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Local Hero: How one woman is tapping rural America's workforce
March, 2006
Kathy Brittain White, a native of small-town Arkansas, traveled through both academia
and Corporate America before becoming an entrepreneur. She taught management
information technology at the University of North Carolina for a decade before becoming
chief information officer for health-care giant Cardinal Health (CAH ). When she retired
in 2003 at age 55, White could have rested on her laurels. Instead, she founded Jonesboro (Ark.)-based Rural Sourcing. The 40-employee applications development company, with about $1 million in revenues, aims to bring tech jobs to America's heartland. It's White's very personal rebuttal to offshoring.
I come from small-town America, and I believe in its work ethic. My hometown --
Oxford, Ark. -- had fewer than 200 people. I married right out of high school, had two
children, and worked at low-wage jobs. We were broke. I figured if we wanted a different
life, it was up to me.
I went back to school and five years later had three degrees, including a doctorate in
business. I sent out 100 resumes. The best job I could find was two states away, at the
University of North Carolina at Greensboro. I'd gone through a divorce, and the last thing
I wanted was to move away from my family, but I had to.
I know firsthand there are a lot of talented people who aren't in the top 20 schools and a
large, untapped employee base in rural America. Many skilled people don't want to move
to find work, or simply can't.
SERENDIPITY?
The decision to leave corporate life wasn't that difficult. At Cardinal Health, I ran a
virtual internship program. That program let our business unit in Chicago employ
information technology students at Arkansas State University. In 2002 I started a
foundation in Arkansas to do outreach training. With all the tech jobs that were going
offshore, the opportunity became obvious rather quickly. I wanted to create a virtual
workforce to capture some of this business. My work and my life experiences just
seemed to come together. Serendipity, I suppose.
I used $2 million of my own money to get started. We're still funded by money from
friends and family. Rural Sourcing's specialty is application development work, not call
centers. It's easier for customers to work with tech people in their own time zone, and we
provide an important element of familiarity that's lacking in offshoring.
Our employees are employees, not contract workers. We bring people in, train them, and
work with them. We've gotten terrific feedback from our customers. We have ongoing
relationships with Cardinal Health, the state of Arkansas, and a major telecom provider,
among others. Local college students are an important pipeline for us, but up to 40% of
our employees are experienced people who are either from the area or want to move to it.
So far we have three locations in Arkansas and one in Portales, N.M. In June we're
opening a center in Greenville, N.C. I think West Virginia and probably Ohio will be
next. The places we select have universities with strong computer science and
information science departments, workforce training, and technology incubators -- but
they're in locations that don't have jobs. That's where we come in.
Being an entrepreneur is a lot different than working for a big company. I used to be able
to throw something over my shoulder and someone would catch it. Now when I throw
something over my shoulder it lands on the floor. It's me who has to pick it up and finish
it. The most frustrating part is selling -- the false leads, how long it takes to close a deal.
I'm on the road 80% of the time. One of the reasons I got out of corporate life was the
traveling, so that's pretty humorous.
I wake up every day excited. Even on my worst days, I believe lives will be changed
because of what we do. I feel blessed. |
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