 Hey, Aloha from the Think Tech Hawaii Studios. This is Security Matters, Hawaii. I am your host, Andrew Lanning, and today we're going to be talking with Lisa Bradshaw from United Technologies Corporation. She is with Lanelle Systems International. She is a prominent woman in security, so we're going to start with women in security. But the first question Lisa, I want to ask you is, what keeps you up at night, being a security professional? What goes through your mind? Oh gosh, okay. So there's just a lot of different things that I think are happening in the industry that are really important. So one of the biggest things that we're dealing with now is cybersecurity. And so the biggest thing for me as a manufacturer, having a play in that and being able to be a trusted advisor and advise our customers, I just want to make sure that we're giving them good advice because they're definitely using that to secure the systems that we're selling them, right? And that's been an issue, a growing issue that we've all been working on for a while. I think I lose some sleep over that one too. So thanks for coming in today. I really appreciate it. I caught you while you were out in Hawaii, so I'm really happy to have you here. Can you give our audience just a little bit, some of your background, as much as you want to share with how you evolved in the industry and then how you ended up sitting here? Sure. So I started in the industry about 15, 16 years ago, I guess, and I just fell into it. I went to work for a company that was doing real estate virtual tours of all things. And that technology, that 360 technology, became a company called iPix. Sure, I remember that. That was a 360. Yeah. The first employees that moved to DC, when we started that division of the company to develop the 360 technology. So that was sort of my entree into the security market. Wow. I didn't know that. Yeah. Yeah. And so I've had, you know, my family has been sort of in the industry. My dad was the sheriff where I grew up. My mom has been, she was the International 9-1-1 coordinator for a while. She was elected to do that for a while. So it's been sort of in my blood, so to speak, but it's never really going to do that, any of that, right? So, but when I got into it, I really loved it. And the reason I did it is because of technology, I think, because at that time I was doing megapixel and no one else was, right? So it was very interesting. And since then, I have to say there hasn't been a gap in technology evolving. And I think that's the biggest thing that sort of kept me in it, right? And so one of the main reasons that I came to Linnell after being sort of on the camera and the video management side is the solution side of it, which we've been talking about the integration of different systems and all of that for a long time. And I think Linnell has done a really good job at developing those partnerships and the integrations to make systems more efficient. And I think one of the bigger things that we're talking about now is operational efficiency and business applications versus just security, right? So that's why I stay, I guess, having gotten into it about 16 years ago. It's interesting. We talk a lot about no one grows up wanting to be in the security industry. You don't think of that. You might think I'll be a cop or a detective, but no one thinks about this. No one knows about this industry. Well, I wanted to be a movie star or something. Oh, you did? That didn't work out. You made it today. You're here. Right, you're here. But I mean, it's just an interesting thing. When we get in it, it's all this cool technology. It's never ending like we're growing all the time. And then we're protecting lives and we're protecting property. So it has this, for me, a sort of a left behind factor, right? We have this factor that all this stuff we've done every day, every hour is still protecting people when we go home. And I like that about it because we can kind of work anywhere in technology. There's tons of technology. Exactly. But this one's special. So I love it that you're challenged to stay in it, especially with the, you mentioned the platforms that Linnell has tied themselves into and, of course, UTC owns Otis and they own Carrier. Yeah, exactly. So the building automation, well, I hope in my career I get to like automate a building someday. That's my whole, that's the one thing I'd like to do because the technology is truly available now. Well, we have a building in Florida where we've actually done that, right? So we've taken all of the UTC technologies, partner technologies, and put them into an efficient building. So that's something. We actually have a place where we can take customers and make sure that they know sort of how this can be deployed and it really is a reality. Yeah. And it's finally here. I mean, I've been chasing it for years. I was kind of wondering who'd do it, who'd really do it, you know, and it's, you need a green field opportunity like that that we get the chance to build a building and design it and do it right. And I think people do pieces and parts of it, you know, and that was one of the things we were talking about at your seminar this past week is there, people do have all these systems. They're not really thinking of how to tie them together, right? And so maybe one or two might be tied together, but they don't think about how they might, you know, think outside the box a little bit and think about how they might put other systems in there to drive, you know, either efficiencies or drive more security. For sure. Yeah. So there's been another trend. We're