Newgentek Becomes Member of USAV Group

Newgentek has joined USAV Group, a PSA Company, as a member covering Tampa, Florida effective September 1, 2018.  This partnership with USAV allows Newgentek the ability to leverage a network of ProAV integrators with technical expertise throughout the U.S. and Canada.

USAV has requirements for membership, including subscribing, implementing, and supporting USAV best practices for integrators.  The integrators that are awarded membership must have a high level of experience providing AV solutions in an array of different industries from government to corporate enterprise and everything in between.

"Newgentek’s standards and values are very much aligned with the USAV team of integrators", said Chon Nguyen, CEO of Newgentek. USAV integrators take on projects from conception to completion and provide ongoing service and support after a project is complete, making sure the systems continue to work without a hitch.

“We are very excited to join the USAV team of elite ProAV integrators.  We feel this is a fantastic partnership. Newgentek helps fill an open void in the Tampa market, and USAV brings a group of talented, like-minded integrators together to turn complex solutions into positive outcomes for our clients locally and throughout the U.S.,” said Jared Lederhandler, President of Newgentek.

“We are excited to add a quality integrator covering the Tampa, Florida area. Newgentek brings IT and AV experience to the group and a desire to learn from their USAV network peers. Our values aligned nicely making the application process smooth,” said Chris Whitley, President of USAV.

About USAV:

USAV bonds ProAV affiliates into an elite industry team.  With Integrators throughout the U.S. and Canada, partnerships with top ProAV manufacturers and service providers, and alignment with leading industry associations, the USAV advantage is unparalleled.  USAV Integrators provide clients with the benefits of a nationwide network of ProAV specialists and personal relationships with local AV experts.

Conference Room Scheduling & Management

Are you keeping a piece of paper outside of the conference room to keep track of scheduling?  

Resource management, especially conference room management, is becoming more and more important.  The need to maximize the resources that are available in a given company has become a top priority throughout organizations.

As many organizations outfit technology within training rooms, conference rooms or huddle spaces, the next logical step is how to reserve the room.  Throughout many organizations today, those rooms are reserved by scheduling the resource through the companies email client - whether Microsoft Outlook, Google, etc.  The missing piece is how that data translates to the room itself.

Just imagine, your team is strategizing on how to penetrate emerging markets outside of your geographic territory with a white board full of great ideas when… your co-worker enters the room insisting that he/she has the conference room that you reserved.  Without any type of room scheduling or management solutions implemented, you and the team leave the room in hopes that you’re able to pick up where you left off. If this sounds familiar - good news! You’re not alone and even better news, there are tools that can assist!

When searching the market for this tool, you will discover that the solutions have changed within the past few years.  Approximately three years ago, many of these tools were solutions that required hours of programming and configuration.  In certain applications those systems are applicable, but in others, the focus is based on three factors: Scalability, Implementation & Ease of Use.  Let’s better understand each of these factors.

Scalability:

In business today, scalability is critical.  No matter how many rooms are formal boardrooms vs. huddle spaces, seats to a room, or geographic boundaries - technology provides organizations the ability for each room to look uniform, be managed by your current email client and provide the room-user with the same experience and behaviors whether your employees find themselves in Chicago today and Los Angeles tomorrow.

Implementation:

Gone are the days of installing a hardware solution and finding that your organization does not go live with the solution for another two weeks due to the backend coordination, programming and configuration and adoption of the software.  The market offers many solutions, such as Zoom Rooms, which allows users to utilize any type of device like an iPad or Android Tablet installed outside of a room, and through a simple, standardized user interface, it is up and running within a few hours.

Ease of Use:

The million dollar question now becomes - how easy are these solutions to use?  In today’s world, many of these solutions require the room-user to be technical - which inevitably has the room-user reaching out to the IT department to schedule room resources.  As with many of the solutions on the market today, Zoom Rooms are able to be reserved from the calendar within an organization's email client or through the front of the scheduling panel itself.  Additionally, with a bank of rooms lining the hallway of an organization, a user is able to understand which rooms are available just by looking at the tablet mounted outside of the room. The bottom quarter of the room scheduling solution will be lit green for available and red for occupied.  The benefit here is for room-users to conduct ad hoc meetings without having to schedule these resources from their desk.

Gone are the days of the piece of paper that is printed at 6 am only be outdated by 8 am.  Let Newgentek demonstrate the scalability, implementation and ease of use that room scheduling solutions offer!

