From our new office through to new starters and exciting new business initiatives, the world at Concurrent has certainly been an interesting place to be in 2018. As a company, we change as much as our software offerings and business priorities move. We do an excellent job maintaining focus and continuing to grow, not only in number, but in skill and knowledge. I hope I can continue to grow and learn as I have done in these 3 months and I’m sure most of you will feel the same.
Lead Update
The amount of incoming leads we are getting is strong with nearly 300 leads coming in since 2nd January. So far, of these leads 102 made it to opportunity, with 10 already closed as won. Our reaction time to leads is essential, so let’s get a focus on calling through the opportunities and leads that are still open and make Q2 even more successful.
TSM Customer Success Story
We now have a published article on the Silicon Republic, which tells a really nice story, explaining how ThingWorx helped TSM create a new arm of the business, Insight: https://www.siliconrepublic.com/enterprise/tsm-control-systems-shane-ocallaghan-iiot
The article is ready to be shared in social media
I spent the 28th March with TSM, when we did the filming for their customer case study around the value ThingWorx and an IoT solution has brought to the business. We had some really positive feedback from both TSM and the crew filming on the quality of the material, so I’m excited to see the final video. This is being edited at the moment and we should have a finished cut around the middle of the month. We can also expect an article in Diginomica, following TSM’s telephone interview with them last week as well. Again, this will be shared once released.You can also look out for our social posts, sharing TSM’s participation at LiveWorx - feel free to like and share everything.
Social Media
On the subject of social media, Concurrent Engineering now has an Instagram page, which you can find here: https://www.instagram.com/concurrent_eng/
I know some of you are already following and liking the posts on there. Our follower numbers on all social media platforms are getting stronger. Looking at our post analytics, this is very likely down to you guys liking and sharing the content that myself and Emma are producing. Everything we put on social media is (hopefully) content that will draw new interest. The backing from everyone to help get our name out there and also having the ability to respond to comments, mentions and messages on social media is all helping to move us in the right direction.
Customer feedback
We’ve received some great feedback from customers in the last month. Comments made about the recent Mathcad webinar said that it solidified the company’s decision to have us help them with their Mathcad business case. Well done to Adam for your hard work on the webinar!
The feedback from our 6 months survey has all been positive. We're now working on getting the results of these more visible
Develop 3D
Adam and I attended Develop 3D at the beginning of March, where we made sure to catch Brain Thompson's Creo 5.0 presentation. There’s a really good story behind it and definitely a lot to talk about. To see the full presentation, please follow this link: https://youtu.be/SBfTCo108K8
The show itself was relatively small but we did get a chance to catch up with a couple of customers. We also connected with some direct contacts within Ansys, who have partnered with PTC in the US and are looking to do something similar in the UK, and Virtual Interconnect who help PTC with the piping and cabling capabilities. I am hoping to increase the amount of shows we attend as its valuable for customers to know we are interested in the world outside these walls and for us to increase our knowledge of what’s available. Plus it makes for some great social media traffic!
Training and Self Development
Julian will talk a little around a specific training course attended by the inside sales team but we have been looking at the development of all teams as a whole.
As a company we had an accumulative 1,323 working days in Q1. Of these 1,323 day we spent 168 days on self-development and training, which is just under 8% of all time spent.
I found this a really interesting metric to share and it’s good to know there is the opportunity to grow and develop our knowledge base. We will be keeping a check on these figures as we move forward . If there are any particular areas you feel you could improve, let Nick, Julian or Owen know and we can see how we can accommodate.
A Concurrent Family
A big congratulations to Andrew and his new wife Rachel, who tied the knot on Easter Monday. I love to see life experiences such as this in the company, as it is really what it is all about. Yes we have to come to work and meet KPIs, targets, minimum requirements, apply positivity etc but by and large, it all about facilitating things in each of our private lives. So, many happy years together Andrew and Rachel. Your minimum requirements will need to be raised up now Andrew, to support your married life aspirations!!
