Member Spotlight on Corey Divine, 2022 Board Chairman for VACEOs
Q: Where were you born and raised? A: I was born in Miami, FL. My parents divorced when I was young, and I spent the early part of my life split between the Florida Keys and Miami. I moved to Charlottesville in middle school and spent the rest of my teenage years in the Commonwealth.
Q: Where did you go to school? A:I went to Gardner-Webb University, in Boiling Springs, North Carolina, and graduated in 2012 with a Bachelor of Science in business administration.
Q: Who inspired you to become an entrepreneur? A: My inspiration came from my father. He has owned different businesses my entire life. He demonstrated that if you work hard, you can achieve success while also being present for your family.
Corey and his dad in Barbados shortly after Corey started his first company
Q: Please tell us about your journey to become a CEO and how old you were when you got started. A:The first company I founded was Rent The Help. I was 22 and still in college. I finished my last semester online so I could start the business when I did. Our original concept was providing residential labor to homeowners to assist with moving, yard work, and other general “muscle” projects. As the business evolved, we diversified by getting into event staffing and warehouse recruiting. In January of 2020 we broke the company into two separate companies – Rent The Help and Candidate Source.
Rent The Help provides high quality, short term labor for homeowners and Candidate Source provides staffing, recruiting, and direct hire services for a variety of industries.
Q: What excites you most about your role as CEO? A: I enjoy developing people and solving problems. Every day is a new adventure and I welcome that.
Mr. Leo, Director of Barks & Treats
Q: Who is Mr. Leo? Is it true he is the real top dog at Candidate Source? A: My fiancé and I adopted Leo in the early months of COVID. He came to work with me every day during the pandemic and won over the hearts of our team. Every morning he runs around the office and gets his daily treat from his office friends.
Q: Are there any national/business authors that you follow? What is it about them or their message that resonates with you? A: I cannot pinpoint one author or business leader that resonates with me. I will share that I am drawn to books about CEOs and leaders that have built something or navigated challenging situations. Over the last few months a few books I have enjoyed are Ride of a Lifetime by Bob Iger (former Disney CEO) and Hot Seat by Jeff Immelt (Former CEO of GE).
Q:During these last few uncertain/difficult years, how did you keep yourself upbeat and motivated? A:I found the pandemic to be an expensive learning experience. As CEOs we are forced to make decisions that significantly impact our businesses, employees and family members. Unfortunately, for COVID, there was no roadmap to help guide us. But, because we survived the experience and learned from it, we are stronger today than prior to March of 2020.
“VACEOs has been a rewarding experience. Having a network of CEOs to share experiences with is a valuable resource and something that has helped me become a better leader and CEO.”
Corey Divine
Q: What have you learned from COVID? A:Overall, COVID proved 2 things: 1) If your business has a strong balance sheet you have a head start and are setup to weather difficult storms when they happen. 2) Always be ready for the unexpected. Never get comfortable with your sales or your people. I forget the author, but I read a quote when I first started my business that has always resonated with me “Your sales numbers serve as a scoreboard for the past. Focus on tomorrow, not yesterday.”
Q: Please tell us about your VACEOs experience. How long have you been a member? Why did you originally join? What part of your membership has helped you grow the most as a leader? A: I originally joined the Council to invest in myself. My early career was all about growing my business, and I rarely took the time to focus on becoming a better leader. When I made the decision to join, I knew I needed to spend more time working on my business rather than in my business. VACEOs provided this platform for me and has been more beneficial than I could have hoped.
VACEOs has been a rewarding experience. Having a network of CEOs to share experiences with is a invaluable resource and something that has helped me become a better leader and CEO.
About Rent The Help and Candidate Source
Rent The Help – Rent The Help’s sweet spot are labor projects in the 2-4 hour range. Our most popular service is moving labor, which we provide throughout the Richmond area. Whether you need help moving an entire home, or just moving a couch from one room to another, our team is here to help. In addition to our moving labor services, we also provide labor services for yard projects, small commercial jobs, & event setup services. Our lives are busy, and the reality is, sometimes you just need a little help.
