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Strong-Bridge
THE PARTNERS AT STRONG-BRIDGE have a simple business strategy that has worked for the past five years: Do a good
job for the client and that spells success for both parties. But even
more importantly, Strong-Bridge does whatever is necessary to
make its clients happy.
“Delivering for our clients is a priority, and the quality of work
being delivered is primary over everything else,” says co-founder
Brian Harnett. “If we do that well, we figure growth will follow.”
And the strategy has worked—revenue was up 39 percent in 2007
to $5.7 million, and is projected to grow another 39 percent this
year. Impressive for a firm with 30 billable consultants.
But don’t let size fool you—there’s a lot of experience at the
helm. Co-founders Ken Simpson and Hartnett came from a telecom background, having worked together at Deloitte’s telecom and
media practice for three years before deciding to start their own
firm in the Pacific Northwest specializing in telecommunications
and high-tech consulting. “We wanted to have a practice where we
would be one hundred percent focused on client work and a little
less focused on the peripheral things a big firm can keep you working on,” Hartnett says.
The partners also know growth doesn’t happen without a good
team. Their recruiting process consists of primarily hiring from
their personal network, so new hires are not just a competency fit,
but also a cultural fit. In order to recruit these high-end people,
they offer competitive compensation and flexible work arrangements as well as valuable employee feedback. Hartnett and Simpson meet with their people every other week to resolve issues,
discuss risk, and assess progress at a client site and provide any
feedback or coaching necessary. “We’re all about real-time, open
feedback, both positive and negative, infused with the humor we
instill at our company,” Hartnett says. “We try to make it fun, and
that enables us to give direct feedback. By being a little humorous
Strong-Bridge co-founders Ken Simpson (left) and Brian Hartnett
about it, we can take the edge off and they can take it to heart, versus feeling like they are punished. In the end, what allows me to
sleep at night is the strength and capability of our people—they’re
the bedrock of the firm.”
Through these regular performance reviews and QA’s, they can
quickly detect if recruits’ previous training measures up. In fact,
they’ve had to coach people to stop thinking about sales opportunities
and instead refocus on doing the work and gaining the client’s trust
by showing that
they’re focused
on delivery, not
on looking for
new sales opportunities.
“That’s probably not the
fastest growth strategy in the world, but it’s the trusted growth strategy
that’s worked for us,” says Simpson.
Even though the firm focuses primarily on the Pacific Northwest, Simpson says Strong-Bridge is planning to open a second
office in California this year and add 15 more billable consultants. Most of the business comes from word-of-mouth, and satisfied clients readily offer glowing testimonials without being
prompted. “Most of our work comes from our people doing great
work with key clients and extending our relationships with those
clients—not to sell, but to make people aware we’ve done good
work elsewhere,” Harnett says.
For a recent client, a large wireless carrier, Strong-Bridge led a critical initiative
to implement an outsourced distribution
strategy. They knew they had to understand the business, gain strong executive
support in order to make decisions and manage a large, cross-functional team. That whole concept of doing whatever is necessary to help make clients successful won the day. “There was
an operational glitch due to a system problem, so we jumped on
a plane at 9 p.m., were on site the next morning and not only
worked through the problem, but also handled inventory,”
Simpson says. That project, he adds, launched ahead of schedule and under budget. —Christine Galea
Headquarters: Bellevue, Wash.
Offices: 1
Billable Consultants 2007: 30
Revenue 2006: $4.1 million
Revenue 2007: $5.7 million
Projected revenue for 2008: $7.9 million
“What allows me to sleep at night is the strength
of our people—they’re the bedrock of the firm.
Brian Harnett, co-founder of Strong-Bridge ”
