Three technology trailblazers innovate with a common critical competitive edge and beyond.
Just as technology has rapidly changed the way we work, so has the evolving dynamic within the workplace. Today, our industry continues to expand to include a diverse set of employees, including both men and women, representing multiple generations from Y to baby boomers, varied ethnicities, and lifestyle preferences.
As true industry leaders, this year’s three Women Influencers – EO Johnson’s Mary Jo Johnson, Xerox Inc.’s Ragni Mehta, and HP’s Anneliese Olson – strongly believe in the power of diversity, deeply understanding how it stokes creativity, drives innovation, and lifts revenues. They espouse values of inclusivity, respect, hard work, and excellence. Their confidence and drive have cleared a path for success not only in their own careers but also for their companies.
As CEO and owner of EO Johnson, one of the oldest and most successful dealerships in the U.S., Johnson consistently relies on the input from her employees, customers, and partners to set a course for the company.
“Diversity drives innovation,” said Johnson, whose company actively seeks out hard-working employees from across multiple generations and life experiences, ranging from more urban backgrounds to farming. “We have all these different minds, different experiences. When you get a diverse population, you can drive more creativity when you work as a team. There are always new ways of looking at things, new ways of thinking about things.”
For Xerox’s Mehta, the company’s diversity is what brought her into its folds and has kept her there for nearly three decades. While studying at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, she first worked with Xerox through her university’s co-op program. After graduation, she joined the company full time in its technical development program, which included a diverse group of students recruited out of college to join the technical ranks of Xerox as an innovation company.
“Xerox wasn’t a homogenous population,” said Mehta, whose parents immigrated to the United States from India and delivered her to their native country for just over two years under the care of her maternal grandmother so they could establish themselves and their careers before bringing her back to her new home. “You could feel at the heart of Xerox’s culture diversity was highly valued, especially in how they wanted to recruit and develop their talent, even starting from the earliest points of people’s careers. The reason Xerox values diversity isn’t to say we’ve got a combination of people from different backgrounds. It’s to say we’ve brought a diverse set of people that not only may look differently but also think differently. It’s just as much about diversity of thought as it is about diversity of ethnicities.”
Like Johnson and Mehta, HP’s Olson understands the importance of leadership’s values, especially when it comes to matters of diversity and inclusion. Boasting one of the most diverse boards in the tech industry, HP has 40% women on its board and 50% of its board members are minorities.
“We want everybody in, meaning we want people to feel a sense of belonging here,” said Olson. “We know that diversity drives innovation and the benefits are clear. With diversity and inclusion, we can grow careers, businesses, and partnerships. We want you to bring your whole self to work because the more you’re engaged, the best output and delivery you can contribute. You can thrive here. We can support diverse thinking, ethnicities, religions, sexuality because that’s how you get diversity of thought. We know the magic in anything you do in business is what happens at the seams. People are more innovative when you’re having all these different kinds of conversations at the table and representing all those different thoughts.”
While our industry and the tech industry at large has made great strides in supporting diversity in the workplace, there is still room for improvement. Women and minorities still comprise a small percentage of these industries’ workforces. Networking through various industry organizations, internal company groups that support women and minorities, and finding mentors are some ways our Women Influencers tell us are making a difference in retaining and developing talent.
“Results speak for themselves, but mentors and sponsors speak louder,” said Olson. “Having someone up above ““ male or female, but many times male ““ having somebody who can advocate for your work, your career, and the kind of development you need is critical. Particularly on the tech side, because it is a male-dominated industry, finding a set of sponsors early in your career can really help enable the right kind of moves, coaching, and representation in your career as you move higher up.”
As history has shown us, our world will continue to shift, change, and evolve as we move forward. These three women are among our industry’s leaders, looking to deliver solutions to solve ever-emerging challenges in today’s fast-paced culture with commitment, drive, and innovation. They lead from the top, and they are proving why diversity matters and how it can be a linchpin of personal and professional success. And there’s no stopping them.
The Fifth Regiment
Carol Cannata (2nd from left) celebrates the fifth anniversary of our Women Influencers franchise with this year’s three featured women, all of whom personify evolutionary excellence: Anneliese Olson (left), Ragni Mehta (second from the right), and Mary Jo Johnson (far right).
Photographed by Hannah Khymych at Blonde + Co. in New York City, June 4, 2018.
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Note: You will also find Mary Jo’s, Ragni’s and Anneliese’s stories as aggregately published below individually posted at thecannatareport.com/magazine_features.
Leading by Listening
Mary Jo Johnson leads EO Johnson with a caring eye to the future.
