UPDATE: This story originally ran in the June 2025 issue. The 1.5-mile section of U.S. 58 mentioned here reopened May 22, after the June issue’s press deadline.
The road repairs on U.S. 58 can’t be completed soon enough for Teresa Dell, whose gas station and country store have seen a big drop in business since Hurricane Helene destroyed 1 1/2 miles of the curvy mountain highway in Washington County last September.
“We’re at the end of a road not going anywhere,” says Dell, whose Konnarock Store & Gas usually serves visitors to the Virginia Creeper Trail and other outdoorsy places in the vicinity of Damascus, a small town that has become a recreation destination for Appalachian Trail thru-hikers, bicyclists and campers.
As of late April, U.S. 58 repairs — estimated to cost approximately $7 million — were set to be completed in May, about five months ahead of schedule, according to Michelle Earl, communications manager for the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Bristol District.
The road’s reopening will come as a relief to commuters whose usual 10-to-15-mile trips from the eastern part of the county toward Damascus have become 30-mile detours along winding country roads.
More damaging to the Damascus economy than U.S. 58’s closure has been the devastation along the Virginia Creeper Trail, says town manager Chris Bell.
More than 200,000 people annually use the trail and visit Damascus, which has experienced an outdoors tourism boom in recent decades. Restaurants, a brewery, bike shops and more than 80 bed-and-breakfasts have sprouted in recent years to serve visitors.
The Damascus-to-Whitetop Station trail section, an easy 17-mile downhill ride popular with families, suffered heavy damage during Helene’s wrath, including the destruction of 18 bridges. The trail is still open west of Damascus to Abingdon, Bell says, but visitation, especially overnight lodging, hasn’t bounced back yet.
Lisa Quigley, the Virginia Creeper Trail Conservancy’s executive director, says 58’s reopening will ease access for crews working on remote parts of the trail.
“All the repairs have been dependent on getting 58 up and running,” she says.
The Creeper Trail contributes nearly $13 million in annual visitor spending along its route, with Damascus earning $6 million in meals and lodging taxes from visitors, according to a Virginia Tech report. “Without trail tourism revenue,” the report’s authors wrote, “the town could see millions of lost tax dollars.”
The sooner the trail is reopened the better, says Dell, whose Konnarock Store relies on tourists. “There’s not enough local traffic to keep the country stores going,” she says.
A $4.9 million grant from the commonwealth will allow leaders from the Roanoke and New River valleys to build upon efforts by Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine and the Fralin Biomedical Institute at VTC to turn the region into a hub for biomedical research.
“As we build the biotech sector, this statewide grant will help us where we have gaps,” explains Erin Burcham, CEO of the Roanoke Blacksburg Innovation Alliance (RBIA), a regional economic development organization.
The money is a slice of a $14.3 million pie from state economic development initiative GO Virginia to fund the multiregional Project VITAL (Virginia Innovations and Technology Advancements in Life Sciences), an endeavor to make Virginia a biotechnology leader.
With its $4.9 million cut, GO Virginia Region 2, which encompasses a swath of the state stretching southwest from Lynchburg to Pulaski County, plans to expand regional work in medical devices, oncology therapeutic research and neurotechnology. The effort will be spearheaded by leaders from RBIA, Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic.
Virginia Tech plans to increase the number of research teams participating in the university’s proof of concept program, which assists researchers with pursuing commercialization of technologies harnessed in their labs.
VT will also “elevate programming and mentoring” for its Fralin Health Sciences and Technology Commercialization Fellows Program, Burcham says. That program is open to VT researchers who conduct health sciences and technology-related research and who are interested in developing products for commercialization.
Meanwhile, Carilion’s innovation team will develop resources to help inventors and companies in navigating complicated compliance and regulatory processes. Carilion will also make its Human Factors Lab, which explores human capabilities and limitations in the context of workplace processes, available to outside companies.
Virginia Western Community College and the Blue Ridge Partnership for Health Science Careers will apply Project VITAL funding toward efforts to bring biotechnology programming to kindergarten though high school students, an effort to develop the biomedical workforce of tomorrow.