Project Planning & National Rollouts

Often times when we're working with multi-unit operators to rollout new hardware or systems, there are struggles relating to infrastructure. The successful operators we work with are growing so fast that installations and infrastructure planning are an after thought. It's much easier to standardize at four locations than it is at 30!

As brands grow and consumer demands change, the desire to roll out technology is necessary to remain competitive. Sometimes these rollouts are driven by operational requirements - things like EMV (chip) card readers, point-of-sale terminal refreshes, or kitchen display systems. Other times it's focused on the customer experience with things like digital signange, guest wireless internet access, or a bold video wall installation for a forward-thinking retailer. Typically these installations are fairly intrusive to operations, so we need to perform them outside of normal business hours.

When we execute a national rollout with new customers or current customers who don't engage us for managed infrastructure services, many times the core infrastructure is so fragmented that the project becomes very difficult to plan for. It's easy to quickly go over budget when, upon sending a resource onsite, we find a rats nest of cables that aren't labeled and there's no network documentation or information.

There are several things we can do during the project planning phase that can help things go smoothly. In certain cases, we will leverage our customers existing field resources to upload photos or collect information so that we can better plan and ensure we aren't sending in resources blindly. We can also perform full site audits and surveys utilizing our staff, or we can perform a full infrastructure cleanup and standardization process.

We work with our customers in a number of different ways, including acting as their complete outsourced IT department and helpdesk, where we can plan & execute these services end-to-end. In these instances we can procure, provision, and install the equipment in our customers' environments. We can also supplement the internal IT resources of your organization, being your eyes, ears, and hands on-site.

We understand that planning to roll out new technology across multiple sites is a daunting task.  Let us help you on your next project to make the process smooth and seamless!

Plan Ahead For Growth

Pay-at-the-table, mobile point of sale, digital signage. The modern restaurant and retail establishment has so much technology and complexity can grow quickly for operators. Some of the biggest challenges we see starts with not having a solid infrastructure plan as you scale. Often times operators are faced with significant challenges as they try to roll-out new technology systems and platforms if their unit-level infrastructure isn't properly planned, documented, and systematized. Our customers have had to spend significant time, effort, and money going back and retrofitting or re-configuring equipment at some of their earlier locations. Most of this could have been avoided with guidance up-front that started with a solid plan for growth.

Here are some tips for thinking about growth up-front:

• Start with the cloud - Your corporate infrastructure should start with the cloud. Hosted email (Google Apps, Office 365), collaboration tools (Dropbox, Box.net), and Voice over IP phone system can help keep you and your team productive without investing in a server. Even your back-office systems are hosted in the cloud which brings your physical IT infrastructure to almost nothing.

• Plan your growth up-front - Things like bandwidth, networking infrastructure, and even cabling should be engineered with a focus around growth. Typically the investment isn't that much more to ensure that your stores are ready to grow into the future. Spend time choosing equipment and developing standards that you can repeat at all of your stores. You will save significant time and energy in the future when you need to make a change or deploy a new system that relies on a solid infrastructure.

• Redundancy and Business Continuity - Locations that have high transaction volumes can deploy redundant and failover internet connectivity to ensure that they can continue to process credit cards, gift, and loyalty in the event their primary connection is interrupted. We handle this by a secondary traditional provider or a 4G (Cellular) connection. Also, thinking about things like offline music can ensure your guests still receive the same experience if there is a service interruption.

• Remove paper and increase efficiency and communication - Spend time thinking about systems that can help you be agile and communicate information across multiple units. A strong back-office system to handle your accounting and a system can help you build processes that will save you time and money in training and labor. When I first started working in hospitality I developed a software platform, Fusionprep, that handles back-of-house kitchen operations. It takes the paper out of the kitchen and allows operators to make changes to their recipes and build cards with the click of a button and communicate it to all of their units. It also stores and prints food safety labels for all of their prepped items ensuring that all of the items in the kitchen are labeled properly 100% of the time.

You should find a partner that has a focus on your business. IT is complex enough, when you combine that with fast-pace restaurant and retail environments it pays to have a partner that understands your unique challenges and support requirements. We work with multi-unit brands across the country to design, engineer, install, and support infrastructure and systems at some of the fastest growing hospitality brands. When we win new business from an existing provider, it's typically because they don't understand the support demands. If there is something we can help you with, feel free to reach out.

