360 Talent Solutions (A Pacer Company)

Thank you, Lisa Wayne, CCWP from 360 Talent Solutions (A Pacer Company) and Bryan Peña, CCWP for nominating me to share my #DefiantOriginStory! Growing up as the youngest of eight children in a middle-class family taught me the value of teamwork, effective communication and resilience. My school years were filled with various activities, including baseball, soccer and theater. Through these, I learned the importance of time management and collaboration. After earning my undergraduate degree from the University of Florida (Go Gators!), I traveled the country promoting health clubs. One destination led me to Boston where I realized I needed to settle down and get a “real job.” In 2000, the staffing industry found me. Thank you Paul Athy, Timothy Ryan and Amy C. for taking a chance on me early in my career. Following 9/11, the economy declined prompting a move to Tampa which led me into the MSP/VMS sector supporting a large telecommunications company. A pivotal moment came when my daughter, was born (see picture). That inspired me to focus on being the best father I could be leading me to pursue an MBA. During my weekend educational program, I was fortunate to have outstanding leaders, Nancy Lawlor and Elizabeth Bushéy, PHR, who provided tremendous opportunities to grow my career. The MSP/VMS market was experiencing its first growth period, and they entrusted me with managing large, strategic, global client relationships. During the 2008 recession, Jeff T. and Fred Lavins offered me an incredible opportunity to join the buyer-side community where I helped source and implement an MSP/VMS solution for a large financial institution. Later, KellyOCG relocated me to the Pacific Northwest to manage and architect global, multi-point Total Talent Solutions. I cherished the growth, global travel and advancement opportunities at KellyOCG. In 2018, I joined a Talent Marketplace to build compliant solutions for MSPs and Contingent Workforce Programs to engage freelance/independent talent. I am now the COO of 360 Talent Solutions, a Workforce Consultancy, MSP and RPO practice under the Pacer Staffing LLC umbrella, a certified woman-owned, minority-owned business enterprise. Thank you Vinny Dhillon and Amrinder Romana for trusting me and our wonderful team to bring new and innovative solutions to the market. Throughout my career, I’ve been blessed to be an active father. My children are a huge part of my life. Despite a busy travel schedule, I’ve enjoyed being a dad in the stands throughout my daughter’s volleyball career and coaching my son’s baseball teams. Starting this fall, both will be in college playing their respective sports at the collegiate level. In my free time, I enjoy running, cycling and attending as many MLB baseball games and Phish shows as possible. I’ve enjoyed reading the #MyDefiantOrigin stories on LinkedIn. I nominate Robin Rhodes Harris and Jeff T. to keep this going.

Thank you, Bryan Peña, CCWP for your interest in learning about my #DefiantOrginStory. How is it possible that I want to hug you and hit you all at the same time for asking me to participate in this super cool initiative?! Perhaps the following will shed some light… Born late (and late ever since) I am the eldest sibling, blessed to be on this planet with 3 spectacular sisters (Amanda, Jordana, and Diane). Never far from my heart and soul, our dear sister Susan, who passed away in an accident on Christmas Eve day in 1984. Raised by my strong, kick-ass, vibrant, intelligent, compassionate, and fearless single mother, I often think back to how she comported herself throughout the chaos and grief our family was left to wrestle with following Susan’s death. I use the lessons that she taught me and hope that I can navigate life with a portion of the grace she displayed during that most crucial time in my upbringing. Considering the trauma that was the loss of my sister, I still look back on my childhood with very fond memories and thank both my parents for that. My dad a doctor, my mom a high school principal, the importance of an education was certainly understood. That said, I struggled in high school… great socially as I was involved in theatre, speech and debate, school newspaper and created a role for myself with the school’s varsity soccer team so I could stay close to the guys, most of whom I had mad crushes on. The academics came easily to me outside of math and science which was a drag…. Needless to say, after graduation, I didn’t want to pursue a degree but my parents discouraged my idea of becoming a professional actor so we split the difference and I went to a community college where I continued my work in theatre and speech & debate and also started juggling jobs to maintain an income so I could live away from my mom or dad’s home (they divorced when I was 5 and all of the sisters have been wonderful family additions accrued through my dad’s marriages). It was during this period in my life, when I decided to work towards hanging up my waitress and bartending apron, leave my call center job and participate in a HR Management certification course at UC Irvine. Upon completing the program, I was fortunate to be hired by a greeting card company to serve as their HR Manager. We both won… I was able to take my academia and apply it practically and they got me for cheap! To this day, one of my best friends is the gal who was foolish (or brilliant enough) to hire me. Through that experience, I realized that I hated working in HR and took the pieces of the function that I liked and leaned into it… which lead me to recruiting… which lead me to selling staffing solutions… which lead me to working for MSPs… which lead me to co-founding the practice that I am with now, 360 Talent Solutions, a Pacer company. To continue reading my #DefiantOrginStory and learn who I've nominated to share their own stories, please go to comments.