HAIR ONLINE

Gone are the days of taking magazines to the hairdresser now you can find your new 'do online.

Online salon

Ever wondered what your face would look like peeping out from under Jennifer Aniston's luscious locks? One click of the mouse will make it happen on the site that allows you to "pick up" your favourite star's hair and transplant it on to your head.

About Hair Boutique

Features a helpline where hairdressers Karen and Spencer promise to solve your woes.

http://www.hairboutique.com/aboutus.htm

Karen Shelton, HairBoutique.com and our sister company, T&S Software, were featured as the company of the week in this issue.

Thank you to Linda DuVal for including HairBoutique.com in her article. If you live in high altitudes, or if your hair is ever exposed to the elements, you will want to check out Linda's fabulous article on proper hair protection and care.

We welcome HairBoutique.com's newest Marketplace Affiliate - World of Hair. Stop by and visit this great site.

HairBoutique.com founder Karen Shelton was featured in an article in this issue.

Cynthia Driskill has a simple management philosophy in running her software company, CDG & Associates.

"I've always wanted to make my employees proud of their company and too happy to leave," Ms. Driskill said.

That's turned into an award-winning attitude. Working Woman magazine has named Ms. Driskill as a regional winner in its third annual Entrepreneurial Excellence Awards.

Ms. Driskill, whose company is moving its offices from Addison to Carrollton in May, is one of two area bosses to be recognized by the magazine. Carrollton resident Karen Shelton - whose firm, T&S Software Associates Inc., is based in Richardson - also is a regional winner. Both women will be featured in the magazine's May issue.

Ms. Driskill is being honored because she has kept more than 90 percent of her employees and clients, said Erika Rasmusson, associate editor for the New York-based magazine.

CDG & Associates' retention rate is "30 percent higher than industry norms," Ms. Rasmusson said. "To have both employees and clients be that loyal definitely stood out."

Ms. Driskill said her success is because simple hard work.

"You work your hardest, never expecting anything like this to happen," she said. "Then it does, and you feel great. But work goes on."

Ms. Driskill founded the company in 1987, starting with only four employees. There are now about 100 people on the payroll.

CDG & Associates, which helps clients integrate software products and computer systems, reported almost $21 million in revenues in 2000, up from $18.4 million the year before.

Every employee owns a piece of the company. "When you see financial results on the balance sheets, that just makes you work that much harder," said Charles Martin, who supervises consultants at different client locations.

"Cynthia's very gifted at empowering and encouraging anyone who's in her presence," he added. "She's found that people are more productive when you work on their strengths rather than focusing on something that's a weakness."

Mr. Martin, who's been at CDG since 1989, said the company is generous with its perks.

"We have a meditation room where you can relax, and juice and fruit is always provided," he said. "It's a work atmosphere conducive to productivity and a positive attitude."

Ms. Driskill said employee morale is important because her company competes against national firms such as Accenture and Ernst & Young. "All you can do is deliver your best," she said.

A San Francisco-based client appreciates Ms. Driskill's efforts.

"I think where Cynthia and her organization stands out is in integrity," said Tony Morgado, human resources manager with the law firm Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison LLP. "Her organization takes ownership of a project as if it's theirs. They see through every project to the end."

Mr. Morgado hired CDG to work with his previous employer about 10 years ago. When he moved to Brobeck, Phleger, he hired the company again to keep its human resources software free from defects.

"We now have data that's extremely reliable," Mr. Morgado said. "I don't think that would be the case if we hired another company that just came in, did a quick fix and left."

The site: hairboutique.com

The lowdown:
Get tips for living and grooming, rolled into one at the Hair-O-Scope.

We recommend:
-- The Quick Poll. It asks hair-related questions ("How old were you when you spotted your first gray/silver hair?"), and articles connect the condition of being to process of coiffing ("Is your hair dryer depressing you?")

-- The Interactive Style Selector is disappointing for men (few suggestions) but it's packed with inspired and inspiring coifs for women.

HairBoutique.com was mentioned in the recent article.

When stress strikes at T&S Software Associates Inc., the employees know what to do - retreat to the back room and surrender to the hands of a masseuse.

As a result, not a single employee has quit the 6-year-old Richardson firm.

"I feel like my employees need to be pampered to do the best job they can, so I provide them a masseuse," said chief executive Karen Shelton, whose hands-on approach to stress relief has not gone unnoticed.

Working Woman magazine recently named Ms. Shelton one of three winners for the Dallas region in its annual Entrepreneurial Excellence Awards. The others are Cynthia Driskill, president and chief executive of the Carrollton software firm CDG & Associates, and Ana Maria Lecea, president of Professional Performance Development Group Inc. in San Antonio.

