DALLAS _ The first time you hear about Nina Vaca, you wonder why you've never heard of her before.
At 46, this married mother of four owns a billion-dollar-plus tech staffing company, competes in triathlons for charity and supports STEM education efforts while uplifting the aspirations of women and minorities.
"I've been blessed many times to be the first, the youngest or the only," says Vaca, founder and CEO of Dallas-based Pinnacle Group and a director of three major public corporations. "I look around the boardroom, and I don't see others who look like me. Changing that is a focal point in my life.
"I call it a three-legged stool: my family first, my business and my community."
Vaca is well-known in some circles _ she was pictured on a recent cover of Latino Leaders magazine, featuring the 101 most influential Hispanics in America.
But Nina Vaca is hardly a household name.
That's changing.
In 2014, President Barack Obama appointed Vaca as a presidential ambassador of global entrepreneurship. In this capacity, she has traveled to five continents, representing the White House and the Department of Commerce in an entrepreneurship crusade.
She was recently in Jordan for three jampacked days as the guest of the U.S. Embassy, spreading the gospel to government agencies, women's groups and the next generation of entrepreneurs in the Middle East.
She's living the lofty name of her company that she picked to inspire her in 1996, when she founded Pinnacle on the living room floor of her Dallas apartment with $300 business check and a Dell Computer.
"I started literally making cold calls on corporations and businesses in Dallas, Texas, offering to provide them with IT talent," Vaca recalls. "I had a purpose, a computer and an attitude. I told myself: 'I can do this.'"
And she has.
Since 2012, Pinnacle Group, which offers tech workforce solutions, mostly to large corporations, has more than quadrupled its revenue, blowing past the billion-dollar mark last year.
Pinnacle has topped or placed second on the 50 fastest-growing women-owned/led companies list compiled by the Women Presidents' Organization in conjunction with American Express in each of the last three years
Vaca figures Pinnacle has a shot at No. 1 again because she expects revenue to balloon to $1.6 billion this year.
And that doesn't take into account a megadeal with MetLife that was inked in August. Beginning next year, Pinnacle will manage the insurance icon's spending on technology services.
"It was clear that (Pinnacle) could adapt to any business climate and overcome complex problems," says Michael Schiappa, vice president of global procurement for MetLife.
