The IT firm Six Consulting has developed a team of talent from around the world. The team is diverse but operates with the common focus of creating technologies that makes a difference in healthcare, manufacturing and the hospitality industry.
By Donna Benjamin

Six Consulting opened for business in 2007, and the fact an information technology (IT) firm is thriving in 2018 is a testament to the expertise of its diverse team. The minority-owned business is currently focused on primarily assisting customers with company portals, customer management and talent acquisition.

However, the company has grown by staying current in a rapidly changing industry and anticipating the future, meaning new services are frequently added. Six Consulting's goal, according to CEO Parth Patel, is to make the workday better for people by providing innovative industry-specific solutions.

Providing Innovative Services in an Ever Changing Industry
As the vice president overseeing delivery from the first introductory client call to execution of the project, Sam Yehya has an umbrella perspective of what it takes to succeed in an industry that is always in transition.

"We are a services firm catering specifically to the healthcare, manufacturing and hospitality sectors. Our key focus areas are company portals, customer management, employee engagement, process automation, data analytics and talent acquisition," Yehya said.

Technology never stands still, so Six Consulting's team is always looking ahead to the future. The workforce must stay current on existing technology while also keeping an eye on technology trends and new technologies that often have a direct impact on the way people work. Six Consulting is a recognized industry expert in areas that include content management, collaboration systems, customer relationships management and cloud services.

Keya Grant, supplier diversity lead at WestRock, a multinational provider of paper and packaging solutions, says Six Consulting is a Protégé through the Georgia Mentor Protégé Connection program and they bring great value to the relationship.

“It has been an amazing journey thus far. Their leadership team is smart and eager to learn from our stakeholders and have been give carte blanche to our entire organization including the C-suite. They are forward-thinking and ask all the right questions,” Grant said.

What makes the Six Consulting approach different is that the project team included the people working in the office in the system so they, too, can keep up with what is going on in the field.

Overcoming Challenges with Patience and Expertise
The focus on employee and client engagement is a competitive differentiator for Six Consulting. For many companies today, people work in multiple locations including at home and/or geographically disperse offices. Engaging clients requires people skills, as well as IT expertise.

CEO Patel explains that one of the main challenges project teams must overcome when trying to connect disparate product automations or content management is documenting a clear business process to establish the base on which improvements are made.

"Everybody loves automation, but many times people discover when they dive down into it that the business process isn't as clear as people think it is. People have to think about how they do their processes and how they run their function and their roles. We frequently find two or three things that have to be cleared up before we can proceed," Patel said.

Sometimes, the feedback that Six Consulting gets indicates the client's employees do not understand why they have to review existing processes and procedures before Six Consulting can work its IT technical "magic."

A typical project involves a series of steps. The project team first interviews the client to identify pain points. Often using a knowledge base of existing industry solutions, Six Consulting identifies what it can do for the client, also suggesting the benefits of moving toward artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. The next step is making sure the existing data in legacy systems is clean and organized. At that point, the project team can identify the kind of data analytics the client wants and needs.

"We usually have to help clients understand the different kinds of analytics which are descriptive, predictive and prescriptive. Most companies are only using descriptive analytics generated in legacy systems. So we draw a visual that shows what the company has been doing over the last year, and then show how the company can move to the edge of analytics, like AI and machine learning," Patel said.

Project teams assist clients with taking the next two steps up from descriptive analytics to predictive first and then prescriptive. It is a complex process of developing statistical algorithms that are aligned with data analytics from legacy systems.

Descriptive analytics look at the past. Predictive and prescriptive analytics project the future.

Adding the Human Aspect to IT
IT firms must succeed in an industry that never stands still.

"We are always in the process of learning advanced technologies like machine learning and IoT (Internet of Things)," explains Patel. "We try to get firms thinking about the future so we stay on the leading edge of new technologies. We want our clients to be well positioned to embrace them."

Staying on the leading edge of technology is just one factor contributing to Six Consulting's success.

Another competitive differentiator is that Six Consulting brings the human aspect back to IT. Its clients often offer feedback that says the project team members were able to work with the client's employees with a high level of comfort.

“I was really impressed with the health checkups and the status updates that they provide. I get a concise version of the health of my SharePoint environment. If I want to dig into the details, I can. I did not get that with our other vendors,” said Lewis Summers, manager, knowledge management at Inspira Health Network.

Six Consulting does not see itself as just an IT company installing new technologies.

"We are making the working day of people a better one, which in turn helps the company do better," Patel said. "We enrich people and their home communities by connecting their worlds through technology.” This philosophy is one reason Six Consulting has long-term clients like Inspira Health Network, a customer for over 10 years.

The focus on the human aspect is also found in Six Consulting's participation in local charities and support of diversity organizations. The company partnered with the Georgia Minority Supplier Diversity Council to develop an app for the GMSDC's corporate and supplier members that enhances connectivity. Six Consulting also uses local diverse suppliers first, whenever possible, to support the company's commitment to its local community.

Six Consulting does not outsource work, which is yet another differentiator. They may collaborate with other firms to gain expertise, but most projects can be managed by Six Consulting's employees. Most projects are extremely complex, but that complexity is raised several notches when the company must meet federal regulations.

"We have the ability to think outside the box and find solutions to complex problems," Yehya says. "We take on projects that other IT firms would refuse because they see compliance as impossible."

A Passion for What They Do
The future of Six Consulting holds accelerated growth. The plan is to grow in the right way by maintaining existing systems, while expanding services and gaining new clients.

"Long-term our plan is to build up lines of services that are aligned with new technologies and industry requirements," Patel said.

As a company, Six Consulting is passionate about what it does and plans on providing IT services for many more decades.