Mithran Mohanraj is a junior at George Mason University and a member of the Karsun Innovation Center 2023 Intern Class. As part of his internship, Mithran took on the challenge of developing a prototype application that addresses a hypothetical problem faced by a government agency. In addition to completing this prototype designed to drive engagement with the National Parks Service, he explored mobile app development with enhancements to the Karsun employee app, Konnect. Learn how Mithran connected with the Innovation Center team and deepened his UI/UX practice in this short interview.
First please tell us about yourself. Where are you going to school? What are you studying? What do you like to do in your free time?
I am studying Computer Science at George Mason University in my Junior year. In my free time, I like to develop games, exercise at the gym, go for jogs outside, and read books.
Could you share a little bit about the project you worked on as part of this internship? What challenge does it solve? What technologies and tools are you using?
So far in the internship, I have worked on an AppSheet app that was supposed to solve a problem the federal government faces. I made an app that could increase revenue and engagement with the National Parks Service. After finishing that app, I worked on creating a mobile version of the Karsun Konnect web page using AppSheet. This app also receives push notifications from multiple sources including the Brown Bag and Dojos app. It also receives notifications for company-wide announcements. I am also working on an expense request app for HR to use in AppSheet.
What is your favorite part about working with the Karsun Innovation Center? Is there a weekly meeting or ritual you enjoy? The opportunity to learn more or get a new certification?
My favorite part about working at the Karsun Innovation Center is the people. I really enjoy working with everyone and collaborating to create something useful. I also enjoy the opportunity I have been given to learn UI/UX design. It is one of my longtime interests and I am grateful I have an opportunity to learn it professionally.
What is your biggest takeaway from your experience as an intern at Karsun?
My biggest takeaway is that working in a professional environment is an incredibly enriching and rewarding experience. It is very different from school and I feel like I am learning a lot of practical skills that will help me in the future.
Mithran’s internship supported work performed by the Karsun Innovation Center. Learn how the Research and Development teams in the center prototype solutions, research emerging technologies and enhance the employee experience at Karsun. Connect with Mithran on LinkedIn to learn more about his time at Karsun.
Digital transformation accelerates government agencies’ ability to meet their mission and elevate their capabilities. Now more than ever, these agencies are racing to build secure systems that improve the citizen experience while preparing for future needs and users. To help agencies meet and continually address these challenges, Karsun delivers Modernization for Every Next.
As Karsun empowers these agencies for their Every Next, we enable our technology experts and problem solvers to Find Your Next. As part of our ongoing series, we are sharing how builders, experimenters, and innovators use technology to solve intricate modernization challenges at Karsun. When they join our team, they grow their careers while using their problem-solving skills to support government agencies in the acquisitions, aviation, grants management, and fleet management industries.
Our last post shared how our Karsun Innovation Center empowers teams to Find Your Next through experimentation. Part of that process was leveraging our toolkits based on mature technology solutions. Another component of those toolkits is their robust support for nurturing collaboration as part of the problem-solving process. Notably, this collaboration is centered on the customer and user experience, ensuring the mission comes first in every solution we execute.
A Collaborative Culture Adapts to Mission Needs
Nowhere is this commitment more evident than when we implement our Digital Transformation Toolkits. Using domain driven design, we focus on the mission of our customer and their users. Our assessment starts by engaging experts in the customer’s domain (e.g., users of grants management platforms) with our technical experts in an approach called event storming. We use the feedback from these collaborative sessions to build scalable, flexible applications using ready-made microservices resources developed by our Karsun Innovation Center. (We dive deeper into this approach in our recent Design for Every Next white paper.)
For one of our grants management customers, our collaboration-centered toolkits allowed us to build a platform that modernized existing legacy grants programs while adding new grants programs to meet that customer’s emerging needs. Our teams could do this because our process prioritizes collaboration and gives our builders and problem solvers the tools to adapt to new customer requests.
