12) Strong-Bridge
Back in 2008, Strong-Bridge was on Consulting 's radar as one of our Seven Small Jewels. At that time, the firm had just one office and 30 consultants. Today, Strong-Bridge has two offices—Seattle and Toronto—and 110 consultants.
In recognition of this growth and as a way to ensure that Strong-Bridge's culture remained in tact, the firm recently added a brand new position—Director of People and Culture Development. That role, filled by Jarrey Audrine, is designed to strengthen morale and unity at Strong-Bridge. It appears to be working as the firm makes its Best Small Firms to Work For debut.
"Morale continues to run at the highest level. Maintaining that high morale is paramount to our success—it's easy for consultants to feel as though they operate in a vacuum, often changing work sites and co-workers once or twice a year," says Audrine. "Being a small firm allows us to really get to know each person on our team and provide the important support and collegial 'co-worker' culture they need on a daily basis."
And Audrine understands that the people are a big part of what makes Strong-Bridge so special.
"Though most individuals come from other consulting firms, we seek out and attract the highest performing and most dedicated people," she says. "Our values and individual personalities define our culture, and our clients appreciate working with the analytic, creative, hard-working, people-oriented, and decision-making people that personify the Strong-Bridge consultant."
Audrine says the firm will continue to drive aggressive growth in hiring, and it's already doubled in size from just a year ago. "We're continuing to add new employees every month, strengthening our offerings to clients, and always keeping our standards of hiring that makes a Strong-Bridge consultant," she says.
And being a Best Small Firm is proof positive, she says, that the firm is achieving its goals. An important impact of this recognition will be the continuing and future opportunities provided to our employees by ensuring we attract the best talent to be their co-workers, as well as attracting the best clients to bring our employees complex, challenging, and fulfilling work," she says.
"For me and our leadership, it's such an honor to serve a group of clients like ours and collaborate with such high-performing consultants and leaders on a daily basis. With that honor comes great responsibility to continue supporting the needs of our consultants and ultimately our clients."
Q&A: What's Strong-Bridge's top priority over the next 12 months?
Jarrey Audrine, Director, People & Culture Development, says: "In the next year, in addition to enhancing the programs that we have begun, our priority is to develop new programs that will provide dynamic Support tools for our teams. These programs will include: redefining our training strategy to better support newly hired and existing employees, especially fostering collaboration and information-sharing amongst employees with the same clients; redesigning out Employee Portal to improve accessibility, ease of use, and quality of information; and driving further team connectedness through organized affinity group activities."
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