Community News

By Shawna Hickman, Staff Writer

Maureen Clarry and Kelly Gilmore have figured out how to do business so differently, so well, it’s brought them success.

Clarry and Gilmore were the winners of the Small Business of the Year Award presented by the south Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce Feb 25. They are the owners of CONNECT:The Knowledge Network, a company matching information technology businesses and professionals.

What CONNECT does that has worked so well for Clarry and Gilmore is remaining an objective third party while matching clients and consultants. Instead of the traditional method of hiring a holding tank full of consultants, then hiring them out when jobs arise, CONNECT tries to find the best fit for both a business and a consultant.

“It’s the right person in the right job in the right company that leads to the right fit,” Gilmore said.

CONNECT has a database of about 3,000 consultants that lists job preferences, skills and pay requirements. When a business calls wanting a specific type of skill, Gilmore and Clarry can pull up a list of consultants that match the job description. Included in information technology are jobs such as chief information officers, project managers, business analysts, data management, system management and testers. And Gilmore and Clarry won’t stop until each party is pleased with the match.

“We joke about being over-achievers,” Gilmore said. “It’s not just win-win with us, it’s gotta be, win-win-win.”

While dealing with thousands of consultants ­ and many businesses such as Hewlett Packard, AT&T, Polaroid, Exxon, New Century Energies, and Level(3) ­ Clarry and Gilmore pride themselves in treating each consultant as a person, not a commodity

“Our emphasis is on people,” Gilmore said.

CONNECT, located at 5602 S. Nevada St. in a building that was once a convent for St. Mary’s Catholic Church, was founded in 1992 by Gilmore and Clarry.

“We worked at GE for three years and one day we looked at one another and said, “We can do this better,” Gilmore said, “We were at a Fortune One. We left that to make it better.”

Shortly after starting CONNECT, the pair found out they were pregnant, within two weeks of each other and each had a baby boy in October 1993.

“That wasn’t part of the business plan,” Clarry said.

Having young children generated a need for child care, so the pair transformed a small stand-alone building in back of CONNECT into on-site day care.

Having families has led Clarry and Gilmore to appreciate the balance between personal and work lives.

“We’re committed to growing but not sacrificing quality of our personal lives, ” Clarry said. “I think we’ve tried to be realistic with what is enough.”

“We started the business to make a living, but have a life,” Gilmore added. “We know what we value an that’s what we’ve stuck to over time, and that is freeing.”

CONNECT boasts about $7 million in revenue each year. It was chosen from among four finalists including Sandhill Scientific, CoCal Landscape and MicrotechTel Inc.

Award Criteria

• Overall management and leadership of the business
• Management of specific functional areas (finance, employee relations, operations and marketing)
• Management of the company’s growth
• Innovation
• Financial performance
• Prospects for sustained success

To celebrate the award, Clarry and Gilmore rented a limousine for all 17 employees and took them up to Black Hawk with water bottles filled with quarters to try their luck.

Directory Listing

The world has no shortage of high-tech companies these days, but finding people to staff them is another matter. A national labor shortage is hitting the information technology (IT) industry hard. Even harder is the job of keeping employees ­ many companies live in fear that their hard-won talent will quit any day.

The name of the game is to before the “employer of choice”. The burden is on companies to become more rigorous and creative about finding the people they need, convincing those people to join, and creating a culture that will keep the best employees. Candidates have become much more savvy in their choices. Not only do they want a culture that fits their lifestyle, they demand opportunities where they will learn, grow and feel a part of a success story.

CONNECT: The Knowledge Network is a fast growing Colorado-based It staffing company that has some answers about how to attract and retain highly skilled employees. By customizing searches to each company’s needs, CONNECT matches IT people with IT organizations ­ for both consulting and permanent employment. For companies struggling with finding qualified candidates or meeting deadlines, CONNECT saves companies time and frustration through their rigorous recruiting and screening process. CONNECT’s high-touch, high-tech approach not only screens candidates based on their technical experience and skills, but also focuses on the cultural and personality fit.

Founded in 1992 by Maureen Clarry and Kelly Gilmore, CONNECT has provided recruiting services for large and small companies alike, including firms such as Hallmark, Polaroid, Exxon, Corporate Express and Level(3). Unlike most staffing companies, CONNECT goes beyond matching job seekers with jobs. CONNECT helps to organize, hire and retain information technology teams.

CONNECT was recently named the South Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce’s Small Business of the Year 2000, an award based on financial results, employee relations, management philosophy, innovation, business accomplishments and community service. CONNECT is one of Colorado’s top 100 women-owned businesses, according to Colorado BIZ Magazine.