According to Joe, his job as a Technology Advisor at Accent is to keep his sight on the forest and not so much the trees. What that looks like on a day-to-day basis is a lot of face-to-face meetings with clients, talking about where they are today and where they want to go tomorrow.
He takes what he hears from these meetings, combines it with his knowledge of the client’s IT environment, and then guides them through the process of creating an IT strategy that will achieve the outcomes they desire.
From Business Owner to Executive Consultant
Joe's background as the owner of a small computer repair shop and a willingness to learn has allowed him to quickly get up to speed in this role.
“My skillset in consulting and dealing with business owners, and being a business owner myself, has lent very well to what Accent needs in my current role,” said Joe.
When Joe decided that it was time to close his business after it took a nosedive as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, he didn’t imagine that being a business owner would be as much of a benefit as it turned out to be. In fact, he was concerned about having a boss again after so many years of running his own business.
“I was really worried about how I was going to relate to having a boss again -- even though when you work for yourself you have 300 different bosses. There have been challenges but Accent has made it easy,” said Joe.
Challenged to Go Up to the Next Level
One of Joe’s challenges has been to take his technology knowledge up to another level. The IT environments that he worked with previously were quite small and simple compared to the complex enterprise networks of Accent clients. Joe was already in learning mode before he came to Accent so all he had to do was switch gears a bit to change his focus from the individual parts of an IT system to the whole.
“Joe has ramped up very quickly. There are a lot of moving pieces and a lot of things to learn, and he’s taken it all in stride and is doing a great job,” said Joe’s supervisor, Jonathan. “Plus, he has an amazing positive attitude that elevates the tone of meetings, and he’s happy to do what needs to be done for clients or the team.”
Core Values Aren’t Just Lip Service
Joe says that it’s the support of his team that has had the biggest impact on his ability to quickly make a difference. They’re there when he has questions, concerns, or needs a listening ear. He’s discovered that there’s a team mentality that underscores everything at Accent, and the “work and win as a team” core value isn’t just lip service.
He also feels that everyone is there to make life better for clients and that’s what he loves best about his job. He gets satisfaction from being able to make things more efficient and more effective for clients. In the process of doing that he has to use some brain sweat to figure things out while relying on the contributions of his team to share their knowledge and expertise to build better IT environments for clients.
“If technology is frustrating to use, you’re not going to use it but if you can design the system so that it’s improved and the client comes back and says, ‘It’s great! I love it!’ that’s the best part of this job,” said Joe.
Everyone Works to Make Things Better
Thinking back to when he was in conversations with Corey and Jonathan about the Technology Advisor position, Joe could have decided that the job would be too hard or too stressful. But their transparency in talking about both the potential challenges and successes made up his mind that coming on with Accent was the right decision.
He says, “It’s not all puppies and rainbows but I really believe that everybody here is on the same team working to make things better.”