All in all, the GO Virginia Region 2 Project VITAL effort has a goal of creating 1,315 jobs over five years, generating an economic impact of $40.8 million for the region, according to Burcham.
In late April, GOP lieutenant governor candidate John Reid posted a highly atypical campaign video on X.
His political enemies within the party, Reid alleged, were staging a “coordinated character assassination attempt to force [him as] the first openly gay candidate off the Republican statewide ticket.”
Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Reid said, had asked him to exit the race after someone brought to Youngkin’s attention the existence of a Tumblr blog with the same handle Reid uses on social media that contained — gasp! — photos of nude men! (Oh my! Excuse us while we fan ourselves dramatically à la comedian Jon Stewart.)
The former conservative talk radio host and son of the late longtime Henrico County state Del. Jack Reid is adamant that the blog, which dated to 2020, isn’t his. As an openly gay Republican and a public figure for years on Richmond radio and TV, he’s the victim of political dirty tricks, says Reid, who is staying in the race.
Calling the matter “a total fabricated internet lie,” Reid further said, “It’s not my place to judge others, so I won’t, but I haven’t publicly performed or publicly posted anything pornographic. Have I seen porn? Yes. Have I had one-night stands? Yes.”
Maybe the blog is Reid’s and maybe it isn’t. You’d need someone with forensic computing skills far exceeding mine to make that determination.
But does it matter? Does it have anything to do with Reid’s qualifications for the job or his policy stances? Would it interfere with his ability to hold office?
It seems a bit disingenuous that we as Americans somehow act as if politicians belong to an upright, moral class far above us mere mortals when all the evidence presented to us for literally centuries speaks otherwise.
After all, Reid is hardly the first politician in the nation — or even Virginia — to be accused by opponents of salacious personal behavior. We don’t even have to go that far back — just to 2023 when Democratic state House candidate Susanna Gibson left the race after it came out that she had solicited tips for performing sex acts with her husband on a streaming internet site.
And the White House is far from pure on this front, either. Take Thomas Jefferson and the enslaved Sally Hemings. Or Grover Cleveland and the child he had out of wedlock. Or the indiscretions of Woodrow Wilson, FDR, JFK or Bill Clinton. Or the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., who was convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush payment to a porn star, not to mention the $88.3 million verdict in a sexual abuse and defamation lawsuit he’s appealing.
As the Bible says, “There is nothing new under the sun.”
Beyond moral or ethical considerations, there is an argument that a tawdry personal life could leave an elected official ripe for blackmail by foreign enemies or other unsavory actors. But that would require shame — a commodity in short supply in a world of social media influencers and George Santos.
Personally, I’d much rather focus on the propriety of a public official say, accepting stacks of gold bars and a Mercedes-Benz from Egypt and Qatar, gifts that will see former Sen. Bob Menendez, D-New Jersey, report to federal prison this summer.
Instead of the media worrying about the state of President Donald Trump‘s third marriage and why Melania has been largely absent from the White House, can we focus more on his intention to accept Qatar’s gift of a $400 million luxury jumbo jet to replace Air Force One? Or how he’s using the White House as the venue for a cryptocurrency moneymaking scheme? Or how about his administration’s stated goal of suspending habeas corpus? Or anything policy related, for that matter?
Because, as far as their personal lives are concerned, the only American public figure I expect to comport themselves like the pope is … well, the pope.
When you manage people, you don’t just oversee productivity — you hold careers, livelihoods and psychological well-being in your hands. The data doesn’t lie, and neither do the millions who’ve weighed in on what constitutes leadership worth following.
Fact: 69% of U.S. workers would rather clean toilets at a bus station than report to a bad boss. I made up the toilet part, but the LinkedIn Workforce Confidence Survey doesn’t sugarcoat the truth — over two-thirds of employees have their resignation letter mentally drafted and ready to go when reporting to a manager who is terrible.
Let’s acknowledge what we’ve all experienced: Someone in your career trajectory either accelerated your growth or made you question your career choices. There is no middle ground.
