Staffing Reserves - By Maya R. Payne

From Crain's Cleveland Business (March 23, 2006)

In 1984 Don Stallard had only his word and commissions to offer employees of Stallard, Schrier & Associates — no salaries, no benefits and no track record in the executive search business.

Yet he was able to round up a handful of “misfits” to execute his vision, said longtime employee Amy Gerrity, who joined the family business in Rocky River two months after Mr. Stallard founded it.

They started out finding permanent executive candidates for area companies. However, they soon branched into offering temporary clerical and office support personnel to clients under the name Office Reserves Group, an allusion to Mr. Stallard’s military background. He had been an Air Force pilot.

“People would say ‘Could you just send us someone to answer the phone?’” said Ms. Gerrity, who now is the company’s executive vice president. “So we fell into the staffing business.”

From there, business snowballed. The company hit $1 million in sales by 1987 and two years later changed its name to The Reserves Network Inc. to encompass the full scope of positions it staffed, from office support to industrial labor.

Extension of the client:

Today, the employee ranks of the company, now based in Fairview Park, have swelled to more than 18,000 people, including corporate staff and field workers tied to 30 offices in Ohio, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina and South Carolina. Company revenues for 2005 were less than $70 million.

Employees and industry watchers say a core ethical commitment ingrained by its founder is the source of the company’s success.

Doug Beabout, immediate past president of the Ohio Staffing Services Association, a trade group, said The Reserves Network has been a leader in shifting the staffing industry from “a thumb in the dike” source of temporary workers to “a very viable avenue for permanent employment.”

The Reserves Network executives “are extremely ethical in dealing with all people, not just their clients,” said Mr. Beabout, president of Douglas Howard Group, a personnel and staffing consulting firm.

“They do extensive due diligence in qualifying people for referral, and they are very straightforward and honest with clients,” Mr. Beabout said. “They try to become an extension of the client rather than just throw candidates at the clients.”

That care is borne out in ways ranging from how the company recruits and places candidates to how corporate staff members are treated.

Rank doesn’t matter:

Mr. Stallard said one of the things he disliked about the military was RHIP — rank has its privileges. So, in his organization, he’s worked hard to ensure that all employees — corporate and field workers — are treated equally and with respect.

He’s passed that conviction on to his whole staff, including his sons, Neil and Nick, who first worked at the company as youngsters filing documents in their dad’s office after school.

Later, the boys’ summer vacations were filled with temp jobs such as inspecting ball bearings, bottling margarita mix and painting stripes on Parma Heights streets.

Working in the field “helps you appreciate what your temps do,” said Nicholas Stallard, a business development manager at the company.

The experiences led Neil Stallard, a company vice president, to declare that he would never ask a temp to do a job that he wouldn’t do himself.

Ms. Gerrity also noted the empathy that’s at the heart of the company.

“We’ve never cut corners because we’re dealing with people. We’ve built a nice business by being nice people. We’ve done it right,” she said.

Working for a family-owned business is “nice because you don’t have shareholders to worry about,” Ms. Gerrity said.

“You can focus on the good of the customer and our temporary employees.”

Lead by example:

Leisa Stallard, Neil Stallard’s wife and director of training and development for the company, said members of the family “have to try harder to set the example and be the best of the best.”

It’s part of a legacy that Don Stallard, 59, has developed since founding the company more than 20 years ago. And, he plans to continue overseeing that legacy for the foreseeable future.

He said he doesn’t have a specific retirement date in mind, and describes his exit as “a gradual disentanglement each day.”

That process appears to be working.

“The company is bigger than the family and would continue to run” if the family members all departed, Neil Stallard said. “Don’s been the identity for a long time, but it’s driving all of us now.”

For additional information on The Reserves Network and its affiliates,  please contact: Brandon Thimke, communications manager, at bthimke@thereservesnetwork.com.