Free up the reins
Once you’ve identified areas that you want to invest in, it can be difficult to get it done quickly enough, Putt says. And the pressure is even higher in today’s climate, where the speed of business has increased dramatically.
“Think about pre-cellphone days. You went home, and you had 14, 16 hours a day that weren’t work-related,” he says. “Now what we’re seeing really is a 24/7 environment, 365 days a year, and the demand for solutions is right now.”
You want to bring new products to market and evolve your existing services, while still maintaining processes and procedures. For example, Aires’ IT team is split. One group primarily focuses on maintenance, troubleshooting and minor enhancement of existing systems, while the other team works on new and enhanced products.
It’s also easier to balance the existing and the new if everybody understands the end goal, Putt says. In Aires’ case, it means ensuring each customer is delighted. So, the company monitors customer satisfaction and incentivizes employees based on that.
On a personal level, Putt has learned to get out of the way of the company’s up-and-coming, young, innovative thinkers, and to trust his team.
“It’s coming to grips with the reality that, ‘Hey, I don’t always have the best ideas, and I’m getting to a stage where I’m not on the upside of that curve, so I need to step out of the way and let people who are really, really confident and great at what they do get in and help us be the best that we can be,’” he says.
You don’t have to be the charismatic, upfront, making-it-all-happen leader. You can be a decent person who’s willing to let other people be out in front, lead and demonstrate what they’re capable of.
It was painful at first to free up the reins, but once he did, Putt says it was liberating.
“When you get to a point where you’ve got a group of people that are really good at what they do, and you become less necessary on a day-to-day basis, that’s actually a really good thing,” he says.
An evolution of what you have
While it’s great to know what you want to do — to feel good about change and innovation — you still have to work with limited resources, Putt says. You might have a vision, but you’ve got to pick and choose.
“That’s probably the most frustrating thing is that you’ve got 10 great ideas, and you can’t execute on all 10 right away. You’ve got to figure out a way to help prioritize and bring the best ones to market as rapidly as you can,” he says.
That’s why having customers be part of the development process has been so invaluable.
As you prototype new solutions, it also should be additive. Rarely do you want to turn off one thing and turn something else on. It’s easier if the innovation is evolutionary, so it looks seamless to customers.
Aires’ new product, MobilityX, which was developed over the past two and a half years, is a big change as far as client experience. However, the customer-focused layer goes over the data Aires has maintained for years.
“That allows you to take core pieces of information and deliver it in a way that’s way more usable and accessible than the designs of five, eight, 10 years ago, but at the end of the day you’re still managing a lot of the same information,” Putt says.
However, there is no perfect solution and system, so there is no rest. You have to constantly evaluate the market and your customers’ needs.
