Collaboration between RightNow Technologies and Montana State University Alumni Association Proves that Ex-Residents Offer Promising Talent Pool For Company in Remote Location.

It’s hard enough for a small business to attract talent. It’s even more difficult when that business is located hundreds of miles from a major job market.

About three years after its founding in 1997, RightNow Technologies Inc. http://www.rightnow.com/ , a Bozeman, Mont., firm that sells customer-relationship management software, had tapped out the local supply of talent. Sales at the company, which had about 100 employees, were climbing. And Greg Gianforte, the firm’s founder and chief executive, knew RightNow needed to grow to keep up with sales and mounting competition.

But being six hours away from the nearest urban hub, Salt Lake City, and in a town of about 30,000 residents made finding local, qualified software engineers and sales and marketing professionals challenging.

To find such people, Mr. Gianforte contacted the Montana State University Alumni Association http://alumni.montana.edu/ and asked for a list of the computer-science alumni who had graduated in the past decade. The association agreed to give him the list of 565 graduates, the company says.

By KELLY K. SPORS

Full Story: http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB118081823563622771-lMyQjAxMDE3ODAwNDgwMTQ4Wj.html

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(Great article in the Wall Street Journal profiling RightNow Tech looking beyond Mt border for MT alumni as part of resource pool. This article reinforces our Montana Ambassador mission here in Seattle. Please pass along.

Thank you,

Sean Thompson, Microsoft)