2022 Arkansas Woman-Owned Small Business of the Year: Career Staffing Services, Inc.

The primary goal of both employers and employees is to select candidates that are appropriate for and can bring success for all involved parties. Every prospective employee provides a unique set of skills, abilities, and job requirements to add value to a business. Beverly Smith and her husband co-founded Career Staffing Services Inc. in February 2000 with the assistance of an SBA 7a Loan to help connect employees to employers and create positive outcomes that result in their common objectives.

Connecting people and finding creative solutions to problems energizes Beverly. With nearly 27 years of experience working closely with businesses to develop and maintain their workforce, she is a valuable resource for the Central Arkansas community.

Beverly is an active member in the community during her free time, contributing money, time and resources to multiple organizations in Central Arkansas, serving as the Vice Chair for the Little Rock Workforce Development Board, and is the Vice President of Administration for the Central Arkansas Human Resources Association (CAHRA).

For the five years preceding the pandemic, changes in management and low margins negatively affected Career Staffing Services. The Paycheck Protection Program that the SBA offered to help small businesses retain employees changed this downward trajectory and allowed them to put more people to work in 2020 and 2021. After participating in the SBA’s Emerging Leaders Program and receiving assistance from SBA Resource Partner: Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center, Beverly further increased their margins, paid off debt, and increased their profits to above $300,000 in 2021 while maintaining six employees.