Donald R. Nokes started NetCenergy, an outsourced information technology firm, about 14 years ago.
Today, from its headquarters in Cranston, the company provides IT support to 220 clients in Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Connecticut. The business started with three employees and has since grown to 45. As it grew, Nokes found NetCenergy had non-IT services it needed taken care of, including legal support, accounting services and – more recently – marketing.
“We needed that breadth of knowledge in marketing that we weren’t able to have when we tried hiring two or three employee marketing people in-house,” Nokes said.
NetCenergy outsources to other companies for those tasks because – as Nokes points out – his company does IT, not marketing. It’s the type of co-dependent relationship between companies that has spurred a proliferation of new, small-staffed, business-to-business firms in Rhode Island over the last decade and a half.
“It’s called ‘business-process outsourcing,’ ” said Anthony Wheeler, former associate dean of the College of Business at Bryant University.
The outsourcing helps companies stay lean, focus on strengths, or “core competencies,” and keep overhead costs down. The latter, in a time when health care costs have grown so rapidly, is especially important, said Wheeler, who recently took a new job as dean of the College of Business and Public Management at West Chester University in Pennsylvania.
“Sadly, you’re seeing some companies find it is more cost effective to hire out because benefits can run anywhere between 33-50 percent of total compensation and that number is rising,” he said.
Providence Business News compiled economic and tax data dating back to 2001 to identify which industries are growing and where entrepreneurs have had the greatest level of success in Rhode Island.
Overarching trends show Rhode Island’s economy is largely stagnant. Population has decreased 0.1 percent since 2001. The number of Rhode Island employers has grown by less than 1,000. And the number of jobs here has grown 1 percent – or 4,787 jobs – compared with 9.4 percent nationwide dating back to 2001, an economically depressed year.
While the overlying economic data is relatively stagnant, however, the makeup of employers has shifted, with small-staff, business-to-business firms leading the charge.
The dynamic has helped create a leaner, more-efficient business community. But it is also putting downward pressure on the state’s ability to grow jobs, as fewer people, in many cases, are doing work once done by many.
So, should the state be working more with existing businesses to help them grow jobs, instead of relying on outsourcing?
“There’s a boatload of companies right now providing support for other companies of all sizes,” said Edward M. Mazze, distinguished professor of business administration at the University of Rhode Island. “The issue that I see today is that we have to not only make it easier for people to start a business, but to also maintain a business in this state.”
[caption id="attachment_175255" align="alignnone" width="640"]
R.I. ADDS EMPLOYERS, ALTHOUGH NOT MANY: The state counted more employers in 2016 than at any time since 2001, although at 2.9 percent, the increase over that time was modest. While an exact comparison with national figures is not available, the number of employers nationwide from 2001 through 2015 grew 4.3 percent. The Great Recession was certainly a factor in the state’s small increase, because since the pre-recession high a decade ago, the number of employers in Rhode Island has increased 0.2 percent. / SourceS: R.I. Department of Labor and Training, R.I. Division of Taxation, U.S. Census Bureau, PBN research[/caption]
HIRING OUT
The term “outsourcing” is often thought of as sending jobs overseas.
But business-process outsourcing can happen between a Providence company and a Warwick firm, or the latter and a California company. It has become an increasingly popular method for business owners to find expertise and keep costs low.
“If you’re a company and don’t have expertise in marketing, yes, you could hire someone to do it, or you could contract with another organization to do it for you,” said Wheeler.
“Some of that is about cost, but some of it is expertise,” he added. “Health care costs are becoming more acute now as companies see their costs increasing, but it’s also about ease and expertise.”
Many of these third-party, business-to-business firms are known formally as “professional, scientific and technical services.” The number of Rhode Island establishments (defined as physical locations, meaning one company with multiple locations would count for more than one establishment) under this designation has grown by 1,529 since 2001, marking a 43.9 percent increase and the greatest growth by any sector. (Other sectors realized greater growth, but only because of a change in federal designations that resulted in artificial increases).
