Let's learn about the trajectory of Ariel Levinson, Sr. Marketing Communications Manager of Johnson Controls, a recognized professional in the electronic security industry sector.
By Security Sales
Ariel Levinson was born in Buenos Aires, having to share his childhood with the entire era when Argentina was ruled by military dictatorships, including the famous Falklands War in 1982 against the United Kingdom. Fortunately, when he finished his high school studies in the country, democracy returned and a decision-making stage came for him.
Ariel was passionate about journalism and communications, but the time he lived in generated certain fears because journalism suffered human losses because of dictatorships. That led him to choose a totally different career: Food Engineering, studies he did for 4 years until he realized that he needed to return to his true passion; that is why he studied two simultaneous careers: "Radio and TV Journalism" at ISER, and "Bachelor of Communication Sciences" at the University of Buenos Aires.
His first big job was at the newspaper La Nación, where he was responsible for selling advertising in different sectors of mass consumption. Five years later, he was responsible for Marketing of the Argentine subsidiary of Editorial Abril, the largest in Brazil, which had several magazines. After his short stay there, he began his career in Retail, always as the head of Marketing of the company. This stage qualifies her as one of the most special of her career.
After some changes in the company, in 2002, Ariel finished his work there and traveled to Canada with his family, where he was Director of the Scotiabank International account at the media agency Carat Canada. But in 2009, Ariel finished his time at this company and after living difficult times due to being the time of the economic crisis, good friends and contacts led him to find a marketing opportunity for Latin America, for the intrusion product company DSC, part of Tyco International.
"In those first months of 2010, the Tyco Security Products division was formed, the 'umbrella' under which DSC, Sur-Gard and Bentel (on the Intrusion side) were integrated with the other developers and manufacturers of Video and Access Control products such as Kantech, Software House and American Dynamics. A few months passed, and since none of those brands had anyone from Marketing who dealt with Latin America, and the Sales team desperately needed that support, they also gave me that responsibility for the region. More brands, hundreds of new products, markets and customers very different from those of Intrusion and much more to learn," said the Professional of the Month.
This division, Tyco Security Products, continued to grow with new acquisitions (Visonic, Exacq, Illustra and several other brands that entered and / or left over the years), the challenges continued to come with some more collaboration and with the promotion to the position of Mr. Marketing Manager.
Security Sales: What are your personal challenges, your fears, and your next goals to meet?
Ariel Levinson: There is no doubt that we live in a world that has been "digitized" at an incredible speed, where technology, in the broadest sense, and social networks play a very important role in communication and in people's daily lives. I think I belong to a "hinge" generation, a generation that began to see and live all these changes as young adults and starting our professional careers. As a teacher of mine said, we know these technologies and new ways of communicating, we learn every day from them, but we are "tourists" of this new digital world, we were not born in it as our children. This implies a challenge, an almost daily challenge: to adapt, not to miss the 'train', because the speed of change and evolution is so fast that one can get stuck both professionally and personally.
VDS: What challenges do you face as a professional from the point of view of the relationship with employees and collaborators?
Ariel: With regard to the collaborators and people who report to you, particularly those who are just starting out, I believe that one should act as a mentor, that is, share the experience and knowledge that one has acquired in life to help them make the best decisions and do the best job possible. As part of that, there is also the sharing of information, of giving them context. We cannot expect them to do the work and achieve the goals that are expected if we do not give them the tools to achieve it. And another important factor is listening. Know what the other thinks and thinks. Know about their life, and many times, learn things from them.
All this allows you to create good work teams where the achievements and goals are achieved as a group, because there is no way to obtain the results that are expected if each of those who make up the work team does not contribute their part. And for those of us who have to lead or coordinate those teams, we must be generous and recognize each other's contributions and contributions.
VDS: What are the reasons for your recognition in this market?
Ariel: As I mentioned a little earlier, that permanent search for excellence, to achieve high quality in the initiatives and projects that one carries out, the passion that one puts into it, the hard work, the honest, direct, without hidden agendas. To be permanently trained, to be open to learning new things. Also in having the ability to look for and find the right people to collaborate with you in achieving work goals. And to all this, putting a quota of humor that generates a smile in others, even when it comes to difficult situations.
