Transfiguring Future of Innovations |Transformational leadership
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Innovation itself describes the authenticity thus, a leader should often emphasize on delivering a unique cooperative ideologies which also encourages others.
Transfiguring Future of Innovations |Transformational leadership
- 1. April 2019 Sam KhashmanEnriching Clients' Performance with Astonishing Software Solutions Transformational 2019 CE s’ CEO of the Year Mark Garver CEO GEOS Safety Solutions Entrepreneur of the Month Nishidha Kumaresan Founder, President & CEO Pioneer Technologies Inc. Sam Khashman CEO ImagineSoftware
- 4. Transfiguring Future of Innovations nnovation has always played a crucial part in enhancing the quality of Ibusinesses over the decades, becoming one of most mandatory factor for the growth of an organization. A true leader should ensure that the fire of crafting new innovations and spreading its significance among the employees must never be perished. To put such actions into practice, a term ’Transformational Leadership’ was introduced. The first thing that strikes to mind, after hearing such concept, is the urge of an individual, or commune to make a difference. If explained, it is a leadership style which portrays the ability of a leader to encourage, inspire, and motivate employees in order to innovate and shape the futurity of the business. The structure of such management style offers employees to be decisive, creative and self-aware of any volatile disruption. This lifts a strong sense of corporate culture, employee ownership and independency in the workplace. Innovation itself describes the authenticity, thus, a leader should often emphasize on delivering a unique cooperative ideologies which also encourages other employees. Elon Musk—technology entrepreneur, investor, engineer, visionary and what not, has successfully gained the stature of this leadership style and is influencing the world through his work. Former HR head at SpaceX, express about Elon Musk, “The thing that makes Elon Elon is his ability to make people believe in his vision.” As exemplified through Elon, a transformational EDITOR’SNOTE Transformational 2019 CE s’
- 5. leader fosters an ethical work environment with clear vision, priorities and disruptive ideologies. Such leaders have a keen perspective over the services, products and various processes. They brought a revolutionary and exemplary change in the customary way of businesses for the budding entrepreneurs, CEOs and professors. CIO Look appreciates the contribution put forth by such transformational leaders and takes pride to feature such leaders in ‘Transformational CEOs 2019’ edition. These leaders are creating a dent in the universe by delivering disruption in the business world. The characteristics of being a successful leader exist in those individuals who admire and drive innovations to meet client requirements. A perfect balance between these two aspects with the integration of market intelligence could enable any leader to take an organization to its utmost heights. This art of leadership is professionally portrayed by CEO of ImagineSoftware, Sam Khashman. His ability to predict market changes in an uncertain healthcare industry have helped him deliver more compatible products to ImagineSoftware’s clients. This distinctive approach towards creating client-friendly products has made his organization more adaptive to technological disruption and market demands. Let’s unveil such alike, inspiring interviews and stories of many such significant business leaders and educators in this special edition and spread a word about their contribution in making this world a better place. Also, flip through the CXO standpoints presented by some of the leading industry experts to taste the glimpse of industrial revolutions. Bhushan Ghate
- 6. CEO of the Year Mark Garver An Expert in Intelligence and Security Industry Cover Story Enriching Clients’ Performance with Astonishing Software Solutions Sam Khashman 24 Nishidha Kumaresan An Entrepreneurial Journey of an IT Consultant 18 10 Entrepreneur of the Month
- 7. CONTENTS Craig Schneeberger Coricraft Transforms Customer Delight and Delivery with Trackmatic Solution Muggie van Staden Open Source Trends to Watch For 2019 Connie Pheiff When a Women Steps up Mark Rees Thoughts on AI “What shall we do with all this speed?” Are we pursuing the right objective in operational efciency? Preksha Kaparwan The Fuss about AI 38 54 9486 68
- 8. Alan Neilson The Architect behind the Company’s Triumph The Art of Leading Attributes of a Good Leader Daniel Etra Building a Business Empire with a Social Impact Leticia Latino Embracing Technological Advancements to Thrive Globally 28 34 42 Imparting Wisdom Successful Personality Traits to Learn from Elon Musk ARTICLES 32 From Editor’s Desk The Journey to Self-Discovery 60 Expert’s Advice The Glass Ceiling Effect: Another Perspective on Women and Leadership 46 78
- 9. Mitchel Sellers The Architect behind IowaComputerGurus’s Triumph Raymond J. Pasquale An Industry Veteran with Exemplary Management Skills Sundar Moorthi Enhancing Omni-channel retail with AR Paolo Fidanza Availing Finance Credits for Everyone Srinivas Kilambi Pioneer in AI and Machine Learning Todd Fein An Exponential Leader 50 64 56 74 82 90
- 11. Copyright © 2019 CIOLOOK, All rights reserved. The content and images used in this magazine should not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission from CIOLOOK. Reprint rights remain solely with CIOLOOK. April, 2019 Corporate Ofces: CIOLOOK, 555 Metro Place North, Suite 100, Dublin, OH 43017, United States Phone - (614)-388-8702 Email: info@ciolook.com For Subscription: www.ciolook.com editor@ciolook.com Follow us on : www.facebook.com/ciolook www.twitter.com/ciolook We are also available on : KIOL We are also available on : CIOLOOK Off. No. 22, 1st Flr., Rainbow Plaza, Shivar Chowk, Pimple Saudagar, Pune, Maharashtra 411017 Phone - India: 020- 7410079881/ 82/ 83/ 84/ 85 Email: info@ciolook.com For Subscription: www.ciolook.com Editor in Chief - Pooja M. Bansal Senior Editor - Alan Swann Managing Editor - Bhushan Ghate Executive Editors - Rohit Chaturvedi Alex Spellman Visualizer - Dave Bates Art & Design Director - Sanket Zirpe Associate Designer - Iresh Mathapati Senior Sales Manager - Passi D. Customer Success Manager - Jack Ryan Executive Customer Success - Leo, Ethan, Gemson Sales Executives - John, Kane, Ajinkya Technical Head - Amar Sawant Technical Consultant - Victor Collins Technical Specialist - Aditya Kothare Digital Marketing Manager - Alex Carrie SME-SMO Executives - Prashant Circulation Manager - Joy Smith Database Management - Eric Mathew
- 12. Enriching Clients’ Performance with Astonishing Software Solutions Sam Khashman “We are servant leaders. We never forget who we work for. Our clients are the reason we’re successful.”
- 14. The characteristics of being a successful leader exist in those individuals who admire and drive innovations to meet client requirements. A perfect balance between these two aspects with the integration of market intelligence could enable any leader to take an organization to its utmost heights. This art of leadership is professionally portrayed by CEO of ImagineSoftware, Sam Khashman. His ability to predict market changes in an uncertain healthcare industry have helped him deliver more compatible products to ImagineSoftware’s clients. This distinctive approach towards creating client-friendly products has made his organization more adaptive to technological disruption and market demands. CIO Look has specifically crafted its ‘Transformational CEO’s’ edition to appreciate such leaders and their contributions in respective industries. Below are the highlights of an interview conducted between Sam and CIO Look: Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader. The word ‘becoming’, itself is a growth process. Despite the phrase “born leader”, no one is born knowing how to lead. This is true for me as well. I knew I had ideas that I wanted to bring to life, and I was able to articulate those ideas with passion and energy, hoping to inspire those around me. It took me some time to realize my strengths and weaknesses for leading others. When you first start building a company, there are lot of hats to wear. Everyone is working towards creating a sustainable, viable product line and managing that becomes front of mind. Over time, with growth and success, priorities crystalize, and this is when leadership becomes paramount. I had to take the next step, lead by example and truly rely on my team, their abilities, and their willingness to grow. Complete transparency and empowering our team to collaborate and trust each other became a cornerstone of our operations. Instead of simply handing out work we had to rally around Vision, Mission, and Values with clear direction and accountability. Changing the mindset from a manager to leader can pose interesting challenges like self-awareness of strengths, weaknesses and surrounding myself and my team with like-minded people who would take the company in the right direction became the key to growth and sustainable success. In doing so, I am proud to say that we practice servant leadership and truly feel I have been able to assist others around me to develop the type of leadership that encourages a team mentality, a company culture second to none, and an undying focus on our clients. Imagine is a family, and we’ve all formed a cohesive sounding board to drive innovation within our organization, offering suggestions and opinions for improving projects and processes while learning and respecting each other. How do you diversify your organization’s offerings to appeal to the target audience? Imagine started out in a completely different market. Our product wasn’t originally designed for healthcare, but that’s the direction we took not long after the system was first developed. We had to revamp the software to accommodate the needs of our initial clients who got us started in radiology. Ever since the beginning, we’ve aimed to meeting, and exceeding, the needs of our clients and that’s really where our product offerings have taken us. Whenever we can develop a new product or utilize partnerships to bring a solution to the table that solves a problem for our clients, we will do so. Our clients help drive our success, and we take their needs, suggestions, and requests to heart. They are the foundation behind what we decide to include in the Imagine Suite. As a result, we’ve been able to appeal to the market by truly creating systems that are focused on making the revenue cycle management landscape easier to navigate and more profitable for all those involved, while enhancing our client’s reputation by providing an enhanced patient experience.