The manager multiplier effect
When Gallup analyzed retention patterns over two years, they found something all of us could have predicted but still escapes too many corners of corporate America: Employees who receive high-quality recognition are 45% less likely to quit within two years.
To get it right, remember that recognition must be:
Specific (not “good job” but “your analysis of the market segment revealed an opportunity we’d overlooked”)
Timely (not during the annual review but immediate)
Authentic (not corporate speak but human language)
Individualized (tailored to what actually motivates each unique human)
The green flag goes viral
In November, a young professional named Simi posted her resignation video call that pulled in nearly 5 million views. Why? Because her manager responded with “Congratulations — I’m thrilled for your next chapter” instead of guilt, manipulation or passive-aggression.
The internet collectively lost its mind because managerial excellence has become increasingly rare. Being a human who genuinely cares about your team’s growth shouldn’t break the algorithm.
This manager understood something profound: Every interaction is a branding moment. In the talent marketplace, your reaction at departures is just as important as your celebration of arrivals.
The economics of empathy
When we measure managerial impact, we typically focus on spreadsheets, OKRs and deliverables. But the true ROI of management is hidden in what doesn’t happen: the resignation letter unwritten, the emotional labor saved, the recruitment costs avoided.
Great managers don’t just cultivate productivity — they create gravitational pull that keeps talent in orbit.
Ask yourself: What’s the cost of replacing a single high performer? 200% of their salary? 300%? Now multiply that by the 69% of your workforce that’s mentally refreshing their LinkedIn profile while nodding through your team meeting.
The noble profession
Management isn’t just a job — it’s a calling. You’re not just optimizing workflows; you’re shaping lives. The average American spends 90,000 hours at work during their lifetime. As a manager, you determine whether those hours feel purposeful or punishing.
The true measure of your success isn’t found in quarterly results but in the trajectory of careers you’ve influenced. Twenty years from now, no one will remember that PowerPoint deck you obsessed over, but they’ll never forget how you made them feel when they failed, succeeded, or needed support.
Management isn’t about being liked. It’s about creating environments where humans can do their best work while becoming their best selves.
The path forward
Want to transform your management approach and create a culture that talented people actually want to be part of? Join us for our upcoming webinar, “The Manager Effect: How Better Leaders Boost Retention & Results Using Employee Engagement Data.”
We’ll dive deep into how progressive organizations are using experience data to identify management blind spots, predict flight risks before they happen, and create a managerial corps that makes all employees thrive.
The webinar runs June 24, featuring the latest insights on how to slash turnover and boost engagement by reinventing your approach to management development. Sign up at tinyurl.com/ManagerEffect.
Because when your competitors are losing talent through the revolving door of mediocre management, your opportunity to create competitive advantage through leadership excellence has never been greater. Register now. Your team is counting on you.
Jaime Raul Zepeda is EVP, Principal Consultant for Best Companies Group and COLOR Magazine, part of BridgeTower Media.
Wondering whether your organization is on the right path to win? Talk to us at Best Companies Group so we can analyze your organization’s health, your team dynamics, and your leadership’s effectiveness. We’ve helped over 10,000 companies understand and improve their workplace using data-driven strategies. Send me a note at [email protected].
A search fund offers a path to own and operate an established business.
Search funds are somewhat new to Virginia, but they’re growing in popularity.
Virginia is well-positioned for search fund investment because of its business-friendly climate and relatively low cost of living.
Generational shifts are driving interest in professional autonomy.
Coming from Stanford University, Edward Silva was well aware of the power of search funds, a less risky way to build a self-owned business.
H. Irving Grousbeck, who co-founded Continental Cablevision and started the Stanford Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, coined the phrase “search fund” in 1984, referring to people who seek funding from investors and then “search for, acquire and lead a privately held company for the medium to long term, typically five to 10 years,” according to the Stanford CES’ 2024 study on search funds.
Although search funds are popular on the West Coast, they’re just getting started in Virginia. The Stanford study shows why it’s lucrative. Nearly 70% of the 681 search funds researchers examined in the United States and Canada were profitable. But Virginia had only nine search-fund-acquired businesses in the study, compared with 55 in California.
Yet Silva views it as a growing trend in the commonwealth.