The Five Areas Where Multi-Unit Operators Are Overspending

Over the years we have worked with many operators on decreasing the upfront costs of opening new stores, lowering their support costs, and getting their technology to do what they want it to.  We’ve unfortunately seen a lot of mistakes along the way, that could have been prevented with proper planning with a strategic partner. When we meet with a potential client, one of the first things we do is a Technology Infrastructure Assessment to determine what is working and what needs to be tweaked or changed.  In doing this assessment, we’ve found there are usually five main areas that operators are overspending: labor, support, products and software, change orders, and telecom. With proper planning, these areas can be streamlined, standardized, and become very useful in growing your business, but when not implemented properly, can lead to overspending, inefficiencies, and even lost business.

Labor
Paying for skilled labor in the opening process of a store or restaurant is one of the most costly pieces of the infrastructure process.  This is partly due to the fact that training takes time, effort, and collaboration. Training employees properly is one of the most important factors in a smooth opening, where understanding and using the technology to deliver a smooth customer experience can determine whether or not they return to your restaurant.  Training on software and technology is complex and can be difficult for internal trainers to cover all topics in detail before a store opens. This is where you should ask yourself if your current vendor acts as a strategic partner. A technology vendor who provides training support before a store opening is key. Sending internal trainers to each store opening to train employees on equipment and software is costly and in most cases inefficient.  Your IT partner should offer training services and should deploy an onsite technical support person for your store openings to train your employees, answer questions, and handle any issues pre-opening. They should also be available to “train the trainers” and get them up to speed before store openings.

Support
Many times when we evaluate the current support provider during our assessment, there are redundancies or inefficiencies.  Do you have internal technicians employed for support services and break-fix problems? Paying salaries plus benefits for a whole IT department can be much more costly than outsourcing your IT department.  The ideal program would come from a consolidated vendor with an experienced support team who can support your business on an as-needed basis, with the costs built into the contract. If an internal IT support program is part of your corporate structure, many times outsourcing IT can not only decrease the need for multiple internal technicians, but it can also free up time for the internal IT department to focus on more strategic technology planning and initiatives.

Products and Software
The cost of your products are directly related to the engineering, design, and type of products you’re using in your store.  When we evaluate potential customers’ infrastructure, we find the cost of products to be much higher than they need to be. The systems and products are over-engineered, do not help the customer meet the objectives of the business, or they are causing inefficiencies.  Sometimes it is just a matter of working with a vendor who knows and understands the restaurant industry and what technology you need to operate your locations with ease. Do you need Mobile Device Management implemented so you can have visibility to all of the Ipads at your hostess stations across the country?  Do you have different products at all of your different locations? Just standardizing products across your brand can help tremendously with the cost of training, support, and installation. If your current vendors aren’t asking you what your business goals are before they are customizing your product setup, then chances are you’re overpaying for something that isn’t doing what you need it to do.

Change Orders
The hospitality and retail industries are ever-changing.  And so are the needs of the next generation customer. With that in mind, we set out to determine how operators could avoid the cost of change orders and re-configuring devices with every store opening.  Anticipating and planning for growth is one of the most important strategies to help with the costs of growing pains.  Having a clear developmental roadmap with clear plans for things like bandwidth, networking, and even cabling is a great strategy to save money.  Do you have enough bandwidth to support your growing brand, or will it become a problem later when your customer base grows? Do you have failover internet solutions in all of your high-volume locations so credit card, gift and loyalty processing can continue in the event of an internet outage, or will you have to go back later to install after problems arise? Costly change orders can be prevented in the early planning stages.  Standardizing your infrastructure across the brand, keeping equipment the same, and getting franchisees on the same page with your corporate technology initiatives are key to keeping costs down throughout your business’ growth.

Telecom
Finding ways to save money on telecom services goes beyond just what provider you’re using.  You may be paying for phone services with features that you don’t need or don’t know how to use.  Sometimes we find that the current phone system is not even working properly, causing latency issues, missed phone calls, and ultimately lost business.  Working with a technology vendor that offers training and support for your telecom needs is a must. They should be able to offer product knowledge on features that will help drive your business forward.  As the size of your organization changes, so do your telecom and data needs. Your technology vendor should also be holding annual (at the very least) reviews of your telecom usage to discover inefficiencies and problems.

When you’re running and growing a multi-unit business with tight margins, changing customer demands, and growing competition, it’s important to work with a vendor who understands your industry, has product knowledge and expertise, and is available to support your business from concept to implementation, all with the goal of driving efficiencies and lowering your costs.  This should start in the pre-planning process, but continue through the growth of your brand, with normal check-ins to evaluate the health and stability of your technology infrastructure. If you think you might need our services, contact us for a Technology Infrastructure Assessment, where we can establish a baseline for what’s working and what’s not for your business!