Candidate Source – We partner with businesses to help them find their most valuable asset – their employees. Our primary focus is in the warehouse, distribution, and manufacturing industries but we also offer solutions for call centers and other entry level administrative positions. We provide these services through a variety of methods but primarily through traditional staffing and direct hire arrangements.
About VACEOs
Virginia Council of CEOs (VACEOs) is a nonprofit organization connecting CEOs for learning and growth. Formed more than 20 years ago, member benefits include placement in a peer roundtable group and access to a thought leader network, and a robust program of events for learning and growth. This is not a networking group, but rather a group of CEO peers who are invested in the success of each member. To qualify for membership CEOs must run a business with $1M+ revenue and 5+FTEs. Learn more at www.vaceos.org.
“I’m a kid that grew up in the north side of Richmond, one of the toughest parts of Richmond when I was growing up,” says Dr. Cedric Moore. “And it was my community, which helped shape me, to help me become who I am today and who I continue to try to aspire to be.”
Moore has risen far indeed. He is now the CEO of Spectrum Transformation Group, the first organization licensed in Virginia as an intensive outpatient Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) service. Also a member of the Virginia Council of CEOs, Moore is supported by a local roundtable group as he implements his strategic plan for Spectrum and navigates various business challenges, including the pandemic.
Dr. Cedric Moore, VACEOs Member Profile
Listen in as Moore talks about his business, social work, challenges facing minority business leaders, and his new-found home a VA Council of CEOs(Captions available)
Moore’s journey out of the city led to a bachelor’s degree in Social Work from Eastern Mennonite University, an MBA, and later a doctorate in strategic leadership from Regent University. He then returned to Richmond and launched Spectrum in 2010. Still, he admits that before joining VACEOs, he sometimes felt unheard or unacknowledged when in a room of non-minority business leaders.
Moore (center) attends a Zoom meeting with several members of his roundtable group.
“There were times where, you know, I had to speak a little louder or there were individuals who wouldn’t call on me in a meeting,” he explains. “Those are some things that we face as minorities, even with a terminal degree.”
“I’m very aware sometimes that I’m invited to the table, but I’m not actually welcomed at the table,” he says. “But I understand now that I’m happy to embrace this role and be able to help other minorities, as well to get them a seat at the table. I’m fortunate enough to find the Virginia CEOs and be able to work with Scot [McRoberts, VACEOs executive director].”
“It’s an ability to not only to survive things like the pandemic but also to come out of the situation a lot better. So everyone is there to help each other. I’m so happy, so proud to be a part Roundtable 17. It’s just been great.”
Dr. Cedric Moore, CEO, Spectrum Transformation Group
He elaborates on his VACEOs roundtable peers, “these groups, I mean, they really care about you as a person and they care about your business. It’s an ability to not only survive things like the pandemic but also to come out of the situation a lot better. So everyone is there to help each other. I’m so happy, so proud to be a part Roundtable 17.”
Carrying the Banner for In-home Autism Services
How did Spectrum come to be? “I want to help people. That’s what we do, social work,” Moore explains. “My wife had a passion with autism and that was huge for us.”
“We met with her mentor, psychology professor Donald Oswald, who is a guru on the East Coast within autism spectrum disorder services,” he says. “That drove us to provide services for a population at the time that there wasn’t much there other than educational services.”
At Spectrum, a team of 52 full-time employees—including psychologists, psychiatrists, behavior analysts and technicians, and speech and language pathologists—provides general mental health diagnoses and a variety of services, such as outpatient therapy.
“We are happy to carry a banner with being the first licensed program in the state to provide those services in the home,” says Moore.
A Future of Service, Family, and Faith
Adapting to a pandemic was especially challenging for an organization whose clients rely on face-to-face interaction. “So going to a telehealth platform made it really difficult. Some of their attention spans are a lot shorter than their peers. Some of them can’t sit for a very long period of time,” explains Moore.
