Lars Mellander
Global Market Access Specialist, Account Manager
Define your role within Nemko.
I'm an account manager, but my official title is global market access specialist. I focus more on the larger-scale accounts that are truly global and international. In a nutshell, I'm sales, but I manage a lot of the key accounts and partner accounts.
How did you choose this career path?
My career path was a bit odd. I grew up commercial fishing, then I went into college, and I was going to get my degree and run tugboats, but a lady from the metropolitan opera came through, and someone told her that she should hear me sing, and she did and said that I could be an opera singer. I did that for years and years, but then I got married and had a baby, and a family and opera do not mix. Personally, I think it is an impossibility. I went out to dinner with Drew Smith (a former Nemko employee), and he told me that I should come and interview at Nemko, and I did, and that's how it all started. I knew nothing about anything. I have three degrees in music but nothing technical at all. I've never been in a sales position or technical anything. When Grant interviewed me, he asked me, "why do you think you can have this job?" and I said Well, Drew said you need to have three things; you need to be able to work hard, be able to memorize a lot of stuff, and be able to present in public and not be nervous. Commercial fishing is just a BIT of hard work. When you must learn and memorize several hundred pages of music in a foreign language a year, you learn to memorize, and when you've sung at symphony hall, any public presentation is easy. He laughed and said, okay, and that was it. Almost 20 years I'm coming up on now, and it's been great.
What do you enjoy most about your job at Nemko?
They let me do what I want to do, very hands-off, they let me be who I want to be and do my job, no micromanaging, and that's very important to me. You learn all the time; every day is something new and is essentially the same goal, but it's always different. I talked about wireless for Vietnam, an email about Taiwan, and EMC testing for a crazy cabinet. You have to be learning in this industry constantly.
Are there any challenges that you’ve faced during your career that have taught you important lessons?
Yes, it's about not working too much and making sure there is a line between your personal life, health, and family with your work. A few years back, I had gotten a bad heart condition because I was working so much, which really slowed me down and was a lesson learned. Nemko started a partner program, which has been amazing, and that makes it to where I don't have to stay up working till midnight every night.
What do you think the industry will look like in 20 years?
Certainly automation, robotics, and imagery. If a customer wants to show me a device, they can send me schematics and pictures, but in 20 years, I think they will be able to just push a button, and a 3D image will pop up like star trek. It's interesting if we will ever stop catering to pharmaceutical companies and big pharma. I think medicine will become much more genetics-based, and I think it will become cheaper, and we can find cures via genetics and modification, which will be a massive change in the medical industry. The ultimate challenge for all of us at every company is heat/temperature. I don't know if we will ever find a solution for heat, but I hope in 20 years we will.
What do you find most rewarding about your role?
I have my home office and working from home is a life changer. I have had much more success in my career working from home, and my numbers have almost doubled since I started working from home. We have an amazing core group of people; from an ethics standpoint, I never have to worry about doing the right thing; whether that means we lose money or make money, we always do the right thing. We don't take shortcuts, and I always am honest with the customers and will tell them, "Hey, you don't really need this," so they are only getting what they truly need.
What are some market trends you’re keeping an eye on?
Cyber security is huge, and I wish people realized this is where the world is going. Also, liquid-cooled devices, whether that's piping water through a radiator or complete emersion. As well as battery technology, I am interested to see where batteries go.
When not working, how do you spend your spare time?
I have four kids and live on 10 acres in Idaho, so I spend most of my time on the farm. It's a working hay farm, so a huge amount of work to maintain, and of course, fly fishing, the ultimate getaway, as close as you can get to heaven on earth.
