Collaborative Solutions
The Best Firms to Work For list has a tendency to look pretty
familiar year after year. For the most part, a handful of usual
suspects populate the rankings. But every once in a while, a
new firm emerges from seemingly nowhere to shake up the
upper echelons of the rankings. This year, that firm is Reston,
Va.-based Collaborative Solutions.
“We have been privileged to win
a number of company awards, but
being one of the Best Firms to
Work For truly provides that validation of what we have always
believed— that Collaborative
Solutions is truly a great place to
work,” says Carroll Ross, CEO
of Collaborative Solutions.
“We believe in the simple but
proven formula that happy employees translate to happy customers.
Happy employees stay with a com-
pany and less turnover means our
projects are stable. Receiving this
award further reinforces this point to
both our existing customers and pro-
spective customers about working
with Collaborative Solutions.”
The last time we saw
Collaborative Solutions on the list
was back in 2013 when the firm was
ranked as the No. 10 firm on the Best
Small Firms to Work For list. At that
time, Collaborative Solutions had
only 120 billable consultants. Plenty’s
changed in just three years. For start-
ers, the firm has grown significantly.
“From an external or client-fac-ing perspective, we anticipate the
growth not only of our core cloud
deployment services, but also of
both our Strategic Implementation
Planning and Organizational Change
Management services,” Ross says.
“We firmly believe these two areas
will continue to be key in driving the
success of our customers.”
Collaborative Solutions operates
in the very dynamic and evolving
market of consulting services for
cloud-based solutions. As such,
Ross says, the firm must be nimble,
flexible and innovative in its ap-
proaches to both customer delivery
and employee engagement.
“It’s not a coincidence that our
name has ‘collaborative’ in it. We
pride ourselves on being a truly
collaborative team, and we are well
known for our open communication
style across the company,” he says.
“We strive to make each customer
experience unique and each out-
come for our customers consistently
successful. Our leadership remains
grounded and engaged at all levels
in the company.”
Speaking of engaged leadership,
the firm’s President also holds the
role of Chief Culture Officer and is
focused on the continual development
of the firm’s employee programs and
company cultural initiatives. “We be-
lieve this role is unique in our indus-
try segment and is one of the key rea-
sons we continue to have a strongly
committed employee population,”
Ross says. “Everyone is willing to
roll-up their sleeves and support their
co-workers and their customers.”
WHAT’S THE TOP
PRIORITY OVER THE NEXT
12 MONTHS?
ROSS: “As we move forward
over the next 12 months, we will
be focused on key initiatives that
further grow and develop our employee experience, while further
expanding the services we provide to our customers. From an
internal perspective, we will continue to build out our world-class
Learning & Development function, known as Collaborative University, to support the continued
personal growth and skill development of our employees.”
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