After graduating from Stanford, the California native built a search fund and acquired Charlottesville-based másLabor, which connects businesses with migrant workers coming to the U.S. on H2-A and H2-B work visas, from prior owner Libby Whitley, who was retiring, and he moved his family to Virginia in 2021. Whitley, Silva explains, did not want to sell her self-built business to a corporate conglomerate or private equity firm.
“As neither of those things, I gave them a nice alternative to get paid well and make sure their business still carried out their legacy,” says Silva.
He grew the business, acquiring and merging it with Georgia-based AgWorks H2 in 2022, into a firm that brings in more than 70,000 foreign laborers annually.
Silva left másLabor last year but remains an investor in the company. He’s in the process of another search, this one self-funded, for a Virginia business he hopes to grow. He says the commonwealth is well-positioned for such investment because of its relative tax-friendliness, a deep pool of available business talent and affordable cost of living.
Those factors and a shift in ideology spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic, Silva says, have helped the search fund model see a lot of success in Virginia.
“You had all these people who, for one reason or another, their life was being reevaluated,” Silva says. “A lot of people wanted more freedom, more autonomy.”
Generational appeal
When Megan McGee graduated from Florida State University, she began her career working for a handful of small businesses in the Sunshine State.
A child of small business owners, McGee saw the impact they can have in their communities. But what she didn’t know was “how the heck can you start a business or buy a business of value if you don’t have millions of dollars yourself?” she says.
So she enrolled at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business to find the answer.
It was there that McGee learned about entrepreneurship through acquisition — the idea of acquiring already-successful small-to-medium-sized businesses rather than starting from scratch.
“At first I thought it was fake,” McGee says. “It sounded too good to be true: Somebody who barely knows me will give me hundreds of thousands of dollars, potentially millions of dollars, to buy a company and make me CEO.”
After a brief foray as a searcher, as such entrepreneurs are known, McGee pivoted to education. She advises students as the director of entrepreneurship through acquisition at Darden’s Batten Institute for Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Technology.
Joel Ankney, who operates Virginia Beach-based Ankney Law, has made his living for nearly a decade assisting searchers when it comes time to close deals.
“Virginia, at least in my purview, is just starting to talk about it,” Ankney says of search funds. “It’s a hot topic right now. Very hot.”
Ankney closes between 20 and 25 transactions per year, and most of his clients are self-funded searchers. Most use federal Small Business Administration loans capped at $5 million, so the businesses changing hands are relatively small and typically in service industries, everything from construction equipment firms to custodial services. As with Silva, many searchers are younger professionals purchasing businesses from baby boomers who are looking to retire.
Silva sees the trend catching on in Virginia for the same reasons he chose to move here from California — lower cost of living, business-friendly policies and plenty of skilled employees. McGee agrees.
“I’m working with more students who want to search, acquire and operate a business, and they specifically want to stay in Virginia,” the U.Va. educator says.
And McGee doesn’t see this trend slowing down when she looks at Gen Z, millennials and beyond.
“People like autonomy,” she explains. “We’re seeing fewer people staying at the same job for decades at a time.”
In 2012, Franklin, his father and two other partners founded the Franklin Johnston Group after leaving S.L. Nusbaum Realty. Franklin took over the role of chief operating officer, and in 2023, he succeeded his father, Wendell Franklin, as CEO. With co-founder Tom Johnston having stepped down in 2024, the company is now known as the Franklin Group. It manages about 200 properties across 10 states and Washington, D.C., employing about 700 people. Over the past decade, the business has developed more than 10,000 new multifamily units across Virginia and North Carolina, totaling more than $1.6 billion in financed projects.
Franklin also is deeply involved in his community, including as vice chair of the Virginia Beach Development Authority board and chairman and president of the Chesapeake Bay Wine Classic Foundation board. He was tapped as 2022 King Neptune for Virginia Beach’s Neptune Festival and serves on the festival’s board. A Virginia Wesleyan University graduate, he also serves on William & Mary’s board of visitors.
