Career
Born in Tarboro, North Carolina, she received a Bachelor’s Degree in English from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. After graduation, she moved to Los Angeles, California and worked for Billboard magazine and also AppleOne Employment Services. She began ACT-1 in a small Beverly Hills office in 1978, with Billboard as her first client.
Today, the company has offices in 75 United States. cities and its clients include Ford Motor Company, Cingular, and Sempra Energy.
This served as a catalyst to create of Acting-1 Employment Services seeing as there was a current lack of minority owned businesses in the staffing industry. In 2003, Howroyd’s company placed third on the Black Enterprise magazine list of Top Black-Owned Industrial/Service Companies in America.
Three years later, she was named Entrepreneur of the Year by the Black Entertainment Television cable television network.