[caption id="attachment_175254" align="alignleft" width="200"]
TOP TALENT: Cindy Butler, president of human resources consulting firm Butler & Associates in Jamestown, says business-process outsourcing allows companies to tap into high levels of talent on a part-time basis. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY[/caption]
This slice of the Rhode Island economy includes technological support, legal services, accounting, scientific research and human resources. The services are used by giants of industry and startups alike, and the demand has created tremendous opportunity for consultants.
“For smaller organizations, as a human resources consultant, I might be called in once every six months,” said Cindy Butler, president of Butler & Associates in Jamestown. “Some clients I visit every week.”
Butler, who started her consulting firm 21 years ago, is also the president-elect of the trade group: The Rhode Island Society for Human Resource Management.
She provides human resources support to companies of varying sizes. The work includes filling in on an emergency basis, helping with a transition and complementing in-house operations.
Butler said she’s seen the rapid growth of support-service firms in Rhode Island.
“Since the [2008] recession, I would say that I have seen it much more,” she said.
Butler’s anecdotal evidence is backed up by a Sept. 21 report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics that showed professional and business services was the fastest-growing sector in the state since the Great Recession. The sector grew 23.9 percent between June 2009 – marking the bottom of the recession – and June 2016. National growth for the sector during the same period was 21.6 percent. The trend of outsourcing services has become so popular, economists at BLS have noticed it in their work.
“We call folks and they no longer work at the company. Instead, people are saying, ‘I’ll put you in touch with our payroll company, or our safety folks,’ ” said Mark Maggi, supervisory economist in the BLS Boston Regional Office for occupational safety and health statistics.
“These in-house processes are getting moved to specialty firms,” said Maggi, who produced the Sept. 21 report.
But it’s not necessarily all about keeping costs down, Butler said. It’s also a way for business owners to tap into high levels of talent on a part-time basis.
“For an IT professional it might be $100,000 to hire them, but you only need that kind of consulting when you have a problem – maybe six hours a week – so you hire that type of person and utilize them when you need them,” Butler said.
The interdependency is largely good for many business owners. The 2016 average wage for the sector was $73,494, nearly 50 percent greater than the average annual wage of $49,558 for all private-sector jobs in Rhode Island, according to the R.I. Department of Labor and Training.
But consulting work on balance is not a big-time employer, which begs the question: How good is the proliferation of these types of companies for the state’s economy?
“In some cases, the overall economic environment might increase. It might broaden the tax base with new companies and it might be bringing new employment to a new area,” Wheeler said. “But when companies are outsourcing, it’s reducing the workforce, which can put a strain on other safety-net systems, [such as] unemployment, and paying for health care for people out of work.”
[caption id="attachment_175257" align="alignleft" width="300"]
WHAT'S CHANGED, 2001-201: While the size of the employer community in Rhode Island hasn’t changed much in the last 16 years, the mix of establishments and types of jobs have shifted quite a bit. And that change could be shrinking the state’s workforce, as the firms that add fewer net new jobs on average are the ones starting at a faster pace than those that typically create more jobs. / SOURCES: R.I. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND TRAINING LABOR MARKET INFORMATION DIVISION, QUARTERLY CENSUS OF EMPLOYMENT AND WAGE PROGRAM, PBN RESEARCH[/caption]
STRUCTURAL UNEMPLOYMENT
Economic data shows each new professional-services establishment since 2001 has added, on average, 3.5 net new employees.
Administrative support and waste-management services – another sector of the economy comprising small, business-to-business firms – grew by 851 and employed on average 4.1 net new employees.
To compare, each new health care and social-assistance establishment employed on average 12 employees, and each new accommodation and food-services organization hired 17 employees during the same period.
Wheeler, whose background is in the study of human resources, said jobs added by some professional-services firms often fill jobs once held by in-house employees, meaning those positions are lost.
And because consultants often fill those responsibilities at more than one firm, there’s a net negative impact on the overall workforce known as “structural unemployment,” according to University of Rhode Island economist Leonard Lardaro.