“We actively seek out ways to give back, whether through partnerships, volunteer efforts or initiatives that support local growth and well-being,” Franklin says. “We are not just managing properties; we are helping shape neighborhoods and creating places people are proud to call home.”
Best advice I’ve received: Work hard, stay honest and lead with transparency. It’s straightforward, but it’s stuck with me because those values build real trust and long-term success. At Franklin Group, I strive to set that tone every day.
Hobbs
CHARLES ‘BRAD’ HOBBS
CEO, AIR CONTROL CONCEPTS, NORFOLK
The umbrella company for HVAC equipment brands in 32 states, Air Control Concepts was founded in May 2024 in a rebranding of Hobbs & Associates, Hobbs’ family-owned HVAC business started in 1984. Based in Norfolk, the business has more than 100 offices and employs 1,750 people, including more than 275 HVAC technicians. Backed by private equity firms Blackstone and Madison Dearborn Partners, Air Control Concepts announced its acquisition in January of Midwest Machinery, a century-old HVAC manufacturers’ sales representative.
A Virginia Tech graduate who serves on the university’s board of visitors, Hobbs is close friends with Gov. Glenn Youngkin, whom he aided with fundraising and as part of the governor’s transition team. Hobbs also has lent significant support to area nonprofits, including the American Heart Association’s Hampton Roads branch, Norfolk Christian Schools and Virginia Beach’s Neptune Festival.
Hobbs says that Air Control Concepts has a culture “deeply rooted in the family business my father founded over 40 years ago. These values include family first, compassion and empathy, integrity and honesty, and empowerment and accountability. We build this business first and foremost with a people-first, profit-second philosophy.”
Best advice I’ve received: It’s been said that business is a long lesson in humility. I was blessed to learn that lesson early in my career from my father. People will always work well together in an environment driven by humble leaders who desire to build as a team.
PRESIDENT AND CEO, CHARTWAY CREDIT UNION, VIRGINIA BEACH
Having joined Chartway, one of the state’s largest credit unions, in 2008, Schools has led its growth into a $3 billion institution with more than 500 employees and over 260,000 members in Virginia, Utah and Texas. At a time when many financial institutions are closing or consolidating branches, Chartway has expanded, opening new offices in Norfolk and Virginia Beach in the past year.
Schools became Chartway’s president and CEO in 2015 and served on the National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions board between 2017 and 2023. Before Chartway, he worked for Chase, Capital One and Crestar banks.
A graduate of Virginia Tech and Virginia Commonwealth University, from which he earned his MBA, Schools serves as a trustee of the Chartway Promise Foundation, a nonprofit that has provided $16 million to assist children with medical problems. He also was chair of the transition board for the creation of America’s Credit Unions, which resulted from the 2023 merger of NAFCU and the Credit Union National Association.
How I foster a positive culture: I aim to be honest when it comes to the environmental forces — whether economic, pandemic, cultural or otherwise — that may create a change in the direction of how we operate, but these don’t change who we are. We are committed to the fact that the balance of well-being and productivity of our team members drives the strength of Chartway.
The son of SOSi founder Sosi Setian, Julian Setian joined the federal contracting company in 1994, just after graduating from Columbia University. The company was only 5 years old then and still finding its footing, but today SOSi is a major defense and tech contractor that has won more than $5 billion in federal contracts and made $200 million in acquisitions since Setian became CEO in 2001.
Although the company’s original focus was on providing language translation and transcription services for federal agencies such as the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration, SOSi has grown its client list to include the Department of Defense and the intelligence community. In 2011, SOSi founded Exovera, a software and data science subsidiary.
Setian and his family support many civic and business organizations in Virginia, including Cornerstones, which advocates for disadvantaged people in Fairfax County, and he sits on the executive council of the Professional Services Council. SOSi is a corporate sponsor of the Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts, and Setian’s family established an endowment to promote early childhood arts education through the foundation. He says a quote from theologian, philosopher and physician Albert Schweitzer provides words to live by: “The three most important ways to lead people are by example, by example, by example.”
How I foster a positive culture: The key is maintaining a strong identity to which employees feel connected. At SOSi, we spend a lot of time talking about who we are versus what we do. The government contracting industry is saturated with service businesses. We adapt to the policy and spending changes, but remain steadfast in our long-term commitment to customers, employees and partners.