- 15. “I am proud to say that we practice servant leadership.” Sam Khashman CEO —
- 16. “Lead by example, be confident and trust your team.” What are the crucial traits which every CEO must possess? Every CEO should make certain that their words, their beliefs, and their actions match. Of course, CEOs should be decisive while employing critical thinking skills as we build our opinion. As the top executive, we should always remember that we must both care for our team members as much as we should care about other people. Practicing servant leadership and building strong relationships with clients, partners, and coworkers, while remaining grounded are crucial to the success of an organization. Communication skill is the key, as is continuous learning. To drive the growth of the company and to provide vision that allows the team to align thinking innovatively, and coaching your employees to do the same, is always an essential part of leading a team. Furthermore, I believe that it’s the job of any CEO to dream big as there is no magic in thinking small. What are your intakes on roles of a CEO with regards to transformational leadership? In business today, everything moves quickly. Organizations that stay stagnant don’t last. That is simply a fact of the world we live in. As a company, we cannot settle for small, intermittent improvements. We must take huge leaps and bounds to stay the leader in our space, and to allow our clients to remain. The future must inform the present. Constantly challenging the status quo, both internally and externally, and anticipating and evaluating various market trends all play an important role to fostering a culture of transformation. To do that, we encourage a constant learning and growth mindset in our team members, to ensure are remain agile in our market. Transformation has to be purpose driven, which is why clearly communicating how and why change is a necessary, permanent component of our success
- 17. must be part of the journey. Transformation takes place at every level of the organization, and so we ensure that transitions are meaningful, and that we measure successes and improvements. Only when our team members understand why positive change will propel our organization can our service levels and product offerings improve, allowing for our clients to reap the benefit and help drive their success. Because the position of the CEO is frequently most visible, it is important to lead by example, align our team, and inspire change when necessary. Most importantly, transformation must be inclusive as everyone plays a role in transforming the way we do business. As per your opinion, what roadblocks or challenges are faced by CEOs in a corporate business? And what is your advice to overcome them? There are several challenges, I believe, CEOs face when running a business. Both talent acquisition and talent retention are crucial, and naturally, every company competes for the best of the best resources. Beyond skills, it can be difficult to find the right talent to align with the company culture, values, and brand. We would like to think that we can hire the perfect fit, but I think it’s important to have realistic expectations from our team, and sometimes onboarding can be challenging in that respect. Further ensuring the company leadership is able to grow at the same rate as our company can pose an interesting challenge, in every aspect. As CEOs, we are driven to succeed for our teams, our stake holders, our clients and partners. Finding the right balance between driving the success of the organization and providing a relaxed environment to prevent burn out definitely makes the role of CEOs interesting. Being we want to stay constantly connected to our clients, partners, and employees at any given minute, it can be a struggle to find the time to unwind and “unplug” to keep yourself (and your organization) healthy and productive. How do you upgrade yourself with ever-evolving technological trends to boost your personal growth? The key to a growth-oriented mindset is continuous learning. Imagines’ business is technology. If we aren’t on the cutting-edge, we’re last in line. I’m always intrigued by technological advancements, both current, and early stage. Technology touches every part our daily lives and much like what we develop, it is typically designed to improve a process or enhance quality characteristics. I make it a priority to stay at the forefront of new technology to keep moving forward. With the rise of artificial intelligence (and not just in healthcare but many other industries), people are becoming more reliant on the role technology will play. While it is important, and some would say a valid concern, I don’t feel that technology will ever truly be able to replace the human component but instead, it will allow us to grow. How do you strategize your game plans to tackle the competition in the market? Our game plan is simple – we listen, and we continue to serve our clients. To stay the market leader, and to increase market share, we constantly keep our eyes and ears open to what is happening in the industry, following trends and taking note of major events that will impact business. Integrating both market intelligence and listening to our clients, using their feedback to improve will continue to let us set a high bar for our competition. Healthcare is currently experiencing a lot of uncertainty, so it’s more important than ever to be hypervigilant to changes that will impact our direction and vision for the future. What will be your future endeavors and/or where do you see yourself in the near future? I see taking this company to the next level by leveraging smarter technology and designing new tools that will continue to set us apart in the industry. There is more opportunity than ever to capitalize on our success while realizing huge goals. We plan to add a number of strong resources to our team while expanding our reach within the healthcare ecosystem. Additionally, we will leverage new and existing partnerships to give our clients the solutions they need to navigate healthcare billing and reimbursement effectively. What would be your advice to budding CEOs in various organizations? Practice a form of servant leadership and make sure that your words and actions match. Restate the vision statement as often as you can and ensure that the company values are in people’s hearts and minds, not just on the wall. Lead by example, be confident and trust your team. Course correct when necessary and always be open to feedback. Don’t become the bottleneck in making tough decisions, but admit to yourself when you need help, and then find it.
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- 20. Mark Garver CEO GEOS Safety Solutions | April 2019 | 18
- 21. Mark Garver An Expert in Intelligence and Security Industry L eading a team or an organization needs confidence, self-belief and decisiveness. Having a good knowledge about the market and the co-workers helps an individual to become a great leader. In an interview with CIOLook, Mark Garver shares his valuable thoughts about the traits a leader should possess. He believes that allowing employees to know about their leader either about the CEO of the company or about someone who is holding any responsible position, helps employees to be more productive in their work and perform their duty with great work ethic. Being the CEO of GEOS Safety Solutions he also believes that learning and giving is the vital part of accomplishing one’s goals. Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader. I am often asked “what or who made you the leader you are today?” I was fortunate in my career to have worked with and learned from some of the best CEOs in the industry. I interacted with and learned from the leaders at Microsoft, Oracle, Intel, and Dell, to name a few. I began as a technical leader, migrated to product definition, then to corporate marketing, and finally to strategy. I rose rapidly through the ranks due to possessing a strong vision and adaptability. It was helpful that by the time I became a CEO, I had worked in so many levels within the companies I had careers with, and I genuinely understood each department. I learned to make decisions quickly, by ensuring that I received real- time feedback in order to tweak my vision and driving decisions so my team could adapt. I also keep a rolodex of leaders and use them as advisors to talk strategy with. It has been by surrounding me with successful people that I developed a mindset which drives and expects success. How do you diversify your organization’s offerings to appeal the target audience? In my leadership journey I learned that you have to listen to the market, to the people, and have a vision that solves the most unique issues they have and adapt to the rest, providing the solution people want most. For us, it is rather fun to look beyond one or two customers’ needs, and instead look at the problem as a whole, define it, and then challenges the belief you and the market have. In writing classes, professors teach you to write to edit first, not to publish. The same holds true when developing solutions for a market, solve the big needs and deliver, then fine tune the smaller pieces and continue to adapt. Too many companies spend time trying to solve it all, and miss what is most important to the market, and you can only know that if you spend time in the market listening and developing your vision. What are the crucial traits which every CEO must possess? CEO of the Year 19 | April 2019 |
- 22. A CEO must have a variety of skills, but perhaps most importantly, these two initial traits: instinct and conviction. You need to have instinct, or vision to know what’s next, what’s coming in years ahead and the conviction to believe in that instinct. For me, it starts with knowing our market and being a good listener and communicator, listening to employees, customers and the market, and absorbing it all. Equally important is being able to communicate the vision internally to your team and ultimately to customers and prospects. Internal communication is where a good CEO can thrive, because the more the team knows about the direction of and challenges facing the company, the more they are looking for solutions - not just in their area of expertise, but for the whole of the company. Don’t be afraid to expect excellence, be a leader, and show the team what it looks like and get them used to it, it is repeatable. Mentor your team, so they can literally read your mind, just as my team does (in fact they state it out loud). I let them know when they have taken that vision and turned it into something great and we celebrate it together. Additionally, be seen as approachable and available to your team. At our company my door is always open, even during non- confidential meetings. This allows my team to see me at work, stop in and ask a question or simply to say “hi”. Master these and not only will your team and customers benefit, you will have a much better chance for transformational leadership which starts with your team. Only then can you be a disruptive force in the industry! As per your opinion, what roadblocks or challenges are faced by CEOs in a corporate business? And what is your advice to overcome them? Corporate CEOs face many challenges and roadblocks, some are self-inflicted while others are external, but both need to be dealt with. Investors and board members have expectations, but your team and customers’ requirements may be somewhat different. My advice is to know who you are - it’s not who others think you are or want you to be. If you want to win the race, win the confidence of those around you and don’t be afraid to be unique! Surround yourself with a great team that shares your beliefs, goals and attitude. I have witnessed CEOs get stuck in the talent versus attitude dilemma, where they are so anxious to get the most talented people; they forget to look for an attitude and personality that fits the corporate culture and persona. I try to look for a good balance of both, and am more willing to take a chance on the person with the right attitude because attitude is what fuels innovation, and it’s that drive that only comes with the right attitude. With regard to attitude, it really starts with your own and if you spend too much time analyzing every decision, your team will see you as indecisive. Instead, be fearless (but not reckless for they will see that too). Don’t be afraid to ask questions, even if you think you know the answer and be okay if someone disagrees with your ideas. To be effective, you have to be available and you have to be around, or do something I call “management by walking around”. I tend to walk around; listening, observing, but not interrupting. This allows me to tap into the central nervous system of my team. What are your intakes on roles of a CEO with regards to transformational leadership? A transformational CEO needs to be disruptive, intuitive and driven. You have to be willing to look at “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”– Aristotle 20 | April 2019 |
