Week Five - Travelog of a COO

Saturday 23rd July, I’m sitting at Denver, CO airport heading to Boston and New York for a week’s holiday with my family who are flying in from the UK. I’m so excited to see them, I know this trip has been a tough one for my children and my wife. Having the opportunity to take some time out and enjoy the USA with them is going to be extremely special and an opportunity to create memories.

This past week has been slightly more relaxed, last Saturday I took the day flight to San Francisco from Sydney. I spent the day in San Francisco, I hired a car and took the opportunity to go visit my old office in Mountain View, California when I worked for Veritas (now Symantec).

Sunday morning, I got up early and drove the coastal road between San Francisco to Los Angeles. Ten hours later I was knackered bus pleased to have had the opportunity. It is truly breathtaking, driving in and out of the clouds, and mist and driving inland and then back along the coast. ?This was recommended to me by a friend, he said if you ever get the opportunity to take the drive (over the flight) – I’m extremely grateful to have had that recommendation.

Monday – Wednesday I had a range of meetings with our regional Sales Director. We visited Universities, K12 School Districts, and a Hotel Chain.

The University engagements in California are always interesting for me as the Police and Security teams are trying to reposition themselves and their services. This is mainly driven by the de-fund the police movement which has forced the hand of the universities and the Police departments to act and modernize the services provided and deliver a contemporary and fit-for-purpose service. ?Having the opportunity to position SafeZone and its ability to transform the University Police department's service lands really well with the audience. It always leads to a question from the customer, can you come back and provide that same presentation to the University Executive (more travel for me and the team??).

On Wednesday morning we met with a global powerhouse in the Hotel industry. The Head of Security wished to talk to us about how he can demonstrate his value as security is often seen as an insurance policy and struggled to get budget. We discussed a range of challenges he had to include; limited security officers and how could technology act as a force multiplier for him, how he keeps maids and the hotel soft services team safe when interacting with guests (in bedrooms and remote locations across the hotel grounds), he has hundreds of lone workers to keep safe. We also explored when an incident occurs how can they target communications vs mass communication and finally how can security enhance the guest experience through safety. ?

We discussed how SafeZone is already delivering on all those objectives for our customers around the world, we had the same challenges being solved with SafeZone and more at other hospitality customers. We explored ways to position his department as a value add as part of the guest experience and for the VIP’s a differentiator for the hotel chain to keep them safe. We also touched on staff recruitment and retention and how SafeZone can help the organization improve staff safety. We have a joint plan to get in front of the executives and position the department for change and align to the hotel group's vision.

Wednesday evening, I took a flight to Denver, CO to spend more time with the US Executive team. We explored regional strategies for sales, our expansion plans for our US customer success program, finance, sales performance (something we do a deep dive on every quarter), exploring the pipeline health per region and per stage, specific deals, and what support the management team can provide to keep deals moving through the pipe.

We finished up the day yesterday, meeting with a global semiconductor manufacturer who is looking to solve a couple of very specific challenges, those associated to the real-time location of staff and evacuating complex buildings and environments. ?Secondly, with hybrid working, there are limited people on site so if anything goes wrong (such as a gas explosion, fire, flood, active threat, etc), how do their emergency response teams, co-ordinate and communicate with first aiders and fire wardens and provide situational awareness and management real-time, to include within buildings. This is something SafeZone is uniquely positioned to address, and the customer agrees. We have a pilot starting shortly to explore these challenges and how SafeZone performs.

We finished the week planning our US Sales kick-off scheduled for the 3rd -to 5th of August. We have a packed agenda for the team who are flying in from around the country. Whilst there will be lots of work, we’ve also scheduled some evening activities at Top Golf which promises to be fun.

What’s clear from my travels is the market is starting to evolve and individuals are much more willing to challenge the status quo. For too long organizations have continued investing in the same technology that isn’t delivering. When a major incident occurs, the post-incident debrief usually follows the same old path and that is for an immediate capital injection to hire more people, install more CCTV and more access control to name but a few systems. Whilst some of this may be true, there are technologies on the market like SafeZone that can have a transformational impact on the service provided and capabilities to support organizations manage and responding to threats whilst also enhancing safety.

I would encourage all of you regardless of the sector you operate within to think bold (that is if you haven't already) to deploy real-time solutions to have a positive impact on an incident vs watching back what happened on CCTV and wondering what you could have done differently. Don't be a dinosaur!!

You have an opportunity to raise the value of your department, protect your community in real-time, and save lives with SafeZone, the time to act is now!