“What’s best for the firm is not necessarily good for the workforce,” he said. “But this is what companies have to do to survive and flourish.”
Meanwhile, the hospitality, food-services and entertainment sectors have realized large gains in both employment and in the number of new establishments. The industries, albeit adding robust growth, typically pay employees lower wages, reflecting structural weakness in the overall Rhode Island economy.
As PBN reported in July, nearly 45 percent of all jobs added in Rhode Island since August 2009 had an annual average wage of $27,323. Part of that is indicative of the jobs that are available here, which – of course – reflects industries where workers are in demand. Since 2001, accommodation and food services have added 8,677 jobs to the state’s economy, marking one of the largest growths of any sector, and employed about 17.2 net new people, per new establishment.
[caption id="attachment_175258" align="aligncenter" width="640"]
SLOWER GROWTH OF WORKERS IN RHODE ISLAND THAN ACROSS U.S.: For more than a decade and a half, Rhode Island employment has grown at a slower pace than the rest of the country, raising questions about the overall strength of the Ocean State economy. / SOURCES: R.I. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND TRAINING LABOR MARKET INFORMATION DIVISION, QUARTERLY CENSUS OF EMPLOYMENT AND WAGE PROGRAM[/caption]
But the average annual wage was just $19,712.
“We’re seeing more growth of low-wage occupations than the high-wage occupations that we’re trying to attract,” said Grafton “Cap” Willey IV, managing director at the accounting firm CBIZ MHM in Providence.
Willey’s firm has offices in Providence and Boston. Working in both areas, he gets a clear glimpse at how different the two city’s economies look.
“We saw a big decline in new firms during the Great Recession, and we’ve seen some of that come back, so I’d say it’s improving,” Willey said. “But Boston is booming. I can’t say Providence is booming.”
Indeed, the state is trying to attract high-wage industries to the Ocean State, and has created a suite of incentives and tax breaks to lure them here. The state has thus far awarded millions, and there are signs of positive results.
But some business owners and others would like to see the state focus elsewhere.
“It’s problematic that the broader business community isn’t being helped while these large, new marquee businesses are,” said Kenneth J. “Ken” Block, owner of Warwick-based Simpatico Software Systems Inc. and a former Republican gubernatorial candidate. “I’d like to see the state not necessarily spend that money on existing businesses, but spend it on reducing some of the unnecessary challenges we as business owners face right now.”
Lardaro thinks the state could do a better job analyzing economic data tied to the economy.
“The state should be analyzing these things to the umpteenth time,” Lardaro said. “Do they do it? No. We don’t track stuff that we need to be tracking.”
The state disagrees, saying data is driving their overall strategy.
“Economies evolve, and by virtue of the way we’re built and structured here at Commerce … we’re able to adjust in real time as we see opportunities,” said Darin Early, president of R.I. Commerce Corp., an economic-development arm of state government.
Karl Wadensten, owner of the manufacturing company Vibco Inc., serves on Commerce’s board of directors. He has a unique view as both a business owner and in his role overseeing and consulting on state-funded deals. He believes the state is now using data to drive its economic-development strategy more so than in years past.
“The data that the governor has in hand from the think tanks [such as] Brookings and [others] … they’re getting more facts than any other administration,” he said.
RIGHT FOCUS?
The state has beefed up its economic-development team since Gov. Gina M. Raimondo took office in 2015.
The first-term governor quickly commissioned an economic report from the Brookings Institute’s Metropolitan Policy Program, which identified five “advanced industries,” including biomedical, technology, defense shipbuilding and maritime, business solutions and design, food and custom manufacturing.
Transportation, distribution and logistics, along with arts, education, hospitality and tourism were identified as “opportunity industries, which provide jobs that pay well for those without a four-year degree.”
The document has become a de facto blueprint for how Commerce has built its approach to economic development.
“It really helped us develop a strategy,” Early said.
