Dennis Schneider- Senior Director of IT at Universal Studios
Universal Studios- Hollywood
On Friday, October 3rd, I had the pleasure of meeting Dennis Schneider, the Senior Director of IT at Universal Studios. He has a fascinating job, and is involved with many new IT initiatives. Dennis’ team is fairly unique when comparing it to other IT departments at NBC Universal. He strictly focuses on activities within the park. This includes managing a dashboard system that shows daily forecasts for attendance, food, retail, and soon to be parking. His team and rolled all the way up to the president, are all about metrics. Every day is measured to the previous year and is plotted on a dashboard, so everyone from IT to leadership can understand what is going on.
An initiative in the works is implementing radio frequency identification (RFID) in employee uniform handling. Within the parks right now, every ride employee has their own unique uniform. Tracking the uniforms right now is a laborious, erroneous, manual process. This is where RFID steps in. Dennis is currently investigating how casinos deal with employee uniforms using RFID, and is making plans to go to a casino to see how such a thing can be managed easily by RFID.
The systems that Dennis’ team supports include all of the point of sale (POS) registers throughout the park, stroller rental system (a future RFID project), and ticketing system. They are currently experimenting with do it yourself technology within Doc Brown’s (from Back to the Future) food area, putting power in the hands of the consumer as I like to call it. Users are able to order food and pay by credit card, all via kiosk. This technology was put in place to see if users will adopt such form of payment in the future. If its successful, similar systems will be rolled out to help ease congestion in the food lines.
Another system that his team supports is ticketing/attendance. They have 6 ticketing booths staffed, in addition, 4 automated ticketing systems on site. The automated ticketing system is similar to the food ordering kiosk. Last summer they implemented a biometrics scanner to register guests that purchased an annual pass. Instead of employing folks to staff the booth to take the annual pass holders photo and create a badge, they simply scan their finger at the entry point to get access to the park. This saves the park a lot in labor and material expenses!
Many thanks to Dennis for sharing his time in showing me around the park and pointing out the systems his team supports.
Add comment October 7, 2008
Vivi Ziegler- President, NBC Universal Digital Entertainment
Vivi Ziegler- Source NBC Media Village
On Thursday, September 25th, the GE Women’s Network sponsored a leadership speaker event here on the Universal lot. Vivi Ziegler, President of NBC Universal Digital Entertainment, came and spoke about her career track and current priorities on the job.
She is focused on 3 areas within NBC: NBC.com, NBCU Digital Studios, and NBCU Digital Strategy. Since I’m a huge consumer of all things web related, I found her presentation informational and inspiring. She spoke about the websites her department supports (SciFi, Bravo, NBC, USA, Oxygen, and Access Hollywood), and the importance of the digital world as a complement to TV.
Our digital solutions, are a direct relationship with consumers, which means big benefits to NBC. Its a two-way experience that consumer behavior demands. Instead of us just pushing content through our distribution channels (TV, etc.), in this day and age, having a digital strategy and solution gives us a two way street in regards to communication. In turn NBC can deliver more value to our advertisers, with more of a breadth and depth exposure. The great part about Ziegler’s job is that she is able to establish that digital strategy. She leverages metrics by looking at click through rates, and the paths users take on say nbc.com to find information on the The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. Her goal is to put power in the hands of consumers, and to offer features on the web that’s going to attract viewership since digital venues like websites gets paid by advertisers for how many people view it.
Looking at the future growth of NBC.com is strong. It started off with 7 employees, and has grown to nearly 60. The exponential growth of NBC.com allows for more in-depth fan experiences, coupled with the technical advances such as the Rewind Video Player, which was introduced 2 weeks ago so that visitors to the site can setup viewing parties amongst their friends.
Another growing business is the development of NBC Digital Studio, headed by Cameron Death. This department pairs great content with great brands. For example, The Gemini Division was developed as a result of this business. It creates webisodes, pairing creative with brands. Such partners include AT&T, Visa, Pizza Hut, FedEx, and VW. These webisodes are completely funded by advertising dollars.
Another exciting emerging market is the mobile market. With partnerships with Verizon, the opportunity is there to seize. Ziegler explained there was two types of emerging mobile options, including on deck mobile in which NBC content would be on the main menu bar within the mobile phone. The good thing with this strategy is that Verizon pays us a distribution fee for license, the downfall though is that we can’t sell ads. The other option is free access mobile, where we generate mobile pages for devices like the Blackberry and iPhone like http://www.nbc.com/m. This is a condensed mobile site for ease in viewing on small screens of mobile devices. NBC alone has 43 mobile sites right now, with expansion plans on the way.
