Message from the CEO

Submitted by: Jim Boland

Back to the Future

Today we are busy and have plenty of work in our backlog. It’s a busy time for all divisions of the company. However, I do have a nagging feeling regarding days gone by.

I graduated college in 1978. It was a tough time for business. I see the red flags on the horizon regarding sustained inflation. It was a period of high interest rates and a feeling of chronic inflation. Paul Volcker, head of the Federal Reserve, stepped forward and applied the tough medicine of high interest rates and reduced monetary supply in 1982. It took a couple of years, but inflation receded and we’ve enjoyed a low interest rate environment for 40 years. 

I know Jay Powell, current head of the Federal Reserve, is trying to get ahead of this inflationary cycle. I know Jay personally; he’s a very smart guy and I am sure he will figure out the right course. 

We’ve built an interconnected Global Supply Chain over the last 40 years. We have seen the benefits and we now see how vulnerable we’ve become on international trade. It’s very difficult to turn off a Global Supply Chain and think you can turn it back on overnight. Our supply of necessary components and parts are not keeping pace with demand in our economy. We are doing our best to satisfy our clients as we work through these supply constraints. 

Scottish Economist Adam Smith (1723-1790) is often referred to as the Father of Economics or as the Father of Capitalism. Smith’s “Wealth of Nations” is a textbook of early capitalism. All things being equal, manufacturing a product should always be manufactured at the site of least cost. This thought however excludes the geopolitical ramifications among different nations. We are now experiencing globalism and the reality of authoritarian nations. Most nations are re-examining their supply chains and vulnerabilities to political realities and COVID realities. 

These are thoughts as we find our way through this inflationary period. 

The good news is that we remain very busy. Our backlogs are still at record levels. We’re having the makings of a very strong year. Our challenge is to be there for our clients as we manage our way through these real supply challenges. 

Finally, Congrats to Brad Bazzare, class Valedictorian 2022! Awesome achievement Brad, I’m sure these past 5 years seemed long, but you paid the price. We are ALL proud of you!

Message from the President

Submitted by: Sean Boland

Last week during the Design & Construction Sales meeting, Jerry Scanlan led a great discussion on staying organized for the purpose of client service. We discussed the different ways that people keep track of their open items, follow up items, and tasks for the day. There was a lot of variety, but most people have a system that works for them. Some use paper calendars to plan their days, some use Microsoft Outlook, and others used different electronic task management programs. All of these are great tools if they work for you.

We have a lot of information to relay to clients. We owe them proposals, price increase notifications, estimated ship dates, technician schedules, and more. These days pricing and schedules change frequently, and we need to communicate those updates. We also need to answer questions, respond to submittal comments, coordinate meetings, etc.

It’s a lot to handle, and if you don’t have a system in place to stay organized, you will not be able to keep it all in your head. Whether you keep a running to-do list on paper or a detailed schedule on your laptop, create a system that works for you. The best way to serve clients is to be proactive, communicating the information our clients need before they ask for it. If we don’t proactively communicate, and a client asks us for something, please be sure to respond in a timely manner. Remember that “timely” is whatever the client expects it to be. If the client has to follow up, we are too late. If we miss a client follow up, we’re in danger of upsetting the client relationship.

It’s likely a system of trial and error, but finding the right system to keep yourself organized will help the whole team improve client satisfaction. 

Account Review - George Mason University

Submitted by: Jerry Scanlan

In accordance with one of our Corporate goals for 2022, the Advisory Team recently reviewed our relationships and performance with one of our top accounts, George Mason University, in a discussion that included Jimmy Murray, Brendan Boyle, Tom Lattomus, and John Cain. Our main involvement is with Rod Billones and Dennis Stater who run the central plant. We continue to help them improve their campus infrastructure as part of their mission to provide Freedom in Learning for a more just, free and prosperous world. They have a lot of Trane equipment which we have under contract and utilize the OMNIA purchasing agreement for sole source. Siemens is the campus wide controls company and they use Water Chemistry for water treatment. They are well funded not only through the State, but from other sources. May be an opportunity for Energy Savings financed projects since Trane is an acceptable supplier on the State of Virginia contract. A relationship with Tom Reinsel may be key for success with this. 

Additionally, there are opportunities with the airside equipment as we are not involved much there today. Upcoming opportunities identified in the pipeline include an R’newal and adding a Chiller. Mike Burke provides quality service, demonstrating Boland’s expertise. 