- 23. the market and your company objectively and be willing to flip it upside down, if needed, to be successful. You need to be able to communicate and lead your team at an aggressive pace, by rolling up your sleeves and leading, not by managing. I have learned over the years that teams need leaders and coaches, not managers because managing does not create innovation, leading does! People tend to morph into a complimentary role when around a leader that has gained their respect, even if the leader seems like a rebel. You also need to share information, stories and experiences that have made you who you are. Once you have done these things for your team, you will all start moving in a fluid way, transform internally, and be seen as one in the market. How do you strategize your game plans to tackle the competition in the market? In a competitive market the last thing we do is look at the competition. Those that do can be bogged down by paralysis by analysis, or simply building a better mouse trap. I look at the true needs of the market by attending professional conferences, reading journals, and building a team of subject matter experts to look beyond the competition on to what is really needed. What generates and maintains excitement by the problem that is solved? I tell my team all the time, “we are not in the better mouse trap business; we are in the WOW business”. If people are not in awe by what we are delivering, and we can’t easily generate excitement, then we have failed. I have had my team study the story of Secretariat, to watch the movie, and read press from that time period because it’s not the game, it’s not the trophy, it’s who we are as a team… we win! Being an Enterprise Asset Management solutions provider, what has been your contribution in the evolving business security aspects? Years ago, as we entered the enterprise asset management market, we looked at the “people” solutions we were providing for time management, security, and safety realizing that there is a direct correlation between people, places, and things. That is when we began delivering “people aware” asset management solutions which addressed the safety and security of people that interact with each of the assets our customers wanted to manage. This provides a solution that is multi-use by addressing duty-of-care, safety and security while maximizing the asset(s) value to customers. There is no other company that does what we do! What will be your future endeavors and/or where do you see yourself in the near future? This year, 2019 will see GEOS announcing space- based solutions, including Satellite IoT, moving beyond machine-to-machine (M2M) technology. We have been working on global solutions for agriculture, food and agriculture supply chain management, with a focus on maximizing yields. As we drive the cost of these technologies down, we are hoping to be able to apply much of the solutions to help solve problems in third-world countries and provide them with affordable technology that might well help fight famine. We maintain our commitment to safety and security, and are simply looking to extend our vision to help in every aspect we can. 21 | April 2019 |
- 26. Don't dwell on the problem instead focus on finding a solution. I call it the solution based approach. ‘‘ ‘‘ Nishidha Kumaresan Founder, President & CEO Pioneer Technologies Inc. — 24 | April 2019 |
- 27. Nishidha Kumaresan 25 ntrepreneurship! The word itself portrays the Ecapability of an individual on taking financial risks in a hope of profit whilst setting up a business. Only few of the known entrepreneurs were witnessed with such an attribute and have successfully transformed their businesses into a huge empire. One such entrepreneur is Nishidha Kumaresan. With an entrepreneurial spirit for a customer satisfaction, this prolific personality has been surpassing the shadows of failure and been marching en route to success. Being a Founder, President and CEO of Pioneer Technologies Inc., she undertook various measures and helped her company to reach massive heights. Her understanding over business insights enabled her in achieving a global stature/recognition in IT solution industry. CIO Look admires Nishidha’s contribution in her industry and feels privilege to feature such leader it’s new edition Transformational CEO’s 2019. Below is her story, Born in India, Nishidha came to the United States to pursue her Masters in Business Administration at Pittsburg State University. Upon graduation, she worked as an IT consultant providing Business and Systems Analysis to various Fortune 500 customers. An Entrepreneurial Journey of an IT Consultant Growing up in an entrepreneurial family she knew she always wanted to be an achiever. It was not until 2010, when she had a financial responsibility and her mom fell ill that she decided to take the plunge and start Pioneer Technologies. At Pioneer Technologies, Nishidha started as a two women team and so far they have made careers for over 300 people. They continue to work diligently in order to provide the best services to their customers as well as making sure their team is always taken care of. When she exited the corporate world she had a good understanding of what customer expectations are and so far her company have been able to keep up to that. It has been quite a journey until now - first came the struggles with being an entrepreneur where she worked 17 hour days, wearing multiple hats but with the determination that she wasn’t going to fail. Then the experiences arrived that morphed her into a better leader. As an entrepreneur, she tend to focus on a vision, customers, revenues and strategies to outsmart the competition but as a leader she also have to do two more things which are impacting lives and taking care of her team. She and her team started with providing services in the area of business and systems analysis and soon after she imitated with system administration, software development and quality assurance. Customer satisfaction, relationship building and Entrepreneur of the Month | April 2019 |
- 28. retention along with employee satisfaction establish a highly differentiated position. Employees with customer interface are responsible for executing day-to-day customer-facing communication so they link the business and customer. If that breaks down, the business is destroyed. Her employees becomes a trusted member of the customer’s team, ensuring that the product is delivered on time and works as it is supposed to, while resolving any issues quickly and accurately. As for service, it just does not include only delivery and the service provided but all other supporting elements as well which seem like simple components but are the most important. She and her company know how to differentiate on service and makes sure to provide the highest quality services to all of her customers. Nishidha also believes that her employees are the asset and her team makes sure growth of Pioneer’s customers is not just limited to professional but overall as well-rounded individuals too. When employees are well taken care of then there is a lot of positive outcome. It is a highly competitive market and there is a constant need to innovate and do things differently both in terms of technology as well as retaining the workforce and customers. So that’s what Nishidha strives for “Efficiency and Innovation.” She thinks it’s self- awareness that is most important which is understanding that one is, what one does and what one wants. When one understands themselves, it’s a lot easier to define where to head and how one can be impactful. In the IT services industry she does face stiff competition. With many companies offering similar services in the market, she believes that she has to think more about what is going to set them apart and how to secure brand loyalty by anticipating trends and staying ahead of the curve. The key is to think outside the box and yet still give customers what they need. She also believes that one has to improve his/her services over time by having direct communication with the customers. The key process is innovativeness, functionality and customer feedback which are necessary for managing competition and creating growth. As an entrepreneur, Nishidha has to face a lot of challenges right from making payroll to every aspect of the business. What has helped her so far and her advice to future entrepreneurs are as follows, in her own perspective: Change is a constant thing in the IT industry so one should keep up to avoid becoming obsolete. Having to deal with changes constantly, a transformational leader has a clear vision for the future, one who can distill the values and hopes and needs of followers into a vision, and then encourage and empower followers to pursue that vision. It’s about leading by listening, being a role model and being authentic. For the future, she wants to continue building a great company by meeting customer expectations with exceptional deliverables, mentoring and coaching her amazing team and giving back to the community.” Being a globally recognized leader, she has been featured in many trade presses such as Industry Era Magazine: 10 Best CEO’s of 2018, and Voyage Dallas Magazine: Inspiring Success Stories. Her contribution helped her company in winning award like Entrepreneur 360’s one of the Best Entrepreneurial Companies in America Be curious and keep learning. There will be times when people may raise doubts about making it through but one must be patient. Stay positive and don't spend too much time pondering on the problem but instead focus on finding the solution. Build a strong foundation and then branch out instead of doing too many things at the same time. Finally, when you make it remember to be humble and stay grounded, always. 26 | April 2019 |
- 30. Alan Neilson The Architect behind the Company’s Triumph T he wave of digitalization struck hard in early 90s, playing an essential role in evolving the then-customary business methods. In an attempt to deliver outstanding customer engagement, many organizations have shifted their interests toward implementing digital transformation. As various business owners are relying on advanced services providers, VerseOne Group is leading in delivering best cutting-edge inventive solutions in the market. Meet Alan Neilson, the Founder and Executive Chairman of VerseOne Group. A leader and prolific philanthropist, his ideology on surpassing obstacles through customer-centric strategies has enabled his organization to achieve its present stature. In an interview conducted by CIO Look, Alan shared his vision and tireless efforts required in establishing his business venture. Below are its highlights: Alan Neilson Founder and Executive Chairman VerseOne Group Ltd. 28 | April 2019 |
- 31. Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader. Growing up I had aspirations to be a medic, and this is what I was studying at college in my late teens. In addition to Biology and Chemistry, it was mandatory to study Mathematics—rather lucky as I always enjoyed that subject. Access to computing power was expensive at that time, and was only available to large Fortune500-type organizations. As part of the course, we had limited access to an IBM Mainframe computer on a timeshare basis, which I found really intriguing and fascinating to program for simple computations. Then, by chance, I read an article about Bill Gates and Microsoft’s endeavors on bringing computing power to a much broader audience. I started reading more about the company as well as computing power, and was hooked from that point onward. I abandoned the idea of being a medic and went to university to study computing; the rest is history! How do you diversify your organization’s offerings to appeal to the target audience? VerseOne provides web technology platforms, digital, and creative services to the social housing, healthcare, local government, and broader commercial markets. Our mission is to deliver highly- personalized, functional and beautifully-crafted digital transformation solutions that offer the best engagement and experience for anyone accessing our customers’ most valuable asset: their business content. We put our customers’ requirements at the heart of what we do by helping them cut through the online noise to deliver their content and messages to their target audience on any device and in an intelligent, personalized and effective way. At VerseOne, we believe that effective and intelligent managing and sharing of business content creates unique competitive advantages with real return on investment. This founding principle, that content is a valuable business asset, is at the heart of our proven approach to providing the best digital solutions for our customers. Our history of organic and profitable growth over the past 14 years, combined with the independent recognitions for innovation, quality, and corporate culture, shows that our strategy of focusing on our customers’ needs and working in partnership with them to deliver a complete and best value solution is the right approach. What are the crucial traits which every CEO must possess? I believe successful CEOs should have strong entrepreneurial traits, with the ability to see the bigger picture whilst at the same time having attention to detail too. Furthermore, any good CEO should always view his business from the end customer’s perspective, and be agile and flexible in the execution of the business’ vision, especially based on how the broader market is behaving and what the customers are saying. As I often say, a business idea looking for a solution is much less likely to succeed than a business idea that is either addressing an existing need or improving on how it’s being addressed (a disruptive approach). Finally, CEOs should be charismatic and good at listening and communicating. What are your intakes on roles of CEO transformational leadership and organizational factors on product innovation performance? Innovation is having a fundamental impact across all businesses, and this is particularly the case within the broader technology sector. CEOs constantly need to keep an eye on such cases and assess their impact on the market’s behavior and how their business could successfully adapt in an agile fashion to maintain and gain competitive advantage. Businesses that don’t will eventually fail or become “In pursuit of your dreams to make a positive impact and be a success, don't lose sight of others less fortunate.” VerseOne Group Ltd. 29 | April 2019 |
