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ECT Services Team Spotlight: Martin Nienaber

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Let’s kick off this July by celebrating not just America but also our team!

We’re proud to have recently welcomed another new member to our team, Martin Nienaber.

Martin is a Security Account Manager. He says he chose to join our team because of our industry and because of the culture at the company.

“With ECT being established for over 40 years in the security industry I felt confident in choosing to work here. Along with the company culture, I felt ECT aligned with my personal goals,” Martin said.

Martin worked in the field as a technician for a few years before transitioning into a sales role. He previously worked for an integrator based in Lexington, Kentucky.

When he’s not on the job Martin enjoys spending quality time with his kids and family and – for the past six years – coaching basketball.

His favorite part of the job so far is learning new applications that can provide our customers value and solutions.

Welcome to the team, Martin. We’re so glad to have you!

Business Culture Series: Team Members

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At ECT we are a small business with a decent-sized team. Everyone on our team specializes in their own area of expertise and we all are in it for the good of the customer.

What we know on our end is the way you make people feel matters. And if were to call everyone who works at ECT an “employee” that sounds different and feels different than “team members.” We choose to embrace our team as a whole the members on that team as individuals.

We decided long ago we would always refer to each other as team members. Not only does it make people feel better, it affects the purpose of the title. Being a part of a team and working toward a common goal for the customer makes you excited to get up and get to work. You feel less of a “cog in a wheel” and more like an important part of what we’re doing here – and that’s how it should be.

Everyone says the customer comes first, right? But at ECT we consider our team members equal with our customer. If we’re all working to deliver for the customer, well we certainly can’t do it without a full field.

It comes down to respect. Our team members stay a long time because they know they are respected here for what they bring to the table. For more on this subject, watch my recent video:

Some thoughts on our 40th from our CEO, Jeff Murphy.

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As we continue focusing on our 40th anniversary, it was my pleasure to sit down with ECT’s CEO, Jeff Murphy. 

When Jeff accepted the opportunity to lead the business he had two main goals:

  1. Build a leadership team and
  2. Grow the service business. 

You’ve heard from members of our leadership team in previous posts with John, Scott, Dave and Tom. 

Service provided an area of significant opportunity for the team. At the time Jeff came into the business, ECT had a small team of service specialists, but they were not dedicated to service only. Service was seen as a necessary evil and they would get pulled from their service-focused work to help out on projects. This approach and lack of focus on service did not allow the service specialists to perform to their potential and created a number of frustrated customers.  Today, with the leadership of Tom Barrett, we are proud to rely on a team of 10 people solely focused on service with a heart and passion for serving the customer by helping them solve system issues no matter what.

Jeff’s team-building focus has been instrumental for ECT. At ECT, we refer to each other as team members, and that’s something the leadership team takes very seriously. “This isn’t just a group of people with a ‘job’ but everyone is part of the team and contributes to it growing, developing and scaling,” Jeff says.

To Jeff and the leadership team, company culture is paramount in building a solid team. At the top of the priority list is flexibility. As long as the customer feels taken care of and the job is getting done, team members can enjoy flexibility in their work-life. This served the team well as the pandemic set in. Our team was already used to functioning under this flexible workflow. Once flexibility became a necessity for business, we found we functioned close to how our “normal” already was.

At the milestone of our 40th year in business, we would be remiss if we didn’t talk about our strong link to the past and our reputation earned over the decades. Our goal is to continue that strong reputation and build upon it.

To accomplish this, we have two mantras: 

  1. It’s amazing what happens when you show up. We must be there for our customers and each other. 
  2. What you focus on expands. When you focus on growing and achieving, you do.

A key foundation for our leadership team is to take our faith very seriously. It’s been a key ingredient in helping us sustain and persevere through the years. 

What does the future hold? 

“We still have work to do to get to quantitative goals. We’ve built the service and leadership team,” Jeff says. But, he goes on to say, “We haven’t grown into our pants. We have a strong infrastructure and that allows us room to grow another 50-100% with the team we have.”

His thoughts on what’s to come in the industry and the company: 

  • We’ll continue to see more cloud-based services with more intelligence being brought into actual devices;
  • The Internet of Things will continue to expand as we see more investment into AI and front-end software to allow these devices to connect easier, regardless of brand. 
  • More standardization, ie, more standards being developed on protocols between systems. The downside here is that can slow us down in the industry, at least in the short-term.

“At ECT, we’re going to become more and more an integrator and service company. We’re going to continue to evolve into being brand- and product-agnostic. With standardization, we’re not going to have to care whose product or device it is because we can work on it, take care of it, get the customers what they want. Our team must continue to become better at troubleshooting and programming all types of systems. The value in the future is not in the device, but making customer’s happy with what  they want that device to do.”

“ECT will continue to make our business about relationships. About four years ago, we determined our ideal customer has multiple buildings and a need to standardize. Our relationship in that process is simply critical. The customer must trust that we have their best interest in mind and that we’re not just trying to make a buck.”

