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FORTUNE 500 COMPANIES HAVE VENDORS THAT CAN PERFORM The Inroads That Vendor CEOs Make Will Benefit STEM Grads
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The women whose companies sell goods and services to the nation’s biggest public and private concerns can relate to a remark made by the queen in Lewis Carroll’s classic, Through the Looking Glass. Her majesty tells Alice “it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”
The Great Recession is supposedly over, but CEOs are still running hard as ever as consum- ers hoard cash, compa- nies don’t order inven- tory, and manufacturers aren’t hiring. What’s a CEO to do? Despite all the bad news, there’s room for optimism. The U.S. Commerce Depart- ment reported that August retail sales had their biggest gain in five months. Okay, 0.4 percent isn’t much, but anything above flatlining is good.
The owners and CEOs that Women of Color found are moving as quickly, and as wisely as possible, to meet, culti- vate and keep corporate clients.
and less expensively, while providing clients with their expected quality level. It is a tough environment, says Denny, because small vendors don’t have the capacity of giant companies, and many can’t outsource.
In 1997, Elise Hernandez founded Ideal System Solutions, Inc. (ISSI), and has since used savvy, speed, competence, and diversity to trans- form a technology product reseller into a $36 million company that fulfills U.S. General Service Administration contracts for customers including Lockheed Mar- tin, Harris Corporation, and Raytheon Company.
The core businesses of the Minnesota firm, with offices in four other states, are system management, security, network, staffing, and storage solutions. Most of ISSI’s contracts are public, but the com- pany has provided computer equipment to Medtronic, the medical technology giant based in Minneapolis.
Elise Hernandez
Linda Denny, the presi- dent and CEO of WBENC, the Women's Business Enter- prise National Council, which certifies U.S. women-owned and controlled businesses, understands. WBENC is com- prised of 10,000 certified women's business enterprises (WBEs) in 14 regional partner groups and 250 corporate members. She says that the women CEOs know how to respond to more competition, smaller margins, demand- ing clients, and tighter credit that restricts expansion.
The survivors have learned how to do more with less,
www.womenofcolor.net
Hernandez says ISSI’s advantage is that it is experienced enough to snag sizable contracts,
and “small enough to be flexible, and [to] adapt to [the] customer’s desires quickly.”
ISSI has developed divisions focusing on tech, unified communication, and staffing solutions. With that broad focus, Hernandez welcomes resumes from students with degrees in information technology. The relative inexperi- ence of new grads is not a hindrance. “It is often better for a company to hire someone and train them in their procedure, than [to] have to force an older technician
WOMENOFCOLOR | FALL 2010 13
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