2019 BTA National Conference BTA Southeast hosts event in Orlando

BTA Southeast hosted the 2019 BTA National Confer-ence March 22-23 at Disney’s Grand Floridian Re-sort & Spa in Orlando, Florida. The event featured a

keynote address, “Strategic Shock: Surviving the Inevitable Crisis,” led by retired 1st Sgt. Matt Eversmann. The schedule also included two dealer panels, four additional educational sessions, and an evening laser and fireworks show at Epcot.

BTA General Counsel Bob Goldberg moderated the first panel, “Ensuring Your Business Survives a Natural Disaster,” and Todd Lee of Wells Fargo moderated the second panel, “Succession Planning in a Multigenerational Business.” The additional sessions were: “Security in the Digital Office of the Future,” led by Dr. Alissa Abdullah, Xerox; “Dealer Chan-nel Evolution (A Blueprint for Growth),” led by Sammy Kin-law, Lexmark; “Leading & Managing in an Era of Disruptive Change: A Practical Guide,” led by Mitch Morgan, Growth Achievement Partners, and John Eckstrom, Carolina Busi-ness Equipment; and “How to ‘Capture’ More Customers With Digital Transformation,” led by Mark Hart, ACDI.

The exhibiting sponsors: ACDI, Agent Dealer, ARLING-TON, Balboa Capital, Brother, Clover Imaging Group, Com-pass Sales Solutions, Crawford Thomas, Datablaze, DCS, Demand, DLL, ECi Software Solutions, ecoprintQ, Epson, ESP AMETEK, FP, GreatAmerica, Hybrid Imaging Systems, Hyland, Image Star, Imaging Solutions Direct, Innovolt, ITC Systems, Katun, Keypoint Intelligence, Laserfiche, LD Products, LEAF, Lexmark (keynote sponsor), Liberty Laser Solutions, LMI, Mars, Midwest Copier Exchange, Miracle Service, Muratec, NA Trading and Technology, NoSales-Guys.com, OKI, OPEX, Panasonic Scanners, PCS VoIP, Per-form IT, Polek & Polek, Print-Rite, RISO, SalesChain, Sentry File, Static Control, Supplies Network, Supplies Wholesal-ers, Technology Assurance Group (breaks sponsor), TIAA Bank, Tigerpaw (breakfast sponsor), TonerCycle/InkCycle, Toshiba, Wells Fargo and Xerox (lunch sponsor). nElizabeth Marvel is associate editor of Office

Technology magazine. She can be reached at (816) 303-4060 or elizabeth@bta.org.

Clockwise from top left: Eversmann, portrayed in the film “Black Hawk Down,” presents his keynote address; 2018-19 BTA Southeast President Mike Hicks serves as the event’s emcee; the 2019 BTA National Conference included a keynote address, two dealer panels and four additional educational sessions; BTA General Counsel Bob Goldberg (right) moder-ates one of the panel discussions with panelists (left to right) Bob Evans, Function4, Sugar Land, Texas; Debra Dennis, CopyPro Inc., Greenville, North Carolina; and Bill James, River Ridge, Louisiana; and 2017-18 BTA President Dan Cas-taneda (right) presents the 2018 BTA Volunteer of the Year award to 2017-18 BTA Southeast President David Polimeni.

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by: Elizabeth Marvel, Office Technology Magazine

Planning for DisasterOne of the panel discussions during the 2019 BTA National

Conference, “Ensuring Your Business Survives a Natural Disaster,” focused on the aftermath of hurricanes and other emer-gencies on the panelists’ businesses. Debra Dennis’ dealership, CopyPro Inc. of Greenville, North Carolina, had dealt with several storms in the past, but she spoke about the effects of Hurricane Florence in 2018. Bob Evans’ dealership, Function4 of Sugar Land, Texas, was most recently affected by Hurricane Harvey in 2017. And Bill James (now retired from WJS Enterprises Inc., New Orleans, Louisiana), spoke mostly about 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. Moderator and BTA General Counsel Bob Goldberg asked about the companies’ disaster plans when these emergencies struck. “We did [have a disaster plan] this time around,” Evans said of his expe-rience during Harvey. “Hurricane Ike hit Galveston and the other side of Houston in 2008. At that point in time, we did not have a plan. We had no electricity for seven or eight days. We went out and bought generators — which we still have — to keep running just in case. This time around ... we had our phones, data center and e-automate in the cloud. Plus, we have branch offices now, so we can transfer phones over. So, we have a much better situation now.” Goldberg also asked how the companies developed the disas-ter plans they have in place today. “You start with a plan, which you can find on the internet at ready.gov; FEMA also has some information for businesses,” Dennis said. “Once you start and make a plan, you then communicate the plan to your employees. Then you go back annually and review the plan, because things change. Your business changes. Every disaster creates some-thing else you wished you would have done ... So you just write it [the plan] down and review it with your employees, because it’s going to change every time.” The panelists also talked about the support they received during their times of need. “I was inundated with offers of help from fellow BTA members and from our suppliers,” James said. “There were just an awful lot of contacts asking ‘How can we help? What’s available? Do you need parts? Do you need ma-chines? Do you need money? How about a roof?’” Dennis had a similar experience. “It was really amazing the number of people in this association who made phone calls in to say ‘What can we do? What do you need? Here’s what we did in the past. This may help you,’” she said. “And hats off to Konica Minolta. They came forward and helped two of our employees; they gave a financial contribution to those guys just to make sure that they were OK. It’s a good group we’re with.” So, what lessons did these dealers learn from their experiences and what do they recommend other dealers watch out for? “We’ve got everything in the cloud now,” Evans said. “We’ve changed ev-erything where we can go plug in anywhere and go back to work. The other thing I would tell you is review your business insurance annually. Get clarification on exactly what coverage you have.” “You can’t depend on just one way of doing things,” James said. “We set up multiple ways of accessing our communication lines, so if one or two are taken out, there’s going to be a third way to get to it ... We now have multiple ways of backing up data, so we don’t have to depend on just one ... The other thing was be-ing prepared. We started a practice pre-hurricane season where we would bring in multiple managers and go through the whole process of starting backups ... and bringing the system all the way up so we have multiple people who are able to do that.” n

— Elizabeth Marvel

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Clockwise from top left: Dealers visit with peers and exhibitors during networking time between sessions; Jann Michishi-ma (left) of Laserfiche visits with Vivian Navas of Interface Printers,

Richardson, Texas, during a break; Todd Lee (right) of Wells Fargo Equipment Finance moderates the second dealer panel with panelists (left to right) Mike Hicks, Electronic Business Machines Inc., Lexington, Kentucky; Brice, Tim and Blake Ren-egar, Kelly Office Solutions, Winston-Salem, North Carolina; and Johnathan Garlow, Ford Business Machines, Connellsville, Pennsylvania; and Ken Fischer (left) of Fischer IT Solutions, Annapolis, Maryland, visits with Steve Mosley and Megan Sundmaker of TIAA Bank during a break.

The conference’s educational session presenters were (clockwise from top left): Abdullah; Kinlaw; Morgan; Eckstrom; and Hart.