Rising Stars of the Profession: Morgan Squatriglia

Morgan Squatriglia is a Senior Manager in the Workforce Readiness Consulting Practice at NTT DATA Services. She is an active leader and volunteer in her local Charlotte community and across North Carolina, promoting minority youth education, entrepreneurship, and domestic violence awareness. Named an NTT DATA Game Changer early in her career, Morgan has proven success in global culture transformation and behavioral reinforcement, organizational change management, and large-scale program development. She is experienced in process optimization, cross-functional marketing and communications, and strategic organizational design through execution. Morgan is passionate about growing and promoting talent while trailblazing the path for the upcoming generation of professionals.

What would you say has been the biggest factor in your success so far?

I attribute my success to the trust and relationships that I have established, and continue to grow, with those around me – especially my leaders, my teams, and my clients.

My leaders trust me to take on the most challenging opportunities and push me beyond my limits. They built confidence in me and enabled me to gain more and more autonomy to try new ways of operating and solutioning. This helped me establish a strong track record of success, which ultimately led to greater responsibilities.

My teammates trust me to lead them and help them grow in their careers. In remaining a transparent and motivating leader, I have guided teams to success while also developmentally challenging individual teammates and providing them opportunities, the same way that my leaders provided me. Having a mutually beneficial relationship built on trust creates better colleagues, teams, and leaders. All this ultimately leads to better results for our clients.

My clients invite me into their world to solve, or prevent their problems. Establishing credibility and collaborating with them early, paired with remaining genuine and communicative, creates a baseline of trust which enables me to teach them and collectively make decisions for their business. Through building that trust, our relationships have evolved and allowed my team and I to provide more holistic solutions and expand upon our presence in the client space.

Trust is foundational, necessary, and powerful. It has been, and continues to be, the greatest asset to my success so far.

What do you enjoy most about your career in the consulting industry?

Consulting is on the front line of innovation and paves the ways of the future across every industry in the world. I enjoy the combination of disruption, collaboration, and variety that the consulting industry provides. I have always been one to get bored easily and challenge the status quo. In my career, I always aim to truly innovate by being disruptive and questioning what is and what could be. The creative freedom that consulting provides is limitless and I have autonomy to make an impact in our ever-changing world through consistent exploration. I am a strong believer that bringing together a group with diverse skillsets and backgrounds is key to this disruptive innovation.

As a people person, collaborating and connecting with colleagues and subject matter experts has been a key factor to my happiness and enjoyment. The knowledge, experience, and points of view that I gain from collaborating with diverse teams is exciting and intriguing – I'm grateful to work with such talented professionals daily. The impact and influence of the industry is so widespread that it's almost difficult to conceptualize. I'm constantly stimulated, challenged, and pushed out of my comfort zone with the variety of concepts, clients, and problems to which I have been exposed.

What is your proudest achievement to date?

My proudest achievement to date is establishing an organization that transformed the culture of a global account with more than 300 colleagues while providing developmental opportunities to promote younger colleagues.

Following the firm's acquisition, our culture was in turmoil and my account of over 300 global colleagues began experiencing extreme attrition. To heal our culture and foster unity, I developed an organization of 14 teammates called the "Voice of the Account" (VoA) whose mission and structure was centered around consistent communication, collaboration, and camaraderie.

The VoA was responsible for: delivering routine communications of firm and client activities, hosting training and development workshops, holding community outreach events, publishing team and individual recognition, onboarding new teammates, disseminating templates and collateral, and more. In addition to developing marketing and branding standards and establishing a single mailbox, we developed a website that was accessible through desktop or mobile applications so teammates around the globe had 24/7 access.

In less than six months, our biannual survey results yielded that account morale was exponentially heightened, attrition slowed, teammates felt more connected, and leaders had more confidence in cross-team collaboration and solutioning. The VoA model proved so successful that the same structure was implemented across other firm accounts and remains in place today. In addition to promoting account culture, colleagues who served on the board directly attribute their promotions to their time serving on the VoA board and have since applied their experience in their client spaces.

What's the best advice you've ever been given?

"The willingness to embrace necessary pain and discomfort is a direct reflection of the growth that we will achieve."

Pain is unpleasant and natural for humans to avoid. Willfully enduring pain evolves us and increases the resilience and tenacity needed for continued strength. I relate this to gardening. I have beautiful hydrangeas which require seasonal pruning. While the flowers are gorgeous and vibrant, the longer the flowers remain on the plant, the more harm can ultimately be done to the plant. Therefore, while pruning may hurt in the short term, it's necessary for the long term.

I've found this applicable in all aspects of my life, and the pain that I have willfully embraced has escalated me to new levels and molded me into the person I am today.

What does being honored as a Rising Star mean to you?

In short, this recognition means everything to me. I am grateful for NTT DATA's confidence to nominate me for such a prestigious recognition, and I am humbled to even be included.

The real honorees are those who took chances on me and had the confidence that I did not have in myself. It would recognizes NTT DATA, my leaders, my teams, and my clients who have all played a critical role in my professional career.

This recognition also serves as a symbol to all current and future consultants that there is success and opportunity in this industry no matter what odds you may face. As a disabled girl from a small town, I had no idea what my future would hold but battled every trial along the way and worked harder than my peers to reach where I am today. I am honored to use my story to inspire others in the same position.