The state subsequently budgeted millions to start spending on these strategies, which includes a host of workforce-development and incentive programs, such as the Qualified Job Incentive Tax Credit, a program designed to spur businesses to move jobs here or to grow jobs locally.
Thus far, 18 companies have promised to create or relocate 1,538 jobs to Rhode Island in the coming years. The median wage for those jobs, if created, range between a low of $33,500 and a high of $137,000.
[caption id="attachment_175256" align="aligncenter" width="640"]
GROWTH, BUT AT WHAT COST? The Qualified Jobs Incentive Tax Credit program, created under Gov. Gina M. Raimondo, has garnered a lot of attention for its big-money promises (cumulative $32.8 million), often to big-name companies. The program has helped lure companies here or helped local companies add jobs, which has heralded a mixture of praise and criticism from members of the state’s existing business community. Some businesses feel it unfairly tips the scales in favor of the out-of-state companies. Funding isn’t awarded until the jobs are created, but here’s a snapshot of the deals thus far, as of Sept. 7. (List is ordered by size of state award.) / Sources: R.I. Commerce Corp., PBN research[/caption]
Commerce has promised a cumulative $32.8 million to the participating companies, assuming the jobs are created and sustained, which includes big-name brands like GE Digital, Johnson and Johnson, and Virgin Pulse, along with smaller players such as Lexington Lighting Group, Whiting & Davis and Surplus Solutions.
Early said the program is designed “to create catalytic growth,” and is not meant to dissuade smaller businesses from applying.
But with a requirement to create a minimum of 10 new jobs, the tax break may not lure too many applications from firms with three or four employees, which represent the lion’s share of new companies that have been added to the economy during the last decade and a half.
Each of the companies that have qualified so far have promised to create at least 15 jobs (Whiting & Davis), and as many as 292 jobs (Virgin Pulse).
Nonetheless, the state – through the Brookings report – has also identified business services as “a significant industry strength in Rhode Island,” noting it’s growing at a faster clip than the nation and neighboring Massachusetts and Connecticut.
But the high cost of doing business in Rhode Island still leaves the state at a competitive disadvantage to other parts of the country.
“Rhode Island will need to offset the higher costs of doing business compared to other centers such as Atlanta and Dallas with a very positive value proposition of innovation and access to high-quality talent,” according to the report.
The state – mostly through Commerce – has other programs and services it offers to the business community, although few of them receive as much public attention as the large-dollar amounts promised in the form of incentives and tax breaks.
Early insists the state does focus on both luring new businesses and helping in-state businesses. And while it may seem like big-name companies are reaping the benefits of the state’s efforts, which Early insists is not the case, any influx of business could also help professional-service firms.
“When we bring in a large company, or help facilitate the growth of a large number of employees here in the state, it has an overflow impact on those smaller companies,” he said.
Block, who employs about a dozen people, however, sees too many regulations and unnecessary barriers for businesses.
“I have never positively felt the state’s touch and frankly I don’t expect it,” he said. “I’m not looking for a government handout. I’m not looking for a tax credit to keep doing what I’m doing. I’ve never done things that way. … What I am looking for is something to make the business environment better today.”
[caption id="attachment_175253" align="alignleft" width="300"]
STAYING COMPETITIVE: Donald R. Nokes, president and founder of NetCenergy, talks with April Pharr Elmore, telecommunications operations manager. The Cranston-based information technology services firm outsources non-IT services such as legal support, accounting and marketing. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
Nokes, whose company is built on outsourcing and who has also utilized it internally himself, sees it as one way for businesses to stay competitive, if not grow, in a challenging economic climate.
“For all the talk you hear from our legislature and executive branch about luring more business to Rhode Island, we continue to get assaulted by additional things like direct costs, additional regulations, or administrative [requirements]. When you outsource, you reduce all of those things,” Nokes said. “That’s a terrible thing to say because as a business owner your goals are to grow. But you have to provide good service at a good price.”
Eli Sherman is a PBN staff writer. Email him at Sherman@PBN.com, or follow him on Twitter @Eli_Sherman.
