William McCormick
Tim Conway, executive vice president and public sector group president of NTT Data and a 2021 Wash100 Award recipient, recently spoke with ExecutiveBiz, for the publication’s latest Executive Spotlight interview.
During the chat with ExecutiveBiz, Conway discussed his sales and business strategies to drive NTT Data’s company growth, recent contract wins and IT modernization challenges, the innovative solutions in the healthcare space and future plans for the company for the rest of 2021 and beyond.
“We know that digital transformation is accelerating to facilitate mission success. We believe our investments in these capabilities are rapidly deployable to serve our clients. We are looking forward to expanding our offerings to the government through participation in best-in-class contracting vehicles. We know our clients are counting on us as we emerge from these challenging times and well into the future.”
You can read the full Executive Spotlight with Tim Conway below:
ExecutiveBiz: Congrats on the recent Wash100 Award! How would you describe your vision for NTT Data’s public sector business as well as your sales and business strategies to grow the company and advance its position to work at the highest level in the public and government sectors?
“NTT DATA is experiencing exponential growth, for several years we have been building our business organically, working slowly to build our reputation and client base through excellence in delivery and earning the trust of our clients. We have made several strategic acquisitions over the past few years which have contributed greatly to the expansion of our public sector business.
Just prior to the pandemic, we acquired Net eSolutions (NETE). The acquisition dramatically expanded our capabilities and market share in public health. This definitely kept us busy throughout the pandemic as our clients were and are on the frontlines of the government response.
As we emerge from the pandemic, we continue to invest in our people and capabilities to support our clients and their respective missions. We are expanding our business into new markets of public transportation, social welfare and criminal justice.”
ExecutiveBiz: With recent contracts such as the DOJ ECAS and the GSA OASIS Pool 1, can you elaborate on your top priorities to support government agency missions, help to modernize their IT capabilities and address the toughest challenges in the federal landscape today?
“This has been a year like no other. COVID-19 had an enormous impact on the federal government. Responding to the pandemic, teleworking, stopping the spread and developing a vaccine—COVID-19 became a catalyst for technological change. Legacy systems that had been limping along as budgets were deferred, buckled under the weight and volume of citizen demand.
Unbelievable, daily news headlines highlighted Cobol programmer shortages and mainframe computer access as millions of Americans struggled, waiting for delayed unemployment insurance benefits. Modernization and cybersecurity became priorities and NTT DATA was there to help…with emerging technologies, and necessary innovation to support the mission.
Through various administrations, federal agencies have heard the call to modernize, become more secure, move to the cloud, but few have truly heeded the call. Even fewer have successfully taken advantage of all the benefits that the cloud can offer for security, accessibility, performance, automation, agility, and savings.
Now cloud is top-of-mind for many and ‘lift and shift’ is not the answer. It is strategy, planning and protection—and that is where NTT DATA is helping our clients.”
Visit ExecutiveBiz.com’s Executive Spotlight Page to learn more about the most significant leaders of consequence to the government contracting (GovCon) and federal sectors and their experiences driving growth, new business and capabilities in the fiercely competitive federal landscape.
ExecutiveBiz: Following the major telework and technological changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, how has NTT Data continued to develop its capabilities and tools to push innovative health technologies and platforms in the healthcare space?
“If we learned one thing from the pandemic it is flexibility. The government needs to be available anytime/anywhere from a mobile device or website. We learned that you need to employ adaptable innovation, which means looking at things through a new lens. Our clients expect innovation.
To be an innovator, you can never get too comfortable, which is why we encourage and embrace new ideas. At NTT DATA we have created a culture of empowerment and accountability. We invest over 3.6 billion in research and development – defining the future of technology.
2020 was anything but business as usual. It was a crisis. We responded with urgency. We focused on rapid collaboration and real-time problem-solving. For example, at the CDC, we are responsible for deploying and maintaining all of the end-user devices – approximately 25,000 workstations and 30,000 client devices.
Over a weekend we ramped up to accommodate 100% remote work, responding to a 500% increase in call volumes and even deployed contactless IT support by creating a mobile drive through tech support in the parking lot.
We did not have a choice, CDC scientists needed to connect, work and respond to the crisis. There was no dress rehearsal for the pandemic, but we created an organizational construct where individuals are empowered to think differently and act with accountability.”
ExecutiveBiz: With the federal workforce putting a lot more focus on cybersecurity, automation, cloud, resilience and other areas such as data hygiene, what do you think will be the greatest challenges that your customers need to address in the near future?
“I’m not sure there is anyone answer to that question, certainly all of these are important, and some are critical, it all depends on the mission and the agency. Cybersecurity is a very recent headline and an imperative across government. The bad guys are winning.
President Biden’s recent Executive Order is increasing focus, but we are not safe yet. With telework, new networks and infrastructure, threats are coming from all vectors. Optimization and automation are necessary to ensure cyber resilience in the new work-from-home world.
Everyone needs to step up their game- vulnerabilities, web scanning, phishing assessments, authentication, zero trust and cyber compliance automation—it runs the entire gamut of cyber protection. With the recent very public breaches, NTT DATA as always includes cybersecurity into our solutions.”
ExecutiveBiz: What are your specific goals for NTT DATA for the rest of 2021 and what do you hope to achieve by the end of the year and beyond for your clients and employees?
“This year has been difficult on our entire NTT DATA extended family—our employees and clients. My continued focus is to take care of our people by helping to guide them through this pandemic and beyond- operationally, spiritually, supportively, and mentally.
We know that digital transformation is accelerating to facilitate mission success. We believe our investments in these capabilities are rapidly deployable to serve our clients.
We are looking forward to expanding our offerings to the government through participation in best-in-class contracting vehicles. We know our clients are counting on us as we emerge from these challenging times and well into the future.”
