“Building Organizations with Automation”

According to Kevin Adam, CFO & COO at FirstService Residential Illinois the CFO of tomorrow needs to expand his/her expertise in areas of HR, IT, Operations and Heart of House (support departments). It is no longer acceptable to possess strong skills in only one or two areas; tomorrow’s CFOs must have depth and breadth of expertise. It is crucial to develop the ability to converse with the heads of all departments in a way that encourages ideas, growth and new ways of solving old issues, while foreseeing newly arising ones. “The CFO needs to be able to take the CEO’s two-year vision and create steppingstones for each department so they can see the path three to six months down the road,” adds Kevin.

"FirstService Residential Illinois’ managed portfolio includes 500+ managed associations, representing over 150,000 residents."

Kevin has been able to lead the organization to new heights because of his ability to solve multiple issues with one resolution—he can create one solution for the bigger program rather than many solutions for each small problem. The steadfast leader has the capability to see the bigger picture and can envision the entire chaos at hand and solve for the complete solution rather than solving for one issue at a time. “Addressing problems issue by issue creates a patch work of solutions that may have conflicts with other solutions. By solving for the entirety, you avoid conflicting solutions,” he adds. Kevin implements ways to automate redundancy and improve his employees’ quality of work. “Using automation to eliminate most of the redundant and low value work so we can improve the output of each person also improves their satisfaction through higher valued workloads,” he adds.-

The pathbreaking CFO has been instrumental in introducing key technological innovations in the company. He believes that a combination of third-party software with internal programming creates a lower cost solution with some customized features. “By using the third-party solutions, we are leveraging the expertise of specialists in building the best off-the-shelf solution,” explains Kevin. “The company can then download the data from the third-party programs into customized programs via application programming interfaces (APIs)so staff members can use it in a customized application.”

Kevin’s current role model is not a person, but a culture. FirstService Residential Illinois has a culture that is felt through-out the organization. “I have felt the culture from the top executives and throughout all levels of staff. FirstService Residential Illinois not only promotes their culture, but they live it,” says Kevin. “It starts every day at 9:20am when everyone gets on “First Call” to discuss how to improve our expression of our culture and quality to our clients and each other. There is a time for “shout outs” of other staff for great work and notable excellence.” There are reminders everywhere to “Be Here Now” and “Know Your Shadow”, as a reminder that when one talks to someone, their only focus is on them and what they say and do will reflect on everyone in their shadow.

Currently, Kevin is working to use the size and breadth of FirstService Residential Illinois to bring alternative solutions to their associations that will help them reduce their budgets. As he finalizes the integration of the Illinois market, from the acquisitions from 2019, Kevin and his team is working to continue to find the best practices and ways to continue automating current processes. “With the recent COVID-19 virus outbreak, any and all automation, processes, and workflow are being tested by unthinkable impacts,” adds Kevin. “Each CFO should be taking stock regarding how well they believe their staff, process, and automation held up to this stress test. For those that feel that things went well, then you and your department are set for the challenges ahead.”IE