Best of Business top vote-getter: Revolution Group

In 1995, when Rick Snide and Polly Clavijo dreamed up their tech company, only 36 percent of households had a computer. Today, the company celebrates 25 years, which in tech years, might as well be billions.

Revolution Software, as it was called then, grew over time from a modest team in a small Clintonville space, to Revolution Group, with over 80 employees providing tech support solutions for professional service companies nationwide.

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In some ways, the Covid-19 pandemic hit the company hard. “Overnight, our support calls doubled for March, April and May,” says Snide, CEO of what's now called Revolution Group. But in other ways, like working from home, not much changed for the company, which got its start as an IBM consulting partner working from home offices. “We’ve always had remote workers,” Snide says.

With Snide and Clavijo, senior leadership at Revolution has been together roughly 15 years—stability and consistency that adds to the company’s success. “We spend a lot of energy caring about keeping and finding the right people,” says Snide. “I think it would surprise people how authentic we are, and how good we are to each other.”

What else does he spend energy thinking about? The future. According to Snide, the future of technology is speed. Considering the dial-up sludge that defined his early career days, it’s hard to think that today’s Zoom calls are slow or glitchy, but, “Imagine being able to have a virtual reality meeting with your team—in Aspen,” he says. “I think we’re going to see unlimited bandwidth that allows that kind of connectivity.”

Virginia Brown is a freelance writer.