- 32. takeover victims. In addition to the need for this vigilance, successful CEOs must have the right processes and team composition within their organization in order quickly to evolve and adapt. As Sir Winston Churchill best put it “to improve is to change, to be perfect is to change often”. How do you strategize your game plans to tackle the competition in the market? The desire to make a difference and tenacity! As mentioned above, always looking at situations through the other party’s point of view even if I don’t always quite agree with it, is how I tackle the competition. This is as relevant to my customers as it is to my competitors or the team within the organization. I have a ‘can-do’ attitude and as JFK famously put it, always asking why not as opposed to why. During early founding days of our first embryonic business providing software for large financial institutions, through sheer determination, raw ambition, and desperation to establish the business, I managed to get an opportunity to bid alongside the blue chip organizations of that time. We did a great job of convincing them that we had the talent, the knowledge, and the desire to deliver the solution they were looking for and at a more commercially attractive rate. As a cutting-edge digital transformation solutions provider, what is your vital contribution in the sectors involving digitalization? VerseOne’s digital services and technology platforms power over 200 websites, intranets, secure portals, and stakeholder management solutions. For such reasons, VerseOne has been recognized three times by Red Herring as one of the top 100 technology companies in Europe and by CIO as one of the global top 20 CMS providers, as well as shortlisted for the Technology Company of the Year 2017 by the UK National Technology Awards. VerseOne has held ISO 9001 accreditation since 30 | April 2019 |
- 33. 2012 and Investors in People since 2015, testimony to our commitment to well defined and rigorous processes and methodologies in everything we do, and the high value placed on, and the quality of, the people working within the company. Though all these means, VerseOne not only builds effective web solutions that are value-for-money, but ones that our customers are delighted with and we are proud of that. What are your future endeavors/objectives and where do you see yourself in the near future? The commitment to the customer experience by everyone at VerseOne also enables the company to take a long view. We are always evaluating the latest products, best practice methods, and design trends, and how best to incorporate these into our offerings. By taking this view, VerseOne ensures its solutions are extensible and future-proofed, developed using open standards to provide robust integration with our customer’s existing business technology platforms. It is also the source of our commitment to security and data protection, with all of our hosted solutions located in ISO 27001 data centres within the United Kingdom. Glimpse on the Leader Alan Neilson is the founder of VerseOne Group. In addition to his involvement with VerseOne, Alan acts a director, adviser and investor for a number of other early-stage IT and technology companies. Alan was the CEO and one of the founding directors of royalblue technologies plc—a wholly owned subsidiary of royalblue group plc (now Fidessa Group plc, FDSA.L). He was involved in all aspects of growing that company from a small start-up in 1991 to a highly successful and dominant software and services organization, where he sat on the main board. During his 15 years at royalblue, he gained experience of corporate finance, due diligence and acquisitions as part of the company’s growth—which culminated in the IPO on the London Stock Exchange in 1997. As Executive Chairman, Alan is responsible for the formulation of VerseOne’s current and long range strategies and how best to execute these to maximise the group’s success through delivering innovative and value for money solutions to the customers. He has a passion for Web Accessibility, and his championing of this cause has been a major driver in making it a particular focus of VerseOne’s web products and free events. “Vision without effective execution is merely hallucination.” 31 | April 2019 |
- 34. Attributes of a Good Leader 32 | April 2019 |
- 35. L eadership is about using the power of a position to empower a group of people in order to attain a common goal. A leader’s task is to implement the plans that usually look good on paper, through a delegated team, in a specific time with an ongoing motion. She/he may use the traditional method or may think out of the box. It depends on the leader as how to do it; the ultimate motive is to get the job done. Although, each and every individual has a different approach on leadership, some might say it is about setting examples, some might say it is about sharing the authority; what matters is, taking the right decision when it is most needed. Leadership varies from one organization to another. An organization is a dynamic body and creates new probabilities every now and then. And with new probabilities, come new challenges. Although, it is impossible to overcome every challenge, the business environment has adopted certain leadership styles for the efficiency of business: The Participative Leader Participative Leadership is the process of sharing authority with the work force in order to get optimum efficiency. The team, after getting access to certain powers, works responsibly to accomplish the goals set by its leader. The shared leadership also helps in case of any requirement of change, as the employees adapt quickly in such environment. Incidentally, this style of leadership fits best in a scenario when there is a limitation of time. The Transformational Leader A transformational leader inspires the team through effective communication and an intellectual environment. However, these business. As the level of hierarchy elevates, the requirement of communication grows. Especially, when it comes to leadership, there is no scope for lack of communication. A Leader who fails to develop this skill is looked up as incompetent, because it is his job to send the message loud and clear. Although, it is also important to listen as it is an integral part of communication. Ÿ Integrity C.S. Lewis said, “Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” Be it giving credit to one of the team members or be it admitting a mistake, a leader wears integrity as a badge of honor. They do what is right, no matter what. Ÿ Empowerment As mentioned earlier, Leadership is about using the power of one’s position to empower a group of people in order to attain a common goal. A good leader shares his authority with the team in order to get the job done. By doing this, he shows confidence in the team and obliged by the gesture, the team works with full enthusiasm to accomplish the goal. Ÿ Decision making There is risk in decision to making. Great leaders take great decisions when the stake is high and it is the success of those decisions that make them great. To add up, a good leader takes right decision at the right time. In conclusion, a good leader can be defined by the dynamics of his style in leadership, the values that he brings to the organization, the methods he uses to make the best of the resources, and the kind of decision he makes in the given situations. At the end it is about the attitude of an individual to bring the change for good. individuals require more detail oriented managers to successfully implement their strategies. Transformational Leadership is considered among the most effective employees of the organization. One of the examples of this type of leadership is when a leader is assigned on a higher level for effective environment. The Transactional leader The transactional leadership, as the name suggests, enables the leader to incentivize the team corresponding to their performance. The team gets rewarded when it attains the goals and the Leader has the power to review the results and act accordingly when the team fails to do the same. The goals and the strategy to attain them are decided by the leader and the team itself. The Situational leader Situational leadership is a theory that the best leader will adapt to the required leadership style according to need of the hour. A Situational leader may adopt democratic style while discussion business with senior executive, but may switch to transactional at the time of team review. However every individual has a natural style of leadership and it may be difficult to switch roles at a certain point of time. Qualities of a good leader There is an old proverb that says, “Give a Man a Fish, and You Feed Him for a Day. Teach a Man to Fish, and You Feed Him for a Lifetime.” So is the case with leadership. One of the basic qualities of a Leader is to pass on the leadership skills. Following are some of the qualities of a good leader: Ÿ Communication Skills Communication is the basic requirement for efficiency in a 33 | April 2019 | The Art of Leading
- 36. Daniel Etra Building a Business Empire with a Social Impact “To inspire and empower individuals with developmental disabilities and those who support them.” reating a social impact delivering best practice Cservices to children with a developmental disability is an appreciable step in health-care industry. At Rethink Austism Inc., Daniel A. Etra the Co-founder & CEO, believes in inspiring and empowering those individuals who are caring for loved ones with a developmental disability. Through dedicating his business and managerial acumen for such a social cause, he has not only contributed to the health-care industry but also lifted his company to the highest success. Featuring Daniel in a Transformational Leadership edition is an honor for the CIO Look, as the issue admires the leaders with inventive ideologies and remarkable contributions in business. Below are some the highlights of an interview between CIO Look and Daniel: Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader. The desire to not just build a successful business but also one that has an impact in the lives of individuals with developmental disabilities, as well as the vision to leverage technology to create a scalable solution that delivers a global solution. With a significant dearth of trained professionals (there are only approximately 30,000 Board Certified Behavioral Therapists) available to meet the needs of a growing population with a developmental disability (approximately 450 million individuals birth to 21 globally), Rethink set out to create a scalable solution that would make clinical best practice treatment tools and supports available to the individual and their caregiver(s) no matter where they are located. Beginning with a focus on families caring for dependents with a developmental disability, Rethink, under Mr. Etra’s leadership, has expanded its product range to serve all entities revolving around the care of this population. Today, Rethink’s three divisions – Education, Employer & Behavioral Health – provide treatment tools and support for caregivers in the public school system, employees of Fortune 500 companies in over 120 countries, and to the healthcare system through public and private behavioral health agencies. How do you diversify your organization’s offerings to appeal the target audience? We are unique in the marketplace offering for online best practice tools and clinical supports to manage the treatment of individuals with developmental disabilities such as autism. Providing research-based teaching strategies grounded in the principles of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), the award-winning 34 | April 2019 |
- 37. 35 Daniel A. Etra Co-founder & CEO Rethink Autism, Inc. | April 2019 | Rethink Au sm Inc.