In response, the company redesigned and reconfigured offices, common areas, and therapy spaces to comply with CDC safety guidelines and enable in-person services. “Our ability to be able to pivot was definitely important as we continue to try to meet the needs of those that we serve,” says Moore.
What’s next for Spectrum? The company is implementing phase three of its strategic plan and is bringing on psychiatrists and nurse practitioners. “It’s super exciting. It’s a new learning experience for me,” says Moore.
As important as Moore’s business goals, however, are his family and his faith. “I grew up with a single mom and my ability to be there for my children, it’s very important to me. My ability to be there for my wife is very important to me. And my ability to be able to serve God as best as I can is important to me. So every day I’m just trying to be better than what I was the day before.”
Q&A with Baskervill President and Current VACEOs Chair
Bob Clark is a Virginia native, a Cameron Herold Vivid Vision fan, and the current president of Baskervill — one of the oldest, continually operating architectural firms in the nation. And, we are pleased to announce that, in 2020, this Inc. 5000 leader will take over the lead role as the current Chair of the VA Council of CEOs.
“I’m excited to be a part of this great organization and glad to help it continue to grow,” says Clark. “I look forward to keeping the conversations going about endeavors that will add more value to the membership and continue to move us into the 21st century: Things like what we are doing now, virtual roundtables and pop-up meetings. And other programs and solutions to help members in this fast-moving world,” he adds.
Q&A WITH BOB CLARK, PRESIDENT, BASKERVILL AND 2020 CHAIR, VA COUNCIL OF CEOs
Q: I see you went to William & Mary and you are a graduate of VMI. Are you from Virginia originally?
I was born and bred in Virginia. My background is that I’m a mechanical engineer from VMI. After VMI, I was a commissioned officer, I traveled the world with the military for five years, then I found a wonderful job in Richmond that led me to go back to graduate school, where I went to William & Mary to receive my MBA. And upon finishing that, I’ve been at Baskervill ever since.
Q: Please tell me about Baskervill and how you came to be president there.
Baskervill is a 123-year-old firm founded in Richmond, Virginia. We have about 185 employees, and we have folks in Washington, Orlando, Richmond, Portland, Maine and in Gdansk, Poland. We are a full-service firm (architecture, engineering and interior design) doing commercial buildings.
Prior to becoming president, I spent five years as the firm’s COO learning all aspects of the business. We were a smaller company then! As we grew, we added HR and IT to my role. During that period, the Board asked that I take the next step and move into the President role – I said yes, and never looked back. Coincidentally, it’s been 16 years this month that I became president of Baskervill.
Q: What excites you most about your role there?
The part about the job I enjoy the most is watching the people grow and become successful in their work. And that may sound cliché, but in all honesty, it is truly rewarding when you see a young architect mature or a young engineer mature into a seasoned designer who is leading projects. It’s extremely rewarding. That’s kind of cheesy, but it’s true!
Q: I’ve heard that you are a Cameron Herold Vivid Vision fan. Why is that?
Over the years I’ve been fortunate to hear a number of great speakers at VACEOs Retreats and elsewhere, and several of those have had a significant impact on me. Cameron Herald is one of them. His presentation at the last retreat was especially timely because I was looking for a mechanism to crystalize and push our firm’s path forward. I found his Vivid Vision process to be just the right tool for us.
Q: You’ve been a member of VACEOs since 2005. Do you remember why you joined?
So I joined the Council back in 2005, and when I joined I was the new president of Baskervill at that point in time. And I was looking for a peer group to help guide me as I tried to guide the firm to places we’d never been before. And I can honestly say it’s been one of the best things I’ve ever done. And it’s been a wonderful ride all along.
Q: You’ve volunteered to be the Chair this year. Why do you think the Council is a worthwhile organization? Or to put it a different way, why are you happy to volunteer your time?
