The Art Of Leadership, And How To Sell To The Electric Utilities
I like to study CEOs. I want to know how they work, and what tools they use to succeed. But I also want to know how they approach running companies.
I have known chief executives of every hue: some shout, some are buried in data, and some try the hail-fellow-well-met approach.
Some signal their importance with the size and splendor of their offices and airplanes. Things can go wrong with that approach. I knew the chairman of a big industrial company who had a glass desk, which, through an optical fault, magnified the crotch of his trousers.
Some manage with huge teams and others with a “kitchen cabinet” of fellow executives. There is no formula for success.
Robert Schwartz, president and CEO of Anterix, a company that provides private LTE networks for electric grid modernization, is devoid of managerial eccentricities. He goes by the name of Rob. He is a mannerly man of studious mien. With a quiet demeanor, he is noticeably polite and is quick to thank and recognize his team and suppliers for their good work.
This gentlemanly exterior belies his passionate and strategic drive to be the catalyst to bring change.
He also is patient. That is well and good because as head of Anterix, a company seeking to provide what amounts to a gamechanger for the utility industry, patience is necessary. Utilities move with care because the consequences of their decisions last for several decades.
Although Anterix is a young company, it is gaining a foothold in the utility industry. It has signed up three important customers for its networks: San Diego Gas & Electric, Ameren, and Evergy.
The company has also launched an ecosystem of leading technology and service providers to the utility sector. Eighty leading companies are now collaborating with Anterix to deliver broadband solutions to its customers.
Schwartz’s patience is getting rewarded.
Anterix has a unique nationwide asset of 900-MHz wireless spectrum. Carefully assembled and now very valuable, that spectrum makes up the backbone of its product line: private broadband leases of spectrum to enable utility LTE and soon 5G communications networks. These private networks enable utilities to communicate safely, to fend off cyberattack, and to stay up when other systems have gone down.
