146 | Business World Magazine |
January 2014
Armed with that sudden self-awareness,
that’s precisely what he did.
VanOrden and an old colleague – the
former chief financial officer from his first
start-up business – set out to start another
company in the telecom/network solutions
space, with the idea that they’d incorporate
the lessons learned about internal corporate
culture and external sales and marketing fo-
cus.
And with that intent, Worldwide Supply
was born.
“I’m a people person and being around
people is important to me, and I don’t think
I really realized that until after the first com-
pany was acquired and I got to step back
from it,” VanOrden says. “That’s what really
led to what we’re doing now.”
TIMING IS EVERYTHING
The new organization officially got off the
ground 10 years ago this month, in January
2004, and VanOrden was again able to take
advantage of his position in an industry that
had both undergone great growth – and was
poised for a whole lot more going forward.
Because of VanOrden’s 20 years of prior
experience in the space, Worldwide Sup-
