Are you seeking recent graduates or alumni? Interested in building a co-op/internship program with Wright State University? Simply forward your job/internship postings to sheryl.kent@wright.edu. In return, Sheryl will send a targeted e-mail blast out to Wright State University students and faculty as well as include your postings in Wright State's CECS LinkedIn Group: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/961807.

You are also encouraged to post your positions to Handshake- WSU's resume referral database.  This system will allow you to post your position, view potential candidates, and register for career related events. Any questions regarding this system should be directed to Career Services, 937-775-2556.

For a complete list of our majors in the College of Engineering and Computer Science, please visit: https://engineering-computer-science.wright.edu/degrees-and-certificates

STEPS TO SUCCESSFUL RECRUITING IN A VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT

QUESTIONS? Seeking customized assistance? The Brandeberry Career Development Center offers a variety of opportunities to volunteer on campus to increase your company's visibility within the College of Engineering and Computer Science.  Please contact me for more information. Simply email sheryl.kent@wright.edu or call 937-775-4491. 

We look forward building your brand on campus.

Ohio students are always searching for internship opportunities. SOCHEintern handles recruitment, applications, employee taxes, onboarding, orientation, hiring and payroll and customizes your internship program according to your unique business needs. Work with SOCHEintern to take full advantage of the energy and fresh ideas interns bring while reducing your hiring and training costs. Click here, email us at soche@soche.org or call (937) 258-8890 to find your interns.

Tickets available for Dayton’s premier entrepreneurship conference

Registration is live for Launch Dayton Startup Week, the Dayton region ’s premiere opportunity for entrepreneurs to connect and network with both resource providers and fellow founders.

This free, annual, week-long, community-focused conference brings together the region ’s thinkers, dreamers, doers, makers, entrepreneurs and small business owners.

“Speakers and workshops have been curated to celebrate the diversity of our startup community and to spur tangible progress for local businesses,” said Launch Dayton Startup Week organizer Audrey Ingram. “At Launch Dayton, we believe everyone should have the opportunity to determine their own economic prosperity. We hope Startup Week serves as a launching point for these young companies that will drive the economic future of the region.”

All experiences are welcome — whether a seasoned entrepreneur or new to the community, there is space to jump in. Register here: https://bit.ly/LaunchDaytonStartupWeek2021

This year’s conference is made possible thanks to generous support from title sponsors Canary Consulting, Parallax Advanced Research and the Entrepreneurs’ Center.

Who: Dayton’s startup founders, entrepreneurs, innovators, small business owners, business leaders, entrepreneurial resource providers, business-building experts, and more

What: Launch Dayton Startup Week, the Dayton region’s premier entrepreneurship conference

When: Sept. 13-16, 2021

Where: All of this year’s sessions will be held in the historic Dayton Arcade complex, from the main stage, startup market and pitch competition in the Rotunda, to business workshops in The Hub, to industry-specific tracks in the The Tank and an artists + creative entrepreneurs track in The Contemporary’s gallery space. (We'll also be live-streaming sessions for those who prefer to attend virtually.)

Why: to celebrate the diversity of Dayton ’s entrepreneur community and to spur tangible growth for local businesses

Be Inspired:

Monday, Sept. 13 we'll kick off at 8:30a with inspirational stories and how-to talks from founders offering advice that applies across industry lines, all told from our main stage in the historic Rotunda. Shop local businesses throughout the day at the Launch Dayton Startup Week Startup Market, hosted in partnership with Tae Winston, founder of the The Entrepreneurs' Marketplace, Shoppe & Connection.

Stick around after the final keynote for a social hour, followed by the Launch Dayton Startup Week Early Risers Pitch Competition, where 10 local startups will compete for cash + prizes, starting at 6p.

