Financial Executives of the Year by Business Examiner Media

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2 | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | www.BusinessExaminer.com | May 13, 2013

A good financial executive sees beyond the numbers. And we’re happy to celebrate the region’s best. Congratulations to all the nominees for the Business Examiner’s Financial Executives of the Year awards. Your vision, dedication, and stewardship are greatly appreciated.

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May 13, 2013 | www.BusinessExaminer.com | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | 3

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Chief financial executives are expected to protect and promote the fiscal well-being of their organizations. And as we emerge from a down economy, their wisdom and guidance is more critical than ever when setting strategy for sustainable success. Key bankers seek to understand, advise, and help companies finance growth. And we are most effective when partnering with leaders who learn from where theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve been, focus on the future, chart a course, and step firmly on the accelerator while seeking expert advice for navigating roadblocks and detours. Financial executives and bankers make great partners. Please join me in congratulating this yearâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s honorees.

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Categories Private Companies Small (under $5 million annual revenue) Mid-Size & Large ($5 million and more annual revenue) Not-for-Profit Organization Government Organization

Behind the scenes of every successful business or other organization is a financial executive who helped the company get there. While these key persons rarely get the proper recognition they deserve, our Financial Executives of the Year program does just that. From small nonprofit groups to large private companies throughout the South Sound, this event is the opportunity to truly salute the significant ways that key financial executives help to bring success to their organizations and to our communities as a whole.

4 | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | www.BusinessExaminer.com | May 13, 2013

Private Companies Small

(under $5 million annual revenue)

Hans Stoker

CodeSmart Inc.

CodeSmart’s Hans Stoker, now in his sixth year with the Lacey-based information systems company, clearly has the respect and admiration of the company’s president, Mark Meyer. “Hans has been instrumental in setting up CodeSmart financial systems and reporting,” Meyer said, “continually evolving the systems and reporting as the company grows (and) always anticipating future needs without over-engineering for the need.”

He’s certainly got the respect and admiration of CodeSmart’s CEO, Chad Stoker — and not just because Hans is Chad’s dear old dad. Hans has helped build CodeSmart into a company with an annual gross revenue of $4.7 million.

And building firms is something he knows a lot about; he’s the former principal of his own company, having founded Puget Sound Systems Group before successfully selling the business to a multi-national firm. All in all, Hans boasts a 30-year career that has spanned everything from software development to corporate management. Nowadays, he’s a big part of the CodeSmart team — and someone who Meyer credits in large part for much of the company’s growth over the last six years. “He is a valued member of the executive team,” said Meyer, “always pushing

forward with strategic thinking, which has allowed for CodeSmart to generate large growth year over year since 2007. “It is through his financial oversight that, even today, CodeSmart has not needed to use outside financing or long term leverages that most other technology companies resort to fuel their growth.” As a principal at CodeSmart, his work isn’t restricted to the financial realm, either. According to the company’s website, Hans’ role in the firm also encompasses project management, application design and software performance testing. As if that weren’t enough, Hans is very active outside the CodeSmart umbrella as well. He is an active member and the current board chairman of the Freedom Foundation. He’s also active in his church, First Baptist Church of Olympia. He’s also on the board of directors of the Olympia ChildCare Center and has served on the board of the Family Support Center for a decade, with four of those years spent as treasurer.

May 13, 2013 | www.BusinessExaminer.com | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | 5

Private Companies

Mid-Size & Large

($5 million and more annual revenue)

When the Great Recession hit, Gig Harbor staffing company LaborWorks found itself needing to reevaluate, reprioritize and reconfigure its finances. Fortunately, the firm had Albert Bacon on the job. “Al was very instrumental in doing a total restructuring of the firm during the economic downturn that we began experiencing in 2008,” said LaborWorks CEO Scott Sabo. “Through branch consolidations, cost cutting, technology improvements, improved training systems, and revamped marketing, LaborWorks is in its strongest financial position in its history. This could not have been achieved without Al’s talents and leadership.” The 50-year-old Bacon, whose strong resume began as a sales representative with Westvaco Paper in 1985, led a variety of initiatives to trim LaborWorks’ costs in 2008 and 2009. The company lowered its branch count from 15 to eight, transferring business to nearby branches as leases expired. The result was fewer, but larger and more profitable locations for the firm. Bacon also led the effort in renegotiating vendor contracts and rental rates.