In 2020, Shriver became Atlantic Constructors’ new CEO, taking over from its founding leader, Art Hungerford. An industrial and commercial contractor with offices across the state, ACI has grown significantly over the past five years. Formerly the company’s executive vice president of construction operations, Shriver led a $25 million expansion to quintuple ACI’s fabrication capabilities, building a 170,000-square-foot plant next to the company’s headquarters.
Trained as a mechanical engineer at Virginia Tech, Shriver has an MBA from James Madison University and holds certificates in lean construction and medical gas inspection, as well as being LEED-accredited. He also instituted a “[Root] Beer with the Boss” program, events where Shriver visits worksites with a cooler of root beer to share with ACI workers while having conversations.
Acquired in April by Texas-based TriplePoint MEP, ACI has worked on major projects like the restoration of Richmond’s Altria Theater, construction of a 515,000-square-foot Microsoft data center in Mecklenburg County and multiple buildings for Virginia Commonwealth University and VCU Health.
Shriver says that a quote from Mike Tyson has helped him stay prepared for life’s unexpected challenges: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”
How I prepare my team for success: There is a major skills gap in the construction industry, so we believe strongly in providing opportunities and training for people to build a lasting career. We have programs at Atlantic to bring in people without any construction experience and give them the tools they need to succeed in our industry.
After having two children, Geller decided to create something else — a law firm that enables women to be successful attorneys and moms. Since its 2011 founding, the Geller Law Group has grown to 17 attorneys and 19 support professionals serving 18,000 clients across Northern Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Maryland, with offices in Fairfax and Washington.
“I saw far too many incredibly talented women leaving large law firms because those environments just weren’t built to support working parents,” Geller says. “I knew there had to be a better way.”
Embracing work-from-home technology before the pandemic, Geller and her firm have received numerous awards for helping maintain work-life balance, including 2023 woman business owner of the year, awarded by the national chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners. She has spoken at a press conference at the U.S. Capitol with former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, advocating for women-friendly workplace policies such as paid leave, flex scheduling and telecommuting.
Geller is also very active in community service. Her firm contributes volunteer hours, money and goods to regional food banks, and it has created a “robust legal resource center” on its website for LGBTQ+ people navigating legal issues.
Best advice I’ve received: It was from a friend who told me to think of all the balls I’m juggling in life — work, family, health, community, everything — and recognize that some of those balls are made of rubber, and some are made of glass. This advice helps me take a breath, figure out what truly needs my attention in the moment and let go of the rest — at least for now.
1. Personal finance educator Tiffany “The Budgetnista” Aliche headlined Virginia Credit Union‘s Financial Success for Women Summit April 15 in Richmond. (Photo courtesy Virginia Credit Union)
2. (L to R) Philanthropist Kimmy Duong; Ken Ball, dean of George Mason University‘s College of Engineering and Computing; and George Mason President Gregory Washington at an April 25 event announcing a $20 million gift from Duong’s family foundation (Photo by Ron Aira. Courtesy George Mason University)
3. U.S. Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Westmoreland, hosted a May 2 roundtable discussion with constituents in Glen Allen to talk about their experiences navigating Social Security and Medicare. (Photo courtesy Office of U.S. Rep. Rob Wittman)
4. Representatives from HCA Virginia and Communities in Schools of Petersburg held an April 23 ribbon-cutting and launch event for a new interactive medical classroom at Petersburg’s Vernon Johns Middle School. HCA Healthcare gave $25,000 to the project. (Photo courtesy Communities In Schools of Petersburg and HCA Virginia)
5. Caesars Virginia held a May 6 celebration for International Firefighters’ Day, recognizing the Danville Fire Department and highlighting the casino’s gift to the city of a new $1.6 million fire truck. (Photo courtesy Caesars Virginia)
Startup incubators across the state help entrepreneurs determine whether their business plans are viable.
Through these programs, entrepreneurs test and refine business ideas and gather customer feedback.
Entrepreneurs with viable ideas often move on to accelerators for next steps.