We have good relationships and are doing predominantly service business, but need to broaden our relationships and to broaden our scope and to avoid inroads by other firms. 

Trane Top 10

Submitted by: Jerry Scanlan

We are pleased to congratulate Gerardo Molina and Mark Shell for achieving Trane Top 10 for 2021. This annual award goes to the top 10% of Trane sales persons as determined by Equipment revenue and commission rate and is recognized throughout Trane as a shining achievement. Gerardo and Mark focus most of their energy on serving consulting engineers, which often involve coordination with other offices for projects outside of our territory. We are proud of them for achieving the recognition for the good work that they do.

Design & Construction promotions

We are pleased to announce the following promotions among Design and Construction Sale Persons:

Pat Bain to Sr. Account Executive

Mike Makovitch to Account Executive

Mark Shell to Sr. Account Executive

These promotions are in recognition of contributions to the success of the office beyond securing orders, including training, developing and mentoring younger sales persons; and setting a fine example for what it means to be a Design and Construction Sales person at Boland. Congratulations and thanks are in order for these gentlemen.

2021 Trane Independent Parts & Supply District of the Year

Submitted by: Vince Dawson

I am honored to announce that Boland Supply was the 2021 Trane Independent Parts & Supplies District of the Year! Boland competes against 9 other independent offices with Greensboro, Houston, and San Francisco being the bulk of our competition. This year we blew past them to take the win! Boland Supply ended at 132% of our target! This is well above the competition by 30% or more. I would like to thank everyone within Boland Supply as well as our internal and external customers who made this happen! This business has and continues to evolve towards a full HVAC distributor while holding onto the OEM parts foundation.

Boland Supply’s New Point of Sale System 

Submitted by: Vince Dawson

I am pleased to announce that Boland Supply’s new Point of Sale (POS) system has been launched and is in operation! The purpose of the new POS system is to increase customer communication as well as productivity. So, what can you and Boland’s customers expect? The following is a list of benefits and communication enhancements.

• Improved communications via email updates with a supplied email address
• Quote updates sent electronically
• Quotes transferred to Orders
• Order staging status i.e. ready for pick up at our XXXX location
• Order shipping status if shipped from one of our locations, with tracking information
• Order has been picked up and invoiced, with a copy of the receipt/invoice
• Increased productivity
• Starting an order from the customer card which also improves searches, if needed
• Tab through order entry in a single screen
• Ability to order product from the sales order screen
• Ability to transfer product from one location to another from the sales order screen
• Tracking information on the order and/or invoice header, if added
• Ability to order “one off” product(s) such as an NI (Non-Inventoried) item
• Direct link of a credit to a return
• Barcode scanning
• Credit card process machines
• Signature capture pads
• Increased inventory control
• Clear and uniform process/workflows across the department

Additionally, we have changed the process of selling to Boland Trane Services. We no longer invoice Service orders at the time of product(s) staging, but rather, at the time of pick up. This change stops product(s) cost being applied to a job prior to work beginning. A larger piece is this allows visibility on product(s) that may be on will call for another job which has been delayed that could be used on a critical job that just came up. 

We are excited about what Salespad and this new POS system brings and the move to the next level. I would like to take a moment to thank Bill Berney, Meredith Clemens, and Tom Boyland for all of their hard work getting us to where we are. I look forward to watching this system and the business grow.

Opportunities for All Associates to Socialize: Coffee & Donuts

Boland associates were invited to start their morning with Coffee and Donuts at the Largo Supply Store on Thursday, 4/28! It was a great way to socialize and see the newly expanded warehouse. As part of the Monthly Opportunities to Socialize Goal we will continue to offer fun and inclusive events for you to join. We hope to see you next month where we will be celebrating Taco Thursday with fun and games.

Jay Roeder, Store Manager was happy to show off the new, expanded warehouse space at Boland Supply’s Largo location to Kim Winokur, Controller and Tim Parrucci, Rental Services Leader.

Sherice Cunningham, Client Service Team Lead, Johnny Washington and DaMont Woods, Client Service Representatives welcome you to visit their store!

Mechanical Assistants, Matthew Barrett, Malcolm Waesche, Desean Gilliam, and Kip Canavan, Logistics Manager enjoyed a laugh while socializing.