challenged with technology. We've also been challenged, as have many industries, to bring recruit women into our industry. Yeah. So you mentioned like you've been in maybe 15 years. I think I've been in this industry maybe 25 years and, you know, the room's always, everybody looked like a bunch of golf balls, right, a bunch of old ball-headed ex-military guys, right? You go to the conferences and there may be women in marketing or perhaps in accounting, but we didn't really have them in the technical areas. And so now you're quite technical yourself or you're a regional sales manager. So you're talking technology to people, you're now starting to approach you mentioned talking about cyber technology, being that trusted advisor. What have you, what's your take on that? I mean, that, that rising role and the changing role, the demographics are changing a bit from a gender perspective. I think in our industry, it seems to me the rooms are, there's more women in the rooms. It's not, I don't think we have parity yet. It's not 50-50. Yeah. And by no means that's big. But it's open to women, I think. Yeah. I think it is. And I think, I think many industries have challenges, especially in the technical side, in getting women involved in that, but being more male-dominated industry in general. I think there's been, women in security plays a role in that. There's a lot of men involved in that as well. How do you mentor younger people to come into this industry? How do you, how do you recruit and help people stay in the industry? And so every time I walk into a room, for example, I do look, I just notice how many women are here. And what are their roles or responsibilities? So interested in talking and figuring out, what is your job, right? Sure. Because I think there are less, as you sort of go up the ladder, there are less and less women sort of rising to the occasion, so to speak. And I hate to even think, like I'm motivated, I don't like to even think about the fact that there's any other reason other than our own effort, right? Oh, of course, of course. Right? And so I think that that's, we're all working really hard to get to the C-suite and be the CISOs and all that, and more and more women are becoming that. And I think as more women become involved in those types of roles, there will be more adoption in the corporate as a whole, because women bring something unique and different to that C-suite, right? A different way of thinking, a different way of collaborating. And I just don't think that there's enough people that sort of embrace that yet. So I think once that we promote that, I think people will begin to see that there's a whole lot of benefit to having sort of this, you know, synergy between how men think and what they do and how women think and what they do to build on how an organization is run and how people are treated and all that. And hopefully, how our industry is run, even. Yeah, definitely. It's an industry that needs collaboration. I mean, every room you go in, and if FBI is talking, DHS is talking, NSA is talking, our industry is talking, everyone says, we can't do this alone. We've got to work with our communities. We've got to work with all the stakeholders. So I have to agree with you. I happen to work, you know, my wife runs our company. I've worked for her, and her style of leadership is far more collaborative than my own. I was Navy trained. Do we laugh about that a lot? Unfortunately, I've had trouble adopting a more collaborative mode of leadership, but she does it very well. And it's fun to watch and fun to learn from and a constant challenge for someone like me who just wants to give you your marching orders. Like I've done that 50 times. I know how to do it. Not giving the other person the opportunity to perhaps do it a better way. Or even another way, whatever, it doesn't matter. But I'm too quick to do that where Christine's not. I noticed that when I work with other groups of women in the industry that there are just, there's a sense of openness to their approach that didn't come from the Navy. I guarantee you that. We were used to getting orders barked at us and then barking orders downstream, you know. It was expediency was the given reason, right? If you don't do what you're told, people die. But I think in business, it can be a little softer. It doesn't have to be run the way the military's run. And I think there's some good parts to that too. I mean, you figure out sort of how to get things done quick and go get them. You just don't want to bulldoze and run over people to get it done, right? So I do think that the women, no. I think that the women insecurity and men insecurity and just this whole sort of idea of how do we have a good experience at work and create those whatever is a good life in that our work and our play becomes one and the same in a lot of cases. We work really hard, right? You sure hope that you have the passion that makes it fun. Yeah. Your work, I agree. And so there's the other aspect of that too, I think is sort of the younger people mentoring millennials, so to speak. And that we're all learning how to deal with millennials coming in. The fact of the matter is we're forced to, we have to, because they are the next generation of workforce, right? And so it isn't going to equate that to women insecurity versus millennials coming into security in that we just have to make it work and figure out how do we promote and keep people in general in their roles and allow them to sort of evolve and make the right choices and sort of move our industry forward. And that we embrace all of those things and there's no way