Eric Kiehn, C&W Technologies "Using a Down Economy to Innovate and Succeed"

In today's episode we speak with Eric Kiehn, the owner of C&W Technologies.  His service provider business has lasted 36 years and has seen good times and bad.  Eric tells us about those experiences and the downturns often led to new revenue opportunities. Eric speaks about how as he went into the last great recession in '08 it opened up a new market in cloud services for his break-fix shop.  Through the need to control costs it opened up a new recurring revenue model.  In fact, cloud drove the MSP services vs. the other way around. Eric also shares how peer groups changed his business and his life.  How the feedback from peers, both inside the industry with other MSP's, and with local business leaders shaped his leadership perspective and helped C&W Technologies innovate. He then shares about C&W's approach to the COVID-19 crisis. Change is more apt to happen during these down periods and clients are open to ideas they may have rejected in the past.  He adds that C&W Technologies built a list of 5 things they planned to accomplish to improve internally in the crisis. On a personal level, Eric focused on learning as much as he could on PPP, not for his business, but to help guide others.  It drew attention to him locally and drove new prospects into the top of his funnel.