February 18, the first full day of the Executive Connection Summit (ECS), began with a bang when Echelon Force, a leadership consulting company comprised of two combat-trained Navy SEALs, delivered a powerful message on leadership.
Jocko Willink and Leif Babin recounted in riveting fashion how their experiences in Ramadi, Iraq, where they were part of SEAL Team Three’s Task Unit Bruiser, helped hone the skills that were now being used to teach business leadership.
In the mid 2000s, during the peak of the Iraqi insurgency, Willink and Babin were tasked with leading disparate units into fierce and chaotic combat missions while also winning the trust and support of the local Sunni population. They detailed their four pillars, the flexible chain of command and explained how communication, particularly the communication of “why,” was critical in achieving success.
The SEALs lessons on leadership were cited by many throughout the day’s sessions. However, just like at the opening press conference, the key themes and buzzwords continued to be IoT, the flexibility and advisability of an open architecture, partnership, and the expectations of millennials which were driving changes in habits and behaviors across the modern landscape.
Sharp President, Doug Albregts, joked about his misfortune in following the SEALs, and then sat on a stool as a long, Star Wars-style intro parody scrolled on the presentation screen.
Albregts introduced his presentation, entitled Relationships@work – Industry Growth Through Partnerships by reiterating some of the familiar themes of IoT, big data and the importance of an open architecture for business software platforms.
Briefly touching on Sharp’s recent troubles, Albregts suggested that all the information that anybody wanted to know was on their website. He did address some details though, attributing the bulk of the issues to poor capital investments just prior to the 2008 global recession. He also described the performance of the solutions division, of which he is part, as “excellent.”
Albregts also addressed the rumors breaking that very morning surrounding new ownership, quipping [he could be part of] a “Japanese company that reports to a Japanese company or a Japanese company that reports to a Chinese company” at any time (Taiwanese Foxconn and Japanese INCJ). He noted that the offers were “significantly over market [value]” and asked the audience to consider the importance of that.
To further dispel rumors of Sharp’s imminent demise, Albregts noted the 13 new hardware products that they released in the last year, which he called a “significant amount,” that included color and mid-range machines.
“We’ve been very, very aggressive in coming out and investing in new products,” he said.
If there was one theme that Albregts seemed keen to communicate, however, it was that Sharp, with its new partnerships and solutions-based approach, is prepared for the future. To underscore this, he remarked about how Sharp’s approach is similar to Apple in how it manages an open architecture system.
“They don’t try to build everything,” he said. “They have a lot partners.”
Like most panelists and presenters, Albregts referenced the habits of millennials and stated that it was as much a marketing concern for them as it is for everybody else.
Albregts also attempted to set the record straight regarding the recent partnership with Tech Data.
“They opened the door to all the hardware that we don’t want to make,” he said. “They opened the door to integration capabilities that we aren’t able to do [and] that they are able to do.”
On Wednesday, March 9, Reuter’s reported that Sharp Corp’s two main banks would lower interest rates on billions of dollars in loans and offer other financial support to ease the takeover by Foxconn.
Although neither Foxconn nor Sharp has offered comments yet, it appears that this probable new partnership can only reinvigorate and strengthen Sharp’s solutions division.
