We really lucked out in this episode, because Jennifer not only sits in a position that has a 30,000 ft view of a highly competitive industry within one of its most powerful established firms, but she also has over 15 years of experience within AT&T that ranges from front line store operations to product development. The main focus of our conversation is related to the human component of value creation, strategy development, and innovation.

We’ve talked about steel on this podcast before, so you might remember that the industry is a part of well developed supply chain and is highly competitive, which hints at the importance of maintaining relationships and the possibility of price competition. John speaks with me about how his firm creates  value for its customers without falling into the price competition trap. Surprisingly, one of those value adds is an award winning website!

Employee mobility conjures a pretty clear image of employees moving from place to place. You might think of this as simply a firm that coordinates logistics of employee relocation or manages flights and hotels for business trips. This might have been an accurate description at the beginning of this industry, but now that barely scratches the surface. 

Jeff is the Managing Director at Casappa Corporation, which is a firm that specializes in hydraulic systems. Hydraulics are a very old technology that is inside almost all machinery with moving mechanical parts.

Prior to joining Esri, Lauren served as a top advisor for economic affairs at the U.S. Department of Commerce where she worked with a team of fellow open data enthusiasts to create the department’s first data strategic plan and establish the Commerce Data Advisory Council. Her 10 years of experience spans across strategic planning, policymaking, and business development in government, NGO, and software industries. Her work has been published in peer-reviewed journals and industry news on the topics of international trade, government data, and innovation. 

Carlie talks with us about the growth of the Naturals industry within consumer packaged goods, or CPG’s. The CPG industry is a very crowded and competitive space that simultaneously must respond to short-run changes in consumer preferences while leveraging massive economies of scale to keep costs low. Yet in the face of those challenges, Natural products successfully find more and more ways to innovate and disrupt.

Health Insurance in the US is a quagmire of complex interactions with lots of moving parts between providers, insurers, governments, and patients. Inside of this intricate dance, healthcare costs have been increasing a fairly intense rate and has only been exacerbated by the pandemic. Louise talks with me how an aging population and the very recent influx of telehealth technology are factors in the industry’s response to inflationary healthcare spending and public policy.

In this episode, we speak with DePaul MBA alumnus, Bob Schiller. Bob is the Countrywide Product Manager at National General Insurance (an Allstate Company).

Insurance is at the foundation of de-risking many other activities, making them more accessible and fueling economic development. That also means that insurance can inherently be a slow-moving industry in terms of its own innovation. However, technology and consumer preferences have drastically changed in the past decade, which is forcing some relatively quick changes for insurance in the forms of M&A, technology adoption, and product development.

Curious what those changes are? Well Bob’s got you covered, so have a listen!

Financial advising is a highly competitive industry for two reasons. Firstly, its largely non-differentiated. The service is usually only differentiated by the way products are packaged and the relationships built by individual advisors. But in the end, all a consumer wants is to make sure their savings will be there for retirement.

In February 2020, Bradley had recently stepped into his role as the operations leader for a Chicago based firm that sells and services industrial laundry solutions. As you might expect, this is a mature and competitive industry with established relationships across verticals like hospitality and health care.