John Chuang Does Things Differently
By: Luanne Crayton

John Chuang’s career in the staffing industry started with his first job in high school. He worked as a temporary employee in the collections department of a bank, calling homeowners whose mortgages were in arrears, right before the bank foreclosed on their loans.

“That was a tough assignment and an incredibly eye-opening experience,” says the CEO and cofounder of Aquent, headquartered in Boston.

A Global Vision
A few years later, as an undergraduate at Harvard University, Chuang started a desktop publishing service with two other students. They typeset term papers and resumes in their dorm.

“From the beginning, we were determined to be global,” Chuang says. “We had a sign on our dorm room that read ‘Worldwide Headquarters,’” The sign would prove to be prophetic.

Soon the three young entrepreneurs moved to retail space at Harvard Square and set up computers for their customers to use. They became known as experts in desktop publishing, and “people started asking us to go to their sites,” Chuang says.

Thus began a temporary staffing company called MacTemps. Its specialty: desktop publishing with Macintosh computers.

“Most businesses were using PCs, which at that time were DOS based,” Chuang says. “The Mac, with its graphical interface and mouse, was unique, and general staffing companies could not fill the niche for workers proficient with Macs.” A single advertisement, and business boomed. “We ran a $60 ad in a Boston computer publication,” Chuang says, “and our phones rang off the hook.”

Within three months, they opened offices in New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. Next came an office in London. Today, 15 years later, the $200 million company has 58 offices in 12 countries.

And now the company is called Aquent, which means “not a follower.”

“John is a very gifted visionary,” says Aquent co-founder and executive Mia Wenjen. “He likes a challenge and to be continually learning. And he is willing to take risks as a way to learn and to continue to develop the company.”

Innovative Thinking
Chuang, who was appointed to the American Staffing Association board of directors in 2001, is passionate about new experiences and trying new things. For his business, that means innovating and doing things differently.

“John is a creative thinker. Ideas come to him faster than he can try them out,” says Wenjen. “I think he views the company as a blank canvas,” she adds. “And when things don’t work, he doesn’t see it as a failure, he sees it as a learning opportunity. And that’s the reason Aquent is so successful.”

They call their company a talent agency - one that represents professionals in such creative fields as graphic design, writing, illustration, and Web design.

And to give the ideas plenty of room to flow, there are no offices at Aquent, not even for the CEO. Chuang says he is proud of the company’s innovations. “We were one of the first to introduce benefits for our talent - a matching 401(k) plan, paid health benefits. Now we have a comprehensive plan.”

For his life outside the business, Chuang’s passion for new things includes places, food, and music. Two of his favorite places are Kyoto, Japan, and Memphis. Kyoto because it is “intriguing and beautiful” with its shrines, temples, and zen culture. And Memphis because of its “awesome atmosphere, food, and music” - especially on historic Beale Street, known as the birthplace of the blues.

A Trend Spotter
“John works hard to stay on top of trends in the world, not just in business,” Wenjen says. “And he reads. He probably reads every business publication out there. He is amazingly on top of trends that do not necessarily affect our industry.”

As for trends that do affect the staffing industry, Chuang sees a rise of firms that are more like professional service firms, as well as some consolidation. “The industry will be segmented into very large players that compete on price, strong local companies that have geographic or focus-based inches, and not much in between,” he predicts.

During his career, Chuang says the industry has become “more sophisticated, talented, and diverse, with many different companies in all sorts of niches.

“But what’s interesting is how it hasn’t changed,” he notes. ‘It’s still fighting the notion that it provides low value-added services. “We should resist competing on price,” Chuang advises. “A lot of professional services don’t compete on price - health-care providers and the Big Five accounting firms, for example. “We should compete on quality and service. That would push us to deliver high quality, which would expand the industry.

“And we should pay more attention to legislative issues and the context in which we operate,” he says. “We tend to focus on the micro level - our own business. But the macro level is extremely important, and we should spend more time, attention, and money on it.”

Just Warming Up
Chuang sees his greatest success in little things such as “just having the confidence to do things independently -to think on my own and trust my decisions. When that happened it opened a lot of doors for me.”

Doors all over the world have opened for Chuang and his partners. But they’re not finished yet. Chuang sees the future of Aquent as a “Talent agency for various professional services - a new type of consulting service, but with a proposition that is much more attractive than that of a consulting firm, ad agency, or design firm.”

“We have a long way to go,” he says. “We’re just getting started.