With almost 40 years of experience in the residential tech integration business, Ron Wanless knows what it takes to survive in an industry that is often at the mercy of financial system meltdowns. Having lost a business to the tech stock crash of 2002 and then weathering the Great Recession in his next venture, the president of Technology Design Associates in Bend, OR, was determined to create a company that was better prepared for the next burst bubble or downturn. His plan? A hub and spoke organization with multiple locations that can hand over their back-office operations to a central HQ. Running a company with locations in Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, and Washington still is not easy, but maybe, just maybe, it’s built in a way that won’t be so vulnerable in the future.
Here’s an excerpted portion of what we learned from our conversation with Wanless. podcast. This portion of the interview has been edited for clarity.
