Blue Badge Building Blocks: Microsoft alums used their connections to build a top consulting agency
Blue Badge Building Blocks: Microsoft alums used their connections to build a top consulting agency
Bellevue, WA, June 10, 2021 – Original Article from the Microsoft Alumni Association, written by Brad Broberg.
Drew and Nicolette Sharp are co-founders of Prime 8, a corporate consulting agency they launched in Bellevue after leaving Microsoft in 2006.
Business partners for 15 years. Married for 25 years. How do Drew and Nicolette make their delicate duet last?
“A lot of people scratch their heads and say ... how can you work with your spouse?” admitted Drew.
Originally from Australia, they owe their harmony to mutual respect and ground rules that balance their personal and professional lives.
“We have a 15-minute rule – I tend to be the enforcer – that we won’t talk about work beyond 15 minutes after coming home,” Drew said. “I think that’s very important in any family-owned business ... a line in the sand that says work is finished and this is family now.”
“When we have date night,” added Nicolette, “we don’t talk about work. At all.”
That can’t be easy because both are passionate about the business they’ve built and the environment they’ve created.
“Having the same values you’d expect in a family, that’s how we run our business. It really comes through in our culture,” Drew said. “We always joke in our new-hire lunches that, like it or not, you’re in the family now. Really Aussie Mafioso style.”
Drew laughed at his Godfather riff. “We’re both Australian, so we work hard, but we don’t take ourselves too seriously,” he said.
Drew and Nicolette do, however, take their reputation very seriously. “We care deeply about our clients, and we care deeply about our employees,” Nicolette said.
“We’re here to make them highly successful,” Drew said.
Drew and Nicolette started Prime 8 on their own, but quickly assembled a team of 20 consultants that now numbers more than 150.
The co-founders proudly point out that Prime 8 is regularly listed as one of the state’s 100 best companies to work for by Seattle Business magazine – all based on feedback from its employees.
Word on the street is that Prime 8 has “a special sauce,” Drew said. “We hear it all the time. You guys are doing something different.”
Consultants know that when they join Prime 8, they won’t be just thrown into “any old role” and then forgotten, Drew said. And clients trust Prime 8 to send them the right person for the job, Nicolette said.
Prime 8 serves a variety of large companies ranging from Amazon to T-Mobile to Adobe, but the matchmaking is especially on the money when it involves Prime 8’s many Microsoft clients.
Drew, Nicolette and Prime 8 President Tom Crozier claim a combined 27 years of experience as Microsoft employees plus numerous hours logged as consultants. In addition, about half of their consulting team once wore a blue badge.
“We just know (Microsoft) inside and out, back to front,” Drew said. That includes knowledge of Microsoft’s customers and emersion in the vast Microsoft Partner Network. “We’re all part of this great ecosystem supporting Microsoft,” he said.
Drew and Nicolette hail from Perth in western Australia. After meeting in college and starting their careers in Sydney, they began looking for jobs overseas and agreed they would go to the first place that made either of them an offer.
Drew, who was already working for Microsoft, hit the jackpot first with a call from the mothership. Planning to stay two years, the couple has built a life and are raising three children here.
Their resumes reveal a clear yin and yang. Drew worked on the marketing side at Microsoft while Nicolette worked on the finance side with both becoming senior directors before departing to start Prime 8.
“She’s analytics and details and keeping everything running on time,” Drew said. “I’m much better at blue-sky strategy and marketing. But those two sides of the brain combine rather nicely to run a company together.”
Keith White, a former colleague and client, agrees.
“Talk about complimentary and supplementary. One plus one equals three,” said White, a former vice president at Microsoft and current senior vice president at Hewlett Packard Enterprise.
“I think it all starts with the mutual respect they have for each other and their ability to communicate effectively with each other and their employees,“ White said “They truly understand each other’s strengths and weaknesses.”
While some consulting agencies are content to simply help clients “staff up,” Prime 8 excels at helping clients understand where their business is going and how their market is evolving so they can stay a step ahead, White said.
“Nothing was ever rinse and repeat as many of the other contractors did,” he said. “They evolved ahead of the market.”
They also bring something else to the table that’s hard to beat.
“Their Australian charm, accents and cultural approach make you feel not only comfortable, but confident in their abilities,” White said. “They keep things in perspective and are humble and inclusive with family, friends, employees and everybody else.”
That spirit is reflected in Prime 8’s philanthropy. The company sponsors local sports teams, supports the Bellevue Lifespring Adopt-A-Family program and partners with the Rwanda Girls Initiative. In addition, Nicolette recently joined the board of Rainier Scholars, which provides a path for low-income students of color to go to college.
All in all, said Drew, starting their own business and providing opportunities to others like themselves has been every bit as satisfying as they hoped it would be.
“Being a consultant frees you up to just do the work ... free of the encumbrances of day-to-day corporate life,” he said. “That’s the thing that fills our cups up now – giving others the opportunity to do great work.”
