Dave Moorman freely admits to being confident. He’s a two-sport star, in a sense, as president and CISO for Novatech—a big-picture executive meshed with a granular technology foundation. He’s even written a book on the subject.
But long ago, Moorman realized that empowering his team members, and not micromanaging them, can have a much greater impact than any one person could provide. It is those personnel within the organization, armed with the right tools, who provide the force multiplier that makes Novatech much greater than the sum of its parts.
“I think about the things I want to accomplish: grow the business and add more services for customers,” said Moorman, a 2024 ENX Magazine Difference Maker. “If I can get a good team in place and empower them to make critical decisions, we can do even greater things. Most of the employees in the company have more visibility into our customers than I do. They’re talking to them every day, and they’re out making service calls and taking the IT support tickets. Empowering the people that work for you is a superpower, in my opinion. It’s all about collaboration and tapping into your people.”
The last 10 years have been transformative for Moorman. Over that period, he’s directed much of his focus to assisting employees with their careers, ensuring they have the training and experience necessary to develop an upward trajectory. He’ll order in lunch and have a one-on-one with a younger team member to help expand their knowledge of the industry and business in general.
Moorman takes the same tactics with clients and helping them arrive at the desired destination from a technology and business standpoint. Tech is his passion, and he wants to ensure it “becomes a tailwind as opposed to a headwind” for customers. The executive and technical duality in his job description offers a lot of latitude and opportunity to make a bona fide difference for those individuals and companies that come to him for guidance.
“I understand the technology, but I also built, scaled and sold my own company,” he said. “I think I have a somewhat unique perspective on what it takes.”
The entrepreneurial DNA flowed through Moorman’s family—his father, two brothers and grandfather were independent business people. So after notching his bachelor’s degree in computer science from Florida State, he decided to move to Atlanta and start his own IT company, DynaSis, in 1993. There was a lot of buzz around the city, as it was to host the Summer Olympics in 1996, and he wanted to catch the “Olympic wave.” The timing was impeccable.
“Half of it was luck, because I was in a growing metropolitan area,” Moorman said. “Around this time, a lot of companies didn’t have local area networks or wide area networks. So I got started helping companies put networks in their buildings and connect their printers. Then, from 1995-1997, we spent a lot of time connecting everybody to the internet.”
Branching Out
After 26 years of helping companies ramp up and keep pace with technology—which included developing best practices for IT infrastructure and a managed services model for IT—Moorman saw an opportunity to continue growing by joining Novatech. The Nashville dealer had acquired DynaSis’ largest competitor only three years earlier.
What really sold Moorman on the deal was the opportunity to help run the company and have P&L responsibility, in addition to being able to invest in the company himself. Moorman and his partner agreed to sign on, and the last five and a half years have provided a whirlwind of activity.
“At the time, our company was three times the size of the national average for an MSP,” he said. “We always wanted to grow and scale the business, be in different markets and add more employees. We had about 60 employees then, and we have 160 now. So the deal removed some of the risk, and we were able to grow and have fun.”
Speaking of tapping into people, Moorman couldn’t have asked for a better mentor than CEO Dan Cooper, who spent the better part of 14 years as the president of Global Imaging Systems and its 40 member companies. Cooper also served as a region manager for Danka Office Imaging and was CEO of Electronic Systems for more than 10 years.
“He’s taught me how to slow down in being an entrepreneur,” Moorman noted of Cooper. “I tend to move fast and take a lot of risks. He also allowed me to be on investment calls. I’ve been on the acquisitions team and have helped integrate 10 companies. That was really invaluable.”
There’s no denying that 2023 was an eventful year for Moorman and Co. Novatech acquired Carolina Business Equipment, which is almost fully integrated now. As for Moorman, he was tabbed to serve on the advisory councils for both Sharp and ConnectWise, which he considers a great honor.
“It’s nice having these large billion-dollar companies asking me my opinion,” he added. “It was great to have somebody else recognize some of my accomplishments and want to hear what I have to say, because I do have a lot to say.”
Acquisitions will certainly play a role for Novatech moving forward. He sees more opportunities as companies with aging leadership and a lack of a succession plan seek to transition out of the industry. While no deals are imminent, Moorman notes the company is engaged in conversations with fairly significant-sized prospects.
Tech Future
Once a techie, always a techie: Moorman feels the path to improvement travels through technology offerings. Whether it’s artificial intelligence/machine learning or data analytics, he says the overarching goal is to provide a more consistent customer experience. The idea is to provide a comparable level of service when clients check in after hours to order supplies or place a service call.
“In my generation, everyone wanted to talk to a human being,” Moorman said. “The millennials and Gen Z prefer self-service and want the ability start a conversation through a chat box or fill out a web form. About 50% of the workforce is represented by those generations now. We can deliver that customer service by using technology to communicate in ways they prefer.”
On the home front, Moorman and his wife/high school sweetheart, Kim, have been married for 33 years. Their son, Max, does data analytics for a Chicago-based consulting firm. Their daughter, Avery, is entering her senior year at the University of Alabama, where she’s majoring in marketing. She did a summer internship for ConnectWise in Tampa, Florida.
The couple have a bevy of hobbies between them. Moorman is a self-professed gear head with a passion for German autos, as well as an audiophile with a two-channel audio system driving his home theater. The couple share a love for wine and good food, and enjoy traveling—British Virgin Islands, Bahamas, Turks and Caicos—anywhere there’s a beach.
