Having Everyone in One Place Promotes Collaboration and Improves Customer Service
“Moving into our new larger building has immediate benefits,” says Tom McLeod, President and CEO. “With the entire headquarters under one roof, we have better internal communications, and better communications within the company translates into better communications with customers.” The ultimate goal is giving the customer more.
Transportation software design and execution requires input from so many different perspectives, and that’s why the ability to communicate easily is so valuable. “Collaboration is huge in the software business,” says Rick Halbrooks, Vice President of Sales. “We are so big now that we have people from different groups who have never met each other, but that’s changing now that everyone in Birmingham works in the same building. Our company is fully integrated now, just like our software.”
Rick gives an example of one way that this will benefit customers. “Customers who call in for help will get answers more quickly, because we can interact easily with the people in proximity, and those are the people who might have answers,” he says. “If you are on the phone with a customer, and you need to transfer the call to someone else, you can look over and see if that person is at his or her desk. You can walk over and say, ‘I’ve got this customer on the phone with this question. Can you help with this?’ In the past, with people located in separate buildings, that wasn’t always possible.”
McLeod Teams Can Work Together More Productively
Bringing teams together is no accident, explains David Custred, Vice President of Operations. “When designing the layout for the new building, we asked who logistically needed to be located next to each other to increase our utilization,” he says. For example, product teams are on the same floor as Quality Assurance teams, and imaging, EDI, and third-party integration are next to each other and near other service operations teams. “The result is we can ask each other questions, work more closely together, and increase productivity,” David says.
Another design decision was to create one large break room for the entire seven- story building, instead of having break rooms on each floor. “Having the one large break room is great,” says Rusty Watkins, Executive Vice President and CIO. “People are getting together in a casual way during lunch and at other times that they weren’t doing before. The nice thing about that is when your team is working on a technical issue,
and you run up against a problem, someone might say, ‘Hey, I just talked to this person at lunch who knows about this. Let me give them a call.’”
The Location and Setting Will Help to Attract the Best Talent
“We now have a headquarters that functions at a level that matches the vitality and strength of our company,” says Mark Cubine, Vice President of Marketing. “The new building is located in a beautifully landscaped office park with attractive views on every side. The interior’s glass walls ensure that natural light flows into every work
40 A CHIEVE MORE
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44