Empowering Self Guiding Teams
In the previous post, we also mentioned our GoLean Agile Platform, which provides data driven insights into the development process. The tools on this platform also support another core principle at Karsun, enabling self guiding teams. We ensure our teams have the autonomy to problem solve and build solutions in the best way for them.
One component of that process is giving those teams the tools to assess their productivity. Our GoLean toolkit provides over 25 health and diagnostic visualizations to help teams better understand their work. These visualizations include measurements like lead time, release frequency, and failure rate. Our toolkit also provides these teams with eight statistical models to help them better predict outcomes.
In addition to these technology resources, we support self guiding through our commitment to workplace flexibility. Most roles at Karsun allow teams to determine whether they wish to remain fully remote or hybrid. Our headquarters in Herndon, Virginia, has collaborative workspaces for those that want to gather in person. However, all resources, from training to toolkits, are available virtually, and most of our teams are fully remote.
At Karsun, we support our collaborative community with the resources and flexibility to solve problems effectively. Our teams are mission focused and passionate about technology’s ability to deliver better government to the citizen. If you, too, are passionate about building better technology for the government, then Team Karsun is where you will Find Your Next. Learn more about our open roles at KarsunCareers.com/jobs.
This blog is our third in our four part series. Follow along and discover why Karsun is Where Problem Solvers Find Their Next and Where Experts Experiment for Mission Success.
Meet Luca Moukheiber. A rising college sophomore, he is a member of the 2023 Karsun Innovation Center Internship Program. He worked alongside artificial intelligence (AI), federal acquisitions and data solutions experts as part of a project team developing a federal contracts management proof of concept. In the interview below, we learn more about Luca, his project using a Large Language Model to generate code and his favorite parts about working with our Innovation Center.
First please tell us about yourself. Where are you going to school? What are you studying? What do you like to do in your free time?
I am an Echols Scholar about to start my second year at the University of Virginia, where I am majoring in computer science. I enjoy hiking, biking, paddle boarding, and playing the guitar in my free time.
Could you share a little bit about the project you worked on as part of this internship? What challenge does it solve? What technologies and tools are you using?
As part of the Karsun initiative to explore the integration of generative AI into application development, I developed a file attachment feature used in a proof of concept application using Large Language Model (LLM) technology to generate code for certain parts of my project. I created a custom interface for users to upload, view, or delete documents as part of a reporting system. My project solves the challenge of improving efficiencies and reducing costs associated with federal contract management. This task involved working on both the front and back end to store documents in a database and the cloud. Leveraging AI to reduce manual code writing reduces development time and improves efficiency. The technologies that I used in this project were GPT-4, Angular, Spring Boot, Postgres, AWS S3, LocalStack, Jest, Nx, Flyway, and Podman.
What is your favorite part about working with the Karsun Innovation Center? Is there a weekly meeting or ritual you enjoy? The opportunity to learn more or get a new certification?
My favorite part of working in the Innovation Center is having the opportunity to develop cutting-edge solutions to novel problems. The projects evolve rapidly, with ample space for creative thinking and problem-solving. I appreciate Karsun’s emphasis on intern learning. I am currently studying to become certified as an AWS Developer Associate.
What is the biggest takeaway from your experience as an intern at Karsun?
My biggest takeaway is that keeping an open mind, being adaptable, and continuously learning are core software development skills. I came in with no Angular experience, and understanding how everything worked together in the codebase was difficult at first. However, by taking courses, I saw how the material I learned applied to the real project I was working on, enabling me to build my own feature. There were also situations where I had to change my approach because I ran into blockers, which took me extra time to figure out but strengthened my problem-solving abilities.
Luca’s internship was supported by the Karsun Solutions Innovation Center Practice Areas. Learn more about Karsun’s Acquisitions Management Modernization solutions. Connect with Luca on LinkedIn.
At Karsun, we help civilian government agencies prepare for Every Next with mission driven modernization. We encourage experimentation, and facilitation of innovation that produces solutions that use the best suited technology to help these agencies meet their mission. Using the right technology at the right time ensures our solutions are built to last.
