In this interview, host Bob London talks with Jeff, a representative of Accela Consulting, and the leader of Accela’s data analytics practice (Speaker C). Jeff describes Accela as a 280‑person IT consulting firm serving federal, commercial, and nonprofit clients. The conversation centers on the company’s “Chief Listening Officer” mindset—prioritizing listening to customers over talking, using structured interview questions to validate market insights, and continuously tracking shifting priorities. Speaker C explains how asking about a client’s business priorities uncovers whether data and analytics are a focus or if other concerns dominate, and how this informs service offerings. Both discuss the prevalence of legacy, “crufty” systems and the need for modernization. Jeff emphasizes that Accela’s growth, reflected in multiple Inc. 5000 rankings, stems from a culture of curiosity, continuous learning, and the belief that “if we’re not growing, we’re dying.” Practical advice is offered: maintain a constant market pulse and avoid complacency. The interview ends with a plug for Accela’s website and hiring opportunities.
Chapters
Give me a little bit of information about Accela. What is Accela all about?
Accela Consulting is an IT consulting firm. We're based in Arlington. We're about 280 people serving federal, commercial, and nonprofit clients, so all sectors.
I lead our data analytics practice. I'm always looking to understand What is the market seeking? What messaging resonates?
What are people looking for? What did you want to get better at as a business that led you to say, well, you know what, it's a good time to talk to some people outside of our, our walls?
One of the things that Accela and Accelians love to do, including me, is talk about what we know and what we believe, what opinions we have about various problems and how to solve them. We really geek out on that. The problem is that we're using our mouths a lot more than we're using our ears. What we say is not always informed by what we've heard. And I knew that this was— these were some of the things that you espoused, understanding what your customer pain points are and listening for the language that they're using and what are they talking about. And if you can get really clear about that, then you can start talking.
I anoint the Chief Listening Officer.
I was really looking for validation of a lot of things that I was reading and kind of trade publications. And I wanted a way to validate that. The question outline, and I think the coaching that you gave me in terms of we're not here to solve, we're not here to, you know, to sell something, we're really here to listen, was probably the best advice you could have given me because I got a lot of— people like to talk and people actually enjoy being listened to. We didn't just talk to customers, we talked to current customers, we talked to prior customers, and we talked to some people who are kind of in our prospect pipeline. And so I liked having that diversity of folks that we were talking to.
I'm curious if you remember that there was maybe one question or two where people really opened up more.
Towards the beginning, one of the questions that you always used, and I copied your example, was the, what are the priorities for your business this year? You know, not focusing on analytics. That context gave me a larger perspective of These are the things that are really important in it for this particular business. It was interesting to understand how many of those were maybe data and analytics focused, how many were completely outside that realm, and then also allowed me to ask more specific questions around where I thought I might get more relevant answers.
So if we start going into data and analytics or modernizing systems or agile or anything like that, it's all in service of something, and we understand what that something is from their perspective in their words.
What jumped out at you as important, whether it was a validation or a new piece of information?
I think understanding that there's still a lot of legacy systems out there. They're looking to see how they can leapfrog. As much as you see in the press, like, data is the new oil, you know, it's highest priority. A lot of companies still are saying, well, yes, it's important. At the same time, we have to do these other things.
What would you say? What advice would you give if a friend told you, yeah, we talk to our customers a lot, we listen to them, the market's growing, we're growing, everything's great. We kind of know everything we need to know.
I think things change very quickly in the markets. And just because you know something today doesn't mean that that's going to continue for even like a medium amount of time. And having a constant pulse on the market and understanding the direction that it's headed, kind of locking in at the beginning of the year and saying, well, we know what we're going to do. We don't necessarily need to keep validating that this is the right path for us throughout the year just seems like a short-sighted way of planning. So many things can change.
I anoint the Chief Listening Officer. Wow. So, Extella has been on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing companies and private companies in the U.S. for a number of years. I've been around the company and been around some of the leaders of the company, including you guys. I think the success and growth comes in part from The curiosity factor that you have.
It's part of our DNA to learn and continuously improve and get better at what we do and do new and different. I kind of jokingly say this, that Excellians are employees. What made us happy today will not make us happy tomorrow. If we're not growing, we're dying.
Where should people go if they want to learn more about Accela?
Best place to go to learn about Accela is accela.com. We've got all the stuff about what we do and how we do it and who we've done it for. We are always hiring.
I want to thank you guys so much. It's been fun.
Thank you.
All right. Thank you. Bye-bye.
System modernization, which is about modernizing all of those old legacy crufty systems.
Did you say crusty? Crufty.
I thought he said— and I was going to call out Crufty, and I was like, what's Crufty? Is it like a dog show?
Quickly, quickly explain to our millions of viewers what Crufty is.
Crusty. Old, brittle, fragile, crusty.
Okay, all right. Yeah, I got it.
You made that word up, so I'm gonna look it up.
Yeah, well, afterwards we're all gonna be on Urban Dictionary. How many years has Xcela been on the Inc. 5000 list? Do you know? A fan? It's not a test.
Uh, No, I don't.
All right, but it's several.
Jeff doesn't know something. Yeah, he's so good with all of these metrics and numbers and things like that.
I can count on two hands the number of times you showed up on the list.