Controls Application Engineer, Welbeck Sintim, visited the Largo Supply location and chatted with Kim Winokur, Controller and Sherice Cunningham, Client Service Team Lead.

Andy Higgs, Materials Planning Manager and DaMont Wood, Client Service Representative enjoying their morning.

John Reading, Warehouse Coordinator enjoyed a doughnut and gave tours of the new space.

Heather Sanchez, Service Sales Representative and Andy Higgs, Materials Planning Manager taking a break from work to socialize.

Ring the Bell!

Congratulations and many thanks to the people who were recognized with a "Ring the Bell" over the past month for their hard work and contributions. Great job, everyone!

New Boland Energy & Sustainability Resources Available

Submitted by: Julie Wolfington

What is BEPS? How does Boland help clients comply? Who do I contact to help me figure out a project payback? These new resources answer these questions and more:

1. “Boland Energy & Sustainability Services Capabilities & Who to Contact” – Does Boland do energy audits? Who is our SME for IAQ? This sheet details our services includes a list of Boland associates who are Subject Matter Experts to help you assist clients. This doc is for internal use only.
2. “DC Benchmarking & BEPS Cheat Sheet” – What is the difference between the Benchmarking law and BEPS? What can we do to help clients? This sheet is a quick reference guide to both regulations, and is geared toward Sales, Technicians, and Clients who have buildings in DC that must comply. This doc is for internal and external use.

See the Boland Sales Toolkit “Sustainability” tab for these resources and more Sustainability (sharepoint.com).

Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day

Submitted by: Von Rowan

This year on April 28, we took Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day virtually! We invited associates' daughters and sons to participate in various activities. There were eight activities to complete along with two exercise breaks with Rick Bradley. If you missed participating in this fun event, we encourage you to take advantage of this time at home with your child(ren) and complete the activities below. Send in pictures of your child(ren) completing the activities and showing how creative they are to HR@boland.com in order to collect a surprise gift!

Click Here for Instructions on Activities

Activity List:

1. Boland Scavenger Hunt
2. Learn About Boland’s History
3. Learn more about What Boland Does
4. Build Your Resume
5. Design a New Boland Logo or Tagline
6. Interview Your Parent
7. If You Were President of Boland
8. Photo of You and Your Boland Parent

Here is Savannah Cartwright working hard at Boland for the day. She learned about how Boland works, all about heating and air conditioning, and completed various activities throughout the day. 

Boland Cares in the Community

Submitted by: Karen Walker

Spring has sprung and Boland Cares is blooming!

We held our Earth Day Clean-up at 30 WWM on April 22nd. It's amazing how much trash can be picked up in a short period of time! A big thank you to Tom Lattomus, Mick Suray, Lisa Sweeney and Elisha Tyler who came out on a sunny afternoon to volunteer.

Elisha Tyler also took a little time out of her day to bring her children to Stepping Stones Shelter. We delivered gently used purses (donated by our associates) that we filled with toiletry items for the women. We were welcomed by the staff and it was great to learn about their mission and the good work this organization does for those in need.

PROJECT Sparkle is sure to be a huge success today as we have close to 700 pieces of jewelry! Thank you to all of the associates who donated jewelry (and spread the word to family and friends). The students at Don Bosco Cristo Rey are sure to have a great selection as they shop for a special Mother's Day gift!

On May 25th, we will be holding our Habitat for Humanity Women BUILD event in Takoma Park. If you are interested in volunteering, please email karen.walker@boland.com to register. We have 9 spots available. This is a great opportunity to bring a client along and work with them in a different setting!                                    

GoFormz

Submitted by: IT Department

GoFormz is our new forms application that will replace Boland Forms. Boland Forms is no longer supported on the latest version of iOS 15.3 Our Project Sponsor, Rick LeFrancois came to IT asking us to vet a solution for Boland. Before we reached out to vendors, we wanted to find a solution that would fit our business and provide the best user experience. 

Our team took the current forms used today and met with the front and end users to capture the current process. Then looked how we can integrate it into our other systems to make it automated. We took our lead opportunity form as our first use case, shared that with several vendors, and selected GoFormz as the best solution for our needs.