The Council has been worthwhile for me, not only professionally, but also personally. From a professional standpoint, it’s really helped me as a leader and helped me to guide my company for many years. From a personal standpoint, my peer group and my roundtable has been a tremendous asset in helping me learn to navigate and manage that notorious work/life balance, with which so many of us struggle. It’s given me the tools to be a better leader. With other obligations fulfilled, I was at a point where I could commit the time and energy to give back to the Council. There is a long list of distinguished chairs before me so I have big shoes to fill.
VACEOs Member Profile: Ron Carey, Tilt Creative + Production CEO
[Listen in as Ron Carey of Tilt C+P explains his business and the challenges he is currently facing.]
We meet Ron Carey in a warehouse building tucked just off of Arthur Ashe Boulevard near Bow Tie Cinemas in Richmond, Virginia. Once we’re inside, it becomes apparent that this space is enormous. In fact, it’s a 16,000-square-foot-studio and production facility, filled with costumes, sets, lights, furniture, a funky kitchen, and a few creative spaces to sit and relax.
“We do all types of work here,” says Carey, founder and CEO of Tilt Creative + Production (TiltC+P). “We build sets here. We’ve got camera equipment here. We’ve got multiple stages. And so, it’s just a fantastic facility for our business partners to come in and make great content.”
Ron, a closet introvert (and former UVA defensive lineman), prefers to lift others up to the light, using his business as his platform to make a difference. “The business, as well as my personal platform, is about making a difference,” he explains. “How do we make a positive impact in the lives of those we touch individually, as well as the business and nonprofit partners we come in contact with?”
At just two years old, his company might be the youngest 30-year-old business around. Read on as we explain.
CREATIVE + PRODUCTION: THE STORY OF TILTC+P
Tilt Creative + Production is a full-service advertising agency and video production company all in one, operating out of two locations in Richmond. TiltC+P’s fully equipped video and production studio is located near Scott’s Addition. Its downtown space is where TiltC+P’s creative team cranks out copy, artwork and post-production work for clients like Walmart, Audi, and Capital One to name a few. TiltC+P currently employs approximately 40 people.
“We started with the belief that there was a better way to offer content development for brands,” says Carey. “But we really believe that because we’ve combined creative services – so that’s writing and art direction, with production and post production – that having all of that in house and having our own studio is something that’s really beneficial for the client. And so that’s the reason we put together Tilt Creative + Production.”
Carey had a clear vision of what his business would be from the get-go – what it would look like and how it would feel. “It should have a strong culture about doing the right thing,” he says. “And so the ability to kind of see all of that come to fruition was what led me to be an entrepreneur.”
Carey says he gives his employees the freedom to make a lot of decisions and operate with quite a bit of autonomy. Everyone brings something of value to the table, regardless of their role. Witnessing company-wide collaboration at work is what excites him most.
“I get excited just thinking about it – which is the notion of having everyone gather around an idea. It can be a creative idea. It can be the idea of what our company could be. It could be ‘What does our website need to look like?’” But gathering around an idea and having 40 [people] move in the same direction to accomplish that. And I love that I get to do it with people I like. To me, that’s really important.”
HR EXEC TURNS ENTREPRENEUR
Carey’s career path to entrepreneurship included stints with iconic and locally well-known brands, including Mars, Inc.; Wyeth; the Richmond Times-Dispatch; and The Martin Agency. His background is varied, but it’s impossible not to recognize his extensive Human Resources background.
“For me today, human resources has probably been one of the best jobs that one could ever have in terms of preparing you for being an entrepreneur. It got me in touch with what’s important to people, how to think about business processes, and how to make sure people have what they need so that they can go forward and be successful and do what the business needs for them to do,” says Carey.
Carey officially shifted away from HR when he became president of Studio Squared – at the time, a new digital content division of The Martin Agency. “Which ultimately led me into purchasing that company, which is now Tilt Creative + Production,” he explains.
THE CHALLENGES OF A YOUNG 30-YEAR-OLD BUSINESS
Tilt Creative + Production is in a unique state. “The business is almost two years old, but the business was really a merger of two companies,” Carey explains. “One was 10 years old, and the other was 30 years old. So although we’re two years old, we still have some of the challenges that a 30-year-old business might face.”
