Introduction by Ali Hamdan, Head of Professional Services, Vertiv GBS Cluj-Napoca
One of the best things about Vertiv as a company is that, regardless of the location, we can be both high-paced and insightful. Case study: Vertiv Global Business Services Cluj.
In here, we are proficient in offering multiple services to our EMEA and Global internal and external customers. Furthermore, a regional Inside Sales team is working with resellers and partners to make sure that best solutions are provided to our end users. Not in the least, we manage the regional FP&A activity from our Cluj office and provide high quality business insights to the entire business and functions, measuring the business performance and help leadership drive the company.
Beyond the diverse portfolio of services that Vertiv GBS provides from our Cluj center, we are growing into the digital spectrum and adding more Data Scientists roles supporting multiple arias including the service business, LOB, marketing and other internal functions. This enables us to be ahead of the curve and deliver top services to our internal and external customers. Because, at the end of the day, their success is our success.
Diversity defines us if we look at the services that we provide – anything from Finance, Operations, Engineering Services, HR, Marketing and up to Software Development, Procurement, Legal to Transformation services. At the same time, we are truly “one Vertiv team” when it comes to the quality of the outcome that we generate for our customers and our vision of being “Architects of Continuity”.
2020 has been a totally different year from what we have seen before, yet it helped us to learn from this experience, focus on what truly matters and how to better support our customers.
Alina Bîrsan, Sales Incentive Manager covering Europe, Middle East and Africa within Vertiv
What exactly are you doing in your current role (and how did you start)?
Currently I am managing Vertiv’s incentive program created for our EMEA sales team, meaning around 500 employees that help our customers by providing the best solutions for their needs. Therefore, my role in this position is to make sure they have a clear target set-up, are being fairly recompensated for their efforts and that our policy and guidelines are correctly implemented throughout the region I am responsible for. On the other hand, I also need to ensure the overall targets are well covered and distributed, to drive productivity improvements and performance management and recommend pragmatic guidelines, clear for the sales force.
I joined the company in 2013 when I started as a partner specialist, part of the Channel sales team and slowly moving to more complex roles. It was and continues to be an interesting journey, that helps me grow professionally and not only.
What are the activities that bring you great joy?
I cannot name a certain activity; however, it gives me great joy to work in such environment where I was, and I am still able to learn and develop, being able to contribute and help our teams in reaching their goals. Also, it gives me a wonderful feeling to see that I am trusted and that my opinion is considered within the organization, and here I am referring to the Cluj site and to the wider EMEA sales operations department. This keeps me motivated but also gives me a sense of responsibility.
What challenges have you faced so far?
Looking back and thinking at each role I had or the projects I was involved in, yes there were challenges and difficulties I faced; however, I remember them as situations that thought me something, business wise or people related.
Tell us about the most unique experience/project implemented in your current position.
Since I first joined the company, I had the opportunity to be involved in several projects, it is a bit difficult to choose only one, but I can say that each of them was unique at that time. However, if I must choose, I would pick the following:
1. Channel reporting infrastructure – being able to develop and contribute to the reporting area of this department, helping our sales people in their day-to-day activities
2. Replacing manual sales incentives spreadsheets with an online version – this is a project that helps and will help not only our sale people in tracking their performance and activity, but also our leaders in managing their teams
When you explain to your parents/family what you do at work, how would you do it?
The sales area it is a well-known domain for everyone, in a way or another we all had contact with it, either being approached by a sales person or us contacting one to purchase different things, from large assets to smaller ones. Therefore, explaining them, that each sales person in our organisation has a sales target and that I am responsible with managing how there are set-up and measured, it turned out not to be very difficult.
What do you consider to be trends in your domain? Please list 3.
We are living in a digital world, where we have access to information whenever needed, we just need a smartphone and an internet connection, nothing too complicated. In the sales incentive area, we want and need to follow the same trend, information to be available for each sales representative whenever they need. For this to happen we need the following:
1. Emphasize simplicity while planning – keep things simple when setting-up targets
2. Transparency – sales people should have access to their compensations plans whenever needed, to track their results even from their smartphones. They should be able to see what’s the outcome of their work not only end of the year or end of the quarter once the results are being calculated, but throughout the year as well.
3. Digitalization – replace all manual spreadsheets used in this area with online dashboards/ reports
What are you doing to ensure you continue to grow and develop in the pioneering work?
In this fast and continuously developing world, my biggest concern is to become obsolete and “dated”. Therefore, in order not to reach that point I think it’s very important to spend/ allocate time for trainings, to read, listen to podcasts, get up-to-date with the latest trends in the business but also to connect with your colleagues and peers. There are many things we can learn from each other it’s just a matter of sharing information and asking for opinions.
