Alicia Venturi's award-winning business, International Language Services, L.L.C., began in her Burke home years ago. It is now on the Div100 list as one of the top 100 diversity-owned businesses in the state of Virginia. Clients include the Department of Defense, the World Bank Group, and Georgetown University Hospital. ILS has also received the Minority Small Business Award from the Asian-American Business Roundtable, among other honors. Formerly of Argentina, Venturi's aim with ILS is to give residents of the increasingly diverse Northern Virginia population quality language tools to help them in their own lives and businesses. She is this week's People Profile.
How long have you lived in the area and what brought you here? I came to the U.S. with my husband and three very young children. He was a student here, and we established ourselves in Virginia and I have been here for 20 years: 10 years in Annandale, 12 years in Burke.
Family: I have three children: 26, 24 and 21, and my grandson. My parents are alive in Argentina and we visit periodically.
Education: I always say that I didn’t come in my 20s, I came with a family, with a master's degree, my language experience. I had a lot of experience as an architect in the construction field because I owned a construction company in Argentina. I knew English, French was my second language, and I speak Italian. My family's Italian.
Activities/interests/hobbies: I like to watch '40s movies very much. I like to practice French, but my real hobbies are traveling. I travel when I meet people from places where I've never been; it's my contact with other cultures.
How does it feel to be one of the top 100 minority-owned businesses? It's great because I started in a basement in Burke. With a lot of effort and dedication and wonderful people that helped me in providing that service, that's where we are. We were able to move into a bigger location, like this one. It took many years but at the same time I was raising three children, so it was very convenient to have my office in the basement like many people do.
Describe how the business came about. I started volunteering on day number one because I knew English … but when I started I was just helping. I was working for the government as an architect. There were some people that would go to buildings and would not be able to communicate in Spanish and that's how I started. I also was helping at the school where my children were going. I took one year off and started to volunteer more for the school. I discovered that I loved interpreting. A lot of Americans kept suggesting to me, "Why don't you do a business?" and so when I started I did not have in mind to become as big as the company is right now. I started in Spanish, I was coming from a lot of experience in government contracting. I became a government contractor with Virginia Planning Commission, which was our client almost 10 years. A lot of D.C. agencies who knew me as an architect, they knew I was doing this, they gave me a lot of work. They started motivating me to find more interpreters in other languages because they liked how dedicated my people were. I was doing the job myself a lot of the time, and kept hiring more people and we kept growing and growing.
Describe your experience being multi-lingual in this area. Even if we can handle lives like mine, socially or in business, in English, we are not natives. Especially people who come as adults and don’t go to school here. That marks a big difference because in the future, children of immigrants will either be bilingual or will be able to handle things in English much better. The market has changed a lot. Twenty years ago when I arrived, there was not enough consciousness about quality in foreign languages. United States population had another strategy, which I agree with, is that people should learn English. But it takes a while to learn … they decided to provide enough information for the ones who cannot understand the message completely. That's why I tried to make a lot of emphasis on quality, because a lot of people are coming to this country from all over the world with great education back home. Their English skills are not good, but they deserve a good native-language translation.
Is there a community "hidden treasure" you think more people should know about? It will be nice to motivate all the immigrants to make more participation in the democracy, so that it's alive in this country. Personally, I participate in forums that are taking place with Supervisor Penny Gross (D-Mason) in Annandale. She lives in a place that is very diverse and it's something that most immigrants do not have. I understand that we all work very hard and sometimes do not have time, but it's very important to integrate ourselves.
Last book you read or the last movie you watched: I recently watched "The Terminal" with the actor in "Forrest Gump." I could read the message is and how we as immigrants feel, how we want to do it exactly right, and it was so funny.
When you were younger, what did you want to be when you "grew up?" A housewife and a mom. I'm very glad to be a mom of three.
If you could go anywhere in the U.S. right now on a road trip, where would you go? Niagara Falls. I've never been there.
Personal goals: To keep this company stable and growing at the same time. To be able to keep providing for the staff and all the people out on the streets right now working, and also to keep providing for the community because that's the main purpose. Other things are being able to visit some of the places I was just dreaming of going.
— Lea Mae Rice