History of SGR

Ron Holifield spent two high profile decades in city management, which included service as City Manager in the Texas cities of Garland, DeSoto, Farmersville, and Sundown, as well as Assistant City Manager in Plano.  He left city management in 1996 and purchased Government Relations Specialists, a small company that specialized in representing companies that do business with government at all levels.  In a little over three years, he doubled the size of the company, growing it into one of the 50 largest lobby firms in Texas. 

However, Ron missed the sense of making a difference that city management had provided.  In response, he sold that company in 1999 and founded Strategic Government Resources (SGR) for the express purpose of facilitating collaboration among local governments on projects and issues that require an independent third party facilitator.

In 2001, a group of cities approached SGR about assisting in the creation of a training alliance.  Twelve municipal human resources directors came together to form the North Texas Municipal Alliance (NTMA).  A full year was devoted to gaining input, surveying cities and developing the right plan for success.  In 2002, SGR trained approximately 50 employees through NTMA in a supervisory series.  In 2004, SGR started producing its own curriculum on a contract basis, and in 2006, a decision was made to begin producing all course content in-house.  In 2007, SGR began offering a variety of employee assessment services, and by 2008, SGR was training over 700 employees per month.  In 2009, SGR launched an online training initiative.