It’s always great to celebrate a work anniversary – and Chris has just marked 10 years at EPIX. Here he reflects on the last decade…
The phrase “time flies when you’re having fun” couldn’t be more apt. It certainly doesn’t feel like 10 years since I started working at EPIX Systems, but that said, my youngest daughter had just turned four years old and she is now half way through secondary school. So actually, I’ve been here ages if I think about it.
Before I began at EPIX I found myself in roles that suited my skills in spreadsheets, databases and data analysis but never really found what my passion/drive was. Starting at EPIX gave me the opportunity to find what had been missing in those previous roles. The interaction with clients, developing relationships with our customers, implementing new systems and seeing the difference our product made gives me a real sense of pride.
When I think back to the early days in my job and where I am now, I’ve certainly come a long way, but so has the business. We were still in our Stockport office when I started with a small team, me becoming the seventh person, aiming to take over Mike’s role managing the implementation of new systems and providing support to customers.
I’d come to the role with a fair amount of experience in ‘IT’ so how hard could it be providing a bit of support to our customers and setting up a system? Turns out it was really hard! Within a couple of weeks I was out meeting clients doing customer relationship visits, mostly writing pages and pages of questions to ask the team back at the office.
When I wasn’t writing War & Peace in client meetings I’d answer the phone, often not really understanding what the customers were asking. I mean, they spoke words to me, and the words all made sense, but they weren’t talking ‘IT speak’ – there was lots of talk of SORs and assets and lots of queries about purchase orders and invoices. And don’t get me started on the acronyms…
After a couple of site visits on implementations shadowing Mike and more and more phone calls I started to understand what our users needed, and it all started to click into place.
With my first training session under my belt (with a group of engineers in a Rugby Club somewhere outside Barrow-in-Furness) I was let loose with my first implementations, two of them back to back. Sapphire Cooling down in East Anglia, and Link Contracting over near Wigan. I must have done something right as both are still customers 10 years later and still ask to speak to me when they phone up, so I’m taking that as a positive.
Fast forward several years of customer support calls, site visits, training sessions, new system setups and helping to develop the team at EPIX, I often find myself having conversations with people who are invariably disillusioned with work, and some who simply do not enjoy their jobs. I still enjoy going to work every day and the challenges that each day brings.
My role has changed over the years. While we were a bit quieter in 2020 I started publishing regular YouTube videos, mostly walkthroughs and handy hints to help our users. My first few took ages! I would do them sentence by sentence with so much editing, and now I do them all in one take (pretty much)! This year we have also launched our series of monthly training webinars which seem to be going down really well across our customers, and our own staff who log on to learn a thing or two! I’ve really enjoyed doing these sessions and seeing the positive impact they bring.
I started at EPIX knowing nothing about MARKUS. Whilst my multitude of online tutorials, webinars and help articles would lead you to think I know all there is to know, I am still learning. EPIX has grown as a business while I’ve been here, and as part of the continuing development of my role, I now help with the development of the team, using the knowledge I’ve gained over my 10 years. I’m enjoying passing on the knowledge to give our team the skills they need to tackle implementing new systems without me and developing the next generation of implementation managers!
What do I love the most about my job?
I can’t pick one thing… so I’ve got four.
- Variety – one minute I’m answering a support call, the next recording a YouTube video, the next delivering an online webinar then I’m off in a train/plane/car to visit a client. No day is the same and every email and phone call presents a different challenge.
- Setting up a new system – I love taking the ideas, conversations and bits of random data from a customer and turning it into a functioning job management system that helps them grow their business and make their operation more efficient.
- Visiting our customers – Travelling around the country catching up with the customers who I’ve got to know over the years is certainly one of my favourite things to do. Over the last 10 years I’ve got to know a lot of our customers and it’s great to check in with them now and again.
- The Team – we’ve got a fab team here at EPIX and, as well as being awesome at what they do, they’re a joy to work with.
Here’s to the next 10 years at EPIX Systems.