Dana Vlase, Record to Report Group Manager, which is the fancy way of saying Accounting Group Manager
What exactly are you doing in your current role (and how did you start)?
I am part of Vertiv Finance Global Business Services (GBS), and my area of responsibility is over the end to end accounting process of our European entities. I joined the company four years ago, when Vertiv was taking the first steps to create a Finance GBS. The initial step was to centralize the typical finance shared service activities into one location, so I joined at the beginning of this transition as an Accounting Team Leader. This was four years ago, and now, from a Shared Service with limited visibility, focusing on executing fractures of processes, we matured and transformed into a GBS Finance organization with full ownership of end to end finance activities, including statutory finance of our European locations.
What are the activities that bring you great joy?
It brings me great joy to see how much we achieve as a team and acting as an owner, especially this year which was mostly a “remote year”. This year is even more challenging because 2020 marks our first year as Finance GBS, we have total ownership over the end to end accounting of EMEA with no local accountants to support and advise. So, for us it was a year of firsts: a first and successful group audit, first statutory financials preparation and audit, first SOX controls implementation overlapping with many standardization and transformation initiatives, most of them performed while working remotely.
What challenges have you faced so far?
We often see this cliché phrase “I work well in a fast-paced environment”, well this is not a cliché in Vertiv. Our organization is very fast-paced, and our teams must juggle with a lot of changes. From the Emerson spin-off and Platinum acquisition, to all the re-organizational changes at EMEA level (company mergers & integrations), fiscal year change and all the fun accounting that comes with it, ERP systems migrations, company policies and procedures changes, Vertiv being listed to NYSE – they all translated into an action or process change that our team had to immediately understand and implement. The challenge is to quickly produce accurate and relevant information in a constantly changing and developing environment.
Tell us about the most unique experience/project implemented in your current position.
The EMEA Finance Transformation journey from the traditional SSC to a more strategic Finance organization, under the GBS model. In one year, 85% of the EMEA finance processes spread across 14 countries were consolidated in Cluj. While the main priority was transitioning the processes, we also focused on standardizing, harmonizing and launching cross-departmental improvement projects to ensure our new processes are well connected into an end to end model. Vertiv’s Finance GBS journey couldn’t have been a success story without our amazing teams, which worked tirelessly to transfer and build robust new processes without impacting current operations.
When you explain to your parents/family what you do at work, how would you do it?
I work in the accounting department. Accounting is looking at your spending and income, the flow of the money in or out, the goods (assets) that you own and the debt that you have (loans, credit cards). All of us are practicing accounting in our day to day lives even if we don’t realize it. Accounting helps you take decision when it comes to saving, investing or paying debt. To sum up, accounting keeps the score of the business: it tells you if you are winning the game and where you have to improve.
What do you consider to be trends in your domain? Please list 3.
Global Business Services – The future of shared services has moved beyond transaction processing to include value-added services, a centralized and integrated model that provides comprehensive and complex end-to-end processes. GBS creates the environment that helps businesses focus on agility, customer service, talent development while enabling cost reduction and process efficiency.
RPA and AI – this topic needs no further explanation. Not only a trend, but a necessity to keep up with digital transformation, address key pressure points, reduce costs and mitigate risks.
Big Data – Big Data Analytics is being used in a variety of fields like Healthcare, Manufacturing, Manufacturing, Media & Entertaining etc., to support business decisions, understand and influence customer behavior. Big data provides critical insights and is expected to change the way we perform accounting. It will help us “historians”, as accountants are sometimes called because we look at past transactions, to provide real time access to information.
What are you doing to ensure you continue to grow and develop in the pioneering work?
The way I continue to learn, and grow is through three main pillars:
• People: Staying connected with my peers from Finance Service Centers, to understand what other organizations are doing.
• Professional: Read different finance and accounting publications to ensure I am up to date with the latest changes and regulatory requirements.
• Technology advances and innovation: keeping up to date with new technologies that can be applied in our daily processes (like AI, RPA).
Ionuț Todor, Marketing Team Leader, Vertiv Romania
What exactly are you doing in your current role (and how did you start)?
Let me go back in time a bit. It was the summer of 2010 and I was looking for a way to make money while still enjoying it. Everything started with a search on Google about ‘online marketing’. That search opened lots of doors and opportunities and it’s the reason why I am here writing this story. Since then, my world was never the same.