He continues, “The biggest challenge I’m probably thinking about right now is just scale. We’re adding additional clients. We’re adding new people and resources. We’ve brought two companies together. What do those processes look like? Each week, each month, if you’ve been successful, you’ve added new revenue. And all of a sudden, that brings some complexity. So how do you pause to change your processes? What talent with new skills do you need in the business? So that’s probably the biggest challenge, is making sure we focus on how we continue to reinvent processes or what things we should stop doing. What things do we need to start to continue to be successful?”
For now, Carey is relying on his football experience at UVA to help him keep his eye on the ball: his core mission.
“I think when I look at the business, I really think about growth,” he adds. “And the core mission of the business for me is about fulfilling the needs of our clients. And I think if we fulfill the needs of our clients and then separately provide our employees opportunities to grow and make a difference, I feel like we’ll be able to continue to grow and expand across North America. I’m really excited about the future.”
Thanks for sharing your story with us, Ron!
RON CAREY OPENS UP ABOUT HIS VA COUNCIL OF CEOs FORUM (VIDEO)
Learn how a CEO forum or peer group can help your business
“Outside of the formal group, I feel like I can pick up the phone and call any of my group members and bounce an idea off of them, and also their expertise back. And so for that, it’s just been invaluable.” – Ron Carey, on his VACEOs forum.WATCH VIDEO.
Charlottesville’s Tiger Fuel President Gordon Sutton Opens Up About Company Growth and More
In 1982, Gordon Sutton’s father, a successful lawyer, found himself in the unlikely position of running a fuel company. At the time, the company was a small short truck distribution business in Charlottesville, Virginia, selling three and a half million gallons of heating oil a year.
Today, Tiger Fuel is a large-scale operation with an employee count of 270. The company is no longer just about fuel – although the fuel business is expected to distribute approximately 124 million gallons to customers across Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina this year. Still headquartered in Charlottesville, the company now includes nine convenience stores with delis and operates 10 car washes under the All American Car Wash brand.
If you live in Charlottesville – and especially if you’re close to The Market at Bellair on Ivy Road – chances are you know about the gourmet-to-go experience that’s popular there. “We hear all these crazy stories about people driving two hours out of their way to get our sandwiches,” says Tiger Fuel President Gordon Sutton. “The line will be wrapped around the inside of the store and coming back out the store into the lot during UVA game days!”
Gordon, alongside his brother Taylor, runs the business now. Gordon is humble, unassuming, grounded, and articulate. Though he grew up in the business – at 15 years old, riding his bike to go pump gas, wipe windshields and check oil – he once dreamt of a life out West chasing fish. But it’s “Pickle People” he and his team chase today. Here’s more about this soft-spoken, inspiring young entrepreneur.
Q: Tiger Fuel is really diversified. Can you break it down for us?
A: It really breaks down pretty cleanly into three equal buckets. There’s the retail company, which has the stores and the car washes; then we have what we call the short truck or home heat side of our business, which is propane and heating oil [this side of the business serves customers from Appomattox all the way to Culpeper, Virginia]; and then there’s the commercial and wholesale fuel distribution side of the business. This business unit serves the whole state of Virginia into North Carolina, West Virginia and parts of Maryland through a vast network of dealers.
Q: You clearly love Charlottesville, but at one point you thought seriously about living out West. Is that right?
Yes. So I was born and bred here in Charlottesville – went to school here and the University of Virginia – so I’m very passionate about UVA. Charlottesville is a very important part of who I am, who this company is, and what we’re all about.
After UVA, I went to Wyoming. I was a fishing guide out there for three years. I thought that was going to be my “astronaut job,” you know – that I was going to die doing that. And I thought that’s why I was on this earth. And I pretty quickly realized that I had turned the thing I loved the most in the world into work. I also realized I wasn’t realizing my full potential or taking advantage of the gift of a solid education that my parents gave me. So I moved back.
