Despite trends, light assembly staffing firm growing
BY NAOMI R. KOOKER
JOURNAL STAFF
QUINCY -Two recessions
and 20 years later,. Mictrotech Staffing Group in Quincy is on top
of its game.
Its 25-staff organization,
which haS offices in Danvers, Medway, Woburn, and Londonderry, N.H.,
just opened its sixth location, in Miami. Its annual revenue has hit
$35 million this year.
The irony is,
the engine-that-coUld runs man increasingly challenging recruiting
climate in the industries it serves: Microtech provides temporary
staffing services to the light-industrial, manufacturing and biotech
crowd, industries in which Massachusetts-based jobs are being lost
to overseas positions and being downsized in general.
Microtech founder
and President Joseph Donahue says his steadfast long-term relationships
and dwindling mom-and-pop competition haS helped him outlive many
of the companies he's served.
Microtech places
1,200 temps a day in Massachusetts companies such as Boston Scientific
Corp. (NYSE: BSX). One way he's done this is through focusing on a
hard-working pool of employees, namely first-generation imnrigrants,
"I see a lot of drive," he says. As he should know: Donahue
was a first-generation American born to Irish parents.
"Basically;
we interview everyone," says Donahue. "You never know."
You never know
about their skill ability or if they're hard working or if you're
making a fair assessment unless they come in to interview. The two
greatest assetS for temps are proof of continual work and a desire
for education,whether it is someone in an ESL or master's degree program.
Donahue was schooled
at Boston College High Sd1ool, then graduated Boston College before
obtaining an MBA from Babson College. He gives back to BC High so
kids can take advantage of getting an education like he did.
Microtech recruiter
Bill Kelly has worked for Donahue for 18 years. The hiring challenges
of late include more background checks, in a post-Sept. 11 world,
and making sure employees are documented workers. But the reason he's
stayed so long is due to Donahue's diligence with keeping the company
growing.
"He's always
looking to improve what we do," says Kelly, "always looking
at the big picture."
Simplifying internal
systems, such as putting all workers into a computerized database,
is a small yet significant tool that allows Kelly and other recruitersto
stay on task rather than get caught up in administrative functions.
"We operate in a lean fashion," says Kelly.
On the recruiting
level, Kelly says, the greatest challenge has been to maintain a local-agency
feel, which they do practicing a hands-on
approach. What
helps is the longevity of Microtech's staff itself, which knows and
understands its clients' needs.
"You're not
reinventing the wheel when you call in and need somebody," says
Kelly.
Donahue's greatest
challenge hasn't been culling the work force as much as grappling
With the Bay State's economic climate. The acquisitions of big companies,
which include Wang and Data General and more recently The Gillette
Co. (NYSE: G) has forced a loss of jobs and propelled Donahue to expand
outside the state, as he's done in New Hampshire and, just two weeks
ago, in Miami.
His first week
in Miami he received a request for 65 workers from a firm that had
cold-called him.
In 1985 when he
started Microtech he says assembly wages were about $8 to $12 an hour.
"We don't pay much different now, 20 years later," he admits.
"I don't think the opportunities are growing fast enough in Boston."