Want to pitch & win up to $5K in cash + prizes? Apply here by Aug. 13: https://bit.ly/PitchLaunchDaytonStartupWeek2021

Hear & network with:

• Mile Two founders Jeff Graley and Jorge Sanchez talk about growing from a four-man shop during the first Startup Week to landing a $15M government contract;
• Maximize the Money You Have — Financial guru Emerald Sparks & Arcani Coil Care founder Jerricha Hoskins will talk about getting out of the mindset that someone else will give you money to launch your business;
• A panel of business owners will discuss Doing Business in 2020 —we’ll talk about the challenges of the pandemic and rising hate crimes, as well as opportunities stemming from the recent push for racial justice;
• Marketing experts will debunk the most common marketing myths they hear from clients looking to launch or grow their business on a budget;
• Neurosurgeon turned entrepreneur & investor Dave Kirschman will share his story, from his entrepreneurial start in a college dorm room to his $90M X-spine Systems exit. His current company, Aerobiotix, produces an air filtration system for operating rooms.
• Nickole Ross, cofounder of the only minority-owned and Black woman-operated processing facility in Ohio’s burgeoning cannabis industry, will sit down with What’s The Biz founder Te’Jal Cartwright to talk about breaking into an industry that has disproportionately harmed her community.

Register here: https://bit.ly/LaunchDaytonStartupWeek2021

Work On Your Business:

Tuesday through Thursday, dig deeper into your business with industry-specific tracks and get hands-on with various workshop opportunities. We'll kick off after lunch and go until 8p to create more opportunities for aspiring founders to attend. Partners have curated a series of offerings for founders innovating in the areas of:

Tuesday, Sept. 14

• MedTech, curated by BioOhio;
• SaaS, curated by Technology First;
• Business 101 classes, curated by Parallax’s Early Risers Academy;
• Marketing workshops, curated by LMG
• Elevator pitch practice — in an actual elevator

Wednesday, Sept. 15

• Food/Bev/Retail/Consumer Products, curated by Downtown Dayton Partnership and the Arcade Kitchen Incubator;
• Artists + Creative Entrepreneurs, curated by CultureWorks & hosted by The Contemporary;
• Scaleup workshops on value prop, financials and investment models, curated by the Entrepreneurs’ Center;
• A million-dollar women founders panel, curated by Aviatra Accelerators —Dayton

Thursday, Sept. 16

• Defense, curated by Parallax Advanced Research and sponsored by Infinite Management Solutions & Treble One Aerospace;
• Future Tech, curated by OhioX;
• Marketing workshops, curated by LMG

Register here: https://bit.ly/LaunchDaytonStartupWeek2021

Join us in-person by entering the Dayton Arcade via The Hub Powered by PNC, at 31. S. Main Street, downtown Dayton. Park at the Reibold Garage on Fifth Street, or park at meters available around the building.

Prefer to attend virtually? Register now, and as the conference gets closer, we'll send you a link to download the official Launch Dayton Startup Week app. The app, available on iOS, Android and the web, will allow you to personalize your schedule, attend sessions, connect with attendees, find resources, and win prizes.

Afidence, a technology consulting and services firm headquartered in Mason, has announced it has sold its managed IT services division to Blue Ash-based Intrust IT.

From left to right: Afidence co-owners Bryan Hogan and Barbara Hogan.  

The move will allow Afidence to focus on serving its mid-market and enterprise clients, with services that primarily include project management, cloud/infrastructure, cybersecurity and application development.

“We are so grateful and appreciative of our managed IT services clients and our devoted team members who have served them throughout the years. These relationships mean the world to us,” said Bryan Hogan, CEO/president and co-owner at Afidence. “Our managed IT services clients and team are in a position to thrive with Intrust IT—an organization focused on providing managed IT services,” said Hogan.

Intrust IT CEO Tim Rettig.

“We cannot be happier knowing Intrust IT is the ideal organization to take our managed IT services clients and team to the next level,” said Barbara Hogan, co-owner of Afidence, who explained that intensive consideration went into the decision to divest this portion of the business. “We’re also pleased that every managed IT services team member will have continued employment with Intrust IT,” she said.

