The award for longest HUB 127 coworking member goes to Arnie Howes, founder of County Quest Consulting and an avid outdoorsman.
A native of Pike County, Arnie, wife Kelley, and their two daughters moved to Gibson County in 1985 when he began his career with Public Service Indiana, which later became Cinergy and is today Duke Energy. Arnie’s role in process improvement and management consulting took him to all 98 power plants in six states until his retirement in 2019.
And with that came the opportunity to build his own business as an executive process consultant. Essentially, Arnie works with business owners and CEOs to identify where they’re struggling with information management and collaborative processes, and then helps develop solutions using technology they already have. Arnie, at his core, is a natural observer and problem solver.
Although he has experience working with companies of all sizes, Arnie says his sweet spot is working with organizations having 20 – 500 employees, or what we would consider small business. And the magic bullet to solve many of the challenges is Microsoft 365, a platform many businesses already have installed.
In his experience, properly applying Teams and SharePoint can save 20% to 100% of the time many processes take.
If they can tell me how their people work together, I can often show them how to save 25, 50, or even 100% of that work .
Arnie’s work extends across the country with clients as far away as California and as close as Ohio. It includes a variety of industries from a large pizza chain in the southwest to industrial construction and engineering companies in the northeast.
But recently Arnie has set his sights on the tri-state. “I never dreamed I’d be working with a pizza chain in New Mexico or a mobile equipment manufacturer in Ohio….but I’ll never meet most of them. I miss sitting across the table from people. Everyone else wants to expand geographically and go big, but I want to do more in Princeton and Evansville.”
At the HUB 127, we appreciate Arnie’s ambition to serve locally and #GoGibson. And he appreciates the HUB 127 for its productive environment. Although he has the capability to work from home, he says “When I’m having one of those days when I’m not motivated or might procrastinate, I come here because I’m not distracted. And the internet is very good. Mine is decent at home but the first time I meet with a CEO or business owner, I come [to the HUB 127] to ensure the internet doesn’t drop.”
When he’s not busy with the consulting business, you’ll find Arnie bike riding, kayaking, or working on the wildlife habitat at his property. He may work from a computer but his happy place is outside enjoying nature.
To learn more about County Quest Consulting or to see how Arnie can help your small business maximize productivity using technology already at your fingertips, visit www.BusinessDriven365.com or email arnie.howes@countyquest.com.