Armed with a long list of clients within the federal space, and an equally long partner list, minority-owned Navitas Business Consulting is winning, growing and thriving. We caught up with Srini Bayireddy, Founder & CEO and Srinivas Talasila, Chief Growth Officer, to better understand who this IT solutions and consulting team is; their view on partners; how they are reinventing themselves, and their office; and how they will refine their capture strategies as they continue to grow and evolve.
A New Brand Book
As a small and growing business, it is important to be mindful of who you are, and who you want to be. With that lens, Navitas recently underwent a significant examination of its branding, its culture, and its intent in business pursuit. “It can be true that everything looks like an opportunity. The challenge is weeding out those that really are not, those that don’t align with your values, that don’t meet your differential.”
The result is a newly defined focus that involves bringing new energy, using digital acceleration to drive change, and a focus on lifting communities through technology.
Engagement
What remains, as the team grows, is a focus on hiring that places an equal emphasis on non-technical aspects, that looks beyond skillset to goals, intent and values. “We want everyone we bring on board to know who we are, to know who they are, and where they want to be. As a services company we want to ensure our teams align with the client’s mission, that our employees and the customer will benefit from the interaction.”
Using all hands meetings as an opportunity for learning and engagement, the teams working on projects share what is happening, what they value about the work, and what the end result will be so that others can be fueled by these efforts. “This lets everyone know how many people are involved with various efforts, who is doing what and is part of how you develop this thriving collaborative environment.”
That collaboration continues through brown bag lunches, and other meet ups with the goal of having those at the customer site sharing what they are doing regularly with the internal team. “No one can succeed in silos. When they have input and support from across the company, they see they are driving the mission and vision of the company, have the commitment of the company and know they are part of a bigger team.”
Employee and Contractor Alike
While some companies treat employees and contractors as being distinct, perhaps assigning privilege to those who are formally employees, Navitas views everyone on its team as the same. “We work within the same lens of transparency with everyone, without hidden agenda, which motivates an openness from them as well.”
That transparency comes from a vision of serving its customers, of delivering quality and innovation. “With a senior leadership team of 10, all looking in the same direction, with the same acumen, we know we can compete, to stand on our own when we do it the right way. We tend not to go after 8(a) work for instance. We just go out, do our thing and have our team aligned. Our clients recognize that and trust us to solve their challenges.”
Understanding that many 8(a) contracts are smaller, the Navitas team, employees and contractors alike, are driven by the collective thinking that they can succeed on bigger projects, that as a collaborative, the team can do more.
“We would rather spend our time pursuing a $100M deal which, if we are successful, will allow us to offer more jobs to more people, would allow us to help both the people served by the mission and the people we can give meaningful work to.”
Reinventing the Office
While acknowledging that its team works well and collaboratively from home, Navitas also recognizes the desire to come together, to collaborate and interact in person. Moving from its current office space, the company will soon relocate to one that represents a deliberate and focused collaborative space.
Noting that even now when members come together there is whiteboarding, collaboration, often a social aspect built in after, and that these engagements allow people to know each other beyond whatever they are working on, what the new space will look like has been the brainchild of many.
“We took inspiration and ideas from across the team to create a space that was more of a destination, a place people would want to come to generate and share ideas, to connect; not just an office space they felt they had to clock into. There are many things people can do well from home, can be more creative at when they can work on their own time, and we recognize people sometimes need flexible schedules. This way they can work from home when it makes sense, but they can also come together when that better serves them and whatever they are working on.”
Refining its Client Base
Part of its forward movement, of maturing its brand, will be refining its strategy towards clients as well, perhaps even paring back its current list of 60 plus customers. “When our commitment to our clients is to deliver our best, we need to think strategically about how we balance that with not overloading our team, especially on the operational side.”
Noting that as it grew, that large set of past performance and extensive client list was an advantage, the team notes maturity means looking at where they can be a shining star, what their niche and domain knowledge may be. “We have this knowledge transfer we can apply between commercial and government and have developed a number of process efficiencies, can accelerate solutions that can help clients on both sides, things like multi-cloud environments that not many are doing yet. Our focus is always on bringing a specific solution to support a specific customer need.”
The Partner Decision
Having made a conscious decision to balance its efforts between being a Prime and a subcontractor, Navitas works to balance its resources and considers this as part of its teaming strategies. “Going in as a sub, you are there to supplement, to plug holes, but you are not necessarily responsible for the response process. We go in, support our partner as needed, show them what we can do and hopefully, develop a relationship that will continue into the future. But you also need to Prime sometimes, so you stay sharp, so you continue to understand what it takes to respond, to set up the environment.”
Whether it is as a sub or a Prime, the team looks for cohesion in who it partners with. “There is a saying that if we can get in the car and drive from here to New York without feeling uncomfortable, then we can be good partners.”
That cohesion includes ensuring the same hunger, the right people, the collaborative spirit that will ensure an equitable give and take.
Giving Back
Noting a symbiosis in everything it does, Navitas applies those same principles to its community engagement including supporting youth, support of those in Third World countries, initiatives focused on single parents, and on women’s health. “We have seen dividends in our efforts, in parents of youth we have supported coming to work with us, and through the industry associations and consortiums we support and through which we help and engage with these broader communities.”
Taking a divide and conquer approach, Navitas’ senior leadership engages as and where they can, touching and being involved in as many organizations as makes sense.
Part of its giving back includes supporting high school students, giving them the opportunity to learn, the chance to get fired up about technology and what they can do. “They are brilliant. They learn at their will, like what they are learning and get caught up in the environment. When they call us back the next year asking if they can be involved again, we see it as a testament that we have done something right.”
A Goal of Inspiration
Noting the hope to inspire and be inspired, Navitas applies this as a lens through which it views people, partners, projects and technology. Whether its is through collaboration, advanced certification, or attracting talented people who can solve any problem, the team is technology-focused, forward-thinking and looking to continued success and growth in the future.
About Navitas
Founded n 2006, we have offices in Virginia and Maryland. As an ISO 9001:2008, 9001:27001, 20000-1:2018, CMMI Level 3, EDWOSB we provide superior, affordable and innovative business management and information technology services to federal and private sector clients nationwide. We specialize in Software Development, Business Intelligence (BI), Data Management, Data Governance, Cyber Security, Data Quality, Master Data Management, Advanced Data Analytics and Cloud Services. Our services encompass data and statistical analysis, program integrity, system automation for analytics, data warehousing, quality control, enterprise portals and content management systems, configuration management, and full life cycle system development.
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