Today, up to 90 percent of all U.S. companies contract staffing professionals. Business executives are increasingly entrusting the recruiting process to the subject matter experts who have a wealth of resources and contacts within the business and job seeker communities.

This trust brings with it an enormous responsibility, and one that the Kavaliro team takes very seriously.

When Mark Moore graduated from UCF, he entered the staffing industry because he felt it was a “dynamic arena based on relationship building.” Over the next few years, he honed his skills in New York City, learning how to establish and nurture such relationships.

“After all,” he believes, “you can’t be a good staffing executive if you don’t know how to work with people and gain their trust.”

One of Moore’s early experiences in the business taught him a valuable lesson he has never forgotten. While working for a woman-owned staffing agency headquartered in Detroit, Moore got to see first-hand what can happen when you treat employees with respect and empower them to reach their full potential.

“I had so much respect for her because it was never about personally benefiting from her employees’ hard work. It was a team effort, and her happiness and success were tied into the success of her employees.”

After spending several years enduring cold and gloomy New York winters, Moore, like many Floridians, began to feel homesick. As he yearned for warmth and sunshine, he learned some of his UCF friends had started their own staffing agency based in San Diego, and they were interested in getting him into the mix. When Moore came to Florida for a wedding, he ran into another college buddy, John Mahony, who was cutting his teeth in the staffing industry as an engineering and administrative staffing specialist. Mahony told Moore he also was contacted by their friends, who wanted to build a book of business in Florida. They took a few days to mull over their options and decided to accept the offer.

“My wife was pregnant, but I decided it was time to take the risk,” remembers Mahony. “We had a year to make it work before we both went broke, so we focused on getting one person hired at a time and eventually started to grow.”

Working out of the guest bedroom of Mahony’s house and conducting client interviews from a Burger King down the street, the two entrepreneurs eventually gained some momentum. They hired more staff, continued to do their homework, and threw their hats into government services staffing at the behest of a friend familiar with the industry. It paid off; by its third year the Central Florida operation was generating huge profits.

While Mahony and Moore focused on sales and client service, Mahony’s wife, Diane Symes-Mahony, took over all the administrative, finance and accounting duties in order to keep the company running on all cylinders. One could say that while Mahony and Moore were rowing, Diane was steering the ship. Symes-Mahony also took the lead in community outreach endeavors, getting involved in charity events and establishing the company in the Central Florida community as a smart, savvy, civic-minded organization.

Bill Peppler, another friend and UCF alumnus, came on board to help with sales and operations in the Southeast Region after working for several years in Seattle, Orlando and San Diego recruiting and staffing technology and financial consultants for companies such as Microsoft, Amazon.com and Boeing. Peppler’s commercial experience complemented Moore and Mahony’s government staffing acumen perfectly, yet a void existed in their professional lives.

Once again, using the motto “no risk, no reward” as their mantra, Moore, Mahony, Symes-Mahony and now Peppler decided to leave a comfortable situation in exchange for the chance to grow and nurture something they could call their own. After constructing a savvy business plan and agreeing on a mutually beneficial buyout with their other business associates, they were ready to move forward with their brainchild.

Like the Esperanto language from which the name is derived, Kavaliro is an innovative company that fosters hope and understanding. Kavaliro represents an extension of a vision shared by a group of seasoned staffing professionals who have developed strong relationships in the industry and who recognize that true strength comes from a collaborative and open-minded environment where employees, clients, candidates and consultants are all supported and empowered to succeed.