They come from a diverse range of backgrounds. Some came to the private sector from the military. Others made the transition from the government. Still others started out directly in the commercial space and worked their way on up. But whatever their individual backgrounds they all share a common theme: Each has developed winning strategies that have driven the success of their companies.

It is that record of excellence that has led each to be named to our Top 10 Business Development Executives list. From defense to IT, all bring to their positions unique industry expertise — and the experience needed to forecast long-range opportunities. As we look to a change in administration and a new economic climate, these Top 10 executives weigh in on what’s ahead for the government contracting community — and what other area executives can do to help their companies rise to the top as well.

Howard Ady, Stanley Inc.

In his spare time he’s a fan of volksmarching — a noncompetitive form of walking — but get Howard Ady in a board room and you’ll find nothing noncompetitive about him there. Backed by a strong team spirit, Ady serves as vice president of federal accounts for Stanley, Inc., an Arlington, Va.-based company that provides systems integration and professional services to U.S. defense and federal civilian government agencies. Having been at the company a little under a year, Ady is currently leading several major GWAC initiatives and assists with positioning Stanley for larger, more strategic opportunities down the road.

“Howard brings both a distinguished federal career in key CIO and CFO positions and a decade of industry IT expertise to Stanley,” says George Wilson, Stanley executive vice president. “We are glad he chose to join our team and assist us in further developing our customer relationships.”

Long before he ever joined Stanley, and before that BearingPoint, Ady was heralded for his work within the local IT community. Having been with the federal government for 33 years with DOD, Navy, GSA and OPM organizations, in CIO and CFO roles, Ady made it a point to establish closer ties between the public and private sectors once he left for the industry sector. That commitment has won big praise from leading association groups, such as the American Council for Technology, which honored him in 2003 with its prestigious Janice K. Mendenhall Spirit of Leadership Award.

These days, Ady is making sure that business development goals for Stanley take into account both the change in administration and challenging economic climate. “We are concerned about delays in confirmations for agency political positions and will continue our strategic planning to better position Stanley for success,” says Ady, outlining a few of his objectives for the coming year. “We are hopeful that new political leadership will strive to fill the vacuum caused by the retirement of the Honorable Tom Davis; we expect the two-front war to continue to draw on scarce resources in a troubled economy causing continued consolidation in the federal, state and local IT community; and we expect to be on the frontlines of what we anticipate to be avid support by [the new] administration to support cybersecurity.”

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This is an exciting time for Vangent. Since it celebrated its one-year anniversary this past February, the company has been embarking on a productive year chockful of new goals, aspirations, and strategies. Mac Curtis, president and CEO of Vangent, has been communicating that vision to employees ever since. Over the past year, he has spent a significant amount of time on the road, meeting with employees and discussing Vangent’s overall mission.

What are you working on these days?

Mac Curtis: Vangent is continuing to grow, and we are improving the way we position ourselves in the market. A lot of people think we are just a customer relationship management (CRM) contact center company, but that is only one aspect of our business. Granted, we are the sole provider of the nation’s largest citizen contact management programs, 1-800-Medicare, but what really separates us from other companies are the people, processes and technology behind the scenes. When we talk about Vangent’s “design, build and operate” approach, we create and implement the systems that allow mission-critical processes to function.

We celebrated our one-year anniversary this past February as Vangent. It has been an interesting year, to say the least. When we were sold by Pearson, we had to take the time to hone our own goals, aspirations and strategies. After we decided where we wanted to take the business, the next step was communicating our vision for the future to our employees. I have spent a lot of time on the road visiting with employees around the country, and when I meet with them, we talk about the company’s mission and vision. This is an exciting time for Vangent, and the employees know it. They get charged up when they see we are working hard to brand Vangent.

What’s happened in the past year, in particular?

Mac Curtis: Sure. The sales process was pretty involved. We reached an agreement in November 2006 with Veritas and shortly after that, we went on the road to sell bonds needed to finance the deal. On February 14, 2007, we officially became Vangent and began the process of transitioning from Pearson. That meant bringing on a wide variety of services that Pearson previously provided, such as a human resources information system, as well as network and infrastructure support. We also had to put treasury, tax and the general counsel functions in place — all the things you need to have to be a stand-alone business. We made some strategic organizational changes and brought on new leaders to build our health solutions business and our civilian, defense and national security divisions. We focused on building the right management team that can take Vangent from a run rate of $600M to a billion dollars and eventually a public company.

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