Roxanne Ramirez

I attribute my success to hard work and not giving up. You have to hire the best people you can hire at that time, and I say that because if a person does not want to stay with the company, they're gonna leave. But if you make your company a place where employees feel comfortable, they will stay. We actually had an open-door policy - not just saying it, but really living it. I had a young engineer who would walk into my office every six to ten months asking for a pay raise, and we would negotiate and give it to him because he was really good. We have built a company culture that employees feel comfortable with, and because of that, I have employees that have been with us since the beginning. I had one young man who was offered a lot more money by another company, and when I asked him later why he stayed, he said it was because no other company would invite him to their house on Thanksgiving or to a family gathering like our daughter's quinceañera and make him feel part of a family. He's still with us and is actually one of my directors now. We have people who have left and then come back because of the culture we have built. We treat our employees and pay them what they deserve, and they're comfortable with it. That's part of our company - we have built a culture that is stable, and they like it.

The best career advice I have ever received is just don't give up. If it's something you really want, and it's something you feel strongly about, doesn't matter what it is, don't give up. I mean, you don't have to be ugly about it, but just stand up for yourself.

Learn everything you can about the industry you're going into. And I'm talking everything. I'm talking about answering the phone, calling to see if that person that you're going to interview for the job is really gonna fit your company. You know, being fair. Don't give up, definitely. Don't ever give up. Be very involved. Because there are some leaders in some companies that have people doing work, yes, you have an HR department, fine, but you better know what that HR department is doing. Don't just sit back and depend on them to do it. Be aware of what - be aware of your surroundings. If you're gonna go into this business, into a field of just either owning a business or working for a business, be aware of your surroundings and just don't give up.

The biggest challenge is getting those contracts assigned to small companies. And I'm just speaking for every small company, not just us. The challenge is just getting those contracts awarded to companies like myself. You know, they oversee what we can do and they go to the bigger companies, like I mentioned. It's not fair, but it's there, and I don't think it's ever going to go away. They try to tell you, oh yes, we do focus on small companies, but that's not true. That's not 51% of the truth. That's not there. And I've been around long enough, and been in different situations where I know that small companies do not get what they deserve as far as work.

Treating everybody respectfully and making sure that they know that they are cared for are my most important values at work. In my personal life, it's the fact that the three of us - the family - has gotten so much closer. We're close, but putting the three of us, Mr. Ramirez the founder, my son Freddie as CEO, and myself, putting us three in that triangle has given me strength to not say, hey, you know, it's time to sell, or I'm just not gonna bother knowing anything about the company. I think what I'm trying to say is it's more of finding the strength in yourself to keep going, and looking what's there, and treating your employees the right way. We started sending birthday cards with gift cards to employees when I got into the company, and we're still doing that after all these years. I get emails from some employees that say thank you, and that to me is, again, part of the culture we've developed and we've kept going.