Albert Bacon LaborWorks

Sabo also credits Bacon for helping LaborWorks embrace new technology and practices to run the business more efficiently. “All of our computer operations were moved to cloud-based centers, resulting in substantial cost and time savings,” he said. “We developed a training department to better educate and bring up to speed our new full-time hires, resulting in fewer mistakes and better customer service. ... Work comp policies were strengthened and temp employee screening processes were made more stringent, resulting in fewer injured employees as well as substantially

reducing our premiums to L&I.” With the worst behind it, LaborWorks is now poised to take advantage of the rebounding economy and, according to Sabo, is seeing record revenues while doing so. The company has almost doubled its revenues over a two-year period, netting $21.8 million in 2012 compared to $12.5 million in 2010. The firm is now also back to 10 open locations — in large part thanks to Bacon’s efforts. “Al was able to help us negotiate a substantial increase in our line of credit allowing new expansion into Reno and the Oregon markets,” Sabo said. Outside of LaborWorks, Bacon acts as chairman of the board for the Emergency Food Network and a member of the American Staffing Association Industry Section Council, and, on a personal note, is hoping to reach Mount Rainier’s summit with his son in the fall.

6 | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | www.BusinessExaminer.com | May 13, 2013

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May 13, 2013 | www.BusinessExaminer.com | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | 7

Not-for-Profit Organization

Associated Ministries of Tacoma/ Pierce County’s nonprofit work is broad and far-reaching: The group provides a spectrum of more than 25 programs and services to improve the lives of people living on the margins of the region’s society, from serving as a central point of contact for homeless residents of the county to distributing government funding to other community organizations. It stands to reason, then, that the todo list for Molly Archer, the nonprofit’s director of finance, is equally as lengthy and diverse. “Molly came to an organization whose financial office was struggling to keep up with GAAP, FASB, and other accounting procedures, while also transitioning to include finance, HR, and facilities,” said Chris Morton, Associated Ministries’ executive director, upon nominating Archer for the award. Put that way, it seems like a daunting challenge. Archer, however, was more than up to the task, Morton said. “With Molly’s dedication and knowledge,” according to Morton, “she has

Molly Archer

helped the organization transition to accrual accounting; (use) employee time cards, and then fully automate the time cards so that (they are) integrated with the new accounting software; transition to QuickBooks for Nonprofits; complete a salary survey; develop job categories with equitable pay ranges; develop a budgeting process that engages all cost center managers in proposing and editing respective cost center budgets; (and) reduce costs by more than $50,000 in 2012 during a very difficult year for Associated Ministries.”

Associated Ministries of Tacoma/Pierce County

Under Archer’s guidance, Morton continued, the group significantly increased indirect program fees from $100,000 in 2009 to nearly $400,000 in 2013, and managed its $650,000 building renovation project in 2013 so that it came in under cost by more than $20,000.

Archer has years of experience behind her to aid in deftly navigating the waters of nonprofit accounting. Prior to joining Associated Ministries, she spent four years as financial manager and CFO of Common Ground, a nonprofit housing developer in Seattle, and seven years as business manager and CFO of Holden Village, an ecumenical retreat center in the Cascades. Archer is also actively engaged in the community, as well. She actively serves on the boards of the Pierce County Affordable Housing Consortium, Tacoma Food Co-Op, and the Greenwald Guild.

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Government Organization

The landscape of the last few years has not been particularly kind to educational institutions, and Tacoma Community College hasn’t been immune to the uncertainty. “Over the last five years, the College has experienced drastic budget reductions requiring changes in programming, staffing, and operations,” said TCC President Pamela Transue. “This took place at a time of record student demand.” Fortunately for the school, a steady hand was there to guide the school’s finances, in the form of Vice President for Administrative Services Silvia Barajas. Barajas boasts a long record of service to education, starting as a financial aid administrative analyst and admission records assistant with the University of California-Irvine in October of 1983. She continued to hone her craft at Golden State schools like the California State University in Long Beach, Sonoma State University, and Santa Ana College, before she headed north to join the University of Washington as

Silvia Barajas

Tacoma Community College

director of finance and administration in August 2004. In October 2009, she became part of the team at Tacoma Community College, and the school has been the beneficiary of her talents ever since. Barajas oversees a management team of seven, as well as staff members in the bookstore, early learning center, corporate education, financial services, food services, human resources, maintenance grounds and capital projects. She is the school’s chief negotiator for faculty contracts, she chairs the college budget

committee, and she serves on the College Foundation Finance Committee. Through all of Barajas’ myriad duties, according to Transue, she has helped keep Tacoma Community College headed in the right direction.

“By managing resources conservatively, building a strong reserve, and using our reserves to buy time to make meaningful and judicious reductions, we weathered the difficulties very well, tending to core programs and refusing to sacrifice quality. Silvia was a leader in this effort,” she said. Outside of the college, Barajas gives her time to several organizations. She is on the board of United Way of Pierce County, and is active in the Business Officers Commission. She also serves as a resource to several Hispanic organizations in the community.

May 13, 2013 | www.BusinessExaminer.com | 2013 Financial Executives of the Year | 9

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