EO Johnson CEO Mary Jo Johnson’s guiding principle is simple: lead as a servant. Since taking over her father’s business in 1999, Johnson has leaned on this core value to help her not only continue her father’s legacy, but also create one of her own by growing EO Johnson and establishing the dealership as one of most forward-thinking businesses in our industry. Through deep listening to the company’s customers, employees, and trusted partners, Johnson has been able to expand her dealership’s business to now include a breadth of products and services to serve everyone the company touches.
After spending most of her 20s working in the commercial insurance industry, Johnson joined EO Johnson in October 1985 to help her father start the company’s inside sales team. Recognizing her limited knowledge of the office technology industry, she spent her first months on the job alongside administrative staff, sales people, and service technicians, learning the intricacies of EO Johnson. She moved on to compiling phone lists and contact info by city and began writing scripts, tailored for different types of customers, products, and services. As she connected with more customers, Johnson strengthened her sales acumen, committing herself to continually learning more about the industry, her company, and her customers.
“One of the best sources of information is your customers,” said Johnson. “Even on the telephone, I’d hear a customer say, I know you do copiers, but do you do… you can fill in anything you want there, fax machines, phone systems. Then, I’d try to pull out the information by saying, tell me about that and tell me what your needs are there.”
If Johnson didn’t have a resource, she connected her customers with local experts who could help, bolstering EO Johnson’s credibility as a trusted partner and resource.
As Johnson grew into her leadership role, she encouraged a team approach in developing the company’s strategy. Monthly huddle calls, a process to funnel up new ideas from employees, and a commitment to consistently soliciting feedback from every level within the EO Johnson organization help draw out details coming from customers and employees alike. In soliciting input from each of her department heads from administration to sales and service, Johnson not only has been able to ensure her employees are being heard, but also that their input is valued, facilitating buy-in from the top to the bottom of the organization.
“With my focus on input, I’m always the individual who asks how the customer is going to feel about this, how is the community going to feel about this,” said Johnson, who continues to run her business in line with the Golden Rule of “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Through careful listening, Johnson is able to better note the trends of what customers are seeking, problems they are looking to solve, opportunities for EO Johnson to expand. She’s able to circle in with her sales team, ask them if they are hearing similar issues, and augment any leads with more research. Occasionally, that research includes reaching out to other industry leaders through her connections with the BPCA and BTA.
“Being in a rural area, it is great to call someone like Kevin McCarthy from MOM [Modern Office Methods, based in Ohio] and ask if they are seeing the same things,” said Johnson. “Because companies like them are in bigger markets, they often have already dipped a toe in the waters and we’re able to see what they are experiencing in the market. We’re be able to see how different solutions may be able to help our current and potential customers.”
This strategy has allowed Johnson and her team to stay ahead of the curve, anticipating customers’ needs and giving the company the opportunity to evolve by diversifying its revenue stream to offset the shift in print, which has led the company to offer managed print services, production print services, document management, and IT services.
“We have been able to augment our print businesses with these other solutions that customers were either asking for or didn’t know they needed but knew they had these pain points, and we knew we had a solution,” said Johnson.
For example, EO Johnson’s 2012 acquisition of data security provider LockNet, Inc. helped solidify the company’s foothold in the managed network services arena. As EO Johnson had opened its La Crosse location to support its copier business, LockNet’s leadership approached Johnson to gauge interest in a potential acquisition. LockNet was looking for more than a buy-out, the company’s angel investor wanted a partner.
“The culture matched completely,” said Johnson, with a mantra of, “We’re here to serve our customers and our co-workers, and while the bottom line is very important, so is the relationship.”
EO Johnson folded in LockNet and all of its employees, expanding the La Crosse location and sending a message to customers that it was now a print and an IT company.
As Johnson continues to strive to be ahead of the curve in serving her company’s customers, acquisitions certainly remain a part of that strategy. In March, the company completed its acquisition of Office Enterprises, Inc.’s copier/printer division and Cornerstone Technology’s IT services division. According to Johnson, both of these moves are sowing the seeds for more opportunities to better serve the company’s customers.
“Print may shift, but it will still be here,” said Johnson, who cites the growing interest in inkjet and the evolution of industrial print to appeal to customers looking to control costs but maintain quality. However, security has become a primary focus.
“We realize growth is in managing information and data because people don’t want to be bothered with it,” said Johnson. “They want to have access to it and have it secured, but not mess with it. We are bombarded with information every day and we want it to be easy for our customers so they can be productive.”
