Brian J. McIntyre is always looking for new openings in the human resources management market. After working for large HR firms for more than a decade, McIntyre struck out on his own in 1994 to establish Working Concepts, a small services
and consulting firm. Working Concepts eventually grew to have a 55-person payroll and a roster of big-name clients, such as Staples Inc. and Geico Insurance Co. In December 2001 the company was sold to one of McIntyre’s former employers, Towers Perrin, for an undisclosed amount.

Last month McIntyre began anew and founded WorkStrategy Inc., with the theory that medium-sized companies, those with 200 to 1,000 employees, had been passed over by most makers of human-resources software.

“Those companies that buy software applications don’t necessarily want a HR management company to be there for a long time,” said McIntyre of smaller firms’ wariness of long contracts. As a result, he said, a lot of software makers “decided to not abandon, but hold off, and go for where the big dollars were.”

Rather than spend months developing software to help potential clients automate payroll records and create Web portals that allow employees to access benefit information, McIntyre is trying to strike partnerships with existing providers and modify their products to suit the needs of smaller businesses. WorkStrategy will then handle integration and training for its customers.

The biggest barrier, according to McIntyre, is convincing companies that human resources technology is a smart investment in a tough economic climate. The company has plenty of competitors, including HRtrack Software International Inc. and PeopleClick
Inc., but McIntyre is hoping that by building a sales force of human resource professionals, WorkStrategy will be better able to address the legal and technical questions raised by leery managers.

“We bring comparisons from companies just down the road and have better communication with the manager and employee,” McIntyre said. “We ask them what they need and what the challenges are today.”

In Profile

Name: WorkStrategy Inc.

Location: Columbia

Web site: www.workstrategy.com

Big Idea: Sell software packages to help medium-sized companies manage human
resource processes.

Founded: Last month

Who’s in charge: Brian J. McIntyre, founder and chief executive; Jay Fox, vice president of business development; Melinda Broome, chief marketing officer; Sujata Patel, vice president of finance; Nichol Mason, vice president of human resources.

Employees: 11

Funding: McIntyre estimates he contributed between $2 and $3 million of his own funds to launch the company.

Key partnership: Microsoft. WorkStrategy struck a deal to act as a reseller and implementation company for Microsoft Business Solutions’ human resource management technology.

Second start-up advantage: Ready-made staff. McIntyre was able to convince several of the executives from his last start-up, Working Concepts, to join his new venture.