Doug Anderson has run Anderson Pro Painting since 2005, when he started it with a ladder, a truck and one conviction he has never let go of. You make the world better by adding value to the people around you. He was still finishing his degree at Shippensburg University at the time.

He had already spent a year testing that idea before the company existed. Doug served with City Year, an AmeriCorps program in inner-city Philadelphia, working with underprivileged children before he went to college. In his late thirties he gave six years to the board of Habitat for Humanity of the Greater Harrisburg Area, three of them as Vice President and his last as President. He now sits on the board of M28, a nonprofit that helps men leaving recovery centers find long-term housing. None of it sits apart from the painting business in his head. It is the same job. Leave people better than you found them.

In 2010 he added an Executive MBA from Villanova, five years into running the company. Most contractors learn the business side by surviving it. Doug did both, and the result is a company built on decisions that cost money in the short term. Thirty-three full-time employees instead of brokered labor. Twenty-seven painters on the payroll. Fourteen vehicles. Full benefits for everyone, which is unusual in this trade and entirely deliberate, because painters who build a career somewhere do better work than painters passing through.

What people notice first is that he will tell them the truth, including when it costs him the job. He would rather lose a bid than lose a relationship, which is a large part of why the company is still standing after twenty years and why so many customers call back. An agreement is an agreement. If something goes wrong on our end, that is ours to fix.

Outside the office he travels with Jillian, follows the Eagles and the 76ers, spends time with family and friends, and keeps learning. Ask him what success actually looks like and the answer has not changed since the ladder and the truck. Leave people better than you found them.