We worked with our development team at GoFormz to develop an automated lead form. I’m happy to announce that after months of requirement sessions, team meetings, working with development, and testing with a small group of technicians, our lead form can now be entered in GoFormz to create a lead opportunity in Salesforce. Jackie Leanos (leads@boland.com) and the technician are notified via email when the lead is submitted in GoFormz then a second email is sent to Jackie, the Account Executive, and the technician, that a Salesforce opportunity is created with a link to Salesforce. 

I want to thank the MANY people who helped us develop, test, and launch our lead form in GoFormz.

Our Project Sponsor, Rick LeFrancois – giving us the opportunity to work on this, supporting the technicians to set up testing, and developing other forms in GoFormz.

Nick Meeder – shared a detailed video how a lead opportunity is created in Boland Forms.

Spencer Nguyen - spent hours working with our development team mapping the fields from GoFormz to Salesforce.

Joe Marchant - testing in GoFormz and providing us constant feedback.

Jackie Leanos – helped us collect requirements in Salesforce, feedback on the automation, and validating the information.

THANK YOU to the 30+ technicians who helped test GoFormz creating test leads, work change authorizations, and other forms.

We continue to work integrating other forms. If you’re interested in how GoFormz can help you, please place a ticket with the IT Help Desk ithelpdesk@boland.com.

Associate in the Spotlight

Submitted by: Emma Karch

Kim Winokur

Controller

Finance & Accounting

Describe your job:

I am the Controller of the Boland Companies. I manage the Finances of the Companies as well as the Finance and Accounting team.

What is your favorite thing about working for Boland?

First and foremost, the people at Boland; especially the Finance and Accounting team who I love seeing their teamwork and the friendships that they have made with one another. Second would be watching and being a part of the continued opportunities that Boland offers to its employees; it is wonderful to see companywide how people grow, move into new roles and take on some exciting projects!

How have you grown your career?

I am coming up on my 19^th year with Boland. Previous to Boland I spent 18 years in Public Accounting (Started in High School as an intern). I would not change my experience at Boland nor my experience in public accounting. I truly loved my experience in Public Accounting and continue to love my experience at Boland. Coming to Boland introduced me to the Private side of Finance and Accounting. Being able to experience both Public and Private accounting for the many years has been an incredible journey for me.

What is your hometown?

Silver Spring, Maryland. Born in Washington DC

Is there something interesting your associates may not know about you?

I like to learn about fixing cars.

Do you have a story to share about a famous person?

I met Penn and Teller in person and received their autographs.

Is there something interesting about your family or history?

My paternal grandmother came into the USA (Ellis Island) from France in 1925.

Do you have a favorite movie, TV show, book, magazine?

Favorite TV show – all the Chicago’s (Med, Fire and PD); Favorite book (series) The DaVinci Code, the Lost Symbol, the Inferno, and Angels and Demons

What was your favorite class when you were in school? 

Business law. I still love learning about Law whether it is tax, criminal, contract, etc. (there was a point in time I thought I wanted to be an attorney)

Do you enjoy music? 

My all-time favorite singer is Pat Benatar. Yes, I have seen her in concert (in my younger and older years😊)

Do you have any pets?

Kind of. My 2 daughters recently got some Weimaraner puppies, they are brothers: Cooper and Moose. I spend a lot of time “puppy sitting” and love them so much!

Are you celebrating any personal milestones?

My husband and I just celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary in Dec, 2021. Both of my daughters recently got engaged and will soon be married in December, 2022 and April, 2023. My older daughter will be graduating in 2023 from Medical School. My younger daughter in working on her Masters in Engineering at Johns Hopkins.

What is your favorite restaurant and food?

 I don’t have a favorite restaurant. I love to experience different ethnic foods. Although I absolutely love a great burger!

What is your favorite sports team and who is your favorite athlete?

Washington Nationals, Stephen Strasburg

What do you do in your spare time - do you have any hobbies?

 I love to read, spend time with family & friends, wake/knee board, be outside, garden/landscaping, cleaning (this is how I de-stress)

Do you have a favorite quote?

It is actually a definition…Einstein’s classic “Definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.”

Who or what has inspired you? 

My parents. My parents always taught us (my 3 siblings and I) that we should never be “too good” to do anything.

Associates Who are Highlighted in Keeping Comfortable will be awarded a "Boland gift" (options available here) or a $20 donation to the charity of their choice.

Please contact HR via email at hr@boland.com