“Habits are like financial capital – forming one today is an investment that will automatically give out returns for years to come.”

― Shawn Achor, "The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work"

Why quote Shawn Achor in a StructShare post?

Shawn opened Graybar's National Training Conference, which took place at the amazing JW Marriott San Antonio. <view all of our pictures here> His kick-off on Thursday night set the tone for the weekend and emphasized to the audience of  more than 700 attendees just how important forming habits can be to their success. When a Graybar employee has success, so do the companies they serve.

After the Welcome Banquet, everyone moved across the hall to the District Race Against Hunger Challenge. Watching the team work of the Districts build and personalize a vehicle left no doubt why Graybar is able to service their customers so well. They truly epitomize the “teamwork makes the dream work.”

Bill Mansfield, VP Strategy at Graybar, opened the morning session followed by Connor Lokar, Senior Forecaster at ITR Economics. Mansfield shared how at the intersection of “People, Process, and Technology is Operational Excellence.” He continued with the Strategic Initiatives and stressed the importance of a seamless customer experience. That is where the partnership between Graybar and StructShare shines.

Graybar leading the way for next generation services

“It’s the first time we've held a ‘construction technology’ section at the conference; a big step in continuing being at the front of serving our contractors,” says Dave Moeller, Director of Construction Markets at Graybar. “We are thrilled to have the leaders in construction technology showcase how customers are managing projects and procurement.”

StructShare's procurement solution is tailored to specialty contractors at any size and specifically successful with many of Graybar's customers. In addition to helping subcontractors save countless hours and reduce errors by streamlining field to office requisitions and POs, digitizing delivery sheets, and automating the invoice reconciliation process. Now, Graybar customers can easily integrate their Graybar catalog items, including their own pricing, directly into their StructShare account. This allows anyone at the company to order specific items, read product descriptions, and more, all without leaving the StructShare platform. No need to say how much time and headaches it saves everyone from jumping between apps and screens.

"Providing a seamless customer experience, as defined by our leadership, is exactly what we're working towards as we identify meaningful data integration points within the StructShare platform," says Quintin Henry, Director of Quality and Service Solutions at Graybar.

During the Expo Hall hours, we were able to demonstrate this integration to the entire sales organization from sales reps, branch managers, district managers to the VPs, and executives. 

What made these conversations incredibly awesome was the excitement felt by Graybar folks stating 'this is really how contractors want to work' when they saw StructShare in action. More than that, we had met quite a few who had already experienced the power of StructShare used by their customer’s catalog. "As being at the core of everything, it streamlined their entire business," said one of the branch managers.

Final treat

The good Texas hospitality kicked-in for the second evening event with barbecue, beverages and more. You’ll have to check out the slide show for more pictures!

Or Lakritz, StructShare Co-Founder and CPO, may have said it best, “Graybar is a unique company with an amazing culture, who builds their team from the ground up. You can feel the passion in each one of their team and it helps them be a leader in the construction materials space as such a customer focus company, even through these uncertain times.” 

Thank you Graybar for a wonderful few days of learning, networking, and spreading the word of how professional electrical contractors are doing business today.

<view our slideshow of pictures>