byline: Sydney Lake

When employees join Dynamis Inc., they gain a new family.

“We’re very supportive of each other,” Dynamis Recruiter Macaya Yao says. “I find that I’m really able to go to anyone in the company and ask for help and they’re willing to jump in and help out with whatever it is.”

This familial vibe, an open-door atmosphere and educational benefits are what makes the Fairfax-based government contractor different, say its employees — who call themselves  “Dynamites.”

The company’s founders, CEO John Milam and John Braun, president and chairman of the board, frequent the Fairfax headquarters and offer employees an open-door policy to voice their concerns, questions and ideas, Yao says.

“I feel like you don’t see that in a lot of companies,” Yao says. “You can go up to anyone in upper management and be able to have a conversation and get their input on anything.”

Due to the nature of Dynamis’ work providing management system and incident response software for clients such as the U.S. departments of Defense and Homeland Security, some employees work offsite. Dynamis’ cultural emphasis on continuing education, however, bridges the gap between headquarters employees and offsite employees in Arlington and Washington, D.C.

Each month, Dynamis hosts its “School of Athens,” an after-hours training for all employees covering topics such as leadership, emergency preparedness, investments, understanding a 401(k) plan and even how to book a vacation and get a good deal, says Human Resources Manager Monica Ani-Adjei. These sessions also serve as time for headquarters employees to socialize with offsite workers whom they don’t see as frequently, Administrative Coordinator Jaime Henry says.

Aside from these monthly educational sessions, Dynamis offers an annual stipend of $3,000 to Dynamites to pursue graduate degrees or other trainings and certifications.

An interest in continued education is something Dynamis seeks when hiring new employees, Yao says.

“Dynamites are supposed to be warriors — thinking warriors,” Yao says. “People of action. People with highly developed skills and experience.”

The educational stipend is just one of the benefits offered to employees that makes Dynamis different. The company absorbs 70% of the cost of employee benefits, Ani-Adjei says. Employees are 100% covered for medical, health, dental, long-term and short-term disability insurance, and are also offered up to a 4% contribution match on their 401(k) funds. 

Employees receive floating holidays and parental leave, have the option for a flexible spending account to help pay for certain out-of-pocket health care costs and can be reimbursed for commuter costs and even Dynamis-branded apparel.

Managers are also allotted “employee morale funds” — money set aside to encourage managers to spend time with their direct reports for rapport-building activities such as going out to breakfast or happy hours or treating their workers with gift cards. This helps to keep all employees connected, Ani-Adjei says.

The company’s initiatives foster a “work well, play well” mentality, Yao says. As opposed to the colloquial “work hard, play hard” mentality held by many companies, Dynamis focuses more on how employees work together.

Although employees come from varied backgrounds, including intelligence, science, politics, writing, policy and administration, they come together for initiatives such as a recent six-week fitness challenge.

“It makes you feel like you’re a part of something big,” Henry says. “The concept is we’re all Dynamites. You’ll always remember your experience being  a Dynamite.”

Return to main story.

The camaraderie that makes Accounting Principals different is evident on an employee’s first day as they’re greeted by a desk decorated with bright, colorful signs trumpeting personalized welcoming messages.

This “cherry-on-top” culture is what makes Accounting Principals a great place to work, says Jennifer Dodge, managing director of the Jacksonville, Florida-based professional recruitment and staffing firm’s Glen Allen branch in Henrico County.

Accounting Principals takes cultural onboarding — welcoming employees into the corporate family and acquainting them with the firm’s personality — as seriously as its structured training.

“Everyone just kind of blends well,” Dodge says. “It’s not like little different groups of people. The tenured people always take the brand-new people under their wings and mentor them and just welcome them into the family right away.”

Accounting Principals has 75 offices nationwide. Along with its Ajilon and Parker+Lynch divisions, the company provides executive search, professional consulting and temporary staffing services. Its roughly 3,600 employees come from varied backgrounds, including human resources, sales, accounting and legal.

Long tenures tend to be atypical in the professional staffing industry, but Accounting Principals breaks the mold, with some employees serving the company for more than 20 years, Dodge says. To retain employees and keep them engaged, Accounting Principals’ managers make a point of getting to know them as people, not just workers.

To promote work/life balance, Accounting Principals offers flexible work hours and telecommuting to employees who require such options. Tenure and productivity are weighed into the decision-making  to determine a win-win plan, Dodge says.

“We’re a company of standards, not rules,” Dodge says. “There are certain standards and certain metrics that define what getting the job done is. That’s constant and consistent no matter what scenario.”

In addition to accommodating life needs, Accounting Principals offers a 401(k) matching contribution and 18 paid days off during a worker’s first year of employment. Individuals are also given one paid day per year to volunteer for their cause of choice, and employees also spend a day outside of the office for group community service.

Each year, approximately 60 employees are chosen to participate in the company’s Win4Youth ambassador initiative, which encourages employees to participate in fitness activities to raise money for children’s charities. This year, employee Win4Youth ambassadors were professionally trained to participate in a triathlon in Canary Island Lanzarote, to raise money for Plan International, a worldwide organization that works to advance children’s rights.

  In addition to Accounting Principals’ benefits and community service initiatives, its Glen Allen office houses a wellness room for employees to exercise on a NordicTrack Treadmill as well as a free onsite gym. Employees also enjoy walking around the on-campus lake.

The wellness room is the result of an employee suggestion.

“We have a lot of open communication on our team — we’re very collaborative,” Dodge says. “Everybody kind of pitches in. It’s definitely collaborative where we solicit ideas from the team all the time about what could make this a better place to work.” This collaborative nature extends past office walls and into the community.

The firm celebrates an esprit de corps built on working and volunteering within a fun corporate culture. 

“The camaraderie — we’re constantly evolving,” Dodge says. “The things we did last year may have worked for us last year. But maybe the market changed or the industry changed and we need to tweak things a little bit. Sometimes your job changes in a way that isn’t what everyone would like.”

Return to main story.