Bryan Thompson

I am a native of Jacksonville, Florida who moved to the Tampa Bay area in 1993 to attend Eckerd College. At Eckerd, I studied democratic theory and political philosophy. I also met the love of my life and source of everlasting support, Rebecca Jacobson, who has been by my side for seventeen years. After graduation from Eckerd, we moved to a small town outside Dallas, TX. I worked for MCI developing reporting for call center ACD systems, and then for Nortel Networks as a Developer supporting the Wireless Field Services division. In 1999, we moved back to Tampa and I continued to work for Nortel as an Analyst and Manager deploying installation systems. In 2001, I transitioned into a very different professional role: small business owner. I founded Bleu Tango, Inc., which allowed me to fuse my technical know-how with my passion for creative expression by providing web and graphic design to businesses in the Tampa area. While running Bleu Tango, I sought to expand by knowledge base and became both a Licensed Building Contractor and a Licensed Massage Therapist. My contractor's license became invaluable when Rebecca and I opened Jacobson Protective Shutter (JPS), a new division of the family's 50 year old window manufacturing company. JPS was dedicated to providing hurricane protection products for both commercial and residential use, and my responsibilities focused on overseeing the installation process to ensure building code compliance and that our products met all engineering requirements. Two years into operating the shutter company, I was tapped to reengineer the business infrastructure of Jacobson Window Company, the parent company of JPS. My goal was to drastically reduce costs in order to maximize return on investment. By eliminating unnecessary layers of management, improving efficiency, adopting technology, and examining industry trends, I was able to realize much of my vision. What I was unable to do, however, was outlast the recession which had slowed the Florida construction market more than a year before it made itself felt across the rest of the country. Since closing the window company, I have been able to again focus on my web and graphic design business. Additionally, recognizing the need small and medium sized businesses have for IT services, I founded a new enterprise focused on delivering server and workstation support through managed services. Although the growth of these endeavors has been meeting the anticipated benchmarks, I am finding