Impactful Culture
I recently had the honor of attending Impact Networking's twenty-fifth-anniversary celebration in beautiful Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
This gathering of hundreds of extraordinary people was inspiring and amazing. Some organizations talk about culture, and the culture of some organizations speaks for itself. Impact Networking's Culture speaks a very clear message of excellence!
Their Esprit de Corps is that of a military unit on a mission to completely destroy the status quo. When an organization can eliminate the need to seek buy-in because all its team members bought into continuous relevance the day they joined the team, that organization will thrive in its ability to disrupt the status quo.
Impact Networking has become the print services industry's most extraordinary deliverable diversification organization.
Impact Networking Won in diversifying its business deliverables
For over a decade, I have been warning all my print industry friends who were heading into managed IT services to avoid small accounts and build an infrastructure to enable successful IT services to be delivered upmarket.
I have warned that chasing and catching 1-5k per month services agreements will build you a marginal lifestyle-managed services firm. Those wishing to create an enterprise Hundred Million plus Managed Services Platform must move upmarket and seek accounts above a ten thousand a month threshold.
I have also screamed regarding the insanity in dealers performing IT assessments for free. Any of my dealer friends still doing free IT assessments must face the reality they will never succeed in managing IT services as their services are obviously worthless!
Impact Networking has built a tremendous team, and all great teams have value. More importantly, all great teams will always demand the appropriate compensation from the clients they serve.
All highly successful top-tier service organizations are adamant about ensuring all their potential clients are qualified to join the roles of their existing clients.
Understanding who you are, what you do, and who you engage is critical to delivering managed IT services successfully.
The success of these deliverables starts with the ideal customer profile (ICP). Those service providers who understand the importance of ICP will consistently deliver services above expectations.
Those delivering managed services who think they can service and scale the profitability of that service to different customer profiles will never succeed.
Any organization selling managed services to the upstream marketplace must understand that clients who buy Lamborghinis do not want to sit in service lines behind Fords.
Successful high-tier service organizations also understand that their team's quality must be representative of the clients the organization seeks.
Something the Impact Networking team understands well. Is that not everyone is allowed to join the Impact Team? Those seeking to join Impact Networking's internal or external customer list are welcome to be considered; however, not all who apply will qualify.
When one looks at the teams within Impact Networking and DOT Security, one will conclude what they see as top-tier quality teams.
Disruptive organizations break through the status quo walls of their industry because they are teams that are unfearful of their place in the future. Organizations such as Impact Networking understand it's being comfortable with all that their competitors find uncomfortable. This is the differentiator that feeds their success.
The print industry has attempted to reinvent itself for over a decade. Unfortunately, today, only a few dealer organizations have exceeded in obtaining more than 40% of their revenues from non-print associated deliverables.
I have always believed that the print industry has been mislead by the IT industry's consultants. This misleading isn't based on malice. It's based on a lack of understanding of scaling IT services through print dealers/reseller organizations whose core deliverables exceed five million in annual revenues. Most IT consultants work with lifestyle IT services firms with annual revenues of sub-five million.
Print dealer organizations with revenues over five million, let alone with annual revenues over one hundred million, have completely different costs and infrastructures than that of a 1-5 million IT services company.
Most managed IT services companies produce between one and three million in total revenues. These managed service providers are lifestyle businesses that do not possess the resources to acquire the appropriate human capital to drive an upmarket enterprise deliverable.
These lifestyle IT service organizations are comfortable with low monthly dollar contracts, and their staff will easily define their limited capabilities.
Anyone who studies Impact Networking will realize the people leading the organization are not those you would find in a one to five-million-dollar business.
One abundantly clear thing is - that Impact Networking is not interested in being another lifestyle managed IT services provider chasing 1K contracts.
Impact Networking is instead writing the book on scaling 10k and above monthly IT services contracts. Today's average fee-based customer qualifying assessment from Impact Networking exceeds 15K.
Any managed service provider organization seeking and winning contracts with over one million dollars in life value is not close to the league where you see nearly 95% of IT service providers globally.
Impact Networking is clearly in a league of its own.
Impact Network learned that those who hang around in comfort zones with little to zero accountability will never reinvent themselves, let alone an industry.
When the foundation of an organization's culture is forged in accountability, that organization will come together and accomplish incredible things.
Impact Networking has accomplished five incredible managed service platforms. Managed IT, Managed Cyber Security, Managed Digital Transformation, Managed Marketing and Managed Print.
Impact Networking, through its culture based on excellence through accountability, has moved far past the roots of its print services heritage.
Those organizations with teams dedicated to delivering exceptional experiences to their client base will, by default, provide exceptional experiences to their teammates.
Impact Networking is a remarkable team that is doing epic things. I look forward in continuing to monitor their momentum as they reinvent the managed services industry.
My Impact Networking Friends have so much to be proud of and much to celebrate as it enters its 26th year in business. I am honored to have access to this incredible organization as their story is truly inspiring. I thank my friend Frank Cucco and all the incredible team.
I am very excited for the future of Impact Networking as Michael Lepper takes the CEO reins and Anthony Cucco takes the reins as COO. Together with so many talented leaders and teammates, Impact Networking and DOT Security are poised for continuous excellence!
Keep up the great work my friends
Status quo is the killer of all that will be invented.
Ray Stasieczko
Founder/Host The End Of The Day With Ray
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