The magazine will select a national winner next month from among the three Texas women and winners in five other regions. All the finalists will be recognized in the May issue of Working Woman, and the winner will be the subject of a feature article.

"Karen Shelton especially impressed us," said Erika Rasmusson, associate editor for the New York-based magazine. "The perks she offers, and the fact that her company's had zero attrition, really speaks well of her."

Ms. Shelton doesn't like to take credit for the success of T&S Software, which now has 25 employees and reported $2 million in revenue last year, up from $380,000 in 1999.

"We just keep growing, and all the credit's to my employees," Ms. Shelton said. "My office is my real home, and my businesses are my kids, so I care for them like they're family."

Tony Sirchio, a T&S sales consultant, said Ms. Shelton inspires the staff.

"Karen's really dynamic and hands-on. She fosters a real mentoring atmosphere," he said. "There are no games here. She really respects you and understands if you have problems."

But she's no softy when it comes to business, said Ram Menghani, assistant general manager at NEC America Inc. in Irving, a T&S customer since 1999.

"Karen is extremely aggressive and exceeds deadlines constantly," Mr. Menghani said. On one occasion, he said, Ms. Shelton's team delivered a product to NEC in six weeks even though they had a three-month deadline.

Ms. Shelton said it was really a labor of love.

"When I was growing up, I'd work at grocery stores. That was work," she said. "This doesn't feel like work because I enjoy it so much."

Ms. Shelton founded T&S after her former employer, IEX Corp. in Richardson, was acquired by Tekelec. She funded the start-up by selling her IEX stock.

"I didn't use any venture capital at all," Ms. Shelton said.

The company's initials stand for Telephony & Speech, the firm's original name. It was shortened at the suggestion of an image consultant.

"Some people just couldn't understand telephony," Ms. Shelton said. "They said it like tele-phony. It just confused too many people."

So she tinkered with the name and also changed the company's thrust from consulting to product development. "Consulting's really a feast-or-famine industry, and we felt we could develop a great product. So we did," she said.

The company's flagship product, the Zeus IP Media Server, providers telephone and Internet service providers with services such as call screening, wake-up and appointment reminder services as well as voice, fax and e-messaging.

But what impressed Working Woman's editors were the perks she offers employees - a relaxed dress code, free lunches and visits from a masseuse and hair stylist.

Ms. Shelton describes them as "minor" concessions to company productivity. But Ms. Rasmusson said, "I don't think we've ever seen an employer bring in a hair stylist to cut the employees' hair."

That tradition started by accident.

"I was too busy one day to keep my hair appointment, so I asked her [the hair stylist] to come here," Ms. Shelton said.

Employees remarked on the unexpected visit, and their boss offered to provide them all haircuts. "Since then, we order pizza or Chinese and have made it a tradition," Ms. Shelton said.

Haircut days allow employees to focus on work without worrying about rushing to the barber during the lunch hour, employees say. "It's a big time-saver," Mr. Sirchio said. "It's just one thing that we'd have to take care of."

The masseuse shows up every Tuesday and sets up in the back room. "It's amazing how that renews the energy - for us all," Ms. Shelton said.

Ms. Shelton said she needs all the energy she can get. She says she sleeps erratically, taking naps between 7 and 9 p.m. and 3 and 5 a.m. and working the rest of the time.

Mr. Menghani of NEC said he laughs when he sees an e-mail that has come in during the middle of the night. "Yeah, I always know it's Karen when the message reads 2 a.m. or something," he said.

But Ms. Shelton said she hopes her employees don't follow her example. "I work up to 20 hours a day, but I insist that my employees not work more than 40 or 45 hours a week." she said. "They need to be happy and rested."

But not too rested.

Each day, Ms. Shelton retrieves gourmet coffee and home-baked cookies for her staff. "They need the energy - just not when they're sleeping."

In his review of online hair sites Tim Wyatt had this to say about HairBoutique.com:

The style gallery here offered links to more than a dozen stylists' galleries and their specialties, including ultra long hair, men's cuts and celebrity styles. It is one of the few sites that actually delivers children's styles, although the cuts were exclusively for girls. The interactive style selector lets viewers get a little more picky about what they're looking for and, unlike other similar tools, seemed to always bring back something to view regardless of how silly or specific our request was. Just one question: Is it just us or should everyone be alarmed when a model puts a floppy hat on her new hairdo?

Thanks to Kay Barnes for coming to Dallas, TX and spending time with HB.com for her article about Karen Shelton in this month's issue.

The HairBoutique.com thanks Ms. Claude Kaplan at Oxygen Network for her recent work with HairBoutique.com and our teen advisers, Ryan and Eric for the Oxygen Network.

Thanks to India's Intelligent Beautician Magazine for their article about HairBoutique.com.