8 questions with ALTESS CTO Andrew Parr

A systems engineer with more than 25 years of IT experience, Andrew Parr leads the cloud, facilities engineering and systems engineering teams at the Acquisition Logistics and Technology Enterprise Systems and Services (ALTESS) product office in Radford, Virginia.

Before joining ALTESS, a managed-services provider that modernizes Army applications, Parr worked at Oracle supporting the implementation of warehouse management systems (WMS) for large retailers, but his work required a lot of travel. “I filled out a passport in less than three years,” Parr said. “I was looking for a job that didn’t involve traveling every week.”

“I thought I would be at ALTESS for a couple of years and move on to something else,” Parr said. “But now I can’t think of working anywhere else. I get to work with talented people who are incredibly smart. There are days I go home mentally exhausted, but seeing solutions come to fruition is very rewarding.”

We asked Parr -- today’s #PEOEISTeammateTuesday -- eight questions about his career and life:

Name something you learned the hard way.

When you need to delete data in a test database, make sure you are really in the test database and not the live-production database. You only need to learn this once.

What advice do you have for companies interested in supporting ALTESS?

Before making a sales pitch, understand our problems, requirements and limiting factors.

The smart companies don't make any pitches right away. They ask us to tell them what our challenges are. And sometimes they walk away and say, “I don't have anything that can help you.”

Limit your PowerPoints to fewer than a dozen slides. Have a conversation. Don't just read your slides.

Describe the PEO EIS culture.

It’s all about the people!  IT is about people, processes and technology. Without the people, the processes and technology are kind of useless.

People really care. We have pride in what we produce and constantly strive to improve.

What do Army customers love about ALTESS?

They love how responsive we are. When a customer has an issue, we immediately help them resolve it. We provide points of contact they can reach out to directly for support.

What does a good leader not do?

Micromanage.

If you could go back in time, where would you go?

I’d rather go forward in time and see how humans and robots hopefully coexist. I’d like to see the new technologies of the time. I’d shoot for 2070.

What is the best advice you received?

My dad always told me, “If you are going to take the time to do something, do it right.”

What do you consider the most valuable virtue?

Integrity. A person with integrity does the right thing even when no one is looking.