Test Drive MBE Magazine May June 2013 | Page 12

Entrepreneurship (continued) Building the Business She took classes to learn ways to ensure growth for her business and increased her networking presence to attract more clients. The turning point came in 2010, when Berry signed a contract with the “potential of a million dollars.” She had already opened a satellite office in South Carolina in 2008 and another in Washington, D.C., to win more federal contracts, and hired an assistant and an operations person six years ago. “The operations person is really my second hand. She does all the behind-the-scenes work,” Berry says. “Most of the business development is still done by me, [but] this is working until we grow to the next level.” Berry’s staff also includes two fulltime employees and a team of diversity consultants with specialized expertise in fields including healthcare and human resources. Her consultants are hand-picked and draw upon deep industry knowledge to help ensure her clients’ success. She also expanded her company’s programs and services to include human resources, consulting, staffing, and online courses. “We had the training aspect already and added work placement and the business learning for contracts we obtained with several uni- Supplier Diversity at Aflac We’ve got you under our wing.® Register to become an Aflac supplier at: https:/ /supplierportal.dnb.com/aflac. Ethisphere Fortune 5/12 Z120282 10 May/June 2013 MBE versities, which we still have as clients,” Berry says. Berry usually requires a retainer from clients. “We have set fees for training, which is based on the type of training we are developing, and for job placement, we get a set percentage of their salary.” McPherson, Berry and Associates’ organizational structure consists of two divisions: ONboard Talent and BLeU. ONboard Talent offers the support needed to bring the right talent to administrative and human resources positions, and BLeU i ́