The Prince George’s County Economic Development Corporation (EDC) tapped Strativia, a Maryland tech company providing technology and professional services, to host and conduct training at its corporate headquarters in Largo, Maryland—about 30 minutes from the nation’s capital. The EDC is the economic wing of the government with a mission to bring small business into the county and hosts a small business incubator.
“What I’m proud of most is many companies will grow and thrive, then move their headquarters to other locations like Washington, DC but we decided to stay right here in Prince George’s County,” said Kenneth Kelly, CEO of Strativia.
Since Strativia was one of the first successful graduates of the EDC’s incubator nearly a decade ago, the company is reciprocating by becoming a resource for small businesses. Today, with 300 employees and two satellite offices in Atlanta and Denver, it may be hard to believe that the company started out with humble and volatile beginnings. According to Kelly, Prince George’s County gave them their first contract, although they didn’t have any past performance or track record to stand on. The county took a risk and gave the then young company a new start.
“What we did well and what we got right was not focusing so much on what other people were doing to the left or to the right. We just put our heads down and did the work. We continued to do the work, doing right by our customer and over-delivering on our promise,” said Kelly.
For the onsite training, Strativia’s assignment was to inspire, share insights, and give guidance on relevant strategies used to grow and leverage the resources of the small business incubator. Service county officials came out to support the event which included approximately 20 businesses—mostly comprised of government contractors and a few commercial businesses. The meeting consisted of networking, various presentations, and was followed by a Q&A discussion. The areas of topics were on service delivery, business development, sales strategy, and technical services.
Strativia’s corporate leadership discussed how to get positioned to win in the government contracting space, which included talks on proper certifications, proper registrations, winning bids, winning proposals, how to identify systems, how to utilize systems, and how to reach out to specific government agencies to handle requests. Kelly shares some success tips here to win government contracts.
In May, Strativia was awarded its largest contract to date, a five-year federal contract to provide scientific, technical, and engineering support services for the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) research programs to provide quality scientific, technical and engineering support. The company has been recently appraised at Level 3 of the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) Institute. CMMI Institute is the global leader in the advancement of best practices in people, process, and technology.
Strativia has been named as an INC. 5000 list and award recipient and will be recognized in Phoenix, AZ on October 10-12, 2019.
Black Enterprise Contributors Network