Pava Cohen

Pava Cohen
Pava Cohen

Vice President, Business Development

Hate long walks on the beach, though I’ve been known to go two-fisted on piña coladas. Happiest when I am doing something creative -- cooking, writing or sewing. At Sage, I help clients make the right marketing choices.

January 30 2012
Business development

10 Networking Tips from a Natural Introvert

by Pava Cohen on the topic of

You would never know it to see me work a room, but I am a natural introvert. It scares me to walk into a crowd of strangers armed only with a badge and business cards. But, I’m in business development, and being a wallflower is not an option.

Here are a few tips I’ve picked up over the years — having suffered only minor lacerations to my ego. Maybe you’ll find a nugget or two that you can use.

September 9 2011
Business development and Government

Proposal Season

by Pava Cohen on the topics of and

Since the beginning of July, I've faced earthquake, hurricane(s) and flooding, but the thing that has really knocked me off of my feet has been the flood of government RFPs. I've logged 80 and 100 hour work weeks and I've not had a "real week-end" since June. I've had to decline to bid jobs that I know we could perform well because there isn't enough time to do the proposal well. I've responded to 20 page RFPs that give us only 7 pages for our proposal -- I've done the best to give the right detail for a decision, but 7 pages is simply too short -- shouldn't we get a least as many pages to answer as they get to ask?

June 3 2011
Business development and Government

The Myth of the Slow Summer

by Pava Cohen on the topics of and

Maybe in other towns, the lazy days of summer still exist, but here in Washington, D.C., it’s time to pull together those end-of-government-fiscal-year proposals and close deals. This year especially, with the shutdown threat and budget uncertainty, many decisions were postponed that will soon need to happen with urgency.

June 2 2011
2011 trends and Marketing

Gadget Gauge -- an accurate measure of audience engagement

by Pava Cohen on the topics of and

A couple of weeks ago, I attended an event where the speaker was so boring that almost everyone in the audience was looking down at their gadgets and clicking away rather than continuing to pay attention.

In contrast, this morning I attended an event at which U.S. CTO Aneesh Chopra held everyone's rapt attention. He was articulate, passionate, and engaged. He spoke without notes or slides and damn well knew his stuff.

March 21 2011
Nonprofit

Sometimes I have the honor of working on projects that can change lives

by Pava Cohen on the topic of

Recently, I’ve been especially fortunate to work with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to help end homelessness and to help support caregivers of wounded and ailing Veterans. This week, I also started working with Chris Cosgriff of the Officer Down Memorial Page to help redesign and enhance www.ODMP.org.

While home on winter break during his freshman year of college in 1996, Chris read an article in The Washington Post that set him on his life’s course. It was about a man about to be paroled after killing two police officers.  To Chris, the article seemed to glorify the killer and ignore the sacrifice of the officers.

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