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Evolution at the Core
Ragni Mehta Drives Xerox’s innovation in high-end production.
For Ragni Mehta, vice president and general manager of Xerox’s cut-sheet business, evolution is more than a buzzword for her nearly three-decade career at the company. Evolution is her key to succeeding in today’s competitive print market.
Mehta’s current role at Xerox illustrates the power of a continued commitment to learning, acquiring new skills, and shifting one’s career path to create a successful future. Since joining Xerox after a co-op opportunity during her undergraduate years with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Mehta has moved throughout the company in various roles, all while bolstering her career with added educational opportunities. With the support of the company, Mehta earned her master’s in business administration from the University of Rochester Simon School of Business, as well as a Master BlackBelt designation from 6 Sigma. She also was able to augment her technology expertise as an engineer with business operational experience, including learning about sales distribution, capacity, compensation and quota planning, as well as short-term position in the U.K. as a financial analyst.
“Xerox does a great job of creating an environment that encourages people to go outside their comfort zones, meet new people, learn about different area of the business,” said Mehta. “It’s really helped me to stay relevant and identify new opportunities.”
Today, Mehta focuses on the high-end production space, managing the overall lifecycle of cut-sheet products. She and her team work to identify product strategy, opportunities in the market, setting goals and objectives to identify what those offerings should be. In essence, she is enabling product lifecycles and development processes, considering when Xerox needs to add and remove products from the market ““ from cradle to grave ““ as well as supporting global markets to launch and manage performance of products, provide training and market intelligence, and helping partners be successful in bringing products to market and supporting them in the market.
With a No. 1 market share in the placement of units in cut-sheet, Mehta is particularly focused on uncovering new areas for growth, building off this position of power.
“In a mature market, over time in order to be successful, we really need to be thinking beyond the box itself to really help customers solve problems,” said Mehta. “We need to think about things from an end-to-end application perspective.”
In line with this thinking, Mehta is looking to add more value to the applications Xerox offers. One example she offers is with Xerox’s efforts to go beyond the four-color process, also known as CMYK-plus. Xerox has developed innovative technology to allow users incorporate digital embellishments having extended the gamut, which includes white dry ink and metallics through its iGen and Iridesse platforms. According to Mehta, these capabilities enable Xerox’s customers to have conversations with their end-customers to drive value.
“Their end-customers are willing to pay a premium for these options so it’s a win-win,” said Mehta. “We’re able to create offerings in our portfolio to help our print service providers and they’re able to command more of a premium from their end-customers as a result. We’re looking for growth opportunities not only from the sheer number of pages printed, but also from the value of those pages over time.”
Inkjet is another area of focus. In the production space, inkjet is allowing customers to deliver transactional, business color, accommodating higher volumes at cost-effective prices. As Xerox looks to invest in the future of inkjet””especially as estimates indicate over 50% of pages will be printed with inkjet by 2020″”the company is looking to commercialize its technology in a variety of ways. Xerox is looking far beyond the document to consider applications for a multitude of uses, including folding cartons, packaging labels, and printed electronics by embedding a level of intelligence, which allows customers to collect data.
“When we think about print, we often think about paper,” said Mehta. “But when we think about future generations, they’re picking up things and we can use printing technology to put some type of communication directly on an object. We can extend the relationship by potentially putting a QR code on it so they can go to a personalized website and continue that relationship.
The beauty of digital print is that there is some level of variable print on it, and personalization has become a key component of Xerox’s value proposition, especially as the number of jobs printers are printing has increased but the run length of those jobs are shrinking. Digital print continues to grow and leveraging hyper-personalization tools such as Xerox’s marketing platform XMPie and its FreeFlow software suite are helping the company’s customers drive more value in the print.
“It’s about extending that customer experience, becoming part of our customers’ lives, and thinking about how we can go beyond just the document and become an integral part of the day-to-day lives of our clients and customers and use our technology to help them improve their day-to-day experiences with a level of personalization and unique experience, leveraging our innovation and technology,” added Mehta.
While product development remains at the forefront of Xerox’s business strategy, the company fully recognizes the power of its distribution partners. Even though Xerox has had much success through its direct channel, it is actively expanding its indirect sales channels worldwide.
“We are seeing more momentum in the indirect channel in the production space with some of our entry-production color products,” said Mehta. “Our Versant platform has all of the elements of our automation, productivity, and color management capabilities of our larger devices, but it’s designed for customers looking to enter the production print environment.”
As Mehta looks to the future of print, she has confidence Xerox is in the right place and the right time to leverage the innovation of its employees to benefit the company’s customers.
