What is a Huddle Space?

Wainhouse Research estimates there are currently 30 to 50 million Huddle Spaces in offices worldwide.  With research showing the number of Huddle Spaces on the rise, you may be wondering, what is a Huddle Space exactly?  Here’s our take on Huddle Spaces…

As recent as 2010, the options for meeting rooms ranged from a 16-person conference room to an executive office, but nothing in between.  Fast forward eight years and depending on who you ask, a Huddle Space could be as formal as a small four- to six-person conference room or a gathering location at a popular coffee house.  What has become the common denominator for this type of space is the ability for an informal, impromptu collaboration where one employee can say to another ‘come take a look at this diagram’ or ‘let’s review this spreadsheet’.

So, next you may find yourself asking, what does a Huddle Space need to provide?  The main three requirements for Huddle Space are:

1.   Flexibility – organizations strive for rooms to be Activity Based Workspaces or ABW.  This allows teams to gather around a circular table on Wednesday and then convert that to a standing environment on Thursday without including facility management.

2.   Collaboration – as desktop computers became laptops and as laptops now become tablets, the trend has moved to ‘smaller is better’.  Which is a key component, but how do we share content? With 95% of Americans owning at least one smart device, the ability to transmit data and audio from users’ tablets, laptops or smartphones to a collaboration device continues to drive the use for technology.

3.   Simplicity – over 20% of meetings start more than 15 minutes late due to technology issues.  Time costs money…various Fortune 50 organizations estimate the cost of poorly managed meetings cost over $75 Million Dollars per year.  Room users strive to enter a room and have their content loaded on the screen upon their arrival. It must be simple!

Organizations seem to be moving away from larger conference rooms in favor of Huddle Spaces from a real estate standpoint.  For example, where 500 square feet used to occupy two large conference rooms, that same square footage can now occupy five Huddle Spaces.  This allows for more efficient use of your organization’s real estate, making the Huddle Spaces more than twice as productive than your traditional large conference room.

We’ve now discussed how simple, flexible, and collaborative Huddle Spaces can be – the final question is what do these spaces cost.  Great news here as well! Huddle Spaces save money. They are much less expensive and less intrusive to outfit than large conference rooms.

With Huddle Spaces on the rise through corporate and enterprise organizations, let Newgentek show you how easy it is to transfer small, unused spaces into productivity zones!

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!

Jared Lederhandler joins Newgentek

Today I'm incredibly excited to announce that Jared Lederhandler will be joining our team as President.

I've had the privilege of working with Jared at my previous company, as he supported our account during his time at Harman (JBL, AMX, Crown). While working together, Jared was a great partner helping us grow our business, taking a creative approach when solving problems, and served as a great resource as we would sell into accounts. I spent more time with Jared on a personal level, and we would talk about my other businesses, discussing strategy and growth. He would bring ideas and insights that were helpful and thoughtful.

As we focus on growth for Newgentek, I'm confident that he will be a great addition to our team and contribute by bringing that same strategy, insight, and execution that I've watched him deploy in his previous roles and during our conversations. He brings knowledge with him from over 14 years in the systems integration business including distribution, services, and sales.

I'm excited to see what we will accomplish together and can't wait for him to help us deliver on our mission to be a trusted strategic partner providing turnkey solutions for multi-unit operators, hospitality, and enterprise markets.

PRESS RELEASE:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Newgentek has announced that effective March 19, 2018, longtime industry leader Jared Lederhandler is assuming the role of President. Lederhandler will oversee all aspects of the organization with a focus on providing substantial growth and pursuing emerging markets.

Lederhandler joins Newgentek after spending 14 years in senior leadership roles with IAVI, Kramer Electronics, Spinitar, and most recently Harman Professional. During his time at Harman Professional, Lederhandler spent three years as Director of Sales for the southeast region, where he was responsible for mentoring the regional sales managers and achieving year over year revenue growth targets through corporate, hospitality, education, government, and large venue markets.  

At Spinitar, Lederhandler contributed to the Self-Directed Team Concept and Services Strategy through various service and integration leadership roles. Spinitar flipped the conversation with customers to lead with services, rather than products, as the organization's main differentiator.

Lederhandler commented, “In a short time, Newgentek has been able to develop and provide an offering to the multi-site restaurant industry across the country.  What attracted me to Newgentek was the team's forward-thinking approach and passion, which is seen in all aspects of their work from the introduction meeting through to support services. Our goal is to leverage these talents into emerging markets for optimal growth.”

“We’re extremely excited to welcome Jared to the team,” said Chon Nguyen, CEO of Newgentek. “We’ve worked with Jared for years, and his commitment to us as his customer and his dedication to our business stood out. We quickly recognized a shared set of values, and Jared’s experience in sales, support, systems integration, and operational diligence positions Newgentek for future growth. He brings valuable expertise and industry relationships to the business that will play a key role in helping us realize our aggressive growth goals.”

Newgentek is a systems integrator based in Tampa, Florida. Their experienced team works with multi-unit operators, hospitality, and enterprise clients to simplify complex infrastructure deployments and reduce maintenance costs through disciplined project planning and management processes in addition to their service and support offerings.

For more information, please contact:

Megan Nguyen
Director of Marketing
megan.nguyen@newgentek.com
813-283-0684

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!