Company & Culture development
Some, or many, of you may remember the survey monkey we did some time back to collect views and opinions on different elements of the company. I am guilty of waiting to have the perfect article on things before I share them, but I am happy to report that all of your input and feedback was used in a recent marketing / business review which we undertook with an outside resource. There are many influence on business today, not just ours alone, so it is a good exercise to stop and have a look from time to time. There are the obvious external forces that we need to be aware of but have limited influence to change and then there are the internal forces that we all have scope to influence and adjust. How we do that results in and shapes our culture.
To try and take stock of where the business is at the moment we have worked on some new messaging which I will be delighted to share with all later this month. We will have a company session in the coming weeks to share the details with all and I look forward to each and everyone having an input. At this point we have developed some top level messaging around what the company is about and what we do. How we execute against that will need everyones commitment. Below is word cloud from the recent survey monkey which starts to give some insight into our collective thoughts. I don’t want to give away too much here but I think the new messaging will give a very clear picture on who we are as a business and how each of us plays our part in its success.
Plans and Quarter
Julian and Nick have provided details on sales and services from this Q and there is a lot to be positive about. The workshop with TSM in Dublin was a great success and may provide some basis for other customer engagements. Incidentally, Emily is doing some great marketing work with TSM ahead of them presenting at LiveWorx later in the year. One of our customers presenting their stuff on the World Stage is pretty cool.
Our numbers to PTC were not where we want them to be last Q so perhaps we can all have a look at how we might help that this Q? Fundamentally, it is the responsibility of the sales team to deliver that number, but all of us can influence it, as we are all talking to customers on a daily / weekly basis. Keep your eyes and ears open about problems your customers have and share them with Julian and the team. It is a team effort.
I am looking forward to sharing the new messaging and aspirations that Julian, Nick, Karen and I have been working on. Your feedback and input will ultimately be the success or otherwise of the plans, so a lot at stake. The business is constantly evolving and developing and sometimes that is hard to manage and control, so it needs all hands on deck. I’m confident that our new messaging is aligned to the industry and the changes taking place within it, so if we can get our collective ducks in a row and all get going in the same direction, we put ourselves in a great position to grow and develop. Here’s to Q2 and the pending world domination plan!
Investing in training and development
We are investing in training and development across all of the areas that I work with day to day. The Insides Sales Team and I had a great day at the end of March at Southampton Football Ground where we took part in a Telephone Prospecting Bootcamp courtesy of Benjamin Dennehy from Sandler Training. If you see Luke, James and Sam arrive in stripped to the waist wearing war paint and bandannas, you know it has gone well!
I am so impressed with the Sandler material that we will be taking the FSR warriors to the same training and we will invest beyond this.
PTC Event near Barcelona
The Pre-Sales people, Lee, Emily and I will be attending the PTC Event near Barcelona in April. This is a mixed event covering Marketing workshops, Technical & Digital Symposium with various tracks and learning and a Channel Leadership Track for me. There will no doubt be a load of information shared at this flagship event and our challenge is to bring it home and be able to put it into practise. There will be some companywide feedback on this during April so watch this space.
Best of luck to Andrew & Rachel
Andrew has been particularly busy in the run up to his wedding, so a good job completed there and of course we all wish Andrew & Rachel the best of luck for Easter Monday. By the time you read this, rings will be exchanged, and they will have tied the knot. It’s emotional…
Cycling update and lessons learned
Earlier last month I joined a small team of honed athletes for early season training in Algorfa, Costa Blanca, Spain.
With a nice age range of 38 – 63 I sat nicely in the middle if we don’t calculate too carefully. Nothing could be better set up. The only thing I had not taken into consideration was the fitness gulf between all of them who have been working on their turbo trainers throughout winter and riding out in all weather and me who spent most of January feeling sorry for myself with pneumonia. And I don’t have a turbo trainer. One of the riders is a thick set, heavy lad but he has 3,000 miles worked out in his indoor gym. Needless to say, I didn’t see much of him during the cycling! I saw him each evening at the bar but that was just another sport that I couldn’t keep up with him either!
