When Stacey Azevedo
started her blue-collar
employment agency five years
ago, one of her chief goals
was to pay workers a fair
wage, whether they had few
skills or were at the top of
their trades.
"To get out there and dig
trenches all day for minimum
wage is hard," she says. "I
wanted to pay people more."
Treating people well is a
theme that runs through
Azevedo's business, A Spear
Workforce in Reno, and her
life.
The agency places workers
in heavy industrial and construction
jobs and is certified
to teach courses in traffic
control and provide traffic
safety crews for road construction
projects. It employs
a wide spectrum from top
trades people who go on to
supervise construction projects
to folks who need quick
jobs to buy bus tickets home.
Azevedo started the business
after opening and managing
offices for another daylabor
employment agency in
California and then Reno. A
Spear Workforce opens each
morning at 6 in a modest
building just south of the railroad
tracks on Keystone
Avenue. People who want
jobs sign in and wait while
the office staff screens applicants
and dispatches them to
jobs as calls from employers
come in.
The agency draws on a
huge skill base, occasionally
recruiting tradespeople from
other states. In some cases, it
also works with people who
are down on their luck. As
long as they are employable,
Azevedo's company will do
what it takes to find them
jobs, including giving them
rides to work or even buying
them shoes.
The agency, for instance,
works with local law enforcement
officials, who refer visitors
who have lost all their
money at local casinos and
can't afford transportation
home. Azevedo's company
helps put the qualified candidates
to work so they can earn
enough to buy bus tickets.
"A lot of people who are at
the bottom of their lives are
really good people," she says.
Azevedo won't put up with
a job can-didate with a bad
attitude, but she also insists
that her workers are treated
well. "If you're a mother, you
get it. You've got to have a
sense of compassion and a
sense of firmness."
Azevedo's business philosophy
is to deal with customers
and employees honestly
and treat others the way
she'd want to be treated. She
says she tells customers, "I
can't guarantee there won't
ever be a problem, but I can
guarantee I'll fix it."
"She has never failed us,"
says Dena Cross, administrative
manager at Cantex Inc., a
local company that makes
PVC pipe. Cantex, a 24/7
operation, has to be able to
reach an employment agency
at any time, and Azevedo
always responds right away
with a cheerful, can-do attitude,
Cross says, even if she's
just been awakened at 3 a.m.
"She just really cares."
Azevedo
doesn't shy
away from
tough challenges.
As a
young
woman in
her 20s, she
drove a bus
in South
Central Los Angeles. After her
husband died in 1989 leaving
her with a son to raise alone,
she helped build freeway
bridges as an iron worker. And
after she married again, this
time to a rancher, and moved to
northern California, she learned
how to handle bulls.
Still, starting her own business,
she says, was terrifying.
She financed it with a $15,000
loan from a friend and the
$30,000 sale of cattle from the
ranch. She says encouragement
from her husband, Manuel, and
friend Vince Merkley were
priceless. She also credits her
office manager, Robi
McMordie, and staff.
The business became profitable
quickly, and annual revenues
are now at $1.5 million.
But Azevedo faces steep challenges
in the tough economy.
After Sept. 11, some of her
customers
went
bankrupt.
Then her
insurance
company
stopped
insuring
temporary
employment
agencies, and her business
had to get expensive high-risk
insurance, even though the
agency had an excellent safety
record. That squeezed margins
even tighter, but Azevedo doesn't
want to pass on the costs to
customers or cut workers' pay.
Outside the business,
Azevedo helps raise money for
the National Association of
Women in Construction scholarship
fund, various food drives
and Kids & Horses, a local
ranch providing rehabilitation
therapy to physically and mentally
challenged children and
young adults. She and her husband
also prepare and provide a
Thanksgiving dinner for hundreds
of the employment
agency workers. And on top of
everything else, she is raising
her baby granddaughter,
Corynn.
"She works so hard, and
she's so caring," says Laura
Staszewski, owner of Mr.
Electric of Reno and a fellow
member of the Association of
Women in Construction.
"Whenever anybody needs her,
she's there. She never says she
cannot do something. She
makes the time for it."