Afidence is ensuring all clients and employees will be transitioned smoothly into a company culture that embraces the same core values as Afidence, according to Bryan Hogan. “Those values include an emphasis on strong relationships that are rooted in trust and transparency,” he said. “During this process, it has been—and continues to be—our top priority to ensure both our employees and clients will flourish as a result of this transition.”  

Intrust IT, an IT support and cybersecurity company, primarily serves small and medium-sized businesses in the greater Cincinnati area. In 2019, Intrust IT became employee owned through an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). For the past several years, Intrust IT has reported customer satisfaction scores of 99 percent or higher. Intrust IT has also been nationally recognized with an All-Star Champion award from the Great Game of Business (GGOB) thanks to its excellence in implementing open book management practices. Intrust IT has been a finalist for the Business Courier's Best Places to Work awards nine of the last ten years.

Intrust IT CEO Tim Rettig said the deal developed through an existing relationship between Afidence and Intrust IT, adding how the two firms share a dedication to company culture and customer service. “We’re like-minded in our approach to serving and supporting clients and our focus on fostering a healthy, positive company culture,” said Rettig. “We’re pleased this deal makes our ESOP stronger and expands the benefit to a larger group. We’re excited to bring these new staff members onto our award-winning team, and we look forward to continuing to provide stellar service to the managed IT clients of Afidence.”

Hogan added this is a milestone step for Afidence as they enter a new phase of expansion. “Our company was built on serving mid-market and enterprise clients, and this enables us to have a singular focus that will give us the opportunity to have even greater impact going forward,” he said.

About Afidence

Since 2010, Afidence—a name which stems from Latin for “joining in trust”—has provided clients with unbiased, real-time business and IT solutions. Built on a foundation of integrity, quality, and strong relationships, Afidence relentlessly serves the best interests of clients, employees, and colleagues. Headquartered in Mason, Afidence specializes in project management, cloud/infrastructure, cybersecurity and application development. Afidence’s proven syncMETHODOLOGY™ process ensures that each step and deliverable is proactively communicated in an easy to understand, open and transparent manner. To learn more about Afidence, visit www.afidence.com.

About Intrust IT

Intrust IT is a Cincinnati IT support and cybersecurity partner that gets you and gets back to you. As a locally owned small business, Intrust IT empathizes with business owners, uses ingenuity to solve problems and delivers service that makes clients happy. Intrust IT was founded in 1992 by Tim Rettig and ever since, has been putting the “service” in “managed services.” As of 2019, Intrust IT is an employee-owned company. By growing together as a business, team members inspire each other and clients in a new way to do more and impact the region. Visit www.intrust-it.com to learn more.

Mardi Humphreys, Change Agent Integration Edge

I made this poster to hang in my office. (Full disclosure: Since the pandemic my office is actually the dog’s bedroom. Yes. The dog has his own room. Don’t ask.) I made the poster to remind myself that innovation is often only appreciated in hindsight. While modern-day pirates are a serious threat to certain areas of the world (e.g., West Africa and Somalia) and should be treated as such, my poster represents archetypal pirates like Blackbeard who was known not only for his leadership and non-violent nature, but also for his boldness, personal courage, and brand awareness; all important elements of innovation. Here in Dayton, OH we have a lot to live up to in terms of innovation. There’s the obvious: The Wright Brothers, Ermal Fraze, Charles F. Kettering, et al; but what about you? Your business is IT. Aren’t you innovating almost daily? There are basically three types of innovation: product, process, and business model:

Product

Since we work in Information Technology, this is the type of innovation we most likely think of when we hear the word because we see it all the time. Think: combining an MP3 player with a mobile phone (more on this later).

Process

This is where I live. We streamline SMBs’ and non-profits’ workflows and procedures to eliminate waste and human error, and to increase data security. We automate as many steps in their processes as possible, thus saving them time, energy, attention, and money. Think: a physician sending your prescription to your preferred pharmacy online instead of writing it out and handing it to you on a piece of paper.