Q: What sets Tiger Fuel and The Markets apart from your competitors?
A: If you think about it, our business, our products, are very generic. You know, nobody’s buying propane from Tiger because it’s better than AmeriGas’s. Nobody’s buying Budweiser or gas or Gatorade at our stores because it’s better than what’s at Sheetz. They’re buying them from us because of our people and our culture and our service. We try to make each customer feel like a celebrity – giving them what we call Tiger Way Service.
That said – and as much as I said our products are generic – we are really, really good at food. In fact, Bon Appétit magazinecredited us with being the first gourmet-to-go gas station. I mean, we’re selling poached salmon and seared steak. Our chefs come from the nicest restaurants downtown and get paid really well. So I’d say what sets us apart is our people, and our commitment to our people, and to the food and service we give.
Sutton with pickle stickers and Tiger Way button.
And I realize that sounds pretty generic, but we really believe that, and it’s baked into our DNA. It’s how we define ourselves. We have a really dynamic, amazing human resources department, and we’re really, really focused on hiring what we call Pickle People.
Q: Did you say “Pickle People”?
A: YES. Part of our onboarding training, or Tiger Way Training, is a half-day training, and there’s a video in there about a successful restaurant. The whole mantra is just, “Give the customer the pickle,” you know? Like, do whatever it takes to make the customer happy. And so we’ve carried that over. I mean, I have pickle socks, we have pickle badges and stickers. It works its way into our hiring process.
Q. In the last few years, you’ve opened three new retail stores and hired 70 employees. How do you find and retain employees?
Again, we have an amazing HR department. They go above and beyond the call of duty. We also pay well, and we have amazing benefits. For example, we just built our own primary care facility with a partner that’s exclusively for our employees. We offer that to part-time hourly folks in the stores. So we’re very, very committed to our employees.
We are also very community minded. The philanthropic work that we’re doing at Tiger is something I’m super, super proud of, and I think it also really helps our ability to recruit and retain, as well. And I think, more importantly, it makes the team feel really great and makes them want to stay and feel good about what they’re doing. It makes them happy at work, which makes them give that great service.
Sutton and his forum at VACEOs Annual Retreat
Q: How has your VACEOs Forum helped you?
I’ve found that it’s been very, very rewarding on a personal level more than anything. When I first got in this role, I was sort of overwhelmed. Nobody wants to hear you complain, and I get that. It’s hard for people to be sympathetic, because they look at you and they’re like, “Oh, you’re at the top!” I totally understand it. But it has been valuable and useful to me to be able to get some stuff off my chest. Sometimes you just need to have somebody to whine to and have them not scoff in your face. The people in my forum group understand what you’re dealing with and are sympathetic.
So it’s been the most beneficial from a personal standpoint – making me a better husband, better father. And I think that correlates to being a better boss and happier person in general, and all of that has an effect. And there are some really, really smart, seasoned, capable people doing some exciting things, and so I’ve learned a lot, too.
“I think if you’re not growing, you’re dying. I know it’s a cliché, but I believe it.” – Gordon Sutton, President, Tiger Fuel
Q: What’s next for you?
A: Continued investment in solar energy projects and diversification into real estate development. We have invested heavily in solar, and we will continue to do that. We’re also developing 33 acres at Zion Crossroads, which will be more of a traditional big box development with a big-name grocery store, a hotel, a couple of restaurants, and apartments and townhomes. That’s a departure for us.
I don’t want to look back on my career and think I just sort of took this gravy opportunity and coasted. I want to look back and say, “I really made a difference. I have that. I made it bigger and better. I created more opportunities for more people.” And so that’s an important part of our future – continuing to grow. I think if you’re not growing, you’re dying. I know it’s a cliché, but I believe it.
About VA Council of CEOs Virginia Council of CEOs members represent a wide range of industries and business sizes. Hundreds of SMB CEOs in Virginia have found the Council to be a critical resource in growing their companies – and themselves. Learn more about the benefits of VACEOs membership.
Recent Comments