Ruth-Ann Nowakowski, Vice President, Defense Sector, Steampunk
Having spent her entire life in the Washington, D.C., area watching many of her family members serve the country in both the military and civilian sectors, Ruth-Ann Nowakowski jumped at the opportunity to help stand up Steampunk’s Defense Sector business from scratch.
Steampunk is a design-led company where human-centricity is a part of its DNA. Its foundational tenets of people, culture, communication and impact drive the company’s passion for helping federal clients solve their technology, process and organizational challenges through collaboration and co-creation with their true end-users.
Steampunk’s integrated human-centered design approach to dynamic problem solving, called Design Intelligence, puts the warfighters’ and stakeholders’ problems at the forefront of solutioning — increasing adoption and accelerating speed to capability.
Nowakowski’s professional passion lies in the tight linkage to mission impact. The closer industry can get to supporting warfighters (like her son, a U.S. Marine) at the tactical edge, the more successful it is.
When technological innovations like data exploitation and digital platforms are married to an implementation lens like Design Intelligence, things get really cool — really fast. Nowakowski is particularly excited by the innovative approaches encouraged by mission enablers in the Defense Department like NavalX and AFWERX. Nowakowski is most proud when she can take on the federal defense mission as her own, and help move the ball in a meaningful way.
Why Watch:
Nowakowski’s focus for 2020 is both unique and exciting, as this will be her first experience bringing the energy and innovation of a startup to market. 2020 will be a year of educating the defense space about innovative new approaches like Design Intelligence as well as spreading the word with industry partners who can benefit from Steampunk’s approach.