“It’s all about leveraging the core knowledge we have with print and apply it to different applications,” said Mehta. “Think about drawing concentric circles from where we are today.”
Global Integration
Anneliese Olson aims to seamlessly weave HP into customers’ lifestyles
Anneliese Olson, vice president and general manager, global head of home printing solutions at HP, has spent her nearly 25-year career at HP traveling the world, helping the company drive its transformation in the technology market. Living and working across countries has reinforced Olson’s conviction in HP’s efforts to fully integrate its technology into its customers’ lives, especially as their work and personal lives continue to converge.
Her HP career started in Customer Insights, completing projects in 30 countries, giving her a foundation of listening and understanding HP’s customers. As HP supported her development through numerous roles both horizontally and vertically within the organization””ranging from product and category management, to enterprise and retail, to printing and PCs, to the Asia Pacific market and back to the United States””this focus on customers and their experiences with HP has remained a guiding theme she continues to emphasize.
“Each piece is a way to make sure we are relevant to what we are doing for customers,” said Olson. “We are not going to innovate for the sake of innovation. What HP has recognized in me and has put me in the intersection to influence the business and drive the right portfolio with the customer and market insight in mind.”
Working within a multibillion-dollar global company with a heritage of innovation, Olson is addressing the challenge of relevance as generations of customers have shifted how and where they are printing. According to Olson, megatrends such as mobility, rapid urbanization, security, and personalization are shaping the home of the future and HP wants to be at the forefront of that movement.
“HP will continue to deliver the best in class solutions for owning that intersection of where digital and physical come together,” said Olson. “In the home of the future, we are looking to be at the right place in the digital path of life for our customers so that we provide the right on ramps and off ramps for that experience is what we will shape and transform into.”
An example of this strategy in play is HP’s Sprocket mobile printer. This pocket-sized, sleek, white device can produce wallet-sized photos from your phone or tablet and can take any image from a customer’s social media platform and bring it to life.
“Customers were saying their photos were trapped in a digital jail inside their phones,” said Olson. “But, the second they print them for themselves or to give to someone else the relevance and emotional connection people make to the physical implementation is powerful. This product has opened up a new category of customers of people who have never printed before, 18- to 22-year olds. HP is building upon that to reinvent memories, reinvent connections, and using that to reignite the home.”
Looking more closely at the future of the home, increasingly we are seeing work life intertwined with personal life. Illustrating this shift, the growth of freelancers, those who work from their homes in virtual offices, has doubled every year since 2014 in the U.S. Driving a lot of the change are the millennials, who will account for approximately half the workforce by 2020. They are digital natives who are accustomed to living in a digital world and they are looking for easy-to-access information at their fingertips without taking 20 clicks to get what they want. This convergence of customers’ professional and personal lives is forcing many companies, including HP, to think differently about the products they are developing. Customers need to be able to collaborate across multiple organizations and be able to print anywhere.
“We talk about “˜one life’ as the overarching strategy for print,” said Olson. “It isn’t just home, office, or industrial. It’s the fact our customers are living one life and it’s 24/7. A day in the life of customer means sometimes they’re on a plane, at home, in an office, in a coffee shop. We’re looking at how we’re making a blueprint for them.”
To cater to these mobile professionals, the company has rolled out numerous innovations. Recently, the company unveiled cloud-based HP Roam, which allows these professionals to print securely from any location and any device to specific print locations at an office, home, or public site such as a hotel. HP is also the first to have voice-enabled printing on all three major platforms, Google, Alexa, and Microsoft.
Also driving HP’s strategy to reinvent the home, reinvent brands, and lift productivity is the continued rapid urbanization of our population. As more people flock to cities, living spaces are getting smaller. Increasingly, said Olson, professionals may not even have a separate home office, which means tech-makers will be fighting for space inside a person’s home.
“You have to earn your right to stay in somebody’s path of life,” said Olson. “You have to have devices that are relevant for the kinds of printing people do.”
Another part of fostering a direct relationship with the consumer is though personalization, which HP continues to explore. According to the Pew Research Center, 40% of millennials have one tattoo or more in the U.S., which speaks clearly to their desire to clarify their identities. As many readers may recall, HP’s partnership with Coca-Cola to personalize can labels with names was a promotional success. More recently, HP linked up with Elle Magazine for its April 2018 issue to send out 50,000 personalized messages from media celebrity Kim Kardashian to subscribers.
“The intersection between digital and physical is where we see these opportunities play out,” said Olson. “As the reinvention of print happens, HP’s devices and solutions can wrap around it.”
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