Helping staff tech jobs is their gig, UDig

Friends since school days help clients find right people for jobs

BY JEFFREY KELLEY TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Aug 14, 2005

With their client running a few minutes late, Jason Williams and Andy Frank strike up a short conversation about another customer.

The subject arises about a job candidate who Williams thought had been placed by UDig Technologies LLC, their information-technology staffing firm.

Frank informs him the placement isn't going to work.

"I thought that was a done deal," a disappointed Williams says.

Frank shrugs and sighs: "That's how it goes."

Along with Logan Bragg, the trio founded the Henrico County-based IT staffing and services firm in 2001.

Staffing is a trade that is "financially rewarding, but it's a very challenging way to spend one's day," said Richard Wahlquist, president and chief executive officer of the American Staffing Association, a trade group based in Alexandria that represents thousands of national staffing companies.

"People really do believe in the work that they do and get a real kick out of being able to find people jobs," he said.

Williams and Frank play the field most of the day, networking and meeting clients. Bragg stays behind in their offices in Innsbrook Corporate Center to run the recruiting operation.

In an industry of high turnover, Williams, Frank, Bragg and their two internal recruiters work to fill their pipeline with the right candidates for the times when jobs open.

"Three quarters of [the job candidates] who come through the door do so with an expectation that their employment is going to be a means to an end," Wahlquist said, and more so as an opportunity to build a resume.

UDig was created amid the dot-com bust and just a few months before the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. No one was hiring IT workers, but the founders -- all graduates of Mills E. Godwin High School in Henrico -- used that downtime to build relationships with local hiring managers, Bragg said.

They've managed to run a successful operation, hiring two additional recruiters and employing about 35 contractors.

UDig hopes for a few regional offices one day, but growing large isn't the goal.

"The regional growth is definitely important," said Frank, 34, "but not at the sake of quality."

Privately-held, UDig doesn't disclose financials.

By comparison, Henrico-based tech-staffing firm Apex Systems Inc. has about 430 internal and 2,800 contract employees working at its 21 U.S. offices.

The three Apex founders are fraternity brothers in their mid-30s and run a company that is among one of the largest contract staffing firms in the country in terms of revenue, according to industry analysts.

While UDig applauds big, successful companies, the founders aren't looking to write the same book as other large firms.

The smallness, Bragg says, lets the company make changes more efficiently, without having to go through managers or corporate policy.

"The way to grow is be flexible and get things done," he said, "with us being able to call the shots."

UDig's size is what keeps a client in the IT department at James River Insurance Co., said William J. Kenney Jr., the insurance firm's senior vice president and chief information officer.

"They helped us build the IT shop," said Kenney. James River's parent company, Chapel Hill, N.C.-based James River Group Inc., announced its initial public offering on Nasdaq last Monday.

As opposed to dealing with large staffing companies, Kenney said, UDig "actually responded better and had better service at a competitive price."

And UDig is up against many large national competitors.

Like other small IT services firms in town, UDig faces difficulties in entering large corporations -- business that is taken by the bigger competitors, who may, for instance, have other national locations in the same markets as the big-name client.

Preferred-vendor lists, used by large firms as a directory of approved suppliers and subcontractors to help maintain consistency throughout the company, can sometimes be a blockade for small businesses.

The big names typically search for lowest bidders that can provide the highest volume of service across the greatest area, said Jon C. King, president and chief executive of Exclusive Staffing in Richmond.

"To survive, we have to provide a niche," said Phil Conein, president of TecHead, an IT contracting firm in Shockoe Bottom. "You have to work with smaller clients, and for the IT world it's very hard. You really have to become the expert in something you do."

UDig has been kept out of the gates at some large local corporations, yet has been successful with others.

"To get inside the really big companies, you have to be willing to partner with other firms," Bragg said. "Some [vendors] won't do it because they want 100 percent of the deal."

But UDig digs a business partner.

"We see 50 percent [as] better than zero percent," he said.

The second way to do it, he said, is to network and build contacts.

"At some point, you have to try and build a relationship so that next time a vendor list comes up, you'll have an opportunity to be on that list," Williams said. "You have to be proactive."

The trick in getting into the big firms is persistence, said Bragg, 33. "Even though we're a small company, I would say our client base is composed of midsize to large companies."

"We can compete against big and small companies because it all comes down to finding the right person," said Williams, 34. "They have the exact same resources that we do."

And their clients, such as James River, keep coming back.

"There's good work in the staffing industry," Bragg said. "It's a fun business to be in."

Any ideas? Staff writer Jeffrey Kelley can be reached at (804) 649-6348 or jkelley@timesdispatch.com