""We could not have survived the growth that we have experienced in the last few months without her being directly involved in the work that she's doing. In addition to that, not only have we survived the growth, but we've expanded in outward areas as well.""
— Alan Darney, Training Director
The Challenge
Alan Darney had spent 27 years building Northern Nevada JATC, an educational nonprofit that has trained electricians and telecommunications workers since 1946. For most of that time, growth was steady and manageable. Then, in just three and a half months, the organization more than doubled its student body — a surge unlike anything in its nearly 80-year history.
Even before the explosion in enrollment, Alan was already stretched thin. National commitments meant frequent travel, his calendar was a tangle of conflicting appointments, and important emails regularly fell through the cracks.
"Sometimes meetings didn't make it to my calendar. Sometimes I just was so busy that it slipped through the cracks."
Alan had tried to solve the problem before, hiring local administrative staff through an agency — twice. Both times, the arrangement didn't hold. But beyond the logistics, there was a deeper obstacle: control. Alan had always managed his own email and calendar, a habit he acknowledged was "probably to my detriment." Letting go felt difficult, even as the organization's needs made it impossible to keep going alone.
The Solution
Alan had been following Michael Hyatt's Full Focus system for years and had previously completed BELAY's delegation coaching program. But it was the organization's explosive growth that finally pushed him to call BELAY for direct staffing support.
What immediately distinguished the experience was the depth of BELAY's matching process.
"When you go out and hire somebody, you interview them. They don't do a lot of interviewing of you. I think the interview with me — the extensive interview that they did with me — is key to the success of that."
BELAY matched Alan with Christina as his Executive Assistant. Trust developed almost immediately — and the physical distance of a remote arrangement, rather than being a barrier, seemed to accelerate it. Christina took full ownership of Alan's calendar, implemented a flagging and review system for email, and established clear boundaries that brought order to his day.
As Northern Nevada JATC continued to grow, Alan returned to BELAY for additional support. He brought on accounting services to replace a corporate bookkeeping firm that had lost its personal touch after an acquisition. And when grant funding opened the door for a real marketing investment, BELAY matched the organization with Faith, a marketing professional who immediately began reshaping the organization's brand presence from the ground up.
""She's really become part of the leadership team. She's the cohesive glue that kind of holds us all together. We would literally fall apart if we didn't have [her] in place.""
— Alan Darney, Training DirectorThe Impact
The results of working with Christina were immediate.
"I always say that I accomplished more in that month than I did in probably the six months prior to that."With his calendar fully managed and communications under control, Alan could focus on leading — not just keeping up.
Faith's marketing impact exceeded all expectations. She led a complete rebranding initiative, designed graphics for a recruitment trailer project, collaborated with the architectural team on facility upgrades to ensure brand consistency, and created and now manages content for electronic marquees throughout the facility.
"It's been really interesting to see where that flows into other things. Really beyond, way beyond what we originally had envisioned for that position."
Christina grew into something far beyond the Executive Assistant role. She became the connective tissue between Alan, his successor Aaron, and all of BELAY's contractors — coordinating between marketing, finance, and operations with the kind of judgment that can't be trained overnight.
"She's really become part of the leadership team. She's the cohesive glue that kind of holds us all together. We would literally fall apart if we didn't have [her] in place."
As Alan moves into a succession plan, he takes confidence in knowing Christina will be the constant through the transition — the institutional memory and operational anchor that keeps Northern Nevada JATC moving forward.