W MI employment agency will place 800 in permanent jobs by year end

By: Deborah Johnson Wood

Since January, EmploymentGroup has placed 435 temporary employees in permanent positions. By the first of 2008, company leaders expect to have placed 800 employees in jobs across the state. The company is headquartered in Battle Creek, with 13 satellite locations including two offices in Grand Rapids and one in Holland.

Besides temporary staffing, the company offers professional recruitment services for businesses looking to hire employees with technological and manufacturing skills. A third focus is managed services for non-strategic departments such as mail and document management, archiving, and others.

"We work with small companies up to Fortune 500 Companies," says Mark Lancaster, a partner in the business with CFO Linda Miller. "Our customers include Bissell, izzydesign, Roskam Baking, and Autocam."

The firm's goal is to reach $85 million in sales by 2010, and it's well on its way, logging $48 million in 2006, and a projected $50 million this year.

Lancaster credits a "daily huddle" as the reason for EmploymentGroup's success. Every morning every department meets for discussions guided by identical agendas that uncover where departments are hitting snags. First, the frontline staff meets for 15 minutes, management meets for the next 15 minutes, and then executive staff meets for 15 minutes. Outcomes from each meeting are rolled up to the next level. The result is that every employee knows the problems and successes of the company as a whole.

"We have a very aligned strategy and all sixty people in the company know where we're headed," Lancaster says.

Source: Mark Lancaster, EmploymentGroup; Clare Wade, Clare Wade Communications

Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].

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