VDS: What has been the evolution of the industry?
Ariel: I think that in this last decade, the great evolution of the industry goes through integration and digitalization. In the world of intrusion there is almost no room left for not only manufacturers but the entire chain, distributors and installers, to produce and sell alarm panels, sensors, communicators, etc. in isolation. If all of them do not communicate with each other wirelessly, are integrated into a solution and have a high degree of encryption that prevents them from being hacked, they do not work. And in the residential case, we are already living it and it is growing very fast, it is home automation where these elements are integrated with video and the IoT (Internet of Things) taking everything to another level of technology that raise not only the levels of security but collaborate to improve the quality of life of people.
In the commercial and corporate field, the integration of video, access control, intrusion, fire, HVAC, etc., through building and facility management systems, is something increasingly used and within reach not only of large companies.
Cybersecurity has also been playing an increasingly preponderant role since it is useless to pay a low price for a product or solution if it has a high degree of vulnerability and can put at risk facilities, services or access to sensitive and private information.
The analytics from these solutions not only allow to accelerate the processes of search and identification of incidents but also provide valuable information that allows to obtain efficiencies, improve processes and help to make correct decisions with high impact on business.
VDS: How do you see the future of this industry in terms of threats, demand, technological advances and applications and possibilities for expansion in Latin America?
Ariel: If I was asked this question a couple of months ago, before the COVID-19 pandemic, my answer would be another one I can give today. The world will definitely be different and there will be a before and after the pandemic. Social and business behaviors will be different. It is quite clear that the digitalization of our lives has accelerated as a result of this situation and that those companies that offer the technology that allows reducing human intervention, facilitate and do the processes more efficiently, will be better positioned in this new world that we will have to live. This acceleration in technological change will also be reflected in the workforce. New activities and professional needs will arise, people will have to be retrained to work or perform tasks in another way.
We will have to see how Latin America comes out of this pandemic. With some common cultural components as a region but with very diverse economic and social developments, where the informal economy has a great weight in many countries, it will have to rethink very well the axes of its economies as well as the role that education will play in helping this re-positioning.
VDS: Do you remember any anecdotes from which you learned for your professional work and personal activity?
Ariel: I will never forget my first participation in Expo-Seguridad Mexico, almost 10 years ago. We had a fairly large stand that shared the space on an "island" of the property with that of another company. Although at that time he had no direct responsibility in the design and construction of the stand, he collaborated from Marketing in everything related to the fair. It turned out that that year, he took a company from Canada to set up the stand because he had already done it in other shows and it was hoped to reduce costs with this. The issue was that one of our walls bordering the other stand was built below the maximum height allowed, which the other company did far exceed ours. They did not make a good finish of the back of the structure that faced ours, they did not intend to do it and it looked horrible. The Canadian company didn't have many resources there and covered part of that wall with a white sheet that didn't improve the visual much either. Moral: always build the structure of the stand at the maximum height allowed to avoid unpleasant surprises and the second learning was to always work with local companies and suppliers that have the resources to quickly solve the unforeseen events that usually arise in this type of events.
The other life of the Professional
Ariel has been married for 22 years to Tamara with whom they have a beautiful daughter, 14-year-old Tasha. In 2002 they left Argentina and came to Canada, to create opportunities and start from scratch.
"Although it cost us almost nothing to adapt to this beautiful city and country, we had to start our lives a little bit again. Unless you've worked in a multinational company, people don't know the importance of the companies you worked for, no matter how big they are. We had to get used to living with another language in one of the most multi-ethnic and multi-cultural cities in the world, to respect new rules, build new friendships, establish themselves in the workplace, and many other things that make the day to day of the human being, "said Ariel.
The Professional is a loyal follower of sports. Fan of the River Plate club, and shares passions with other sports such as basketball, getting a special taste for the team of his city, the Toronto Raptors (last champions of the NBA). He also plays tennis and watches the most important matches on TV.
Among Ariel's other interests, politics, technology, business, sports, everything related to media and entertainment stand out. "I'm also passionate about food and one of the favorite things is to go out with my family and friends to try new restaurants and get to know foods from other cultures and regions, something that a city like Toronto makes much easier."
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