My saving grace was that I did complete the 100 miles over two days even if I did ride at the back of the pack and sometimes not even with the pack!
There are so many lessons from this.
One, get off your arse and put the effort in if you want to be good at anything. You can only freewheel downhill!
More importantly though it just shows what practise and repetition can do for you. The more times you practise or rehearse, the more likely you are to succeed.
Easy to ignore because that is how we are programmed but very hard to argue with!
To conclude my cycling news, we have five or six confirmed for the CEH company cycle in the summer.
Put your name forward and let’s have some fun with it. We will ride as a group and providing we agree to let Owen win, there will be no race!
It will be a breeze of a day and you will talk about it for months or years!
Do something to tell your friends about!!
https://www.ukcyclingevents.co.uk/events/wiggle-tempest-sportive/
Q1 sales numbers
The Q1 sales numbers are just being collated as I write this but the overall picture is not one that I want to dwell on to much. Despite some nice engagements and pockets of good work, the numbers are very average. No alarm bells but there will need to be some real focus to try and redress this as we start Q2. We didn’t fall off a cliff but we need to move forward to seize the opportunity that is staring at us and it is my job to ensure that everyone has the training and is in the right mindset to do this. Then it is the job of individual sales & pre-sales people to perform.
Luke and Steven have posted good numbers this quarter so well done
Conclusion
Highs and lows, joy and despair, it has been just like any other quarter.
We have things to correct and plans to work to.
The bar is high, and the journey gets no easier but my glass is half full as always.
Presales has been working on a number of different activities in March. Some simple, some complex. We continue to refine the use of the Presales Tracker and the use of Windchill CEH for managing account data.
We do need to continue to set realistic targets for Presales Activities and focus on Objective, Task and Next Steps for each activity. We will try also for more complex activities to build jointly with Sales a ‘Communications Plan’
Another activity type we are introducing is the Technical Account Manager Role for key activities with key accounts – sometimes this will be managing problems, sometimes it will be supporting services but it is meant to add value to the engagement, improve visibility and reduce ‘gotchas’.
PTC Technology Event
As mentioned, during the week starting 9th April – Andrew, Adrian and Adam will be in Spain attending a PTC Technology Event. They will try to reply to emails in the evenings, but please respect the time they need to spend educating themselves in the latest and greatest and only email requests – please do not try to call them.
Accounts we have worked on this month include (not exclusive):
Next month Adam, Andrew and Adrian will provide a report on the event in Spain – the highlights
Celebrations
Happy birthday to Adrian for the 19th April
WALK It 2018 – Just Giving
For those of you who were interested in supporting Emily in the sponsored walk, the just giving page is no up and running - https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/priestygals-walk-it-swansea-2018 There’s two months to go so I’m hoping that you can find some spare change to donate to this really worth while cause.
Helping at the UN Offices – Luke
During week commencing 19th March, I was out the office having a working holiday in Bonn at the UN office and events centre. My friend works as the Events Manager for the UN and put on the UN SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) Global Festival of Action.
The Global Festival of Action for Sustainable Development is the world´s most inspiring SDG event to celebrate, empower, and connect the global community driving Action for the Sustainable Development Goals.
The Festival provides a dynamic and interactive space to showcase the latest innovations, tools and approaches to SDG implementation and connect organizations and individuals from different sectors and regions to exchange, build partnerships, and make the impact of their solutions scale.
I assisted with the set up and close down of the event and managing a room of multiple speakers through the week. Speakers included people from the German Government, the global campaign manager from Oxfam, photographer and Canon ambassadors and more!
It was a really enjoyable week; very fun but also moving and inspirational hearing a lot of stories of how people are improving the world and helping in their local communities.
It’s worth checking out the website to understand more about what the SDG’s are and learn more about what happened at the event. http://globalfestivalofaction.org/