Business Model

This is the most drastic innovation because it affects the entire organization. It’s most successful in startups because they’re still experimenting with how to structure their businesses. It usually occurs when the person in charge starts wondering out loud why customers aren’t buying. Think Amazon.

You see innovation and you are innovative, but do you act on that innovation? When you have an idea you believe will change the course of the product, process, or profession, what keeps you from acting on it? Innovators have at least three things in common:

Bravery

Innovation is scary. You have to put yourself out there. Brene Brown says, “Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change.” As the Change Agent for Integration Edge. I have to sit with vulnerability a lot. Change is hard. Even good change, like growth, is still difficult. There’s a reason growing pains is a cliché.  Humans are creatures of habit. We love doing what we’ve always done. It’s getting what we’ve always gotten that we don’t like. That’s where innovation enters the equation. One of my favorite things about innovation is that it seems so epic; but in reality, one little change can be that last push the flywheel needs to start turning as fast as you’d hoped it could.

Boldness

Back in the Product section of this article, I promised more to the story of combining an MP3 player with a mobile phone. Here it is, long story short: When a small team of engineers, designers, and marketers at Apple presented the idea to Steve Jobs, he vehemently opposed it. But his team saw the potential both in the technology and the market, and kept gently persuading and boldly negotiating with Jobs until he agreed. Four years after it launched, the iPhone was responsible for half of Apple’s revenue. Innovators don’t ask their customers what they want. Innovators ask their customers what they want outcomes to be. iPod customers did not suggest that Apple combine the iPod with a mobile phone. They just wanted to stop carrying multiple devices.

Brand Awareness

Innovation is ineffective if it’s a secret. In development you need secrecy, but once you’re in production you have to tell the world about it. It’s okay to get excited about projects that improve our clients’ businesses. You worked hard. Tell everyone who will listen. The more organizations you impact, the more innovative you’ll be and the more your reputation will grow. I learned this lesson from Edward Teach. Back in 1717 he commandeered a slave ship, La Concorde, disembarked the people at Bequia, then proceeded to acquire two more ships and 150 crew members. Teach was big and tall. In battle, he dressed in dark clothing with a sling over his shoulders that held a brace of three pistols. He wore a wide hat under which he put lit matches to appear fierce. He did this to intentionally make a reputation for himself that would scare his enemies so that he did not have to hurt them. (We have no verified account he ever harmed any of his captives.) Like Teach, we want to cultivate a certain reputation because we understand the value of appearances. How valuable was his appearance? Teach renamed the slave ship that he commandeered Queen Anne’s Revenge. Edward Teach renamed himself Blackbeard.

Future of No-Code Bright, but Challenges Remain

Matt Coatney, CIO, Thompson Hine LLP & Technology First Board of Directors

Several years ago, I led professional services for a data analytics no-code/low-code company. We built cutting-edge solutions for healthcare, life sciences, finance, and more using our trailblazing platform.

There was one problem though. Consulting was a great revenue stream, but business wants the recurring revenue of licensing and “citizen developer” self-service. But no matter how much we tried to convince companies they could build applications with our tool, inevitably they would lean back on us instead.

I call this the Development Gap: the gulf between organizations’ application needs, the availability and technical sophistication of their business teams, and the state of no-code platforms. The gap is still too wide for the average company to get real, transformative benefit from these tools., But I remain optimistic in the long run.

There is a lot of hype around products like Microsoft PowerApps that promise “anyone can build an app.” I recently surveyed the landscape, tried out several tools, and admittedly walked away disappointed. Most tools approach the space in a similar way and focus on basic use cases: form data entry, editable lists of items, and dashboards. While you can create some useful apps with those building blocks, it is not much more than a glorified online spreadsheet with a few more bells and whistles.

But if you want to make an immersive application experience? Forget about it. Even something as simple as uploading a file and performing an action in real-time proved difficult in these platforms. In many cases, the user must write code to accomplish more than trivial use cases, and we are right back where we started. Non-developers are either overwhelmed by the interface or stymied by limited functionality, and developers will not use the tools because, well, they love to write code.