Finally, Ziegler addressed the recent acquisition of the Weather Channel. The digital footprint of Weather Channel is huge, there are over 50 million registered unique users, categorized by zip code. The future of geo-targeting is getting even closer with this acquisition!
One last interesting tidbit…the sweet spot of target market for digital is 37 years old, and the sweet spot for TV is 38 years old. This perplexes me, I would have thought the demographic for TV would have been older and the digital demographic younger.
Add comment September 30, 2008
It’s official…I’m an alum…a reflection on my graduation ceremonies
This past Sunday, May 18th, I graduated with my Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration with majors in Information Technology and Marketing, with minor in Advertising. The ceremonies, both the university-wide and College of Business, were nothing short of magical. With confetti, silly string, and beach balls flying widely, the ceremony was quite a sight.
Both ceremonies featured heart-felt speakers that gave us kind words of encouragement for the new chapter in life we are all about to embark on. Andrew Natsios, distinguished professor in the practice of diplomacy at Georgetown University, gave the commencement speech at the university-wide ceremony. He spoke about his involvement in international affairs, and gave some encouraging guidance in the form of 5 guiding principles: do what is right, integrity is non-negotiable, know yourself, regard every job you have as the last you will ever hold, take some risks, take care of yourselves and your family, and cultivate the inner life. At the College of Business ceremony, both Dean Dennis Garrett and Stephanie Storck delivered encouraging words, and guidelines for staying “happy” in life, being passionate about what you do for a living, and keeping your friends and family close.
Personally, I can’t say enough good things about Marquette University. I’ve had such an amazing 4-year journey, being a leader within both the IT Student Organization and Entrepreneurship club, serving others in the community by being an active Richfield Lions member, excellence both in and outside of the classroom, and being part of a faith-filled community which has opened my mind to different cultures and religions around the world. I’m proud to have faithfully served out the mission of Marquette University, and I am so thankful for them to give me the opportunity to attend there. With the knowledge and passion for what I do gained through my education experience, I plan to continually work hard, gain knowledge, give back to the community, and keep the Marquette pillars: excellence, faith, leadership, service alive in my heart. Marquette, faculty, family, and friends, thanks so much for the best 4-years of my life!
Add comment May 21, 2008
Pardon the absence…life has been busy
The holidays and sorting out my future after school have taken me away from blogging for a few months, and for that I apologize. It’s February of my senior year of college, and couldn’t be happier to where my life is headed. Other news, a team made up of friends John and Steve and myself, are competing in a business plan competition at Marquette. Our business idea, EduAttend, is an automated attendance system for inner city schools. Our team formed last semester during Professor Ow’s MANA 124- Emerging Technology course. So during our last semester here, we are attending Saturday workshops, and meeting with an advisor to refine and analyze our business idea.Other entrepreneurship news, our family business, Lee Precision, is celebrating 50 years in business. I’m extremely proud of my grandparents and my own parents for continual innovation over the past 50 years!
Add comment February 6, 2008
How to effectively conduct group projects
Its that time of year again, with the transition from fall to winter like conditions, the group project work season is well in full swing. Like most college-aged individuals, we are all faced with the chore of being assigned to a group that has to accomplish a variety of tasks. For three years I’ve tried to perfect the art of facilitating group projects, but looking back I’ve learned a lot of new things, but still haven’t perfected the skill. I’ve learned what makes people tick, management styles, spotting the natural born leaders of a group, how to deal with low performing group members, and how to budget time appropriately. But despite what I’ve learned, every group project ends up the same, there are those one or two individuals that take the lead, those one or two that take the backseat, and there is always a scurry at the end to get the task completed on time.
So what I need is your input…what has made running group projects effective/ineffective, are you one of those natural emerging leaders or to you like to take the backseat approach, how can we improve the whole process of being assigned group members and carrying through the tasks?
Add comment November 7, 2007
Meet Your Future Employee
I was featured in Computerworld on October 23, 2007 about emerging Gen Y employees. I just wanted elaborate on a couple points after viewing some of the comments below the article.
One comment by an anonymous individual made the statement, “Generation Y largely consists of self centered, arrogant, and lazy individuals. They have an overblown sense of self worth and huge egos. Breaking them in isn’t worth the hassle. Avoid at all costs.” I have to disagree with you sir/madam. I work extremely hard, and continually reach out to help others. Ever since the legal working age I’ve held a job, and I continually seek new work to feed my appetite on learning new things. Growing up within a faith filled family taught me to care for others beside myself, in fact I would have to say that most Gen Y-ers beside myself make volunteering a commitment. Whoever made this statement was way out of line, and just stereotyped my whole generation without any relevant evidence.