- 38. Rethink program includes a comprehensive online individualized treatment program with over 1,500 video-based demonstrations. This program is developed by internationally-recognized experts in the field to train caregivers, parents, professional and paraprofessional staff on how to manage problem behaviors as well as to teach an individual with a developmental disability critical skills. Automated data- based reports track progress in real time, facilitate coordination across care team members, and allow for robust data analytics. In addition, Program Specialists can also utilize Rethink as a form of job-embedded professional development and to augment coaching caregivers and other support staff. Rethink also offers a range of technology-enabled remote service options, ranging from short-term web- based consultations with Rethink’s Board-certified behavioral therapists to ongoing program development initiatives supported by an in-house team of clinicians. In addition, Rethink’s practice management offering allows with the tracking of service authorizations and cost of treatment as it relates to clinical outcomes. Rethink serves individuals at all levels of development and ages ranging from point of diagnosis through early adulthood. We currently serve all entities that revolve around the care of this population in the school system, in the home and in the healthcare system. Accordingly, we have three different versions of the platform, each distinct to meet the needs of the target market. For example, school districts need scalable solutions to manage the intervention of this growing population, train staff in a variety of locations and provide real-time visibility on outcomes to district administrators. Parents need a simplified version of our tools for use in the home by each caregiver interacting with the child. Lastly, behavioral health providers need additional clinical functionality to comply with the unique requirements of managed care organizations. Our platform must address these myriad needs of our respective clients. What are the crucial traits which every CEO must possess? A leader must possess the ability to clearly articulate a vision and align all members of the organization around that vision as well as motivate them to execute against it. The CEO must be tenacious and must have the grit to overcome many obstacles that will arise throughout the life of a business. Lastly, one must be able to perform at the highest level in any endeavor, whether for fun or in a professional context. The CEO needs to hold himself/herself to the highest standards and seek to drive the same in their colleagues. What are your takes on roles of CEO transformational leadership and organizational factors on product innovation performance? Despite what many may think, building a successful company does not happen overnight. There is the expression “the 10-year overnight success.” This is particularly true for entrepreneurs and successful ones need to be willing to pivot their business strategy to respond to changing market conditions as well as to have the patience to play the long game and be willing and able to move the ball down the field a little bit each and every day. How do you strategize your game plans to tackle the competition in the market? Of paramount importance is to respond to the needs of the customer and to continue innovate in order to create a wide competitive moat. One can never be complacent when it comes to continuous improvement of the product and service of the customer. As a global health technology company, what is your most vital contribution in health-care sector? Creating a platform that addresses the significant dearth of trained professionals in the market and makes clinical best practice intervention available to any individual with a developmental disability wherever they are located anywhere worldwide. What are your future endeavors/objectives and where do you see yourself in the near future? Expanding our product to support adults with developmental disabilities, both in the home and in the workplace and helping organizations align their culture around supporting this population and helping them be productive members of society. 36 | April 2019 |
- 40. Coricraft Transforms Customer Delight and Delivery with Trackmatic Solution oricraft, South Africa’s premium quality home Cfurniture and furnishing design and manufacturing company, contracted with Trackmatic to help tackle the challenges it was facing around fleet visibility and customer satisfaction. The company wanted to reignite the magic of the last mile, transforming how customers perceived their performance and delivery efficiency. Today, Coricraft has reduced its delivery window to less than two hours, reduced customer complaints to a record low, increased delivery drops per route, and has transformed the customer experience, all while cutting costs. Last mile logistics is becoming increasingly difficult to perfect and is evolving at a rapid rate due to the growth of e-commerce. There is a growing need to get goods to customers faster and more cost effectively. Customers are willing to pay a premium for faster delivery fulfillment and companies like Amazon are raising the bar and raising customer delivery expectations. According to McKinsey, last mile logistics have been identified as the cornerstone to driving growth and profitability, and companies like Coricraft are under increasing pressure to create logistic strategies that align business and customer expectations. Last mile logistics are troublesome, especially in South Africa. There are challenges around infrastructure, addressing accuracy and security that impact on delivery timing, fuel costs and efficiency. This is further compounded by the complexity of delivering irregular size furniture items that requires skilled unpacking and assembly upon delivery. For Coricraft, these issues were affecting its customer relationships and brand reputation. “In our industry, the journey doesn’t start and end in the store,” says Craig Schneeberger, Chief Operating Officer of Coricraft. “The real magic is in the last mile when we deliver to your home. Purchasing furniture is a very emotive thing and, with us, you pay money and leave empty handed. We needed to refine our delivery element which is one of the most difficult things for a business to do successfully and profitably.” Prior to its implementation of the Trackmatic Driver- Led Visibility® solution, Coricraft was experienced roughly 45 Hello Peter complaints a month. The complaints were all centered around one specific issue – customer service on delivery. The delivery window sat at a lengthy three hours and customers were left uncertain as to when their furniture would arrive, what service they would receive on delivery, and timing around the re-delivery of any incorrect or damaged items. In addition, it was impossible to proactively respond to failures in the field in real time. “When we started working with Coricraft the first challenge was to address the visibility of their fleet,” says David Slotow, CEO, Trackmatic. “They needed a tool that would allow them to communicate more clearly with their customer service team by developing richer engagement with their operations team and their drivers.” For Coricraft, it was essential that delivery fulfillment be transformed in such a way as to revolutionize customer experiences. In addition, the company also faced challenges around address capturing. Customers often provided incorrect location details or left out critical delivery information. Coricraft needed technology that helped their drivers get to the right place at the right time. The solution had to ensure that when they delivered, the destination was location- perfect to meet faster, tighter delivery windows. “We could not tell customers accurately when their deliveries would take place, especially as we didn’t have an accurate measurement to easily determine the time it would take between customer deliveries,” says William Webb, Operations Executive, Coricraft. “We needed to find a way to manage the drivers to ensure that they adhered to the scheduled routes, stock on the 38 | April 2019 |
- 41. Craig Schneeberger Chief Operating Officer Coricraft 39 Craig Schneeberger | April 2019 |
- 42. truck was secure and the customer experience was pleasurable.” Any failures on route resulted in delays further down the line. If a customer wasn’t home or if the driver took longer than planned to find an address, the waiting times then had a knock-on effect until the last customer had waited for far longer than anticipated and the driver kicks into overtime. This often resulted in failed deliveries or high overtime expenditure for teams returning late. “Those challenges of wasted kilometers and frustrated clients were endemic, further impacted by unknown addresses, failed deliveries and drivers wasting time and fuel driving up and down a road looking for the right place,” says Slotow. “For a company as aspirational and professional as Coricraft, these delays and challenges were impacting on the way customers perceived their service and professionalism.” Coricraft wanted a white-glove delivery process that was as slick as its in-store experience. It needed the same efficiencies at the point of fulfillment as it had at point of sale. To start, Trackmatic integrated the Coricraft point of sale system into their Address Validation Tool (AVT). This allowed for a dedicated Data Integrity Team at Trackmatic to process the addresses and resolve them into GPS coordinates in real time. Any conflicts of address would be filtered through Google Maps and manually checked by a dedicated Data Integrity Agent who could shift the pin to a more accurate or relevant location, when required. “A great example of where this level of manual control excels is in gated estates,” explains Slotow. “The delivery entrance could be different from the visitor’s entrance and the vehicle has to then navigate back routes to get to the home. That level of discretion doesn’t come from GPS, it comes from human engagement, intellect and experience. We built an entire Address Validation Tool (AVT) for Coricraft and delivered a highly targeted and elegant solution without any delay in the delivery timeline.” The AVT solution is cloud-based and fully integrated, taking the address from point of sale to the front door. It provides an incredibly high level of accuracy and has transformed delivery operations. It has also changed the way the drivers engage with technology. “Getting drivers to take their mobile device into the vehicle and navigate with trust and confidence was a major achievement,” says Slotow. “When the shift happened, it was magic. They felt empowered as they could now resolve issues independently without impacting on operations when there were delays on the customer side. The integrated voice solution allows them to contact customers and let them know they are outside or their estimated time of arrival. Trackmatic’s solution also stores all recordings in the cloud to use in the driver debrief process and in case of any issues. This process of continuous learning and improvement has had a significant and positive impact on results.” Trackmatic believes in empowering the drivers, providing them with the tools they need to deal with frustrated customers in real time. Using this level of engagement with the customer has meant that drivers can relay issues around damaged items or poorly filled orders and give the customer insight into when these issues will be resolved. This availability of information has seen a significant reduction in customer complaints 40 | April 2019 |
