Edition One
How people and technology make the Ultima difference
Scott Dodds, Ultima CEO
For over 30 years, Ultima has been synonymous with technology solutions delivered with deep knowledge and expert-led resource. As the world around us changes, we’re changing too. We’re building our skills and solutions and focusing on the areas that matter most to our customers: cloud, digital workspace and security.
Let’s be honest though, don’t other tech companies say similar things? What – in our view – sets us apart?
Change is the only constant
From the time I took over as CEO of Ultima in 2015, it’s felt like we’ve been constantly talking with our customers about the pace of change and disruption in the marketplace.
But since the turn of the decade, the speed of change has gone into overdrive. Were any of us ready for the pandemic? And as businesses deal with its aftermath, and make fundamental changes to how and where their people work, who genuinely expected war in Europe to break out, with its enormous impact on energy supplies and prices?
Of course, these events affect business, but they affect people too, often making us anxious and uncertain.
As we move from one disruptive event to the next, we all know that technology can play an essential role in enabling us to adapt to change – whether that means adopting more energy-efficient cloud services or ramping up our business’s cyber defences in the face of a hostile nation.
Where technology and humanity meet
I passionately believe that technology alone isn’t the answer. It’s what people do with technology – the way they deploy it and the solutions they build – that drive transformational impacts and outcomes.
This is Ultima’s point of difference, and what sets us apart.
Our people have outstanding specialist knowledge and skills, yes. But more importantly, they take a human approach to human issues, and apply technology to achieve tangible positive impact on businesses and individuals in these times of deep change.
Many companies provide technology, but few genuinely offer people who know technology, care about facilitating the right solution, and measure their own personal reputation as a technology professional by their ability to deliver customer success.
We’re people people
Other businesses claim ‘our people set us apart.’ But we can prove it. We have more technical specialists, and fewer sales generalists, than similar businesses. And we put this know-how into action by developing our own automated solutions for cloud, digital workspace and security. These solutions enable our customers to get more value from their investments, and adapt quickly and successfully to the serious disruption that’s becoming a persistent feature in our lives.
So when I talk about our business evolving, and you ask ‘so what?’, it’s our people – and the way they blend human empathy with business and technical expertise – that makes the difference to what we achieve for our customers.
And it’s why our customers can look to us to understand today’s most transformational technologies – how they work, what they do and how to deploy them. But customers can also look to us for help in solving their real-world issues, so they can innovate and drive value, even in these turbulent and disrupted times.
Scott Dodds has been in the European IT industry for 33 years and has held senior positions in EMEA and the UK with VMware, Microsoft, Acer and Compaq, before joining Ultima Business Solutions in October 2015. He has had full P&L responsibility for multi-billion dollar sales and marketing teams as well as running business operations and planning functions. His breadth of experience spans all customer segments from the largest global enterprises to mid-market and SMBs.