When you join Team Karsun, you become part of the team delivering state-of-the-art, long-lasting solutions to these government agencies. Whether applying emerging technology or using proven resources to produce extraordinary results, Karsun is where experimenters and problem solvers Find Your Next. Moreover, when you are here, our team will cheer you on and celebrate as you solve problems and build exciting new solutions!
All Karsun, team members have access to two critical components of the Karsun Innovation Center (KIC). Our in-house research and development team is the first stop for teams ready to try building with emerging technologies. This team receives requests via our Innovation Radar. The R&D team validates the technology and then creates a prototype. Working alongside the customer team, they develop the prototype further to implement the solution.
Each month we share and promote successful implementations at our Innovation Town Halls. If you want to grow your career through experimentation and innovation, these monthly events are your opportunity to shine. Open to the entire company, executives, portfolio leaders, and experts eager to introduce new solutions attend these interactive sessions. Every solution includes a demo and a question-and-answer session. Many Karsun colleagues follow town halls with brown bags to share their findings, process, and expertise.
Fully matured solutions may later be included in our Innovation Center Toolkits. These kits combine robust assessments, data driven analysis, and proven resources with expert guidance from our Innovation Center Practice Areas. Leveraging industry best practices, our toolkits are used by our teams as readymade cloud migration, DevSecOps, microservices, UI/UX, agile, and data solution resources.
Early adopters and those early in their technology careers may not yet feel comfortable participating directly in the R&D process. These toolkits support you as you implement new and powerful tools in your solutions using established guidelines and playbooks, plus support from our subject matter experts. Industry certifications also validate these toolkits. Our Cloud Runways and AWS cloud practice are backed by AWS Government, Migration, and DevOps Competencies. Our GoLean Agile Platform uses our CMMI v2.0 Level 5 DEV appraised software development methodology. That appraisal reflects our data driven approach to development using the visualization tools available with the GoLean toolkits.
As a manner of field testing these toolkits, some Karsun team members also participate in codeathons and challenge teams. These exercises allow our team to experiment with these resources to solve hypothetical problems that our government customers may face. Past challenges include applying new AI-assisted development tools, cybersecurity, and UI/UX resources.
Whether you want to lead new technology adoption or introduce new technology with expert guidance, Karsun has a growth opportunity for you. Resources from our Karsun Innovation Center R&D and Practice Area teams have your back. If you are an innovator or experimenter ready to help government agencies build better technology, join our team and Find Your Next.
Update August 2023: This blog was the second in our series exploring how our problem solvers grow at Karsun while helping our agency customers meet their mission. Check out our previous posts and discover where we find our next, how our teams collaborate with toolkits and how our team champions power possible.
Last June MeriTalk released its Modernization Hits and Misses: Lessons from Federal Digital Service Innovation report. Among the report’s findings, 99 percent of the federal information technology leaders surveyed said that IT modernization has changed the citizen experience. And you can be part of this government-wide effort to improve government for citizens.
Karsun Solutions’ technology modernization work helps agencies like the Federal Aviation Administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency enhance their infrastructure and applications. When you join Team Karsun, you join a group of people inspired to solve problems to help the government serve its citizens better. Along the way, you will work inside our collaborative culture, access proven toolkits and playbooks, and receive the support to champion your team’s goals.
Collaborate, Innovate, Champion, and Grow
From collaborators to innovators to team champions, Karsun has opportunities for every problem solver looking to build their career. You can do this as part of a team of experts that puts our customers’ missions at the forefront of our work. Elevate our government agency customers’ capabilities and build exciting solutions when you Find Your Next at Karsun.
For those who build by innovating and experimenting, the Karsun Innovation Center (KIC) has a wealth of resources to support your career journey. Our in-house research and development team works with innovative teams to take solutions from prototype to production. Our Practice Areas ensure everyone can access mature solutions using emerging technologies. Whether at the forefront of solutioning with emerging technologies or using building blocks created by our experts, Karsun is where experimenters and innovators find their next opportunity to envision the future of government.