- 43. as most understand that there can be delays, but want these delays communicated clearly and on time. Creating a platform for real-time engagement and communication has enhanced Coricraft’s relationship with its customers as customers trust that they will be kept informed of the progress of their delivery. “Coricraft hasn’t done anything differently to achieve this goal, they haven’t changed their manufacturing process or their product range,” adds Slotow. “All it took was them knowing that a customer was unhappy and having a strategy in place to deal with them. This could be as simple as sending out a manager to look at the product or ensuring that any missing items were delivered straight away. This level of customer engagement has made an instant, massive difference.” Coricraft can better plan and fine-tune deliveries, optimize operations and redefine customer engagement. Each challenge around visibility, communication, control and timing has been addressed using Trackmatic’s innovative and disruptive technology solutions. “The results speak for themselves,” adds Slotow. “Customers have left positive feedback around the professionalism of the delivery service and Coricraft has grown their deliveries without having to expand on their fleet or their teams. They have created capacity to scale without increasing costs or infrastructure and, as benefits go, that’s one that hits the bottom line.” The company has seen delivery accuracies increase by 27%, the leave on time by 33%, (while shifting the start time by an hour earlier) return on time by 36% and overtime bills reduced by 15%. In addition, the time to delivery has been reduced from three hours to 32 minutes and there has been an 80% increase in customer service. Even more stats point to significant increases in route efficiency (86%), turnaround adherence time (94%) and a rise from 34 to 43 trucks a day leaving the depots nationally each day. “We are proud of the work that has been achieved at Coricraft,” says Slotow. “Success does not happen by chance, it takes the right client that is willing to collaborate, experiment and trust us with their business.” Trackmatic is currently working with Coricraft to expand its solution which includes the Trackmatic Insight analytic dashboards that will give Coricraft the means to measure key performance metrics and provide even more meaningful data for richer last mile and customer delight deliverables. Schneeberger concludes: “Trackmatic has given us visibility into driver behavior so we can ensure we are as efficient as we can be in terms of delivering our furniture. Because we have this level of visibility, we can give our customers visibility, and this allows us to proactively engage with them and exceed their expectations.” About Coricraft For more than 20 years, Coricraft has been the easy choice for exceptional value on top-quality furniture. From just one store in Cape Town, we have grown to a chain of almost 50 stores in South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. We have factories in Cape Town and Johannesburg, where we manufacture all our couches ourselves. Beyond this large manufacturing presence lies a sophisticated retail infrastructure, with Coricraft stores across all South Africa’s major towns and cities. For customers, this means there is always a Coricraft nearby. 41 | April 2019 |
- 44. 42 Leticia Latino CEO Neptuno USA, Corp. | April 2019 |
- 45. Asuccessful leader understands the significance of integrating technological advancements in business to increase the overall organizational efficiency. Through such an apprehension, Leticia Latino, the CEO of Neptuno USA, Corp., took her organization in attaining a global recognition for transitioning Neptuno from being mostly a Tower Manufacturer to adding technology driven products and services to its offering. Her unique way of approach, by socializing with her co-workers and clients, assisted her in delivering more customer-oriented solutions without failure. Along with the qualities like decisiveness, adaptability and curiosity, Leticia believes that a leader must possess a sense of humanity for building better relationships. CIO Look takes an immense pleasure in featuring such adherent leader and addresses her coherent contribution in telecomm industry in its new edition Transformational CEO’s. Below is her story, “The Neptuno Group is a family affair”, quotes Leticia Latino van-Splunteren. Her father, Baldassare Latino, founded the company in 1972 in Venezuela, after emigrating from Italy in search of better options. She has seen leadership and entrepreneurship as an example since her birth. At 85, he still is the CEO of the group of companies, while she leads Neptuno USA. After having worked for several years in Merrill Lynch and Telecom Giant Nortel Networks, in 2002, she accepted the challenge to expand the company’s horizons by establishing it in the US and exploring various ways to innovate and get ready for the new technology “wave”. As a result, Neptuno has patented several tower designs and has applied 3-Dimensional technologies to Site Surveys, Tower Mapping and Virtual Telecom Assets Libraries. The company also contributed in the development of NAAP, a Telecom Asset Management Software, geared to help manage Assets Life-cycles, and is taking an active role in the Smart Cities movement through one of its spin-offs and newly formed SmartTecPort. Leticia believes that when an individual is innovation- oriented, it may at some point, impact and transform his/her leadership to support organizational learning and implement an innovative culture. Innovation is directly linked to change, hence it is not always an easy task to change the company’s culture, success lies in one’s ability to engage the entire organization in the creation of that very “special something”. In her case, she states that her company has committed to the SmartCity vision and is navigating through that change—of transforming from a passive structure provider to Smart Infrastructure provider. Even though of such a transformation, she believes in leveraging the years of experience to catapult her company to the next chapter. “When someone highlighted the inspiring impact of the fact that my father was an enabler of the Cellular Revolution, and now I’m fully committing our companies path into to the SmartCity revolution, the responsibility of taking that ‘baton’ forward is really meaningful to me,” says Leticia. Neptuno currently focuses on three main verticals—Tower Engineering and Manufacturing and Leticia Latino: Embracing Technological Advancements to Thrive Globally 43 Neptuno USA, Corp. | April 2019 |
- 46. We have to be open to follow where opportunity leads us without forgetting where we come from and what we are all about. “W “W “BTS projects, IoT Asset Tracking and Smart Cities. Neptuno was born with the Cellular Revolution. Initially, the company only installed utility poles, but when the cellular hit-hard, the company understood that there was a very compelling target market that needed to be served. Networks where being built in such a rapid pace, that whoever could contribute to satisfying the demand for products or services quickly positioned itself for substantial growth. Neptuno manufactured and installed some of the first Wireless Towers in the Americas, accounting for about 10,000 year to date. Then, in 2005 and under Latino-van Splunteren’s leadership, the company sensed that there was also the need for tracking Telecom Assets as operators grew too fast and were suffering from a clear lack of data centralization and inventory accountability. NAAP efforts are currently focused on bringing IoT as an enabler of better Asset Tracking. Lastly in 2018, the company decided to actively participate in the SmartCities initiative by forming SmartTecPort, a company that will own and operate Artistic Smart Infrastructure to help cities embrace new technology, like 5G, but preserving the cities aesthetics in the process. “I don’t like getting too deep into what the competitors are doing, rather I focus on developing strong and genuine connections with our customers and finding solutions to their needs”, says Leticia whilst explaining her outlooks on dealing with the competition. To tackle the competition, Leticia states that Neptuno maintains a good relationship with the customers that eventually help in attaining information regarding competition’s products and partial agendas. She exemplifies her business as a long marathon thus tries to keep her company away from the competitive effects. Neptuno prides itself of being an innovation solution provider; its approach has always been around customizing solutions rather than push an ‘off-the- shelf’ one for its customers. Engineering the right solution is an art, and one Neptuno is really good at. As a result, it does have several iconic structures that have received international praise for its engineering design, as well as several patents and trademarks. Running the family business is an interesting spot to be in. Leticia believes that sometimes one may feel that he/she doesn’t have anywhere to go, but also realizes that one can actually go wherever he/she wants to, because it is you that’s driving the bus. Being a fully privately-owned company, the idea of partnering up with Smart Money comes up from time to time as it could help the company grow to its full potential. For the time being, it will keep focusing on its three verticals with particular emphasis on Smart Cities as its disruption is inevitable. Leticia is a recipient of the 2018 Women in IoT award by ConnectedMagazine, and has been featured as one of the prominent women in Telecom by TowerXchange, the Wireless Industry Association and AGL magazine. Besides, she also plays a role of an active member for the SmartCity Council TaskForce, the WIA City Networks Task Force and mentoring young women that want to start a career in Telecom. Neptuno, her company, is also a finalist in the 2019 WeInnovate! Program promoted by WBENC-Certified Women’s Business Enterprises (WBEs) to showcase their company’s expertise in areas of innovation that are critical to WBENC’s Corporate Members. In addition, Leticia is a big advocate of nurturing “Human Connections” through her Back2Basics Podcast and through the #Time2Reconnect movement, which she created “. “. “ 44 | April 2019 |
- 48. The Glass Ceiling Effect: Another Perspective on Women and Leadership 46 | April 2019 |
