Seattle Business selects Threshold as co-winner in small-biz category. Multifamily office Threshold Group has taken the number-one spot in the small-business category in Seattle Business Monthly magazine's 2009 list of the Seattle area's 100 Best Companies to Work For -- tying with the Seattle-based law firm GordonDerr.

"We owe every bit of this [honor] to George Russell, his late wife Jane Russell and our family owners," says Threshold's president Ed Lazar. "They challenged us from the start to create a special workplace for our associates with the end game of creating exceptional service for our clients."

10,000

George and Jane Russell founded Threshold -- then Sunshine Investment Management -- as they were selling Tacoma, Wash.-based Frank Russell Company (now Russell Investments) to Milwaukee, Wisc.-based Northwestern Mutual. Sunshine became a commercial family office in 2003 and changed its name to Threshold in 2004.

Seattle Business Monthly culled through 10,000 employee surveys and brought the firms so identified as "top employers" to a panel of judges for further analysis and ranking across an number of categories including corporate culture, leadership, benefits and training and education.

Threshold was the youngest company ever to take the top spot in Seattle Business Monthly's ranking of area employers.

Gig Harbor, Wash.-based Threshold provides family-office services and investment-advice on approximately $1.5 billion to about 55 households. In addition to its headquarters on Puget Sound, it has offices in New York and in Portland, Ore. -FWR

Purchase reproduction rights to this article.