So why am I still optimistic? For one, the market demand has increased significantly, and investment dollars have followed. Plus, with several large players pushing into this space, I expect significant improvements over the next five years in user interface design, reusable component libraries, and AI-enabled automation. Additionally, as younger tech-natives enter the workforce, they are more attuned to how software works, and while they are not developers, they often have a better grasp of data and business logic.

In the meantime, what can you do to help bring innovative applications to your organization more quickly (the promise of no-code)? One way is to leverage more mature self-service platforms for targeted use cases, especially in the area of data reporting and dashboards. Your development teams can also spend more of their scarce time building platforms to support rapid development and self-service, rather than bespoke business unit solutions. And development teams can also further embrace agile iterative development with shorter cycle times, which ultimately bring product to market quicker.

These steps will help you advance innovation initiatives while we all wait for the Development Gap to get just a bit narrower.

Technology First has teamed up with Girl Scouts of Western Ohio for a CSA Cyber Challenge with support of the Ohio Cyber Range Institute!

Volunteers from Technology First’s membership will lead a series of “plugged” and “unplugged” cyber challenges to over 50 Girl Scouts grades 6-12. This event will take place on July 23rd at the University of Cincinnati’s 1819 Innovation Hub. Participating companies include 84.51, CareSource, Great American Insurance Group, Kettering Health, Kroger, P&G, and the University of Cincinnati.

If you know a Girl Scout interested in participating, they can register by Friday, July 9th!

Business Leaders and Community Stakeholders,

A successful and sustainable recovery for Ohio must include all Ohioans. Nearly 20% of Ohioans live in distressed areas—defined as areas that have not recovered from the last recession. The COVID-19 pandemic further disproportionally impacted these communities and their residents. It is critical that we support these areas of the state to help them and Ohio overall with post-pandemic economic recovery.

These communities are home to businesses with intellect that can benefit all of Ohio. JobsOhio is prioritizing efforts to empower the businesses with the resources they need to reach their potential. Since the start of 2020, we have worked on an inclusion strategy that focuses on investing in and driving job creation to Ohio’s distressed areas as well as providing the capital needed to grow the businesses in these communities and those owned by underserved populations.

One component of this strategy is the JobsOhio Inclusion Grant, which was created in July 2020 as part of JobsOhio’s COVID relief programming. The program puts funding of up to $50,000 for small and medium-sized businesses located in distressed areas of the state and owned by underrepresented population groups. As of today:

• 133 companies have closed deals or are currently in the pipeline.
• Over 4,287 jobs have been created or retained.
• Of these projects, 82% are in distressed communities, 23% are woman owned, 21% are minority owned, and 11% are veteran owned.

Some of the participating homegrown businesses include The Chef’s Garden, an agriculture company that pivoted its business model due to the pandemic, and MAKO Finished Products, a rural Ohio-based business that helps power a leading fitness brand. After a successful first year in providing $5 million in financial support to small and medium-sized businesses, the JobsOhio Board of Directors recently approved an increase of up to $8 million in 2021 due to the success and growing interest from local businesses.

Our efforts to ensure Ohio’s recovery is inclusive of all Ohio continue and we will share more in future updates.

Treg Gilstorf has been selected chief operating officer for Smart Data, a local IT services provider and Technology First Member.

Treg is Vice Chair of the Technology First Board and has 25+ years of experience in IT, strategic planning, process improvement, consulting, operations and project management. Prior to joining Smart Data, he spent eight years as chief information officer at Yaskawa Motoman, the Miamisburg-based robotics division of Yaskawa Electric Corp. Before that, he held leadership roles for companies throughout Southwest Ohio and Indiana — including Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bank, Afidence and Luxottica; as well as Duke Energy’s operations in Indianapolis.

Congratulations on the new adventure, Treg!