Our Karsun problem solvers and experts are also members of our collaborative community. The resources developed by our Innovation Center support collaboration at every stage of the transformation process. Our remote/flexible roles empower self guiding teams to work together in their best work environment. Backed by this collaborative spirit, our teams defy assumptions and deliver extraordinary customer results.
Finally, our team champions lead from the top. Their role is essential to the ideation and execution of complex modernization solutions. Like our problem solvers and builders, our champions have dedicated KIC resources and training opportunities. Moreover, this training integrates knowledge of federal skill sets. At Karsun, leaders growing and building in the public sector will Find Your Next.
At any stage in your career journey, those that use technology to build new tools and solve complex problems can Find Your Next at Karsun. We hope you join us over the next few weeks as we delve deeper into how experimenters, collaborators, and champions meet our customers’ mission while growing at Karsun. Follow along to learn more, or start your career journey now at KarsunCareers.com/jobs.
Update August 2023: This blog was the first in this series. Check out our previous posts and discover where we experiment for mission success, how our teams collaborate with toolkits and how our team champions power possible.
Every day over 21,000 people use U.S. government websites. Given this, incorporating the needs of millions of users while modernizing on a large scale can be daunting. Karsun Solutions President Terry Miller joins John Gilroy and the Federal Tech Podcast to share how a product mindset combined with Karsun’s Digital Transformation toolkits enable agencies to meet their mission while meeting the expectations of its users.
The Product Mindset
In the interview, Miller describes how legacy application modernization can get bogged down by a focus on adding functionality over a focus on the product as a whole. He notes by taking a product mindset, technology teams instead consider the purpose of the product and what it is supposed to do for its users. This goes beyond adding features or modernizing to meet new requirements. Instead, product mindset oriented modernization considers the long-term vision for the product. It involves stakeholders from the beginning to ensure their vision is part of the collective vision. This includes adopting feedback loops, like those used in human centered design, to ensure consistent input from the beginning.
Toolkits Accelerate Transformation
Miller explained the second part of Karsun’s approach to design at scale is its Digital Transformation Toolkits. These resources and playbooks accelerate transformation as Karsun begins its modernization process. For example, the Digital Transformation Design Toolkit uses a system of 40 different components enabling our developers to quickly create U.S. Web Design System (USWDS) standards compliant interfaces. This allows rapid interaction from prototype to production while engaging the frequent feedback cycle needed for product mindset development. Miller mentions Karsun’s new Design for Every Next whitepaper dives deeper into this relationship. Produced by the Karsun Innovation Center, the paper examines user experience throughout the modernization process.
The podcast is out now. Tune in to the Federal Tech Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or at https://www.theoakmontgroupllc.com/ep-73-how-to-build-federal-systems-for-scale-and-resilience/.
Over 21,000 people visit U.S. government websites each day. The annual paperwork burden for executive departments and agencies exceeds 9 billion hours. Adopting next-generation user experience practices can address these challenges. By considering the needs of all stakeholders, designing for scale can improve the user experience, reducing paperwork and empowering agencies to meet their mission no matter the changing digital landscape.
In 2021, the Executive Order on Transforming Federal Customer Experience and Service Delivery to Rebuild Trust in Government called on agencies to improve government performance while using proven best practices such as human centered design and service delivery models. We must embed the user experience in the process to meet these requirements as early as possible. It compels us to take a long view. We should take a product oriented mindset that asks not how we can introduce a particular feature or functionality but how the product itself will be used past the completion of a modernization project.
We have applied this approach to modernization projects for our customers in the acquisitions, aviation, and grants management industries. Aligning to industry standards, some of our applications see more than 1 million registered users. Using repeatable processes, we enable User Experience/User Interface (UI/UX) on a massive scale as we modernize complex systems for our agency customers. We collect our best practices, resources, and components into toolkits used by our teams. Now we have assembled our insights into a white paper from our Karsun Innovation Center.
