CDM Electronics
Monitoring Software Provides 'Remote Insight' for Roving General Manager

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The Setting

CDM Electronics, Inc. is a distributor of several complete lines of high-quality electronics, and also offers contract manufacturing for similar products to customers around the world.

There are 33 employees at the company's main facility in Turnersville, NJ, while General Manager Carmen DeLeo and another salesperson form the Irvine, CA team dedicated to increasing CDM's West Coast influence. DeLeo's father started the company in 1993, and in 2003 Carmen and his brother joined CDM to make it decidedly a family affair.

DeLeo's primary focus is Sales and Marketing, but based on his past ownership of an IT business, DeLeo also is the company's computer network expert.

“With my background, CDM has been fond of technology … as a competitive advantage, or as a tool for efficiency,” said DeLeo.

CDM's New Jersey-based network server runs Windows 2003, and all workstations use XP. DeLeo uses his laptop PC to connect to CDM's Virtual Private Network via an encrypted tunnel.

“Our employees are quite dedicated,” said DeLeo. “Many times we have to tell them to go home … I attribute much of our success to this attitude.”

DeLeo said his industry's recent annual growth rate has been about six percent. In comparison, CDM has been growing at approximately 20 percent a year for four consecutive years.

The Challenge

In an effort to build on CDM's recent success, DeLeo moved to California from the company's New Jersey base. The separation of a key manager from main operations appeared to be a situation ripe with potential, but also one potentially fraught with difficulty: to effectively relocate, DeLeo had to be convinced he could stay connected to his company.

“I questioned how I was going to be able to pull it off, especially with the travel involved AFTER the relocation,” said DeLeo. “I wanted to remain intimately in touch, to be able to check the pulse of the company from a distance. You can learn a great deal just by reading a string of emails. I wanted and needed to be able to work remotely.”

Search for a Solution

“I was really looking for a software program that would permit what I call remote management,” said DeLeo, adding he had known of SpectorSoft's expertise and reputation for quite some time.

“I read about Spector Pro in PC Magazine … probably five years ago,” said DeLeo. “Based on what I knew about Spector Pro, Spector CNE appeared to be the logical choice.”

Spector Pro TWICE has been awarded PC Magazine's Editors' Choice for monitoring software, and is the forerunner of Spector CNE (Corporate Network Edition). Spector CNE records everything employees do online, including instant messages, chats, emails sent and received, web sites visited, applications launched, network connections established and bandwidth consumed, files downloaded, files copied to removable media, and keystrokes typed -- then saves this information for review at a later time -- EXACTLY what DeLeo needed to keep up with the work of his remote staff 2500 miles away.

Discoveries

“Using Spector CNE gives me a good pulse on the company … it gets me in there to see how the business is doing,” said DeLeo. “It's sort of like deep sea diving. You might see a thread of something crucial to the business.”

Even though DeLeo terms CDM “a pretty clean shop”, he admits the company is not immune to what seems to have become typical employee behavior in business worldwide, especially where a high speed Internet connection exists. “We're not immune to web-surfing and personal use of emails,” said DeLeo. “This summer, we had some young folks working and after reviewing Spector CNE reports we found some very explicit communications via email.”

Awareness

“Everybody knows about monitoring and they are busy doing their work,” said DeLeo. “And that's exactly as we want it to be.”

Working With Employees

DeLeo said CDM employees are informed of the possibility of monitoring at time of hiring.

“It's spelled out in our Employee Handbook … what they do could be monitored,” said DeLeo. “In addition, once or twice a year we send a reminder.”

Spector CNE: The Software of Choice

“Spector CNE is an insight tool as much as it is a monitoring tool,” said DeLeo. “The monitoring part is the no-brainer … to make sure your employees are doing what they're supposed to be doing. But for me, other things are more important … like REVENUE and EFFICIENCY … gaining controls over cost. These things are the most valuable.

“Insight is a good word … that's what I get from Spector CNE.”

	“Using Spector CNE, sales leads can be reviewed, evaluated, and distributed. For my sales effort, I gauge what is happening by regions … the Midwest vs. the North, for example … for this, information I receive using Spector CNE helps me load balance,” said DeLeo. “Using Spector CNE, I am able to increase productivity because I am able to balance … it's the BALANCE.”
	“With Spector CNE, you can see who your busiest people are,” said DeLeo.
	“The install was smooth,” said DeLeo. “Our IT guys went in at night and it was running the next morning. Even though I wasn't there, I'm sure the install was smooth because my guys will let me know if there are problems. When it comes to software installs, no news is good news.”
	“With Spector CNE the performance impact is a nonissue,” said DeLeo. “It's simple … once in the server through the VPN, I just launch Spector CNE. There's no change in server performance … no change in workstation performance. It's a small footprint … it doesn't take up a lot of space on the server. Performance is just fine.”
	“When it comes to value, Spector CNE gets good marks,” said DeLeo. “It's a good deal … affordable … a great product.”

“To me, Spector CNE means information management,” said DeLeo. “Personally, I think Spector CNE is more important than antivirus software. With my background, I can write antivirus software if I have to. But it's easy to see the value of Spector CNE. I wouldn't be without it.

“There's no question I would recommend Spector CNE … in fact, I recently did just that. A company President I know told me he had some suspicions.

“I said get Spector CNE … tell your employees you are doing it … then spend 10 minutes a day reviewing the reports and you'll catch ANYTHING that's going on.”

For more information about CDM Electronics, please visit www.cdmelectronics.com.

For more information about Spector CNE, please visit www.spectorcne.com … or for more information about SpectorSoft and its other dependable, full-featured PC and Internet Activity Monitoring Software products, please visit www.spectorsoft.com.

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