One year after taking the helm of Madison Electric in 2008, Wiandt launched the Sparks Innovation Center, an Internet-based product development program that uses crowdsourcing to partner with electricians and contractors to develop their ideas.
To Brad Wiandt, growth is a natural byproduct of creating a holistic culture of innovation.
The president of Madison Electric Products Inc., an Ohio-based electrical products manufacturer, tries to position his company as one in flux -- a rapidly changing enterprise not held to a rigid strategic plan.
"It's a very progressive culture. It's cards on the table, open innovation, think outside of the box, let's push the envelope," Wiandt says. "We feel like we're operating within an industry that is starving for companies to evolve and reinvent themselves. We want to be the company that fills that void."
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He calls the electrical products industry a "mature" one and says from the beginning he knew he wanted to find ways to redefine and distinguish Madison Electric in the marketplace.
"When I showed up, our vast product portfolio was very dominated by commoditized products; it was very mature," Wiandt says. "I didn't want to have prices be our only weapons. That's not sustainable."
One year after taking the helm of Madison Electric in 2008, Wiandt launched the Sparks Innovation Center, an Internet-based product development program that uses crowdsourcing to partner with electricians and contractors to develop their ideas.
"I understood we had to reinvent ourselves and a new product was a way to do that," Wiandt says. "I knew there were end users, the installers, there was always something they were rigging up…In layman's terms, it's brainstorming by utilizing resources outside of our company."
He knew those on-the-ground ideas were a gold mine, a solution to solving both the questions of what demands existed in the industry and what new products would best meet those needs. And it saved his company from having to hire a team of engineers, a costly and risky endeavor for a 45-person operation like Madison Electric.
