Symplicity Communications creates niche for telecommunications consultant jobs in Grand Rapids

Think your business is paying too much for its Internet carrier, phone services or mobile communications? Well, Grand Rapids-based Symplicity Communications has developed a niche business around helping companies wade through complicated communications packages and verifying that their monthly bill is accurate.

Those services are behind Symplicity's growth over the past five years from one person to seven employees. An eighth employee will join the company in April, and owner Catherine Lazarock expects to add three full-time positions in the mobile communications department this year.

Symplicity Communications represents telecommunications carriers -- a list that includes AT&T, TDS Metrocom, Nortel and US Signal -- and connects clients with services that fit the clients' needs, says Lazarock.

"We have access to most carriers worldwide and typically there's a cost savings [to the client], but we don't focus on savings," Lazarock says. "We focus on what they need and let the savings be a byproduct of making the right decision. Having access to all the carriers helps the clients because I can explain to them why to use a particular carrier."

Lazarock says that because her company receives payment from the carriers, most clients don't have to pay for Symplicity's services. She adds that it's an industry standard that 85 percent of monthly communications bills are wrong -- that clients are overcharged and not billed according to their contract terms. That's where her staff can make a difference.

"We look at clients' monthly bills to find errors and correct them," she says. "The savings is amazing." Lazarock says one client reduced communications cost from $10,000 a month to $6,000 as a result of her company's expertise.

Symplicity Communications also provides project management services and oversees technology upgrades and implementation.

Source: Catherine Lazarock, Symplicity Communications
Writer: Deborah Johnson Wood, Development News Editor