When Beth Stackpole addressed me in the second paragraph, “She doesn’t write code, she isn’t gadget-crazed or Internet-obsessed, and she positively isn’t interested in a career as a programmer or tech support jockey,” it was a little far from the truth. I developed my website and this blog by coding myself, what I think she intended to say is that I don’t want to make coding and being the computer techy my life. What I do want, is a problem solving role that allows me to be the bridge between the developers and the end-user/client. Don’t get me wrong, knowledge of coding is vital to understanding how the world of computing works, I did not intend to downplay how vital the skill is to have, I just meant that I don’t want to make that my career focus.
Another area I would like to explore is this supposed “lack of business communication skills” as mentioned in the 6th paragraph of the article. I have to agree in part with Stackpole when she made this statement, there are a lot of fellow students of mine that don’t have the business acumen to be able to effectively present a pitch in front of an audience, but these are the small majority of students that have never held a job in their life and neglected to get an internship while enrolled in my college. Personally, putting two summer internships in at GE Healthcare have made me an effective public speaker because this company stresses having this skill. I don’t think this is just a problem with Gen Y, because when I look at my parent’s generation (late Gen X-ers), they are scared to pieces to address others in front of a group, just my own personal experience.
Moving on, I agree with Stackpole’s statement on work/life balance. For many with families, it’s critical to have that balance. When speaking with my fellow Gen Y-ers that are already employed in the workforce, more and more employers are becoming more family friendly. One such employer gives them the ability to work from home maybe 1 or 2 days out of the week if they don’t have client meetings, etc. For some jobs, like my own father’s business, I understand it may be totally unrealistic to give employees the ability to set their own hours and work from home. I know firsthand how much time and energy my father puts into running a small manufacturing company, and I am amazed how well my dad can keep everything in pretty good balance. Its important though for employers to always keep in mind that all of their employees have a family back at home to attend to.
Overall, I think the article was a great way to spur some discussion on the differences between generations.
Add comment October 24, 2007
Splash Pages…Comparable to a Detour Sign On the Road
For those of you considering building an online portfolio, or a website to showcase you, I have one major piece of advice…kill the splash page. I treat these splash pages like a detour sign in that I don’t even want to waste a click on getting into the website, and I take the detour to find another website that doesn’t subject me to wasting one click to get in.
It is statistically proven that people use three clicks with a website, and if they don’t find what they are looking for in 3 clicks, they move on. Why would you want one of those precious three clicks to be used up on a page that offers no real value to the site?
To back up my point, a web developer Jennifer Kyrnin on About.com, offers the downfalls of using splash pages.
1 comment October 14, 2007
Forty Years of Lessons Learned- A Retail Journey
Today, founder and chairman of the board of Best Buy Dick Schulze came and spoke at the Business Leaders Forum Luncheon at Marquette University. Schulze presented 10 valuable lessons when developing and running your own business.
1. Listen to your customers
– Hassle free shopping
– Quick & easy checkout
– Service after the sale
2. Know your competitors
– Differentiate yourself
-slashed prices, and are known as the low price leader
3. Persistence pays
– Stand by convictions
– Find a unique way to serve a niche
4. Find a mentor
– They ground you, give you directions
– Find someone actively engaged in business within the field of your choice
5. Hire strong people
– Bring in consultants if you aren’t good at something (ex. IT and HR at Best Buy)
– Make a case for company
– Promote from within. “ordinary people doing extraordinary things.”
6. Don’t Punish Mistakes
– Reward innovation
– Minimize mistakes, and don’t spread them through every area of business
– Hypothesize, test and verify
7. Leverage your strengths
– Strength at Best Buy= innovation
– Allow floor employees to have open line of communication to company’s decision makers
– Allow employees to be intrapreneurs (innovate from within)
8. Learn to listen
– 360 evaluation
– Solicit opinions from diverse groups
– Embrace diversity of thought
– Remove anything that blocks creativity and innovation
9. Create partnerships
– Offer end to end solution (ex. buy a satellite and have installation staff)
– Geek squad
10. Infrastructure is critical
Overlying message, “empower your employees, and delegate!”
Add comment October 3, 2007
Private Pilot Aspirations…
Born with flying in my blood, I love the convenience of jumping in your own plane and flying to a destination…beating the lengthly lines at the airport for security, and those screaming/crying babies on the public planes. I’m going to take this winter break to finally get my private pilots license down south somewhere. I just thought I’d share a helpful link to search for some notable flight schools: aviationschoolsonline.com
The site allows you to search by a specific state and school name. Since this is the last free winter break I have before graduation, this would be an opportune time to get my license, as well as a chance to break away from the lovely Wisconsin winter.
Add comment September 28, 2007