- 49. he glass ceiling is a barrier so subtle that it is Ttransparent; yet so strong that it prevents women from moving up the corporate hierarchy” —Ann Morrison, American Author The term “Glass ceiling” can be defined as an unacknowledged upper limit in corporations and other organizations, above which it is difficult or even impossible for women to reach out to the highest ranks.“Glass ceiling” is a popular metaphor widely used for the hard-to-see informal barriers that prevents women from getting promoted or achieving further opportunities in leadership positions. The metaphor of “glass ceiling” has also been used to describe the limits and obstacles faced by racial minority groups. The U.S. Department of Labor’s 1991 definition of glass ceiling is “those artificial barriers based on attitudinal or organizational bias that prevents qualified individuals from advancing upward in their organization into management-level positions.” (Report on the Glass Ceiling Initiative.) Famous American actress cum author Ann Morrison defines the concept of the Glass Ceiling as: “The glass ceiling is not simply a barrier for an individual, based on the person’s inability to handle a higher-level job. Rather, the glass ceiling applies to women as a group who are kept from advancing higher because they are women.” The Elements behind the Glass Ceiling: It is pretty obvious that women are facing a lot of hurdles to break through the glass ceiling and reach to the highest leadership position throughout the ages. Preventing both women and organizations from reaching their full potential, the invisible “Glass Ceiling” denies us all of the maximal benefits of gender diversity in leadership. Some of the most common barriers are highlighted below: Job isolation: Women are offered the same kinds of job roles like staff, public relations or occasionally finance specialties that rarely lead to the more powerful management positions. Over time, women are eventually excluded 47 Expert's Advice | April 2019 |
- 50. from jobs in the mainstream of business, the route taken by CEOs and presidents. Old-boy Network: There are many instances when men gets the managerial powers in an organization who manages greater numbers of people, enjoys more freedom of hiring and firing, and controls the company’s assets directly while women are deprived of such authorities and powers. It is the “Old-boys” of the organization that makes all the policy; where the women are kept virtually absent. Sex Discrimination: In a recent survey, working women were asked about the greatest obstacle they had to overcome to achieve success; “simply being a woman” was the most frequent response. In another survey by the Wall Street Journal, women leaders quoted their most serious obstacle in their business careers to be “male chauvinism, attitudes toward a female boss, slow advancement for women, and the simple fact of being a woman.” These instances are enough to prove the prevalence of sex discrimination in the workplace. Sexual Harassment: Sexual harassment remains one of the biggest barriers for women in managerial roles. A corporate environment that tolerates sexual harassment intimidates and demoralizes women executives. Even after the adoption and enforcement of numerous laws against sexual harassment, women do not feel sufficiently encouraged and empowered to speak out for fear of compromising their work. Benefits of Women in Leadership: Studies found that inclusion of women in business leadership has significantly improved such factors as firm value, financial performance, economic growth, innovation and social responsiveness and philanthropy. The additional benefits of women in corporate leadership include stricter monitoring and supervision and fewer legal infractions such as fraud and embezzlement. A better balance among women in leadership positions can create a more diverse team of leaders with different perspectives and a greater ability to contribute new ideas and thus enhancing the profitability. The transformational leadership style often used by women tends to be a good option for contemporary organizations, as it encourages employee morale, motivation and performance. Overcoming the Barriers: Strategies Women’s progress up the corporate ladder is still limited by the “glass ceiling” despite the myriad of Government policies and programs which have been introduced to ensure that their talents and skills are recognized and accepted. Women can help themselves to overcome this career hurdle by: Ÿ Acquiring appropriate business skills and know how; Ÿ Taking up line management positions rather than management service roles; Ÿ Gaining the necessary experience through “apprenticeship” and “acting positions”; Ÿ Seeking career counseling; Ÿ Volunteering for leadership and executive positions; Ÿ And lastly, acquiring the ability to measure their operating effectiveness in the workplace. An awareness of the emergence of new barriers to their progress is also worth considering. The current socio economic situation is creating different “glass ceilings” in the form of the downsizing of organizations, new differentiated and self directed career paths, the advent of the contractual worker, and the care of aged parents. Conclusion: th Since the latter half of the 20 century, women have made great paces in increasing their representation in the work force. However, a considerable gap remains in achievement of leadership positions across different fields. Renowned feminist Gloria Steinem stated it best: “Clearly no one knows what leadership has gone undiscovered in women.” It is far past time we strive to find out and finally shatter the glass ceiling. 48 | April 2019 |
- 52. —Mitchel Sellers Founder & CEO IowaComputerGurus We create great technology solutions with superior quality and exceptional support – building value that makes companies, communities, and economies stronger. ‘‘ 50 | April 2019 |
- 53. The Architect behind IowaComputerGurus’s Triumph Mitchel Sellers technology company must ensure that it deploys Atech savvies who can contribute effectively to the growth of the company. One such core technical contributor is Mitchell Sellers. Being the Founder and CEO of IowaComputerGurus (ICG), he endeavors to integrate innovative solutions by offering business-class management systems and custom coded solutions that exceed client’s goals. Mitchel a.k.a “Mitch” holds a deep knowledge and understanding of software development with a focus on architecture, standards, performance, stability, compliance, accessibility, and cost-effectiveness. CIO Look admires such leaders and appreciates Mitchel’s work in the evolving technological sector, and takes pride to feature him in Transformational CEOs Edition. Below are the highlights of an interview conducted between Mitch and CIO LOOK: Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader. I never intended to become a “leader.” Back in 2005 & 2006, I recognized that there was a strong need for professional development expertise across the .NET technology stack from websites to applications. It became a single-minded focus for me. I think that people are naturally drawn towards that kind of dedication to something. Couple that with sound business practices and attention to quality, and it forms the core of leadership success. How do you diversify your organization’s offerings to appeal the target audience? It’s a delicate balance. Our customers are businesses and enterprises that need reliable, secure, and performant solutions for mission-critical applications. We create those solutions by writing code, architecting and managing the hardware and hosting environments they run on, and training business teams to deploy and use those solutions. So that’s both a diversified set of offerings and a narrow focus at the same time. Importantly, it’s all the things we’re really good at. As per your opinion, what roadblocks or challenges are faced by CEOs in a corporate business? And what is your advice to overcome them? I see lists of challenges all the time. But the truth is that every business and every CEO are different. What is a challenge to one person is a perfect fit to the natural talents of another. The event or roadblock that hurts one business can be a redirecting opportunity to another. But the most common challenge I see in most business leaders is too much looking at the now, day-to-day operations and neglecting the long-term health and growth of the business. Especially, if you’re a small outfit – you’ve got to have a one, three, and five-year time horizon that you are looking at. You need to be flexible to change your plans, but you need to always be aware of your plans so that you do not make decisions today that will hamper your future. Sometimes that can mean NOT taking a project now that might distract or unnecessarily redirect company focus, even if that job pays well. It can mean not hiring certain job positions now – even if you feel temporarily overwhelmed in that area – and instead making a strategic hire for the future. Or maybe you invest back into your own technology and website this year – even when things are going well – because you know that it’s needed for next year’s success; things like that. What are your intakes on roles of a CEO with regards to transformational leadership? The term “Transformational Leadership” has unfortunately become a buzzword these days. It’s as if “transformation” has become a goal unto itself. This misses the point. Transformation happens all the time to virtually every modern business. It’s often not pleasant. It often arrives unexpectedly. In my view, successful 51 IowaComputerGurus | April 2019 |
- 54. “Transformational Leadership” is when you manage and adapt to the disruptive technology and market conditions that come while still accomplishing tasks, projects, and strategic objectives successfully. Every successful CEO and entrepreneur who has been on the job for a decade or more either has such skills, has failed, or little bit of both. Tell us something about your industry and the competition it gets in the market? The competition in our space is really interesting. Where most industries have experienced a lot of consolidation, the website and application development market is still wide-open and entrepreneurial. I think that this has something to do with the fact that great technology projects – even ones inside huge technical organizations like Microsoft, Google, Oracle, and Apple – are accomplished by small to medium-sized teams. Even Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, has publicly discussed what he calls the “Two Pizza Rule.” That rule stated that – even in a company the size of Amazon – no technology project should have more team members than can be fed by two large pizzas. This is because the team becomes less agile, more structured, less accountable, and ultimately less creative. And there is some solid social science that backs this up. This allows a lot of small-to-medium sized development teams thrive, and the best ones find their niche like we have. And that also means that the best competitors are also cooperative players – hiring each other from time to time. It’s really a great way to get things done. Let’s call it Cooperative Capitalist Competition. As a leading provider of custom applications solutions, what is your most vital contribution in growing technology sector? That’s an interesting question; we have taken two approaches to Mitch and Plane contribution. The first is that we take a no-compromises approach to website and application security, and we contribute reference materials and best practices to the broader development community at no cost. The second is that we regularly release internal tools, utilities, and modules on GitHub as open-source contributions in order to help everyone create better solutions. What will be your future endeavors and/or where do you see yourself in the near future? We’re really excited by the recent advancements in the Microsoft .NET Core coding framework. We think that the portability, incredible performance gains, and security of this technology make it the business development platform of the future. So, we’re investing heavily in this technology stack and supporting the open-source and .NET Foundation projects built on it now. 52 | April 2019 |
