Tamara Dawn

I attribute my success to passion and drive, and the mindset that failure isn't an option. If my name is behind something, I want it to be good and full of integrity. One of my most notable accomplishments is building a company with only 7 months of reserves in my savings account as a single mom, and growing it into a multi-million dollar organization in 5 years. After I had children, that drive became even stronger because I wanted them to see that I was somebody who was courageous, and I wanted a strong legacy to be remembered by. I've always believed in remaining extremely humble and being a very giving person. I'm the first person at the stoplight handing out whatever cash I have to someone in need because they need it more than I do. I've always taught my children that if you have the means to give to people who need more than you do, you do it. Even after experiencing tragedy - I lost my daughter to fentanyl four years ago - I kept going. My younger daughter told me that my personal perseverance alone is something people need to hear about, because I do it every day even while suffering. You can overcome tragedy, you can overcome abuse, you can overcome so much in life, but you have to do it - it starts with you.

The best career advice comes from Wayne Gretzky's quote: you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. There's so much meaning behind that because it's absolutely true. There are so many people who have all these great ideas but they don't have the confidence to put them forth, and I feel like that's a real unfortunate circumstance. If you don't try, you're never going to know if you were going to succeed at that or not. And failure is fine - don't be afraid of failure. It's one step toward success. Steve Jobs always used to say that if you love what you do, you won't work a day in your life. Find something that you're passionate about, because that is when good work comes - that's when good work is done, when you're really enjoying what you do. Those two sayings are what I say to myself constantly and what I say to my daughter all the time. If you want to try something, you need to try that. You need to do that. If you fail at it, that's okay. You're going to learn, and you're going to be like, okay, why did I fail at that? Learn from it and try to grow.

I would encourage young women entering this industry to follow their passion with confidence and determination. Take chances, embrace new opportunities, and never let the fear of failure hold you back, because some of the greatest growth comes from stepping outside your comfort zone. Surround yourself with motivated, supportive people who inspire you to keep learning and pushing forward. Most importantly, never allow others to define your limitations or tell you what you cannot achieve. Believe in your abilities, stay resilient, and continue pursuing your goals with purpose and passion.

My biggest challenge as a staffing firm is actually internal recruiting competition. Clients aren't fully educated on why they can't drive projects to fruition - it's because of talent shortage, but they don't understand talent shortage. One of our biggest challenges is trying to overcome barriers with internal recruiting departments and helping them understand that it's actually not a talent shortage. There are people out here for your jobs, but perhaps the way you're going around trying to find that talent isn't working, or you need to re-engage partners like Velocity to help move those projects forward. Our biggest challenge as an organization is encouraging and getting internal recruiting departments on board with getting the support that they need. I'm always staying in tune with market trends throughout my day, doing a lot of research and development about what's coming down the pike. I'm constantly building relationships through conferences and being in the industry for a long time, coupled with what's going on in the news and what manufacturing plants are going up. If data centers are the next thing, I look into how they're going to power the data centers - okay, great, they're going to start building these types of power plants to power the data centers. You have to be a few steps ahead.

Work ethic and ethics are always something important in a professional or personal setting. Integrity is what you do when no one is looking, and I think that people need to carry that on both a professional and a personal basis. You really just always gotta do the right thing. I really just feel like that's what it is - having that work ethic and understanding that even though nobody is looking, you know, doing the right thing, you have to keep a clear conscience. I think that's just something that is so important, and that is an amazing rule of thumb to live by. Integrity is what you do when no one is looking.