Having attended the Total Tech Summit for several years, I like to refer to it as a big think tank. The Summit brings together the audiences of Emerald’s CE Pro, Commercial Integrator, and Security Sales & Integration brands to create one enormous mindshare. This year, it’s taking place Nov. 13-15 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

What elevates it is that we invite the cream of the crop from all three technology sectors. Total Tech Summit is an elite-level event that unites elite-level companies and combines enticing education, frank discussions, networking opportunities, vendor exhibits, and lots of fun (TopGolf, cornhole, and some adult beverages, anyone?) — it’s why we foot the bill for airfare and accommodations to attract guests.

On the CE Summit side, many attendees’ names can also be found on our annual CE Pro 100 list. Ninety-nine out of those 100 integration companies exceeded $3 million in revenues in 2022, and the one that did not still brought in $2.95 million. That number has steadily climbed over the 15+ years the CE Summit has been staged, to give an idea of how successful these businesses are.

But of course, there’s always room for improvement, no matter if companies are among the CE Pro 100 or the thousands of others that comprise the industry. 

Consider a recent CE Pro VIP2P (peer to peer) group discussion in which more than a dozen integrators joined me on Zoom to talk project management.

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These VIP2P calls take place monthly and reflect that think-tank mentality ascribed to Summit attendees, only on a smaller and more intimate scale. The shared smarts and candid conversations enable these dealers to learn from one another, mention specific brands they’re using, and even share contact info to chat further offline.

Here are just a few highlights of that always-pertinent project management virtual roundtable:

Tom Redhead, SuRe Innovations, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan: “Project management is actually something that I’m going through right now, changing who my project manager is. I think my biggest challenge right now is not getting too far into the weeds with all the fancy project management terms — you open up the big book and it’s 600-700 pages of stuff — and trying to stay on point with just good old customer satisfaction.” 

Dylan Cassagnol, Logic Integration, Lone Tree, Colo.: “A big challenge for us is just trying to figure out how much time do we allocate for either field supervisors or a project manager to get them out on site? I know some companies have individual project coordinators who help do the office work and they get that project manager out into the field. Often, right now our project managers are kind of doing both… and when they get out in the field it’s great because it’s billable time and they’re expensive employees. Something we’ve found really beneficial is just keeping track of people’s time.”

Michael Oh, TSP Smart Spaces, Boston: “We have a project manager who works internally, who’s really doing all of the scheduling coordination and communications to clients. She never goes out into the field, she’s not technical, but that’s actually really beneficial, because she is really there — air traffic control, right. If a technical question comes in, a lot of the engineers like to dive in, and then they forget about the regular job. So, it’s good to have that separation.”

And that’s just a few starting points to the topic generated by the group. Now imagine 200+ residential, commercial, and security dealers convening to address vital business operations matters. If that excites you, stay tuned for next year’s Total Tech Summit. We’ll be looking forward to seeing you! In the meantime

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