Interview
Dominating a Market:
Valerie Freeman & Imprimis Group

As businesses grow, the need for competent staff increases. But many factors affect an organization’s ability to hire the right people. How can a company effectively manage its ongoing staffing needs yet remain focused on its core business competencies?

Back in 1982, Valerie Freeman, founder and CEO of Imprimis Group, met this challenge head on by creating a staffing company that has grown into one of the largest privately owned recruiting organizations in Texas. Discover more about her unique business vision and how she created a niche target market strategy that successfully meets customer needs.

Our customers wanted more specific services and told us what they needed. They wanted a staffing partner who really understood about the positions they were trying to fill and how to evaluate talent. That was the start of our targeted market strategy. We also were in a position to take advantage of hot markets where it was hard to find qualified people. We ramped up in areas such as mortgage, accounting, and legal. I also knew that we were good at starting up businesses — taking something from nothing and making things happen by building in value. Because of this, the specialty recruiting niches are our primary differentiator — no one else has developed this strategy. We bring more expertise to the table than our competitors.

How has this niche strategy affected the overall Imprimis brand?

Well, there have been pros and cons. Some people still don’t know that Bravo Technical Resources, Art Squad, and Primetimers are part of Imprimis. So, creating different brand names can dilute the power of the overall brand a bit.

But on the other hand, we’re seen as more expert. That’s why we developed different identities — to better sell our expertise to very specific segments. The Imprimis brand has good brand recognition, and our other agencies are gaining ground as well. We’re not a plain vanilla staffing agency that does everything for everyone. We’re more focused.

The staffing industry has mirrored the ups and downs of the economy, especially in the last four years. How has Imprimis positioned and adapted itself to these changes?

The changes happen so fast, it really makes it difficult to adapt. Sometimes you’re forced to shrink. But even in tough times, we always consider what we can do to increase revenue. This means we look at those areas that are doing well. For example, the medical area heated up, so we added a medical records practice. It’s important to quickly examine the positive areas and adapt your staff and resources to them.

The temporary market is also a good example of change, and is a big part of our business. The desire for contract workers expands and shrinks — as does the interest on the part of job hunters. While most people want full-time jobs, there are people who like moving around to different companies while operating as a permanent employee. We offer that option.

We’re also working not just with HR staff, but with more purchasing directors, and they’re all about cost. We’re able to show our value and cost savings. At the same time, the person making the final decisions is often an executive because spending on staff is so significant. Our recruiters can work at all these levels.

Overall, it’s been a tough four years for employers and employees alike. We’re witnessing a general pick up in hiring and full-time job opportunities. That’s the good news. But looking at the employee side, job seekers can’t count on just one skill or specialty any longer — they have to keep up their skills and learn new things. No one wants to scramble reactively, so it’s important to stay up with what’s going on in your field and be prepared.

Though outsourcing of jobs has been around for a long time, it’s become the center of many debates as jobs go overseas. How has this affected Imprimis?

It definitely affected us — call center jobs have been going overseas, so there’s fewer positions for us to fill. But in the staffing industry, things are always changing. You’ll gain an account, fill the positions, and then the company doesn’t need anything for a while. You really have to be prepared to lose every customer as their philosophy changes, and our sales process takes that into account — new business, new niches, and new things to offer.

Primetimers is an interesting concept. What drove you to concentrate on a specialization based on age?

I started thinking about this in the late 80s when the SLs and banks were closing. So many older workers couldn’t find work — their expertise and experience were being wasted! I knew there had to be companies that wanted to take advantage of this expertise, but we had to educate them on the myths surrounding older workers. For example, there were biases about the flexibility of older workers, their learning skills, and their growth potential. We had to change that and help employers understand that expertise costs more — they couldn’t pay minimum wage.

We also helped them overcome common objections about job hopping or promotions. The truth is that more and more older workers are not interested in moving up, they’re not worried about promotions, and they don’t have childcare problems. The range of personal issues is lower — there are a lot of advantages to hiring more senior workers. While we educated the companies, we also coached the workers in having and setting the right expectations. With our counseling strategy place, it started working well. We’re getting more interest all the time.

The average tenure of employees keeps dropping. How have the hiring attitudes changed?