Our new Design for Every Next white paper takes you step by step through this process. From building your data capabilities to effectively analyzing stakeholder needs to creating effective feedback loops. We also share best practices and strategies for leveraging emerging technologies to implement new enhancements quickly. We also share our component-based approach to rapidly iterating and prototyping interfaces. Part of our Digital Transformation Toolkits, our Design Toolkit ensures teams have the resources and expertise to accelerate transformation with a comprehensive view of stakeholder needs and wants. Download the white paper at https://karsun-llc.com/resource/design-for-every-next-2/.
This week the Washington Business Journal released its annual diversity index. We are proud to have appeared here and on the Journal’s other diverse businesses lists in the past. A critical part of building our diverse culture is a commitment to creating collaborative spaces and instilling teamwork across our organization.
It begins at the top. Our CEO and co-founder, Sundar Vaidyanathan, is a past winner of the Washington Business Journal’s Minority Business Leader Award. He was named to Comparably.com’s Best CEOs for Diversity in 2021 and 2022. This award is unique because the rankings are based on the reviews of diverse employee groups across Karsun. Those CEOs named to this list are recognized directly by their employees for their outstanding leadership.
“Teamwork and inclusivity are [the] most positive [part] about the culture and environment,” begins one Comparably review. Teamwork is one of our core values, and we pride ourselves on building an open and collaborative workplace. Again, much of this begins with our leadership. Each month a rotating group of employees is invited to participate in Coffee with Leadership. During these small virtual meetings, Karsun team members share feedback and concerns directly with our executive team with their recommendations to make Karsun an even better place to work. Lunch with Leadership gives managers the same opportunities to advocate on behalf of their teams.
Additionally, every employee has access to Karsun career pathing, a tool that allows them to view the pathway to every role at Karsun from entry-level through CEO. The tool suggests resources for an employee to progress and grow at Karsun. As a team growing together remotely, these resources are available to all team members regardless of their location via our Karsun Konnect app.
We extend this commitment to growing diverse teams outside Karsun as well. We invest in supporting community organizations that enable people from diverse groups to grow in their careers. This includes organizations like TiE DC, which hosts entrepreneurship programs for current and future technology leaders. Or Women in Technology, which empowers women and girls exploring careers in STEM. Many of our senior leaders and executives also support industry organizations such as the American Council for Technology-Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC).
While we are proud of past recognition for our diversity efforts, we are excited to see how the diverse experiences of our team members inspire us to build better solutions for our government customers. Teamwork and collaboration are core to the work we do. Learn more about meaningful opportunities to join our collaborative culture at KarsunCareers.com.
Each quarter we celebrate a special group of individuals at Karsun. These team members, nominated by their collaborators and leaders, embody our core values. Their work represents the values that drive us to deliver quality solutions to our U.S. government customers.
A recent LinkedIn survey found 82% of U.S. workers said it is important that their company’s values align with their personal values. We know core values are important to our team members, which is why we honor our values throughout the year. And it is also the reason we take special care to recognize how excellence, innovation, teamwork, commitment, integrity, and fun all help us deliver exceptional solutions to our government customers.
Excellence
At Karsun, we celebrate excellence in all we do. That includes recognizing team members who go the extra mile to learn or enhance their skills to deliver on a critical project. We also honor team members who take on new projects and responsibilities. We recently recognized a team leader who embodied both of these qualities. He stepped in to perform hands-on work when his team needed additional support. As a result, that team exceeded customer expectations on their project. When we recognize excellence, we honor both the outcome and the initiative, time, and effort required to obtain those results.
Innovation
In addition to our monthly Innovation Town Halls, we also recognize some of our innovators during our quarterly awards ceremony. Every team member at Karsun has access to the Karsun Innovation Center, no matter their role. In one instance, a recent winner was celebrated for her work prototyping a synthetic data solution within a short time frame. This award also promotes work that may otherwise go unacknowledged publicly because it relates to confidential or proprietary projects. We use this opportunity to celebrate the members of our challenge teams that take on additional work beyond their usual duties to support new opportunities.