Richmond husband-and-wife tech entrepreneurs Kyle Johnson and Mari Soonsoo Bae were on a path to creating their first business together. Johnson’s technology and AI acumen and Bae’s business school knowledge were the perfect pairing.
But it wasn’t until they joined the Idea Factory, a program developed by Richmond-based business incubator Startup Virginia, last year that their venture began to take full shape.
Once the couple started asking questions and gathering feedback from potential customers, they saw the problem that they needed to solve, as well as the solution: Data analyst teams across corporate America needed a central place to store, organize and share data with many sources. That’s what their business, Ara Platforms, provides.
“It was constantly interviewing and really learning to leverage your network,” Johnson says. “That really helped me snap out of some of my own biases. You can start to fall in love with your ideas. You can start to think that if it works in my head, people will buy it.”
Startup incubators abound in Virginia, but for early-stage entrepreneurs, programs that help determine whether their business plans are viable are often valuable — even when the answer is “no.” Here’s a sample of incubators across the state that aim to answer that question.
Idea Factory is a seven-week cohort program that brings aspiring entrepreneurs representing a variety of industries together to develop and test their business ideas. The process is called customer discovery, which involves gathering feedback from people to find out if there is a target audience and a need for a business idea and who and what that audience is.
“It’s the watermark behind your business,” says Kip Hart, startup engagement manager for Startup Virginia, which supports entrepreneurs and business growth in Central Virginia.
“If we can help them focus on their target market, then the effectiveness of their marketing and development of their product will be much higher,” he says. “Our tagline is, ‘Why not build a business on insights instead of assumptions?’”
Through the Idea Factory, entrepreneurs create a list of 100 potential customers and then choose 12 to interview. They ask questions that key in on how or if their business idea solves a real problem. A survey with feedback from potential customers also gives entrepreneurs useful data.
At the end of the program, entrepreneurs learn whether the idea has a solution, but customers don’t buy it; whether they should proceed cautiously and consider changing the idea’s direction; or whether the venture is viable, says Hart.
Viable businesses typically are invited to continue with Startup Virginia’s incubator, which focuses on high-growth, scalable ventures.
Not every entrepreneur’s idea pans out, but Hart says all discoveries are important revelations.
“You may realize that you don’t want to be in this startup world,” he says. “That is positive. It saves you time and energy. You may learn you don’t want to be a founder but [still] love the startup ecosystem. You may explore opportunities within the startup world.”
Business Bootcamp, part of Staunton’s Shenandoah Community Capital Fund, has a similar philosophy. During the eight-session program, aspiring entrepreneurs learn to identify target customers, define a problem their venture can solve, establish business and marketing plans, and more.
The bootcamp also asks participants to survey potential buyers during the customer discovery process and encourages them to go beyond their personal contacts.
“We really stress to get outside of your friend group,” says Ryan Hall, SCCF’s executive director. “It is pretty incredible how many people think they have a good product and never ask anybody else or collect data.”
At the end of the eight weeks, some may realize that their startup idea is not feasible, Hall says: “That’s a win for us. We have given them the ability to see that.”
In Roanoke, a business incubator with a focus on building high-growth IT, health care and life science companies also offers a pre-accelerator program dubbed On RAMP. Held by the Regional Accelerator and Mentoring Program (RAMP), the program lets entrepreneurs test their ideas through customer discovery with guidance from business experts.
So far, about half of the entrepreneurs in the On RAMP program have feasible business ideas that are in development stages, says John Hagy, RAMP’s director. The goal, he says, is for most participants to move into the RAMP In Residence program, the next stage.
Meanwhile, as Johnson and Bae continue to build Ara, Startup Virginia remains an important resource for them. The couple meet regularly with mentors and other colleagues involved with the incubator. With the incubator team, Bae also has practiced business pitches for potential investors.
“I really believe that we found a very fruitful problem to solve,” Bae says. “I know that so many people who work in corporate America experience the same problems and the same frustrations. We want to solve that pain.”
