In the past couple of years, an increasing number of State Agencies and financial firms have been re-addressing cost cutting solutions by sending customer service jobs to rural areas of the United States, where labor costs can be dramatically lower and where skilled labor forces are available.

We believe that there is an attempt to bring outsourcing jobs back from overseas to smaller cities and towns through the United States. We recently visited the Michigan town of Oscoda -- home to about 20,000 people, near the northeast lower peninsula of Michigan along the shores of Lake Huron -- where some say there aren't enough jobs in local retail, government, building, farming and manufacturing industries to keep local residents employed.

"In today global marketplace, these industries operate with lower and lower margins each year," says Art Cruse, CEO of Crusecom Technology Consultant LLC. "I believe the Economic Development challenge for rural Northeast Michigan is (getting) from a commodity economy to a technology based business-driven economy."

Crusecom is one company taking up the challenge, hiring local residence, providing appropriate training, who otherwise would leave rural Michigan to find work in bigger cities. Crusecom went from 8 to 67 employees within 10 months and expect to grow to over 100 employees by the end of 2007. By using the Internet, and the latest asterisk-based VoIP System from Fonality, the firm supports over 75,000 calls per month.

Cindy Walker, Director of Operations who manages the call center and Web design services for Crusecom, “I am elated that I found a job in Oscoda that matches my experience and desired occupation. A large factor in our success thus far has been the same excitement and positive attitude our employees bring to Crusecom." she says.

There were a number of potential roadblocks to their success, but Crusecom goal was to build a new industry in rural Michigan. This new industry would fundamentally bring more jobs to Iosco and surrounding counties. "We are bursting at the seams in our current facility”, says Leesa Cruse – CFO. Crusecom expects to expand to a new 14,000 square foot facility this fall. This facility includes a 5000 square foot secure data center that will be used to support the growing demand for Internet and Data solutions and support up to 300 new employees.

Although it may take more than one success story to bring additional call centers throughout the U.S, we need other States to see how this success story provided local jobs in a high unemployment county and to help them work to build a similar footprint in their State.

“Our call center footprint works, it has been highly successful and very cost effective. Outsourcing is a direct response to the need for “cost savings and the right skills”. We have a success story using good old fashioned American ingenuity that is a direct result of our services meeting or exceeding the needs of our clients.” Art Cruse says.

We found that Crusecom was significantly wired for communication and information. This means that they are connected to the global marketplace. For this rural community, Crusecom is a prime example of a leader that recognizes the global economy and how they can fit into it. Crusecom considers itself a local business within the global business community and invests in the infrastructure necessary to optimize the existing opportunities and continue to update their business direction to gain additional potential advantages.

Can others create the competitive jobs in rural communities that are needed in order to compete in the global marketplace? Many real success stories of small urban-based companies leveraging the relationship with global marketplace to build new industry in rural America are not featured on prime time news. “Not to be harsh, but it seems as though our economic development leaders place their faith in industries of the past. What we need to do is to continue to build a telecommunication “fiber” infrastructure in our communities. I am concerned when local and regional leaders really do not seem interested or concerned about this infrastructure and how it could save, promote and expand their/our communities. Don’t get me wrong, these people are sound community leaders, but they have a new industry to learn in the global marketplace. ” Art Cruse says.

The new wealth of America’s heartland once again relies upon innovators in order to compete for outsourced projects. Success stories need to be shared so that the American businesses with the desire to create new jobs closer to home in beautiful rural America communities may, like Crusecom, seek out and seize such opportunities.