota’s future.
“I never would have dreamed I’d find myself where I am today,” she says. “Things turned out better than I could have ever imagined. Not because of me, but because I have the best team in the business. I’m proud to say that we’re changing North Dakota for the better, one piece of technology at a time.”
From a temporary role to a leadership seat, Durgin’s career has taken her places she never expected. These days, she’s right where she belongs—leading a team, embracing change, and still finding plenty to smile about along the way.
Navigating an Ever-Evolving Landscape
If change is Durgin’s specialty, the hardware and collaboration landscape has given her plenty of practice.
To her, it feels like technology used to shift every 18 months or so. Now, with artificial intelligence reshaping demand and volatility across global supply chains, prices and availability can change from week to week.
Sometimes the biggest changes aren’t about the technology itself but about how it’s delivered. For example, NDIT is preparing to revamp its Desktop as a Service offering for the next biennium, creating a more transparent model that gives agencies greater control over their hardware needs. For Durgin, it’s another opportunity to rethink how NDIT can serve its customers and make the experience work better for the people relying on it.
It’s also an opportunity for her to remain steadfast—working through challenges, bringing people together, and finding a way forward. That mindset was on full display one evening at a Fargo restaurant, when she sat down with Corey Mock, Chief Information Officer for the State of North Dakota, and Craig Felchle, NDIT Chief Technology Officer, to talk through a plan she’d been developing for some time.
For the past couple of years, Durgin had been advocating for her people to be brought together in one location. The team was split between two spaces, making it harder to build the camaraderie, efficiency, and effectiveness she wanted for the group. This year, she took the idea a step further, fleshing out a plan to consolidate everyone in the Capitol’s J-Wing, create more room for inventory, and add a service window where customers in Bismarck could drop off or pick up equipment in person.
That evening, Durgin walked Mock and Felchle through the proposal, explaining not only what she wanted to do, but why she believed it would better serve her team and NDIT’s customers. After hearing the plan, Mock told her to move forward with getting quotes for the reconstruction.
For Durgin, the moment represented something significant. The idea wasn’t new, and the plan hadn’t come together overnight. But having the opportunity to bring a well-developed idea to leadership, explain the why behind it, and get the support to take the next step was a powerful example of the trust and empowerment she values at NDIT.
The Best Part of the Job
Ask Durgin what she loves most about her work, and she won’t point to technology. She’ll point to people. She thrives on bringing the right team members into the room to solve a challenge, then empowering them to carry the work forward.
“That literally energizes me,” she says. “It’s one of the many reasons why I love my job.”
That instinct extends well beyond her office. When friends or family are experiencing grief, for example, Durgin is often the first to organize meals, gather cards, and connect people with resources, including grief counselors. Her own family has weathered more than its share of loss in recent years, and she’s candid that those experiences have changed her, making her more attuned to what other people might be carrying, even when they show up smiling.
That instinct—to notice, to connect, and to quietly put the right pieces in place so someone else doesn’t have to carry the weight alone—is the same instinct that makes Durgin such an effective leader.
“I’m just here to be a coordinator,” she says humbly.
A Great Place to Work
NDIT has been named one of the Top 10 Workplaces by the Bismarck-Mandan Young Professionals Network two years running, a distinction Durgin says tracks with her own experience. For her, it comes down to two things: access and opportunity.
“It’s so easy to approach NDIT’s executive team,” she says, pointing back to the conversation with Mock and Felchle about her team’s needs. “I’ve had conversations with every single one of them, and I’ve never felt like I was interrupting them or taking up their time. That door is always open. It means the world!”
Durgin also points to the opportunity to grow. Earlier in her career, working as a regional technician outside of Bismarck, she remembers feeling stuck, with no clear path upward. NDIT changed that, giving her the opportunity of a lifetime.
Today, after 30 years in state technology, Durgin is eligible to retire…but she isn’t quite ready to power down just yet. What keeps her showing up is the same thing that has carried her through every career transition, every new technology, and every unexpected pivot: her people and the work they do together.
Because at the end of the day, it’s not about laptops, monitors, storage, or hardware. It’s about making sure every team member across North Dakota’s government has the tools and support they need to fulfill a calling that will never change.
Serve the citizens of North Dakota.