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Career Progression: Dan’s early passion was to become a police chief. He attended West Liberty State College for their criminal justice program, and was on track to graduate, when entering his senior year his career path took a turn toward high technology sales. Following the advice of a friend in high technology, he accepted an entry level sales role in the minicomputer industry at a time of rapid expansion. He went on to exceed sales quotas for the next 22 years in high technology, and his career responsibilities rapidly expanded.
Initially, Dan had a front-row seat in the 1980’s when the minicomputer market collapsed as a result of their resistance to open-systems and insistence on high margin proprietary systems. It was a business lesson he never forgot. Generic UNIX servers and Intel-based PC’s transformed that industry by enabling connections and interfaces previously unimagined. Dan observed firsthand the slow destruction of the major market segment for minicomputers. While these systems promoted interoperability within their own internal product lines, they would not communicate with the ecosystem of machines outside of it. This was a failure of a successful and established market to position for technology change, grounded in stubborn management thinking, and a resistant sales culture. Dan opted to embrace a sales opportunity in the emerging market for Unix (Open) systems, offering a far more compelling model that can leverage solution capabilities as they grow. During this timeframe Dan experienced another major cultural shift in the high tech sales profession; the move to using third party sales channel partners. Originally, manufacturing companies protected their sales through the establishment of large, inhouse sales teams. The majority of “old school” sales professionals across technology companies absolutely refused to embrace a third-party sales partnership model. However, Dan saw how effective this model could be from a scale standpoint and a market penetration strategy. He became a strong advocate for new selling relationships as an effective way to expand company growth. “Open architectures and channel sales relationships were not things to be avoided. This mindset included embracing third party solution providers to expand a company’s product portfolio. These were “game changing advantages to those that adopted them.” Dan says.
This focus on new business models led to a startup opportunity in the emerging market for the original Network Attached Storage (NAS) servers. Auspex Systems pioneered the NAS market and grew to $200M in sales revenues while experiencing a successful IPO. This architecture proved much more effective than traditional PC based servers in delivering data. Dan saw a big future in network attached storage. At the time, everything originated from the desktop. As successful companies expanded, they needed to be able to store and retrieve huge amounts of data very quickly. He built an international sales team that would grow this new market. At decade end, Dan found himself joining a former customer that was creating an start up sales organization within a $22 Billion dollar global organization. Nortel Networks purchased a startup organization (of former Nortel engineers) pioneering the new market for optical networking. He hired a domestic sales and technical organization which focused on the financial sector and quickly exceeded revenues during the height of the “optical networking insanity”, pre tech wreck. This model incorporated a new technology within the umbrella of an established global organization and for a time was the best of both worlds: innovation and scale.
The combination of the Dot Com bubble bursting in 2000 and September 11th, created an opportunity for introspection. Dan observed the increased importance of physical security in the wake of the attacks. Taking a 2 year “retirement”, Dan attended seminars and trade shows in the physical security market with an eye toward video surveillance systems. He was convinced that these cameras would be networked across high speed networks and integrated with third party solutions and platforms. He started tracking the way industry deploys physical security out to a customer, and realized these sales organizations did not have experience selling to the IT organization. Dan says, “The convergence of physical security systems (video / access control) with the IT infrastructure was early in the process.” Add to this that the cultures of physical security (protect lives) and IT (protect data) were polar opposites in the mindset of solution deployment timeframes. Addressing these issues led to Dan becoming a published author in the security space. He also recognized the importance of cybersecurity protections for devices being attached to the Internet. From a security camera perspective, the historical model of installing these end point devices with factory default passwords, and outdated firmware and OS releases, would not work in a world where everything is connected and vulnerable. The Mirai botnet proved this with a major hacking attack. Inspired by his decades of experience, Dan started his own consultancy, New Era Associates, where he built upon his knowledge of the convergence of physical security, IT platforms and cybersecurity. It takes a strong competence in all three disciplines to create a converged security strategy for the age of Cloud deployments and the Internet of Things (IoT).
Working with the Professional Security Alliance (PSA) since March of 2019, Dan created a Managed Security Solution Program (MSSP) to assist a network of (200) physical security integrators domestically, to deploy Cloud based solutions in the areas of access control, video surveillance and cybersecurity. The Cloud model leverages continuous monitoring and updates while providing monthly recurring revenue streams to build equity in these businesses. Packaged as easy-to-deploy managed services, they are able to plug into solution sets when and where needed. Many of these integrators support small “mom-and-pop” operations, mid-tier, and enterprise institutions. “Providing scale and efficiencies through cloud based managed services has become a game changer for most companies.” Dan says. “I understand these different markets and their cultures. I’ve seen significant markets disrupted as a result of technical innovations, and I realize how vulnerable organizations are that don’t quickly adjust their business models to embrace it.’.
Surprises: “Today the pace of technical innovation is faster than at any time in my 33 year career. Technology is the foundation, but “business models” have to change rapidly to leverage it, or you miss market cycles,” Dan says. The consistent message is that technology disruption will also continue to impact sales professionals. “As Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and BIG Data come together, we won’t need humans dialing for dollars asking people to upgrade their equipment.” My comment to people currently in inside sales, is that in 10 year’s time, when you explains to a young person that you once worked in the inside sales profession, they will respond, “People used to do that job?”. Keep your eyes open for how technology can disrupt your business and career.
Advice for Decision Makers: “If you want it to be successful in your business” Dan says, “you have to see where your business is going – not where it has been. Don’t be like the minicomputer executives who wanted to hold on to their margins. I always encourage people to ‘Disrupt Yourself’. It’s painful and doesn’t feel good, but that’s how you start thinking about the future of your business, so you won’t get caught in the cross hairs of a new technology.”
Views on Thought Leaders: Steve jobs has always inspired Dan. He saw the potential of a smart phone as a solution platform. Motorola wanted to design flip phones while Nokia played with key pads. Dan also follows Richard Branson, for his innovative way of looking at new opportunities and entering entirely new businesses.
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About the Author
Chris Ward (Commander, U.S. Navy (Retired)) has over 30 years of experience helping the Department of Defense (DoD) solve difficult technology requirements. She has a proven track record of building, maintaining, securing and certifying technology solutions for use within DoD. She works with Industry to identify key opportunities and provides strategic guidance and support. She is a strategic analyst and cybersecurity professional who has deep expertise in improving enterprise cybersecurity.
Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence
Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence