Seth Earley – Earley & Associates
Earley & Associates provides taxonomy, search engine optimization, and information management consulting to large corporations and government agencies. In spite of the recession, 2009 was a good year for them. Earley & Associates delivers a variety of projects, from small strategy and roadmap engagements to larger projects that can last longer than a year and span multiple business units of a large enterprise. Today, they serve clients across multiple industries. Current clients include, Astra Zeneca, Best Buy, Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina, Inter American Development Bank and State of Wisconsin Investment Board.
EARLEY & ASSOCIATES HAS GROWN FROM ONE PERSON TO 20
Seth Earley, CEO and President, started his business 15 years ago and has grown it from a single person operation to 20 consultants who live throughout the United States and Canada. Everyone, including Seth, works out of home offices. His company became virtual in 2003 and this has had absolutely no effect on their growth.
SETH USES A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO HIRING NEW STAFF
He is methodical about hiring new consultants, and prefers to hire seasoned people. “They need to be good. I need to trust that they are professional, and that they understand the industry.” Seth checks credentials, references, and uses a skills assessment checklist during the interview.
“There are people who have worked together for a year who have not yet met in person.” Most team members however, meet face to face at client sites. When working on a project there is lots of communication, Web meetings, conference calls, and use of collaborative technology such as a VPN, Sharepoint, Lotus Notes and bulletin boards.
“I DON’T THINK OF MY COMPANY AS VIRTUAL”
“I don’t really look at our company as virtual, because this is our normal way of doing business.” New people shadow more experienced staff to become acclimated to the company’s procedures. Most of the orientation is done remotely. The virtual work arrangement has also had minimal effect on his group’s output. Consultants follow style guides and templates. There are set protocols for how to interact with clients and everyone’s work is reviewed. “There is no sloppy work” – even draft documents must look like finished documents and be free of spelling, punctuation, and grammatical errors.
AUTOMATED SYSTEMS FUEL COMPANY GROWTH
As his company has matured Seth focuses on putting in place systems and infrastructure to help the business run more efficiently. Over the past two years, Earley & Associates has invested significant time and money to integrate project management, time tracking, and accounting. Consulting hours are automatically billed. In this way Seth sees the status of tasks, and he can quickly add new consultants to a project.
Everything tracks back to the Statement of Work, “so we never have to create a manual invoice.” His company can run an audit with the push of a button, whereas before it would take days. Seth can now tell how profitable each project is and make very precise cash flow projections. He’s also integrated Salesforce.com with the website lead capture process and developed marketing management and business development processes.
These technology and process investments have helped improve operational efficiencies and enabled the company to expand and take on larger more complex projects. This has not been a simple or straightforward process. The company has changed quite dramatically from its beginning. “I have reinvented the business and changed our strategy and operations over the past 15 years. It’s a process that never ends.”
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