PRESIDENT AND CEO, VIRGINIA INNOVATION PARTNERSHIP CORP., RICHMOND
Formerly a deputy state secretary of commerce and trade, Benevento started his career at Goldman Sachs and private equity firm THL Partners and was managing director of an investment firm. A graduate of Cornell University and Harvard Business School, Benevento was named in 2023 interim president and CEO for VIPC, a state-funded entity that supports Virginia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. The following year, he was made VIPC’s permanent leader.
During the past two years, Benevento launched a $100 million private sector investment initiative, Virginia Invests, focused on sourcing outside capital for state-based startups. Last year, VIPC also celebrated Virginia’s return to the top 10 states for venture capital investment, as the commonwealth saw $2.48 billion in VC deal value in 2023. VIPC also has helped promote the fact that there have been 10,000 high-growth startups created in Virginia since Gov. Glenn Youngkin took office in 2022.
In nominating Benevento, VIPC board member Richard Hall noted that VIPC’s CEO “constantly challenges the organization to move faster and reimagine new ways of doing things to amplify the impact we can have in the commonwealth,” as well as being a “great collaborator who works extensively with many diverse external stakeholders in a solution-oriented and nonpartisan manner.”
Benevento serves on several boards around the state, including the Northern Virginia Technology Council, the Virginia Space Grant Consortium, and the Alliance for Building Better Medicine. In a 2024 interview, Benevento wrote, “EQ (emotional intelligence) is just as important as IQ, and there’s no substitute for having a ‘degree’ in GSD — Getting Stuff Done.”
Casey joined Chesterfield County as its administrator in 2016, but he’s been active in local government since 1990, serving as a deputy county administrator for both Henrico and Hanover counties. A graduate of the University of Richmond, he earned a master’s degree and doctorate from Virginia Commonwealth University in public policy and public administration.
Also qualified as a CPA, Casey began his career at KPMG, one of the Big Four accounting firms. As a public servant, he has held many statewide leadership roles, including serving as president of the Virginia Local Government Management Association and the Virginia Government Finance Officers’ Association. He was also a member of the national GFOA’s executive board.
Chesterfield has seen both economic and population booms in recent years, landing major projects like Lego Group’s $1 billion toy factory, Commonwealth Fusion Systems’ nearly $3 billion commercial fusion power plant, and Danish electrolyzer manufacturer Topsoe’s $400 million manufacturing plant. Meanwhile, the county saw its population rise by 8.3% between 2020 and 2024.
Chesterfield Economic Development Director H. Garrett Hart III says Casey “possesses an extraordinary blend of strategic insight and operational expertise,” as well as “ethical leadership and unwavering integrity.” Casey also has served on several boards and councils, including the Appomattox River Water Authority and the Asian & Latino Solidarity Alliance of Central Virginia.
How I create a positive culture at work: Keep engaged and smiling, create memorable stories others can then share, and laugh at yourself with humility and self-deprecating humor.
A native of Greece who arrived in Virginia as an infant, Vithoulkas graduated from Henrico County’s J.R. Tucker High School in 1985 and began working for the county as a budget analyst in 1997. Since 2013, Vithoulkas has served as Henrico’s county manager, overseeing its operations, recommending a $1 billion operating and capital budget annually to the county board of supervisors, and leading more than 4,000 employees. In 2021, Henrico County was recognized as a top workplace by the Richmond Times-Dispatch and as one of America’s Best-In-State Employers by Forbes in 2024.
A graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he earned a master’s degree in public administration, Vithoulkas has led multiple initiatives and programs to improve life for Henrico residents, including two bond referendums totaling more than $930 million that funded 47 capital projects.
Vithoulkas has also worked with supervisors to cap real estate taxes for older and disabled residents, and in 2023, the county opened the Henrico Sports & Events Center, which attracts sporting competitions and other events at the site of a former mall. Earlier this year, he announced plans to rebid rights to redevelop the former Best Products corporate campus into an arena-centered mixed-use development.
Best advice I ever received: My first supervisor told me, “Never fear failure. If you do not take risks, you will never fail, and if you never fail, you will never grow.” Henrico County is a laboratory for “Let’s try this,” and if something has never been done before, so much the better.
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