Gabbert's consulting firm grows to $5 million in 5 years

In 1999, Jo Anne Gabbert founded Adams-Gabbert & Associates with just one employee and $5,000 of her own money.

Now the consulting firm, based in Lee's Summit, Mo., has 26 employees and a net worth of $5 million. The company was named one of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce's Top 10 Small Businesses of the Year in 2003.

Previously Gabbert worked at SBC Communications and most recently at Ernst & Young. While at Ernst & Young, Gabbert spent most of her time at Sprint, leading teams in business improvement and information technology projects for numerous divisions in the company.

Gabbert, whose maiden name is Adams, left Ernst & Young to create Adams-Gabbert, because "I wanted to have a work-life balance for myself and create work-life balance for others," she said.

To achieve that balance, Adams-Gabbert's employees do not travel. The firm's clients, which include Sprint, H & R Block and United Missouri Bank, are all local.

Gabbert also allows employees to have a flexible work schedule, with some working three or four days a week, including several members of the executive management team.

She said she founded her company on four core values: balance, commitment, professionalism and quality. Adams-Gabbert provides telecommunications and sales and marketing consulting services, as well as risk management and change management consulting. The firm also manages projects for its clients, which range from Fortune 500 companies to small midmarket businesses.

Gabbert attributes her success to good business practices and "being able to hire the most wonderful people," she said.

That's why, she said, the company's new logo states: "Right People and Right Solutions."