- 56. Open SourceTrends to WatchFor 2019—By Muggie van Staden, MD of Obsidian Systems 54 | April 2019 |
- 57. Obsidian Systems is an established supplier of Open Source software solutions. The company was started in 1995 as a services provider targeting businesses and organizations looking to integrate and leverage off Linux infrastructure. Obsidian Systems has expanded its knowledge base in partnership with subsidiaries Cape Town based Autumn Leaf and GuruHut. The expansion of skills is now a formidable team with Java™ expertise aligning our Enterprise Open Source solution for retail,supporting technology and consulting services across enterprise- ready open source infrastructure,big data, collaboration and agile IT strategies for your business. Obsidian Systems and its subsidiaries strive to bring three legs to the South African market: the first being vendor-certified products,the second bein g local skills providing consulting, development and support and the third being vendor-certified training and certification. With these three elements, any organization can trust the enterprise open source solution provided. ollowing several mergers and acquisition this Fyear, 2019 will see open source investments starting to pay even more dividends. Given how it has become the driving force behind much of the world’s cloud-based systems, companies need to keep a close eye on the open source trends that could impact their strategies for the months to come. With deals such as Microsoft and Github as well IBM and Red Hat, this open source-driven environment will see organizations in a position to take the best aspects of these businesses and come up with something truly great. Thanks to the growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) and the resultant explosion in data points, companies understand that they need the resources of cloud-based systems to extract the most relevant insights. The days of relying exclusively on proprietary solutions to do this are long gone. Open standards have become part of the approach many organizations take towards implementing technology innovation. And those that have not done so yet, will soon follow as they seek to find relevance in an increasingly digital (and connected) world. This will also likely impact the cost of solutions. Using open standards is resulting in products being developed faster as data is analyzed in virtually real-time. Understand what customers want and providing the customization to do so, have become integral to the operating environment today. And the secret to this must be the open source foundation on which this is built. Local changes The imminent arrival of several international data centers in South Africa (two from Microsoft and one from Amazon Web Services) will have a significant positive impact on the local market. This not only shows those skeptical of the cloud that investments are being made, but, more importantly, South Africa is viewed as a platform for growth into the rest of the continent when it comes to the cloud (and open source). The evolving landscape is seeing business requirements also shifting. Next year will see a veritable land rush for position in the cloud environment. More C-suite decision-makers are open to going, well, open, and vendors and service providers are clamoring for market position. Providing even more impetus for this is the recent launch of what many consider to be South Africa’s first truly digital bank. Focusing on ‘behavioral’ banking, all its systems are cloud-based highlighting the security, availability, and redundancy of going this route. Moreover, it is built on open standards all but giving the death knell to those who think proprietary is still the preferred method of doing business. Next year will be an intriguing one to see where the cloud and the open standards approach will be heading. Strap in and enjoy the ride. About Obsidian Systems 55 Muggie van Staden | April 2019 |
- 58. Availing Finance Credits for Everyone Paolo Fidanza P assion is the key to change an idea into innovation. It is the most necessary element that drives the skill sets to achieve the desirable goal. People who are passionate about their visions are always willing to go one step further. In the corporate world, it is essential for entrepreneurs to excel their desire passionately and connect it with other people as well. Paolo Fidanza Founder and CEO of MO Technologies is a leader exemplifying leadership powered with vision to help others grow successfully. He has a significant amount of experience in technology and internet industry. Paolo has started his entrepreneur journey in 2001 and never looked back again. He started with the automotive industry and subsequently moved to the IT, Telecom, Social Networking, Healthcare and Security industries in his tenure. With his technological excellence now he is excelling his wings in Fintech sector, and envisions providing an advanced platform which can resolve the difficulties of maintaining credit score and loan management. Below is the story of Paolo Fidanza exhibiting his exclusive knowledge about industry and emergence of MO Technologies: Paolo Fidanza was born in Italy and graduated in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Rome, Italy, but he has lived most of his life outside of Italy, and spanned his career across the continents and industries. He has the passion for technology and for making of the world a better place. He has founded MO because he wanted to be able to use technology to help the billions of people in the world who cannot access credit and cannot progress as a result of this. Today he is the CEO and Chairman of the Board at MO and oversees all Companies operations, with particular focus and very many hands on product & technology development. Paolo has a broad experience as a chief of management he reveals that being a CEO in a rapidly evolving industry like technology, adapting proactively could be one of the essential traits every CEO must possess. It is vital to recognize that setbacks are an integral part of changing course and treat mistakes as opportunities to learn and grow. He further said to clearly communicate the vision of the company to inspire staff, investors, and customers is another trait that has also been crucial during his journey. Adding the significance of leadership he mentioned as MO is flag-bearer; all eyes turn to the CEO for direction and example. Our revolutionary technology has created an end-to-end solution that allows us to transform the lives of people who are financially underserved. ““““ 56 | April 2019 |
- 59. MO Technologies Paolo Fidanza CEO MO Technologies 57 | April 2019 |
- 60. Paolo trusts MO Technologies has developed an innovative patent-pending proprietary with credit scoring technology and loan management platform. This loan management platform uses Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to implement credit products for consumers and merchants without a formal credit history. Ultimately, the organization’s mission is to promote financial inclusion with the aim at revolutionizing the credit scoring industry. The company is eliminating discrimination occurring due to lack of credit history and giving everyone the possibility of accessing Nano and micro loans in a simple and effective way. According to Paolo Global financial sector has been resistant to change. This rigidity has given the opportunity to MO Technologies to solve real-world issues utilizing cutting edge technology to give everyone, independently of their credit history, the opportunity to access a small credit. Paolo stated “After all, technology is leaping ahead, and moving ever forward. We, as today’s business leaders, need to do the same to secure enduring success.” The company with its revolutionary technology has created an end-to-end solution that transforms the lives of people, who are not financially included, and take them to a new world full of opportunities. Thanks to the product range integrated by credit technologies, credit issuing, payment services and consulting, business partners, Financial Institutions, Service Companies and other Fintech firms, organization can offer new credit products to consumers and merchants with no access to traditional credit. Currently almost 70% of adults worldwide do not have access to traditional credit – to build a customer centric financial model it needs to include most of the excluded, so to make it fair and for everyone. MO Technologies’ future lies in further expansion, forging new partnerships and moving into overseas markets. After all, Paolo has set MO’s sight on creating a paradigm shift in the credit industry, realigning the financial industry with the very real needs of its customers. MO working with many financial institutions and Fintech firms in South, Central and North America, African and Europe, giving access to small credit to millions of customers and merchants. The organization also sees many of these credits to be delivered instantly on pre-paid and debit cards, therefore truly financially including these people. About the Leader Before establishing MO Technologies Mr. Paolo Fidanza was the founder and CEO of Opinit Inc, a content sharing Technology Company sold to a Canadian investment fund. He has been a Member of Advisory Board of Fundamental Applications Corp. and ROK Homeland Securities. He holds expert knowledge in the social networking, telecommunications, healthcare and financial industries. He has launched and advised companies on the Canadian Securities Exchange and Frankfurt Exchange. He held positions at Lotus, PriceDoc, JP Selects and Pinot Corporation. He is an international executive and established entrepreneur with vast experience in the technology and internet industries. His fields of expertise include automotive, media, entertainment, healthcare and consumer e- commerce sectors. 58 | April 2019 |
- 62. The JourneyThe Journey Self-DiscoverySelf-Discovery toto E ntrepreneurs set up their new ventures with a new and unique vision, goal, and its future. These entrepreneurs face many challenges over the course of their journey. However, financial challenge is the most painful ones they have to face. Making a list of all the financial challenges can aid a business and a new starting player in attaining sustainability and economic stability. The Small Business Association estimates that around forty-four percent of startups and small business survive at least for four years only. Others cite that poor capital management, overspending, and the lack of reserve funds are some of the common reasons behind a business closure. All these three terms come under the finances of a company. terms come under the finances of a company. 60 | April 2019 |
- 63. 61 | April 2019 | From Editor's Desk