People come to FEI from a lot of different backgrounds.
I started my career working as an apprentice at Cambridge Instruments. It was a four year program, and it was a requirement that I work in every department in the company. That included design, development, test, marketing, applications and accounting. I got very good at jumping into new areas. It was great preparation for my career at FEI. I've been with FEI almost 16 years and it's been quite a ride. I've gone from an all-purpose engineer all the way up to leading marketing strategy. Now I'm in the job I like best. I'm an Account Manager working directly with our customers. There are few roles in life where you have the ability and opportunity to resolve problems in real-time and immediately see the impact of your efforts. This is one of them.
1992 Joined FEI as a Sales Engineer |
1996 European Sales Manager |
2001 Took on the first of two VP roles within FEI |
I was attracted to FEI by the combination of technology and opportunity.
When I joined back in 1992, we only had 5 people in the European office and less than 100 people worldwide, so I had a lot of responsibilities. I was the applications engineer, the service engineer and the service lab engineer. FEI has changed a lot over the years, but one thing has remained the same - if you work hard and get results, new opportunities will find you. In my career so far, I've been a demonstrator, managed the UK service lab, and established the Munich office and service lab. I've also been the European sales manager, a product manager, a product line manager, and the head of Data Storage and Semiconductor Metrology.
Be prepared to learn and grow.
Why would I choose to move away from the corporate career path and focus on Sales? I just find this to be the most gratifying of all my roles. In a technology environment like ours, an Account Manager has to combine expertise in technology; business consulting, development and management; applications development; problem resolution; negotiation; team building and a lot more. There's a lot to do and a lot to keep track of, but I'm always amazed at how simple problems are once you break them down into the basics.
Of course, it's the people who make the difference.
I suspect that's true just about everywhere. People can make relationships positive or negative, and that has an enormous impact on results. I always try to think about how I would want to be treated if roles were reversed. As long as I keep that in mind, things go pretty well. I know it's a cliché, but making our customers successful really does make us successful - and that makes me successful.
I'll give an example. When I took over a region, I was told a particular customer was a challenge and there was a low probability of success. The first part was true. They were a challenge, because they had very specific needs and most of the solutions were outside our standard business practices. Once we made the commitment to develop new capabilities and offerings to meet their needs, the relationship took off, and so did their company. They went from a startup to a successful and profitable organization in just 12 months. Since that time we've had multiple repeat orders from them worth millions of dollars. We help them grow their company. They help us grow ours. That's our business model right there.