TurningPoint’s History
San Diego is truly a unique business community empowered by its diverse industry base and entrepreneurial spirit. More than 105,000 businesses call San Diego their home, and the vast majority of these are small, privately held organizations. In fact, the average company employs fewer than 20 people and 99% of San Diego’s businesses are privately held. This unique marketplace fostered the development of TurningPoint Executive Search, a new type of search firm that can effectively support companies of all sizes and structures.
Ken Schmitt, a native of San Diego, founded TurningPoint in 2007 after spending 9 years in the executive search industry. Beginning at age 14, working in his father’s local Jack in the Box franchise, he became acutely aware of his desire to build a consumer-facing business. After working his way through college and spending 5 years in management with Enterprise Rent A Car post graduation, Ken answered a want-ad for a position in the recruiting industry. The rest is history! Having worked for one of the world’s largest firms, a local boutique firm and a mid-sized regional staffing company, he set out to develop a unique firm that truly caters to companies as well as candidates. Rather than opening yet another staffing company, Ken founded TurningPoint as a virtual career management firm that lives up to its tagline: Connecting People. Inspiring Performance.
Today, Ken and his team – Elaine Rosen, Dina Hemmi, Kim Higgins and Vicky Willenberg – can be found working out of their respective home offices throughout the county. And rather than following the traditional model of spending the majority of his time on the phone, Ken is actively involved in the community, sitting on 2 boards, serving as a member of 5 industry associations and attending an average of 6-8 networking events each month. In addition, Ken is a frequent guest speaker at various organizations around town including CafeNet, the North County Personnel Association, USD, Cal State San Marcos, the San Diego Sales Leadership Alliance – which he co-founded – NHRA and the WIST Conference among others.