we couldn't be successful in it because everybody has their own ideas. So to that collaborative point, that's sort of the space that I come from is how do you leverage other people's strengths? Maybe identifying your own weaknesses and build your team based on that fact, right? And then you've created something that is unstoppable. That's awesome. I know that Christine started the local as is chapter, which is the American Society for Industrial Security has a women insecurity group, a council that they start, I think maybe a decade or so ago, but the group here, when she got involved with as is here, there was just no focus on it at all. So she's been able, I think, to recruit maybe 10 women just in Honolulu alone that are security directors are working in those roles around town that probably didn't have a voice or didn't have an opportunity for mentorship, didn't have an opportunity to get involved with as is and learn. Probably didn't even know about it till she reached out to them. And so, you know, this is a thing we've got a nurture, you know? Well, in the Bay Area where I live, there's a women insecurity group that gets together and I've gone to a few of those. Awesome. And there was a pretty good turnout for that more. So, I mean, it sort of stopped and started and it's, you know, back to being pretty strong and men come too. It's not just a thing, right? But I do think that there's a lot that they can promote, you know, as far as training goes and having conversations around, you know, what are some of the things that we might be experiencing and how do we overcome, you know, some of those, whether it's, you know, just not being taken seriously or whatever the case is. Yeah, Christine's had that. We've, you know, we've been talking with, it's happened with customers, it's happened with other manufacturers. We'll be in a booth together at a show and they're talking to me and she's the president and they're like ignoring her and she'll be like, that guy thinks I'm your secretary. Like, you know, when we walk away. Right. And it's so sad. Like, you know, because I've got the bald head, I'm the target, like, you know, where's the president guy? You know, he's not doing his job, you know what I'm saying? He's just, so there's a, there can be a, I don't know if it's a rigidity, if it's a, I think of some of this and even like the C-sweets and those guys, it's time to just move on and let the rest of the world take over, whether it's millennials, it doesn't really matter. We, we stay in too long in the workforce maybe, you know, we need that fresh blood to come up and leave. Well, and it is an awareness thing. And I think most, if maybe people just don't think of that, right? It's like just, I'm focused on you because I usually work with men and maybe it's uncomfortable. I don't know. But it is sort of a, you know, that individual and I've experienced it myself, right? Yeah. And it's sort of like, it's just automatic. So I'm not blaming, but it's like, quit being so automatic about it. And it's also on us, right? So I did talk with someone about this recently and it was, it was sort of the same sort of conversation, but it was going into a meeting with, you know, a group, a couple of people and the, the man was the one who was being sort of directed to the whole time when the woman was really the, the, had, had the ownership. The decision maker. She probably should have made that pretty clear, right? So there's some ownership on our, ours as well to make sure to speak up when we need to. But yeah, I think it's, it's interesting because that does happen a lot. Okay. We're going to pay a few bills because we have to do that. We will be back in about one minute. Thank you. Hello. I'm Lisa Sinclair. I have a show called Finding Respect in the Chaos. It's all about women's rights and gender equality. It's a place for survivors of abuse to come on and tell their stories and a place for advocates to come on and share important resources so that people can get past the abuse and into the hope and healing that's on the other side. I hope you'll join me every other Friday at three o'clock for Finding Respect in the Chaos. I'm Cynthia Lee Sinclair on thinktecawaii.com. I'm Jay Fidel, think tech. Think tech loves energy. I'm the host of Mina, Marco and me, which is Mina Morita, former chair of the PUC, former legislator and energy dynamics, a consulting organization in energy. Marco Mangostorf is the CEO of Provision Solar in Hilo. Every two weeks, we talk about energy, everything about energy. Come around and watch us. We're on at noon on Mondays every two weeks on think tech. Aloha. Hey, Aloha, and welcome back to Security Matters Away. I am talking with Lisa Bradshaw from United Technologies, and we're getting ready to talk about our favorite topic, l'nil. We had a symposium this earlier this week. We got to show some of l'nil's new bells and whistles to quite a turnout of people. I'm sorry if you missed that, but you can catch up here a little bit. So you run the Western region, along with your partner Rich, you guys have the Northwest. We actually have the Bay Area, Northern California, Northern Nevada, Hawaii. Yeah. So you have big customers, the big boys, and l'nil's a global sort of product has an enterprise level. There's not in common trust to have customers from around the world that are maybe headquartered in your area. So you get to see a glimpse of a market space that we don't really have in Hawaii much of. Smaller enterprises, but not that global audience. So anyway, what's exciting for your audience? What's exciting for you? What's going on with the new