CEOs drum up high-tech business

LINCOLN — Tom Gallaway grew up in Nebraska's windswept Sand Hills, on a cattle ranch outside Bassett.

But like many young people in the Cornhusker State, he moved away for the bright lights — and opportunities — of the big city.

He now lives among the palm trees of Orange County, Calif. He and his wife, Lezlie, operate businesses in 13 states. One, Technologent, helps Fortune 1000 companies maximize technology. The other, Your Selling Team, is a call center business.

But even from his West Coast base, he's still working for his home state.

Gallaway is among a handful of CEOs with Nebraska ties who, for little or no pay, are helping lure good-paying, high-tech jobs here.

Their backgrounds give them inside contacts that help identify companies looking to relocate to a more business-friendly climate.

These part-time job hounds help the state's business recruiters make their pitch about Nebraska's hard-working, dependable work force and, most importantly, provide testimonials about doing business on the “silicon prairie.”

Just recently, the 46-year-old Gallaway provided a key assist in helping lure a California-based high-tech loan management company to Grand Island. Structured Solutions Inc. plans to provide 200 jobs, with more than 50 of them paying $45,000 to $90,000 each for engineers and managers.

Both Gallaway and Jennifer Zhang, a Shanghai-born Omaha business owner who prospects for Chinese companies, said Nebraska — and particularly Omaha — are on the verge of landing significant new jobs.

“Now is the best time in the world to go after some of these companies,” Gallaway said in a phone interview. “When times are difficult, companies want to cut (expenses) to survive.

“I'm not overexaggerating. I think there's another dozen companies they should go after” in California, he said.

Though it's not a new concept to use owners or presidents of Nebraska businesses for recruiting, those with high-tech backgrounds are now playing a key role in helping establish the state as a place for high-tech companies and jobs that can help keep talented young people from moving away.

“Our kids are going to compete in a knowledge-based, technology-driven, global, free-market economy,” said Gov. Dave Heineman. “We want those jobs here.”

These high-tech assistants are a high-octane version of the Nebraska Diplomats, a group of about 400 business leaders who help the Nebraska Department of Economic Development and local chambers of commerce recruit companies.

But CEO-types such as Gallaway and Ryan Downs, a Hershey, Neb., native and a recently retired PayPal executive, bring a higher level of contacts and knowledge to the economic development table. They not only learn of prospects within their business circle, they also know whom to call to open doors for Nebraska recruiters, including Heineman and his lieutenant governor, Rick Sheehy.

Richard Baier, the state's economic development director, said a recent phone call by Downs got state officials a meeting with executives of a Silicon Valley high-tech company — a meeting that wouldn't have happened otherwise.

CEOs such as Gallaway and Downs can discuss the “numbers” that other CEOs consider in relocating a business division. They also can provide testimonials about the high productivity of Nebraska workers.

“They know the industry, they know the players, they know the technical lingo and they can speak from their perspective,” Baier said. “We're really fortunate to have these kinds of friends helping our state.”

Downs, 40, who lives near Springfield, was PayPal's senior vice president for worldwide operations. State officials became acquainted with him when Pay- Pal opened its La Vista facility — and became more acquainted as the company expanded to more than 3,000 employees.

Gallaway came onto the state's radar as he located businesses in Ainsworth, Neb., in 2003 and later in Chadron, with the help of state business incentives.

Downs said he's concerned about the state's future and its need to create innovative, entrepreneurial jobs that will keep young people here. So when state officials asked him to go on a recent recruiting trip to California, he jumped at the chance.

“I'm a real believer in what the state has to offer,” said Downs, who was reimbursed for his expenses. “I really do care where this state goes in the future, and if I don't invest the time, who's going to do it?”

He can tell a real-life story to prospects: how PayPal came to locate in Nebraska and how, over the years, it kept choosing the state for expansion over other states.

“I give them an honest view. I tell them where Nebraska might not be the best but also tell them where Nebraska has advantages,” Downs said. “They know I'm going to be very truthful.”

Among Nebraska's advantages, Downs and Gallaway said, are less government red tape and regulation, cheaper power, competitive tax incentives and a reliable, educated work force that will work for less than employees on the coasts.

“They'll drive in tractors to get to work if they're snowed in,” Gallaway said of his employees at Ainsworth and Chadron. “It's an unbelievable work ethic. You can't find that everywhere.”

Zhang, 37, owns a company that imports roofing nails from China, where her father, Longen, is a longtime government official and her brother, Qing, is an entrepreneur. Zhang said she fell in love with Nebraska and its lifestyle and now wants to sell that passion to others.

Her father and brother have helped her arrange meetings between Chinese business owners and Nebraska officials during a 2007 trade mission to China and a “reverse trade mission” held here in 2008. Zhang has also helped Nebraska businesses open offices in Shanghai.

She worked for two years as a volunteer interpreter and business prospector until state officials offered her a part-time job last year. Her title: “representative for State of Nebraska to China.”

“When I start contacting people, they don't even know where Nebraska is,” she said. “They say, ‘Alaska?' ”

But now, Zhang said, these business prospects know the state and have met the governor. There's a level of trust and a recognition that Nebraska officials care, she said.

“There's no easy way to get into the China market,” said Baier, the state economic developer. “She gives us more credibility than anything we've done there.”

The governor said he makes it a point to personally call the business prospects or to personally meet them. Companies, he said, take note of such attention, which they might not get from other states.

“This is still a people business,” Heineman said.

Zhang said that China is offering incentives for its companies to open offices in North America, and that Nebraska is on the verge of landing a couple of them.

Gallaway said Omaha is “close” to landing 500 to 2,000 jobs from two California companies looking to locate branches here.

Heineman, who called California “a target-rich opportunity,” said he expects some announcements this year. “We're working on them,” he said.

These part-time, mostly volunteer business recruiters, Heineman said, exemplify a unique loyalty he sees in a lot of Nebraskans. Even if they've lived in Texas or California for years, he said, if you ask them where they're from, they'll say “Nebraska.”

For his part, Gallaway, who is an unpaid volunteer, said Nebraska “has been good to me, and I try to be good back to it.”

He and his family still spend considerable time during the summers at a ranch he bought near Valentine. It's easy, Gallaway said, to sing the praises of a state that still values hard work and integrity and where, if you want to, you can still get out of cell-phone range.

“I try to help any way I possibly can,” he said. “I think they ought to use me more.”

Contact the writer:

402-473-9584, paul.hammel@owh.com

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