Molitor “Steps Down”; IDEA in Transition

Paul Molitor, the president of IDEA since 2014, announced he is stepping down from his role later this month.  According to IDEA’s press release the departure is for personal reasons.

 “The IDEA Board and the entire organization thank you for your five years of leadership at IDEA and the improvement in the quality and range of services achieved during your tenure,” said Chairman Bill Waltz, CEO of Atkore. “All your friends and partners wish you continued success in your next endeavor.”

“We’ve seen a tremendous amount of change over the last few years and both the company and the market will continue to adapt quickly for the foreseeable future,” Molitor said.  “The long-standing data quality program and the recently completed technology transition will have IDEA ideally positioned to keep pace with those changes.”

With Molitor’s departure, the IDEA Board will rely on the remainder of the leadership team to oversee day-to-day operations during the search process: Vice President of Finance and Administration Aneesha Darst; Vice President of Products and Services Bill Ferguson; and Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Kevin Corcoran. Additionally, two CEO-level members of the IDEA Board of Directors will be advisors to the trio.

“The Board has full confidence that this team of accomplished professionals will manage IDEA seamlessly during and after the leadership transition, ensuring continuity of customer service,” said Waltz. The team will concentrate on delivering a successful launch of the new IDEA Connector.  The platform upgrade offers new features, functionality, and processing efficiency that will enhance the customer experience today and open new ones for tomorrow. Customer training that will play an essential role in ensuring a smooth migration to the new platform is already underway.

The search for a new executive is expected to conclude in the first half of 2020.

Stable, New, Leadership in a Time of Change

The past couple of years have marked much change within IDEA. As mentioned in the press release, the organization will rely on its leadership team for stability during the search, supported by two BOD members being more “advisory” (active).

It’s leadership team is essentially all new with the top three executives all relatively new to the business and the industry, the organization changed to a new platform (IDEA Connector) which took longer than expected and a couple of industry veterans (Mike Wentz and Mary Shaw) have left the company.

Mike’s departure leaves some interesting future oriented questions and, to a degree, gets one to think about a posting on ElectricalTrends in 2007 titled “IDEA with Vision?” as the question becomes, what is ownership, and the BOD’s vision, let alone the vision of the current management team.

Some things to think about, and this is based upon being involved / exposed to IDEA since its inception over 20 years ago, helping generate some charter members when I was at IMARK and sitting on the first marketing committee.  Conceptually, the concept of a centralized product database to support the ERP needs of distributors, makes 100% sense … standardize the basics to ensure transactions operate smoothly (so yes, I’ve been a supporter of the core concept.)

• IDEA’s leadership, and specifically the president role, has historically been influenced, some say “driven” by NEMA (read “manufacturers”) while the organization is 50/50 owned by NEMA and NAED, even though the BOD is evenly split.
• For the first time, the leadership team, other than the BOD and it isn’t known if they are hands-on, doesn’t have industry experience / come from the industry.
• They are going through a platform change and rebranding.  The IDW becomes IDEA Connector with the system “live” in about two months according to their website countdown clock.
• The organization, originally founded to help reduce supply chain costs by improving data quality within ERP systems between manufacturers and distributors, has expanded over the years. First into offering EDI services at a reduced cost and into data standards and now is into the ever-changing role of trying to offer content for websites (a competitive market).  There was a time, and maybe still is, where distributors wanted the company to pursue providing content to the contractor market (and compete with Trade Service.)
• IDEA, for many years, talked about expanding its platform to serve other industries.  There have been starts and stops in this endeavor. Some of the starts were based upon growth aspirations; some to support manufacturers who serve multiple industries. Stops were driven around financing and distributors wanting the organization focused on “more fully” serving electrical distributors (its 50% owner).

What is IDEA?

Often the question is raised “what is IDEA”?  Selection of the next leader will hopefully shed light on the organization’s direction for at least the next 5 years.  Will the leader be a “manager”? Will they be a technologist? Have experience in the electrical industry and therefore have industry empathy? Perhaps someone with distribution / channel experience but from a complementary industry and hence bring a new perspective? Will the organization focus on supply chain to reduce operational costs or continue the pursuit of the ever changing eCommerce content world which is being served by others (and with more manufacturers being requested to supply information to large distributors directly, is the model (and customer needs) changing too quickly for an association-inspired endeavor?

The current IDEA BOD has an interesting mix of skill sets and Rick Gigliotti from WESCO becomes the IDEA Chair in January.  Rick’s a sales operation veteran and succeeds Bill Waltz, CEO from Atkore, as chair.  Two BOD members will be more “active” in helping manage the company during the search.

It will be a challenging role to fill, as it has each time and the search process, and ultimate result, will help inform the industry about what IDEA’s vision is in serving the electrical industry, its constituencies and its further product and market expansion.

In the interim, next step is transitioning to the IDEA Connector as the new “master data management” (MDM) platform.

Paul, good luck and it was a pleasure knowing you and supporting you over the past five years.

Thinking about the IDEA of Tomorrow

• What has been your experience with IDEA?
• What should IDEA’s role be in serving the industry going forward?
• What is needed for IDEA to be more successful for you?

Interested in applying? While IDEA didn’t mention whom to reach out to, but perhaps the best place to confidentially reach out to someone is connecting with Rick Gigliotti in his role of incoming chair (and of course Rick was looking for another full-time job!)