Thanks to Jim de Vries (Founder/President, EIG) for his contributions. The content for this blog was published in the January 2021 US Print edition of GasWorld. A few years ago (2017), Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook, published a book with Adam Grant called ‘OPTION B’ on the topic of building personal ‘resilience’ after the tragic […]
Driving customer focus and efficiency
Thanks to Chris Ebeling (Executive Vice-President of Sales & Marketing, US Bulk, Messer Americas) his contribution. The content for this blog was published in the October 2020 US Print edition of GasWorld. Balancing customer focus and efficiency is absolutely essential for any company that desires to maximize its ability to attract, serve and retain customers […]
Customer and process – Balancing the organization
Thanks to Chris Ebeling (Vice-President of Sales & Marketing, Executive Vice-President of Sales & Marketing, ) and Jeff Bezos (CEO, Amazon) for their contributions. When running a business division or even an entire company, there is constant friction between being customer focused and being process focused. It’s a constructive friction that often swings like a […]
Centralizing your functional resources
The content for this blog was published in the May 2020 US Print edition of GasWorld. The decision of centralization vs decentralization of functional resources has been a regular evaluation by small and large businesses for decades. No company is fully centralized or decentralized, instead there are varying degrees of both. The amount of centralization […]
Moving to ERP Systems
Thanks to David Schaer (President, CU) for his contribution. The content for this blog was published in the March 2020 US Print edition of GasWorld. The use of the term ‘ERP’ (Enterprise Resource Planning) can get some senior executives and business owners a little nervous. Some recall the implementation failures during ERP’s early days, or […]
The importance of a digital strategy
Thanks to Eric Wise (CEO, Wise Telemetry) for his contribution. The content for this blog was published in the February 2020 US Print edition of GasWorld. The concept or maybe the value of a digital strategy started becoming more evident over the last 10+ years as some digital capabilities (social media, mobile, e-commerce, IIOT) have […]
Talent Management – The future of work
The content for this blog was published in the January 2020 US Print edition of GasWorld. The topic ‘Future of Work’ has become a mainstream talking point over the last 5-7 years, principally driven by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and its potential impact on the workforce in the not too distant future. So, […]
The Rise of Private Equity in the Industrial Gases industry
Over the last 5-10 years the presence of private equity in the industrial gas industry has dramatically increased. Not just at the mid-market level (with local and independent producers/distributors), but now they have made their presence known on the regional and global stage with companies like PAG Capital in China and CVC Capital globally with the Messer Group. Taking a closer look […]
Why the interest in Coal Gasification by Industrial gas companies?
The industrial gas industry provides products that are not typically known by the average consumer but, are critical to the manufacturing process of products they use everyday (i.e., computers, cell phones, packaged foods, gasoline, etc.). There was a famous tagline used by BASF twenty (20+) years ago that said, we don’t make a lot of the products you buy…we […]
Blockchain….why all the hype?
The topic of Blockchain is all over business and technology news but, if you ask an operational executive to explain why all the hype, chances are they will have a difficult time explaining its value. This response is not unusual because the technology is a bit complex, and it’s only proven use case is cryptocurrencies like […]