Along with celebrating its start 40 years ago, CSG Systems International is marking the first time the Colorado company passed the $1 billion in revenue threshold in its history.
Now, the company, which provides support systems and services for businesses around the world, wants to double its size and revenue in the next three years. Brian Shepherd, president and CEO since January 2021, said the company aims to stay true to its roots while tapping into the innovation that propelled its early growth alongside the emerging cable TV and telecommunications industries, which are among its major customers.
“It took us 40 years to get to $1 billion. Our aspiration is to double that by 2025,” Shepherd said. “That’s the speed at which businesses are changing.”
The coronavirus pandemic has done little to slow down CSG, whose headquarters are in Greenwood Village. The company recently announced a six-year contract and renewal with Charter Communications, a broadband company and cable operator with more than 31 million customers.
CSG also sealed a multi-year contract extension in November with DISH Network, a primary customer for 25 years.
“CSG has been a trusted partner since we launched our first satellite in 1995,” John Swieringa, DISH chief operating officer and group president, retail wireless, said in a statement.
CSG also acquired new companies in 2021, including Boston-based Kitewheel, Australian company DGIT Systems and Tango Telecom in Limerick, Ireland.
“We don’t buy things to grow just for growth’s sake. What we’re constantly trying to do is say ‘where are the market trends going,’ ” Shepherd said.
CSG looks at the leading companies in financial services, health care, retail, technology, government, cable TV and telecommunications and sizes up how the companies are trying to improve and personalize their customers’ experience, Shepherd said. CSG develops the technology to help the companies do that.
“So the acquisitions are all kind of in that same mission,” Shepherd said.
Colorado roots
Even as CSG continues to expand globally, it is determined to maintain its deep roots in Colorado. It was founded in 1982 as a division of First Data and was named Cable Services Group. Neal Hansen and George Haddix and a group of investors bought Cable Services Group in 1994, renamed it CSG Systems and kept it in the Denver area.
First Data processed payments for other companies. Shepherd, who joined CSG in 2016, said the people involved in the business spun out of First Data were entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity to provide services to the growing cable TV industry.
“The giant breakthrough for CSG was when they won the TCI contract when John Malone and the team still owned TCI,” Shepherd said.
Denver-based Tele-Communications Inc., or TCI, became one of the country’s largest cable operators under Malone’s leadership. The company was sold to AT&T Corp. in 1999.
Shepherd said just as the cable and paid TV industry has its roots in Denver and grew up here, so has CSG.
CSG provided a number of services for the cable and TV industries, including customer support, printing statements and online billing. Since then, the company has expanded its services and its customer base. Shepherd said CSG’s early growth was fueled by entrepreneurial drive, innovation and breakthrough technology.
“The company went into more of a mature phase,” Shepherd said, “and it was let’s become better, let’s serve our customers.”
CSG still had its great work culture and obsession with serving customers well, Shepherd said.
“I’d say we lost some of that innovation, boldness and agility,” he added. “But we’ve tried to bring back that boldness, that agility, that breakthrough innovation.”
The global teams have been “leaning into going bigger in the market,” Shepherd said.
“We’re excited to have one of our fastest growth years in two decades and to achieve the $1 billion mark,” he said.
Although CSG continues to branch out around the world, it maintains its headquarters in the Denver area.
“We believe we are a global company and yet we’re proud of our Denver base,” Shepherd said. “It’s a great place to live. Our employees like it. Our customers and global employees like to come here all year round, sometimes for skiing, sometimes for summer.”
And the access to talent in the Denver area is an asset, he said.
Weathering the pandemic
While 2021 ended on a high note for CSG, with revenues up 6%, the company wasn’t immune from the effects of the pandemic.
“The first six months, it slowed us down,” Shepherd said. “I think everybody paused.”
People pulled back on spending, like they did during the 2008 financial crisis and when the dot.com bubble burst in 2000, he added.
“We’re so grateful to our employees because we almost didn’t miss a beat, other than we slowed sales and revenue about 1%,” Shepherd said. “We saw business in about October of 2020 really return to normal. We’ve kind of been growing gangbusters since then.”
During the pandemic, CSG has added employees, including Patricia Elias, the chief people and places officer who’s responsible for human resources and workplace management. About 1,200 employees were added in 2021 through new hires and acquisitions of other businesses.
“Worldwide, we have just under 5,300 (employees). In Denver, it’s just under 300,” Elias said. “Denver, Nebraska and Texas are our big locations in the U.S., but we’re a work-almost-from-anywhere company.”
The company has employees in nearly all 50 states and more than 25 other countries. It operates in almost 70 countries. The numbers have grown quickly since 2016, when roughly 3,200 people worked for CSG worldwide.
Before the pandemic, CSG employees had the flexibility to work from home if they wanted. Elias said more than 90% of the staff started working from home when the pandemic hit. The company’s printing facilities in Texas, Nebraska and Florida stayed open.
Last year, CSG made its “flexible-first” approach official, giving employees choices about their work environments. “It’s really what works for the team, for the individual and for the business,” Elias said.
Shepherd and Elias said fostering a positive work culture is important to CSG. To that end, the company offers two days of paid time off a year for employees to do volunteer work.
The company has started what it calls “me days,” when employees can do whatever they want. It’s basically a mental health timeout, Elias said.
“Even with a globally dispersed business of over 5,000 employees, you can tell when people are kind of up to here,” said Elias, moving her hand above her head. “So, we’re going to kind of keep it in our back pocket and have a ‘me day’ when we think we need it.”
CSG has seen a recent increase in employee attrition, which was historically low. Voluntary departures were below 15% in 2021, which Elias views as a healthy rate. “But for us, it’s been an increase.”
Companies across multiple industries have been affected by “The Great Resignation,” the name given to the surges of people who have left their jobs during the pandemic to rethink their careers or pursue different work.
CSG’s days off for volunteer service and other measures are part of the efforts to retain and attract employees, Elias said.
The company has also started an internal “talent marketplace” for people interested in career growth. People can submit an online profile, say what other types of jobs in the company appeal to them and get feedback on improving their skills if necessary. It’s also a way for managers to see who is interested in new opportunities.
“I am worried about The Great Resignation. If we don’t provide the environment that people can thrive in, they’ll go look for that somewhere else,” Elias said.
Among the staff additions during the pandemic was CSG’s first chief diversity and social responsibility officer. Channing Jones oversees the company’s initiatives in ESG: environmental, societal and governance.
Shepherd said the company has been focused on increasing diversity on the leadership team and the board of directors. Still, CSG, like other companies, can do better, he said.
“We want to have (CSG) be a place where any employee in the world is included, feels a sense of belonging, feels equity and feels supported for exactly who they are.”