release? So I've only been with l'nil for a couple of years, but it's been an amazing couple of years. And I get the benefit of working with people who have been with l'nil for 15, 70, 20 years, right? Isn't that something? So I came in at a great time because l'nil had sort of revamped their APIs and rewrote sort of the whole interface of l'nil to be in preparation for the cloud, right? So a couple of things that happened in that regard, right? So we've got web-based clients now. So you're not having to load software on a bunch of clients. It's web-based. What that gives you is sort of ease of use and ease of deployment. And those are some of the biggest things that we're looking at is how do we make it easier for our customers? There's still a lot of work that goes into developing a system, right? It's complicated, potentially, especially in those enterprise-level kind of customers. But what the company has done has been very diligent about creating the l'nil experience in a modern architecture. It's in HTML5 so that it's basically browser-agnostic, device-agnostic. You can use your iPad. You can use your phone, which is amazing. What comes with that is the user experience. So we have a team of people that are experts in not only user interface, but user experience. How are people using the system? How do we make it easier, more intuitive for them? Because nobody wants to sit and read a manual, right? People just want to get on and use it. For sure. Swipe and tap. Swipe and tap, right? The manual is there. That's what we're doing now, is creating these web interfaces so that people's jobs become easier to do and more intuitive. Sure. So that is the most exciting thing, I think, that we've been, for my opinion, been doing. And now it's just done, right? And if our audience doesn't know, so if you're not an access control person or you haven't used some of these larger products like a l'nil or a software house or a church, the thick client experience, it was necessary. There's so much technology behind that user interface and hundreds, thousands, infinite actually, configurable alarms and configurable ways to do this and that with a door or a person or an object in the system. And that ability to manipulate took a lot of software on the front end. And so those of us that have evolved with it over the years look at where we are today and it's like, it's actually easy to use now. Yeah. I remember teaching people l'nil and literally it just took days. You know, it was really difficult and then you've reviewed how to do a thing for them, make a schedule or something and then they got it and then they don't do it again for a year. They can't even find where to get to, you know, and it was really difficult. So today, all that stuff's gotten quite a bit simpler. How's the reception? I mean, you were out, l'nil is doing road shows and you guys do, you visit a lot of offices and show off the technology. How's the reception for your, like, existing users? Yeah, I know. It's been great. So even at ISC, you know, it was my second one with l'nil and the booth was crazy. It was constantly busy. A lot of existing customers coming in to see what was new. Obviously, we had new potential customers too. But yeah, it's a great reception and I think that's one of the reasons that we're doing our road show as well around the country. And ours is on June 19th in San Francisco. If people want to come. I wonder where I'm going. You should come. Is to show people what's new, right? So people may be, we've got a lot of customers that, you know, since, you know, I don't know if I want to get into the details of what, versioning and all of that. But basically, you know, as people upgrade to get more functionality, more of the thin capability and coming out in 7.5 that's coming out, most everything will be in this, you know, for users is in thin client architecture, the web-based stuff. There's still some thick client stuff from a setup perspective. But the users themselves, the response has been amazing. I mean, it's sort of, it's the modern. It's the thought process. There's a lot of conversation about cloud. Everybody's talking about it, saying, yes, I want to go. We have initiatives to be all cloud-based. What does that mean? We talk to people about what that means and they don't really know yet what that means. But we're supporting it. We're supporting it. So we support, we have what's called infrastructure in the cloud now, which is all of your servers and everything can be virtualized or off-prem. So in the data center. Sure, and Azure or Amazon or Google or whatever, sure. Exactly. And we support that. We're just, you know, the difference between infrastructure, cloud and SaaS-based software as a service is we're not pushing updates to that. I mean, the integrator and the end-user are still responsible for making sure that whatever their software and their updates are all happening sort of on your timeline. But certainly there are plans to have a software as a service platform and offering. Yeah, I know our lab, our engineers that run our lab are putting that, we use Azure. So we're putting our lab version in Azure. And we have our demo version all on that too. So we have a great integration with Milestone from a video perspective. We've done a lot of development and co-developing with them. And so we can show that in our demos. All of our, everything that we do basically we can do through the cloud that's set up. Yeah, it's cool. And that's what the end-users get too, right? Yeah, exactly. So it really works for everyone. And it's been, you know, we talked cloud for a while. And