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Distinction: Founded three companies in past five years

Place of business: Boca Raton

Recent accomplishments: Jocelyn Silverman is not a millionaire - yet. It's only a matter of time, though, and this young, Florida-born entrepreneur is moving fast.

As a marketing and design executive, Silverman chose to forgo the corporate ladder and create her own pathway to success. When she was 22, she started 304 Media, a full-service design agency named for her apartment address, which also served as her office space in the early days.

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Five years later, she owns three companies (304Media.com, Creative-Juice.com and ShortRunCards.com) in an upscale Boca Raton office, across the street from the tony Royal Palm Yacht & Country Club. (Creative-Juice.com supports the creative outsourcing needs of ad agencies, while ShortRunCards.com makes plastic business cards, even in small numbers, in less time than typical printers.)

Over the past few years, Silverman, a graduate of Olympic Heights High School, has assembled a culturally diverse team of five employees working full-time for her three companies.

"Tenacity plus talent equals success," said Silverman, now 27. "I have a good head for business and a great eye for design. I knew that hiring a culturally diverse team would add more depth to the graphic and Web design projects we create, and it has."

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Her team includes Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, Cuban-American, Asian-American and black men and women employees; along with a network of local talent that can handle overages if needed.

"They all bring something different to the table," she said.

The going hasn't been easy. In the process of creating her perfect team, she had to fire 14 employees. "I'm actually very easy to get along with," she insisted. "Firing was the most difficult thing for me. My selection process has become more and more detailed. The employees I have on staff are the cream of the crop."

After Hurricane Wilma made landfall in October 2005, the 304 Media team evaded electrocution from an office flood.

Employees quickly unplugged all of their electronics and within 10 minutes they were standing in ankle-deep waters.

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Their office was condemned, forcing them to find new digs. Silverman's father, David Kessler, whose company builds luxury homes in Boca Raton, allowed her to move her computers and employees into his cramped conference room, where "we worked elbow-to-elbow, but our clients never knew there was any business interruption," Silverman said. "We were back up and running within two hours of the disaster."

Her future business growth plans include adding employees to her satellite office in New York City and landing accounts with some of the major players in the advertising industry that need reliable creative outsourcing solutions.

"One of the things I am most proud," she said, "is that we deliver graphic and Web design solutions that have the same, if not higher, quality than agencies three times our size, but can give the personal attention to our clients that larger companies can not."

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Education: Degree in multimedia and Web design from the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale.

Age: 27

Personal: Married to Marc Silverman, a medical expense analyst for United Healthcare. They live in Boca Raton.

Hobbies: Cooking, kickboxing, pilates, riding wave runners and traveling.

Career highlight: "I worked so hard to build the foundation of my businesses, and now everything is coming together. It's taken a really long time to get where I am. Now everything is starting to happen."

Favorite quote: "Losing is not an option.

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