Take ComputerShare, for instance. There are times now when our customer is not even onsite for installs. Their trust in our team is 100%. That trust comes from a solid relationship and our commitment to perform the ability of which we know we are capable. Communication is paramount, as is our timeliness and ability to quote properly and come in on budget. With this particular customer, we have the benefit of being involved from the design stage so we can catch issues well before they would have happened.

We’re headed into a much broader global focus than we ever have been. We’ve broadened our horizon and it has produced relationships outside of this area and market. Jeff sees an opportunity to continue expanding that. 

“I see ECT growing and getting involved in other areas of technology like A/V and systems that buildings utilize for other intent than just security and energy management. 

Jeff ends our conversation in much the way it began: 

“I’m extremely proud,” he says. “A short time ago we were in a meeting with a customer in which our team leaders had the opportunity to describe their role and their team’s accomplishments. The resiliency and flexibility through the pandemic, we now have the honor of talking about, brought some actual tears to my eyes. They rolled up their sleeves and did whatever it took to get the job done.”

“The day-to-day stuff that gets us more business are the people out there putting in the systems and making it work and making our customers thrilled with what they’ve got. We get so many remarks on a weekly basis on how our team has created an excellent experience for our customers. And that’s something I don’t see changing.” 

Looking back, Looking forward with John Arnold, VP of Security Operations

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As we continue moving toward our company’s 40th anniversary and celebrating who we are as a team, as a company, I sat down with John Arnold, Vice President of Security Operations.

The conversation began with a general discussion of transitions over the past 40 years, and specifically in the past 10 since John joined the team. The changes in technology have impacted customer needs and have opened the door for conversations. For instance, the DIY market has mostly affected residential projects which doesn’t impact ECT, but customers are more knowledgeable of capabilities due to a Ring Doorbell or Nest thermostat they’ve put in their home. Having a basic understanding of available technologies allows us to talk about how to translate those technologies to commercial projects.

This type of education expansion is a good fit for our team’s culture. We’ve always enjoyed that consultative perspective, and this has taken that task to a new level.

AI (Artificial Intelligence) is another area of growth we’ve seen over the past 10 years, and the technology continues to evolve quickly. One way we’ve seen this is with technology showing an object left behind on video surveillance. This is especially important for public transportation buildings, as you can imagine, but translates to security in all commercial spaces. The technology shows an object in view that shouldn’t be there, but has been there for a specific amount of time. Other examples include “Crossline Detection” and “People Counting.” Both of these play into security and are examples of different systems working together.

One area of AI that has come along in the past few years is being certain if an object is inanimate or not. For example: a security system looking for movement could see a balloon flying through the air in the middle of the night and sound the alarm of an intruder. Today, the technology knows if that intruder of the space is a breathing being or just a… balloon. These are the kinds of systems we’re installing for our customers everyday.

What John really likes about the new AI and technologies is how integrated they can be. For instance, a security system can alert when a back door is open, and it can trigger a change in the thermostat as well. “Integrating access control, intrusion, video systems, site management and temperature controls all from a single seat can take into account safety and security of an entire business at once,” John says. And today, it can even be managed from a phone.

So what’s on the horizon for our industry and ECT as a whole? John thinks customers are now more open to adaptation and change. “As technology evolves, we see more moving toward a cloud-base solution. The cloud is more widely accepted with cyber security, can be safer for access control and allows for reducing the amount of hardware to be replaced regularly.

Of course, some of this was triggered by the pandemic, but the evolution of technology has been there for a while, it just needed the impetus to come into play.

One of the things John loves about ECT is we are nimble and able to respond to our customers’ needs. We’ve been asked to travel for our customers. “Customers love us so much they send us places instead of finding a subcontractor there. They know our skills and talent and know full-well what they’ll get with the ECT team.”

So when we’re asked to do something new or travel outside of our local area, the response is always “hey let’s do it.” Our culture and leadership allow for that, and we’ve been able to perform, meet the needs. We’re willing to take on the challenge of doing work thousands of miles away because our customers trust us to be successful, and exceed their expectations.”

As we approach our 40-year anniversary, John feels ECT team members have embraced our culture as a whole. “We’re an organization of individuals that come to work do something we like rather than just to put food on the table. At our leadership meetings, the ‘why are you here’ question is typically answered with comments about our culture. The culture and people are really what makes ECT.”

Of course, John touched upon the customers as well. “We gravitate toward customers who have a similar culture. We like to build partnerships – we are not just selling a commodity.” ECT is more concerned with understanding customer needs, so that we can take care of them. “We’re not going to win all the jobs on which we bid, but we are committed to our customers and our team. I like working here at ECT because I feel I’m cared for. People have doctor’s appointments and have kids with ballgames, and that’s all ok. We have work-life balance that works for us.”