there's been a few products that have launched in the cloud. Our industry's finally paying attention and catching on. And I think the behind that sort of the managed services model for an integrator perspective is another thing that we've got as integrators have to take on. And then because the customers want to consume us as a service. Well, and that's sort of where we've, we're developing sort of this, you know, what, how are you going to, how are people going to procure a product going forward? Is it, you know, capital expenditures? People want to use their capital funding. And then some people want to use operational funding. We've got to figure out how to, how to manage that, right? So subscription-based product is certainly something that we will have in the future. That subscription, you know, is going to coincide with whatever kind of service contracts the integrator might have, which makes it easy for them to pay for that kind of thing. But I think we're still figuring out, you know, how are we going to help different types of customers that want to buy differently depending on how they're getting funding. And sir, and like our, we have, because we service, you know, federal government, we service municipal government, and then we have our contracted and then, you know, direct customers as well in the commercial space. And so, and they are all different types of consumers. You know, government is talking cloud, which is awesome. And they're moving stuff to cloud. But no one's asking us about consuming security from a cloud perspective yet. So that one, that piece, and even the way it gets contracted, I don't, I just don't know how they'll work that out. But hopefully they will. And I think the commercial side, though, is a little more interesting and a little closer to evolving there. And I know there are some large customers, you know, enterprise level customers that are moving and moving parts of their stuff. So they get maybe hybrid now. They got a whole corporate building that's got its own stuff. But that satellites are cloud-based and things like that. So we may have a version of models for a while that we have to sort of wade through and, you know, figure out how to manage and things like that. Definitely. So that the great thing is, is as we start having these conversations, you know, we have solutions to be able to help people, you know, in that hybrid sort of scenario and then helping them. As long as we're at the table to be able to have a conversation about what you want to do, we can help, you know, architect those systems so that it's not going to cost them a bunch of money some day because they didn't, you know, think ahead or whatever. Sort of like the proprietary conversation of, you know, the past. Yeah, we can fix that today. Yeah, today we're... Future proof of them a little. Exactly. So what else, you know, what's pretty, I think, interesting in the readers, the Blue Diamond readers, right? So a lot of people are interested in mobile. I know the hotels are playing, the campuses are playing. What do you see in there in that space? So lots of interest in mobile credentials, using your phone as the device to be able to get into your office. Also being able to, you know, integrate that into maybe another portal that a company might have that is where the employees might go, right? Like another form of authentication. Yeah, or just they want to use it and they want to be able to buy lunch, you know, with it. So all of these things, people are just using their phones obviously for more. I mean, I was talking the other day to somebody and it was like they were doing something on their phone and were looking for their phone at the same time because they wanted to make do something on it, right? So there were all these different concepts of I use my phone to make calls. I use my phone to search the internet. I use my phone to, you know, do all these other things. And so just having a moment, they're talking on the phone, looking for their phone because they want to do something else. And so... Wait, let me find my phone. No, you're talking on it. The realization that, yeah, you're talking on it. Wow. And I guess that's probably somebody who was over 40. But I digress. It is something that is coming. I think that it is still something that corporations, large corporations that are ingrained in sort of their cards and being able to identify people by their card. Yeah, I'm a fan of that. I like to know that you belong here. It's a bit of a paradigm shift for people, right? So people are starting to get used to it. I think where we're finding quite a bit of, you know, success and interest is in education. Lots of students and then also in just Greenfield opportunities where they don't have anything yet, right? They don't have, you know, readers on the door already and cards and credentials. So they're interested in sort of leapfrogging into that type of technology just because it's easier. People don't forget their phones. Yeah, the path of entry is pretty simple. Yeah. So we have whipped through another episode awful quickly. I would say that those folks that want to carry that badge, remember, you can still use your phone and print that little 10 cent piece of plastic instead of that $5 piece of plastic. That's going to close us up for this episode of Security Matters Hawaii. I want to thank you for visiting with us, Lisa. Thank you for coming out today. I really appreciate it. And next time you're in town, I'll hopefully get you back on for another update. Stay safe out there over the weekend, everybody, because security matters. Thank you.