Teamwork
Our team champions and experts unite to build extraordinary solutions for our government customers. We honor the champions that implement better ways for their teams to work together. One of these team leaders was recognized for updating onboarding, reporting, and standard operating procedures for one of our helpdesk/operations and maintenance (O&M) teams. These major process improvements enhanced the relationship between his team and other teams, and our customers. A team member from our finance team was also recognized for similar process improvements. We celebrated her for not only improving productivity across teams but the way she builds trust and loyalty within her own team as well.
Commitment
We are committed to building modernization solutions that are built to last. That commitment extends from our practice advocates in the Innovation Center to our delivery teams. As part of our organization-wide commitment to this cause, many of our team members pitch in to grow our company in a way that ensures we have knowledgeable experts on every team. Last fall, one of these individuals was recognized for his commitment to ensuring talented team members join Karsun during rapid growth. He dedicated his time to interviewing and was ultimately responsible for multiple new Software Development Engineers in Test (SDET) joining Karsun.
Integrity
We conduct ourselves with honesty and fairness. That means doing the right thing for both our employees and our customers. That also includes acting proactively to ensure we do things the right way every time. We recently recognized a member of our quality assurance team for his management of our Software Process Engineering Group (SPEG). Under his management, that group is responsible for designing and executing quality assurance programs across Karsun teams to ensure we continually meet audit standards and best practices.
Fun
From day one, Karsun celebrated fun as one of our core values. That includes both a commitment to spending meaningful time together through events such as family picnics and team celebrations to ensuring our teams use their time in the way that is most efficient for them. Several of our core value award winners were recognized for going beyond one of the core values described above to improve the culture of their team. Nominations for our awards frequently mention how these stellar individuals improve team morale, bring empathy to their projects and improve the overall experience of working at Karsun.
Our core values inspire us to deliver extraordinary solutions to our government customers. These values are important to us, and we hope they might be important to you. If these stories inspired you to join a team where we honor and recognize strong values, then it is time to Find Your Next at KarsunCareers.com.
The Great Resignation is out, and the Big Stay is in. At least according to a recent report from ADP, which observes many people are opting to stay in their current roles rather than risk an unsteady job market. However, at Karsun, we are still growing and want you to grow with us!
Here growth is about more than moving up (though if that is important to you, we hope you do that too!). It is also about growing your expertise and technical skills in government technology projects. We are an information technology consulting company, but our teams exclusively serve the federal government. If you want to grow your career in public sector IT, there is no better place to be than Karsun.
Grow to Serve the Mission
We support important missions at agencies such as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). We prioritize training to ensure our support of the mission continues. We proudly recall several examples when our teams persevered, despite external constraints. During the 2019 Government Shutdown, rather than send our teams home, we created a training program focused on developing the skills and tools that would best support our agency customers the moment the work stoppage lifted. Likewise, during the early days of the pandemic, one of our teams not only continued delivery on their current project but due to their expertise in enterprise modernization and grants management systems onboarded a new program to support first responders.
Because our training programs anticipate the needs of our agency customers, we can ensure they meet their missions. And as our customer wins, our teams share in those successes while growing their experience in new technologies and tools. Our Innovation Center has dedicated technical practice areas and experts focused on modernizing Acquisition, Aviation, Grants, and Fleet management systems. These same practice leaders work with our Karsun Academy team to develop tailored training programs to support the needs of our customers and our teams serving them.
Grow with our Industry
In addition to our in-house resources, we also proudly support local industry organizations like the American Council for Technology-Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC). In fact, eleven Karsun leaders are ACT-IAC fellows, graduating from one of its exclusive professional development cohorts. We also support organizations such as Women in Technology to ensure our region has diverse opportunities to grow and excel.
Join our team and not only grow your technical skills but grow your knowledge and experience in public sector IT. In fact, you do not have to be based in the D.C. region to utilize our resources. Karsun hires remote roles nationwide, and all of our team members have access to Karsun Konnect, our virtual portal where they can access the same Innovation Center resources available to our local employees. Many of these tools and courses are designed for remote/asynchronous learning. Visit our Career Development page to learn more about growing with Karsun or apply today at KarsunCareers.com.