I think it has more to do with a trend in thinking about core functions and core employees. Companies know that 20% of their people give them 80% of their productivity so they’re restructuring a lot. Keeping this in mind, there’s a shift toward getting that 20% to stick around while rethinking staffing options with the other 80%. That’s why there’s more outsourcing and the use of temporary staff as a strategy. Even HR departments are being outsourced! In the past, organizations tend to bulk up fast. A reason can always be found to hire someone. Instead, you have to fight against the bulk by focusing on core productivity and doing more with less.

There's a huge incentive for employers to increase online job board usage to save time, effort, and money. How has Imprimis responded to this change?

I think job boards are an advantage for us. They complete one part of process — getting resumes. But that’s just the tip of iceberg. There’s still a lot of work to do as half of the resumes won’t be acceptable, and the other half will need to be screened. The recruiting process involves many stages such as creating job descriptions, screening candidates, performing interviews, tracking, testing, and so on. It’s a lengthy and people-driven process. Job boards can definitely help, but they don’t replace the recruiter.

Are corporate HR needs expanding beyond recruiting to a total HR solution? What new services are companies now asking for?

Yes. First, outsourcing certain HR functions such as recruiting, benefits management, and employee assistance programs has been done for a while, and is being considered even more. This gets back to the core competency issue and sticking to what they do best. Additionally, companies want to know about the latest technologies that can help them keep up with and streamline the HR process. For example, HR has difficulty tracking the variety of people they hire — consultants, temps, day workers, contractors, etc. So staff tracking is a service being requested these days.

They also want technology that can consolidate results and inputs from various recruiting vendors, so they’re buying vendor management and applicant tracking systems. These streamline the recruiting process, but there’s still one problem: It’s still difficult for an in-house recruiter to staff all positions with equal success. A recruiter can really only be knowledgeable about two or three different kinds of positions (e.g., engineering, admin, finance, etc.). The company can’t recruit effectively for everything, and that’s why they turn to us.

How does Imprimis keep ahead of the customer hiring curve and anticipate future trends?

As president, I personally focus on strategic planning to make sure we’re headed in the right direction, get into the right niches, and have the right resources. To do that, I read constantly to learn about business and hiring trends, demographics, technology, and economic issues. This generates ideas for us to consider and act on. For example, technology will continue to get more sophisticated, and that could mean employees use voice, not a keyboard. How will that affect future hires? TVs and other devices can process emails and other communications. How will we take advantage of that? We’re always looking at trends to help us determine where we need to be.

Beyond niche marketing, how have your marketing and business development strategies evolved?

Every company can use our services. But I believe that when you place your resources on a focused path, you can do better, particularly if you focus on quality. Our specialty niches have enabled us to develop a targeted marketing approach. We use direct mail and email marketing. It’s been a long time since we’ve mass marketed Imprimis, but there have been times when we’ve engaged in corporate brand marketing. On the employee side, we work through the job boards, professional associations and employee referrals. When a position or specialty is particularly difficult to fill, we use radio.

What do you consider the most critical factor to the continued success of Imprimis?

The thing about the staffing business is that people can’t be manufactured — you have to work with what’s out there. Imprimis is able to flex and bend with the changing business environment and employee marketplace. We’ll continue to look for new niches and build on the niches we have.

Overall, the staffing industry is a good — it’s the fastest growing industry in the country right now, and there are a lot of opportunities out there. When one thing doesn’t work, we’ll move on to something new. That’s very exciting.

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Valerie Freeman, is the founder and CEO of Imprimis Group, a collection of staffing, search and outsourcing companies. Freeman has a long and impressive career as an entrepreneur and as an involved community leader. She founded Imprimis Group in 1982 and today, it is one of the largest independently owned staffing companies in Texas. Her other entrepreneurial ventures include being a founding member and Director of Resource Bank and Texas Capital Bank, and a founding member of the Texas Women Ventures Fund.

Ms. Freeman is the 2004 recipient of the Women Business Enterprise of the Year Award from the Women's Business Council of the Southwest for outstanding performance in using innovative approaches to overcome obstacles in growing a business. She is also the 2003 recipient of the prestigious Athena Award for professional excellence and community service.

Ms. Freeman is a distinguished alumni of the University of Houston where she holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Education.

September 2004