"I see the lack of sharing information, the lack partnerships as a challenge. This world is big enough for everyone to win and get a slice of the pie."
Meet Shilonda Savage, a Wife, a Mom, a CEO, an Author, a serial Entrepreneur, a Leader, and a Recruiter. Recruiting is her happy place. She continues to focus on filling roles with fintech and consulting companies or any industry that is pushing the boundaries, innovating and moving fast. Growing is something she can get behind.
Check out more interviews with entrepreneurs here.
WOULD YOU LIKE TO GET FEATURED?
All interviews are 100% FREE OF CHARGE
Table of Contents
We are thrilled to have you join us today, welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview! Let’s start off with a little introduction. Tell our readers a bit about yourself and your company.
Shilonda Savage: I am Shilonda Savage; believer, wife, mother, CEO of Dower Personnel Services and Published Author of the book “Fire to Gold”.
If you were in an elevator with Warren Buffet, how would you describe your company, your services or products? What makes your company different from others? What is your company’s biggest strength?
Shilonda Savage: Dower Personnel Services is a staffing firm specializing in Admin placements focusing on placing Executive Assistants, Project Managers and Data Scientists. We offer three different options for employers to choose from which includes: contract, contract-to-hire, and direct placements.
What makes Dower Personnel Services different from others is that; we’re really great at sourcing and building candidates relationships. It’s super important for us to build candidate relationships because this is a people business-Right!?!? What good would be to have thousands of jobs and no one to fill them. That is also be our biggest strength- building candidate relationships.
Quiet quitting, The Great Resignation, are an ongoing trend causing many businesses to struggle keeping talent engaged and motivated. Most are leaving because of their boss or their company culture. 82% of people feel unheard, undervalued and misunderstood in the workplace. In your experience, what keeps employees happy? And how are adapting to the current shift we see?
Shilonda Savage: In my experience what keeps employees happy is:
1) Pay- employees should be compensated properly according to the market rate and their worth. Let’s keep it real- employees are trading their time for money. Also, bonuses are a great touch and other incentives such as free day off and not a stress ball that nobody really wants.
2) Thank you goes a long way (acknowledge what your employees do great and don’t just chastise them when they may not be doing so well). Encouragement is great as well.
3) Employees should be seen as a person not a number (many times employers tend to forget that they were once employees).
I totally understand the business side of it and what the numbers may show, but if your numbers aren’t what you expect them to be you may want to dig deeper. It may not be the employee. It could be your process which needs to be revised or tweaked, perhaps morale is low or even you have the wrong people in leadership.
It could be a number of this but just as any relationship you want to work and last communication is key. Talk to your employees and listen to understand. Your employees are the ones doing the work every day so they should have input on what can make the company better.
Online business keeps on surging higher than ever, B2B, B2C, online shopping, virtual meetings, remote work, Zoom medical consultations, what are your expectations for the year to come and how are you capitalizing on the tidal wave?
Shilonda Savage: My expectations for the year to come is to hire and add to my team to prepare for future clients who need assistants with hiring. Also, looking to bring more awareness to companies who’ve never used a staffing firm, that don’t understand how a staffing firm can benefit them and save them time and money.
There are so many jobs that need to be filled and these companies’ internal teams can’t do it all alone. People need people! We need each other and partnerships is the way to GROW! I am so looking forward to building more partnerships/relationships in 2023!
Christopher Hitchens, an American journalist, is quoted as saying that “everyone has a book in them” Have you written a book? If so, please share with us details about it. If you haven’t, what book would you like to write and how would you like it to benefit the readers?
Shilonda Savage: Yes. I have written a book which is called “Fire to Gold” and can be purchased on Amazon. Here’s the link: https://a.co/d/gFtRUYN
This book about two teenagers who fall in love and experience life and marriage together and going through some fiery situations. It is fiction based on a true story, short read but a great read.
Business is all about overcoming obstacles and creating opportunities for growth. What do you see as THE real challenge right now?
Shilonda Savage: I see the lack of sharing information, the lack partnerships as a challenge. This world is big enough for everyone to win and get a slice of the pie. God created it that way.
2020, 2021, 2022 threw a lot of curve balls into businesses on a global scale. Based on the experience gleaned in the past years, how can businesses thrive in 2023? What lessons have you learned and what advice would you share?
Shilonda Savage: Business can thrive in 2023 by creating! Your business should always have multiple avenues to generate income. That is the lesson I learned and the advice I would share.
What does “success” in the year to come mean to you? It could be on a personal or business level, please share your vision.
Shilonda Savage: Success to me in the year to come means to hire more staff to be able to take on more clients in other states.
Jed Morley, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Shilonda Savage for taking the time to do this interview and share her knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Shilonda Savage or her company, you can do it through her – Linkedin Page
Disclaimer: The ValiantCEO Community welcomes voices from many spheres on our open platform. We publish pieces as written by outside contributors with a wide range of opinions, which don’t necessarily reflect our own. Community stories are not commissioned by our editorial team and must meet our guidelines prior to being published.
