Questions and Answers From the Top

By Security Products Staff · May 2007

A conversation with Leon Chlimper

BOSCH Security Systems is a recognized name in the security industry, and recently, the company has redesigned its customer support initiatives by creating a customer solutions support team. The new team will offer superior service and cutting-edge technical support on all of the company's diverse product lines for its customer base across North America. We caught up with Leon Chlimper, vice president of Bosch, to ask a few questions about the new approach.

Q. Bosch has recently restructured its customer support division, bringing three different disciplines—training, technical and applications support—together into one group. How will this approach better satisfy the needs of your customers?
A. With our new team, Bosch customers will benefit from a larger, stronger response team. The transfer of knowledge between field applications, training and tech support will provide us with a better understanding of the challenges faced by our customers and allow us to provide an enhanced level of support.

Q. Your team members will need to be experts in many different disciplines. Explain how their expertise will be able to cross departmental lines.
A. While each group will retain their own specialties—training, technical support and application engineering—customer issues or suggestions that can positively impact other areas of the business will be more easily shared. For example, a technical support associate can contribute to updates in a product manual or training course based on feedback the associate receives from customers. Overall, the group will work closely together to help customers deploy and support Bosch Security Systems’ products and systems.

Q. Training is a critical part of any industry, but getting to the training is another matter. In what manner will Bosch offer its training opportunities to its customers?
A. Bosch is currently making significant investments in its four major training centers—Lancaster, Pa.; San Jose, Calif.; Indianapolis; and at corporate headquarters in Fairport, N.Y.—creating working product labs that will give the dealer/integrator and end-user customers an in-depth look at the capabilities of our extensive product line. Training also will be available at customer locations when warranted. Also, each of our field application specialists will work regularly in the product labs and with customers. This experience will be invaluable in helping to support our emphasis on providing solutions—the integration of different products into more comprehensive overall systems, not just products—to the market.


Q. What will be the most noticeable differences that customers will see in this new initiative?
A. As part of the new Customer Support Solutions Team approach, customers will see technicians with a more sophisticated knowledge of both design and the implementation of our products, systems and solutions. Because that knowledge will be available from the outset, our customers will have less need for technical support and won't have to rely on the assistance of technical support to complete projects.

Q. Why was this new approach implemented? Was it in response to your customers' needs?
A. As a customer-driven organization, it is their needs that we are directly addressing with this new initiative. Because we offer services through our technical support and training areas to the dealer/integrator channel, as well as to the end user, these needs can vary considerably. As part of this initiative, we are working to further define how these divergent needs are influencing the market and how the market is impacting the industry as a whole. We took this approach because we realized the need to quickly adapt to the industry's changing dynamics.

Q. How will this new initiative help to serve Bosch as a manufacturer to the industry?
A. Customer feedback is crucial to the business processes of any company. Now, there will be a single group within Bosch Security Systems that will serve as a central repository for customer experiences in all three areas: technical support, training and applications/design support. This team will help us more easily recognize and adapt to market trends, refine how we process information and become more proficient in what we do and more effective in how we do it.

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