“I wish I had put the resources into hiring additional salespeople, VP people, rather than just recently here, because it’s kind of put us behind the eight ball, a little bit, because it takes a year to sell something,” he says.
You’re the leader, so lead
As a leader who is taking your organization into new markets, developing new products or providing innovative solutions, Grose says you have to be decisive.
You certainly should meet with your team and listen to ideas to find the best solution, whether it’s your own, someone else’s or a compromise.
“But at the end of the day, somebody has to make the decision; somebody has to lead and it’s typically the guy at the top,” he says.
It’s also important not to waste valuable time sweating the small stuff. Grose says if you’re debating between a blue or red pen — buy them both.
“So many times people are tripping over dollars to pick up pennies,” he says.
Then once you make the decision, your team needs to know that it’s time to fall in line and support the decision, Grose says.
And while you want to try to make the right decision, that’s not the worst-case scenario.
“There’s three ways you can make a decision — you can make the right one, you can make the wrong one or you can make no decision,” he says. “I think the worst of the three is to make no decision. You don’t want to paralyze yourself or stand still because the market and everything passes you by.”
Building a cushion
Some challenges you face as you develop new products are external and out of your control.
As Comtech develops and commercializes its innovative ideas, government regulation and oversight is always the biggest hurdle. Grose says he builds in extra time with any new project.
“You’ve got to realize with anything you do, you’re now going to tack eight to 12 months onto it, and because of that you have to plan your business accordingly,” he says.
For example, you can permit a well in two months in Ohio, but in Pennsylvania it takes 18 to 24 months. And the situation doesn’t look like it’s going to speed up any time soon.
The wheels of government run slowly and committees make a lot of the decisions. Grose says it’s hard to get two people to agree, let alone 50, so the process tends to grind on.
“We’ve seen it time and time again — not with just our companies but with a lot of the companies,” he says.
“And you’re not asking them to turn a blind eye, you’re not asking to turn the clock back on environmental regulations — that’s not what we’re asking at all,” Grose says. “We are asking (them) to hire the staff to streamline the process so that if we do need a permit to operate, we can access that permit quickly.”
Turmoil in the market
Grose has always prided himself on building in that cushion and being able to look out 12 and 24 months, but the tumultuous natural gas market has made that more problematic.
“Now it’s very difficult to see the end of three months,” Grose says.