I joined Vertiv in 2014 with great hopes, not too much experience, and an immense desire to learn and develop in a corporate environment. At that time Vertiv started to build their own online marketing department in Cluj to drive business growth and in the same time had a lot to offer to their employees. It was exactly what I needed and a perfect match with my personality. That was just the beginning.
I am here now to support Cluj marketing team achieve company’s key results and people’s professional goals. Our role is to generate interest from the customers and make a difference into the market and industry. Creating disruption. Thinking differently. Acting as owners for our own processes. Making a positive impact on company results. Drive change. Innovate.
What are the activities that bring you great joy?
I am with Vertiv for 6 years now and still have the wonderful feeling of learning something new each day. And this is quite impressive. I love my Cluj team – I honestly believe they are unique, and I have a lot to learn from each one of them, no matter of years of experience or position. It’s about those small jokes, chit-chats, regular stand-ups, funny meetings, opinions, dreams, hobbies, difficult projects and even challenging discussions. And I adore the wider EMEA marketing team – it’s nice to see you are treated with respect by each and every one. The level of cumulated experience in marketing at an EMEA level is huge, you just need the capacity to store all that information.
One of the things that brings me great joy is seeing people develop and grow each day. It’s not about telling them what to do, it’s about guiding them to achieve what they want and need. There are no many feelings like this one.
What challenges have you faced so far?
I would approach this from different perspectives as I am wearing two hats here:
From a marketing perspective, there is a lot of noise inside the organization and in the marketplace. Even if you have a strong message and a brilliant marketing plan who will guarantee it will be implemented? How would you get the resources you need? How will you make sure the budget will be approved? Talking louder won’t solve anything on longer term. Market noise is what customers get bombarded with. Endless messages and confusing ads from competitors. The best way to rise above the noise is by creating a positive sound. And this is one of the hardest things to achieve. Not to mention the multitude of never-ending changes into the marketing landscape.
From a management perspective, creating that healthy environment that everyone strive for is not an easy task. When people join Vertiv, they bring their own experiences with them, their own successes, failures, achievements, expectations, desires and even personal beliefs. Everyone is equal but how they can develop on their own way by choosing their own path into the same environment? How to reach every one’s career dream and in the same time help the organization? It’s not that hard to accomplish individual objectives and key results but how to achieve stretch targets and company goals? How to make a difference in the market and stand out? The answer stays in a collective effort, unity, respect, share of the same values, a clear direction and hard work. No more, no less.
Tell us about the most unique experience/project implemented in your current position.
During the years there were many projects implemented (locally and globally). Each project with its own experience (good and bad) and lessons learnt. I would make no justice by naming just one but to give you an idea I would choose two.
By far I am the proudest of assembling the team I have in Cluj. It has been (and it is) a long journey of learning, debating, (receiving) mentoring and guidance and so on. Each one of us is working on different marketing areas – email, social media, inbound marketing, paid media, channel marketing, web, reporting, and product marketing. It’s a very tasty ‘marketing cocktail’.
Secondly, I could name one of the global projects that me and 3 other colleagues owned. The objective was to increase the traffic from Google by 20% in 1 year by optimizing more than 15 language variations. Mission accomplished after 12 months of hard work.
When you explain to your parents/family what you do at work, how would you do it?
My family is using Google and mobile devices. And they browse web sites, do online shopping or click ads. I am telling them I make that possible.
What do you consider to be trends in your domain? Please list 3.
It is clear we live in a time when technology marketing moves at the speed of light and consumer behaviors are hard to predict. Nowadays it is essential for any marketing team to coordinate with sales, HR and other departments to deliver a unique experience.
Data will become more and more important. Top data-driven companies like Facebook, Amazon, Google or LinkedIn are actively using big data, predictive analytics, machine learning and artificial intelligence to improve their products and drive more sales/conversions. The way we understand the data will be THE KEY.
Personalization is the new marketing. More than 90% of visitors do not convert into a customer and the problem is that the message does not fit every single one of the visitors. Thinking at buyer journey and marketing personas is a great way to convert more visitors into customers.
Marketing automation to increase efficiency. Whether we speak about nurturing campaigns and omni-channel experiences, machine learning and artificial intelligence, chatbots, conversational marketing, personalized content, automated social media and email marketing – all these will take your organization at the next level. These trends will not only free marketers from mundane tasks but will increase conversions and sales. If you want to be successful you have to leverage AI and automation.
What are you doing to ensure you continue to grow and develop in the pioneering work?
Learning should never stop no matter what. This implies any mistakes or failures. As I already mentioned I learn a lot from my team, local and remote colleagues. I like to have clear objectives in mind that will ensure continuity in my development. Also reading books, articles and listen to podcasts – can’t go wrong with it.