REQUEST A DEMO

Author: Stephen Lynn

President and CEO

Stephen Lynn
Stephen Lynn
About:

Stephen Lynn is the Chief Executive Officer of Dovetail Software. As CEO, he is responsible for formulating the strategic vision, executing the business plan, and building the team for Dovetail Software. Stephen is a successful entrepreneur, with extensive experience running enterprise software companies. Prior to becoming the CEO of Dovetail, Stephen was the President and Chief Operating Officer for bTrade where he was responsible for the day-to-day operations. Under his leadership, bTrade tripled revenue in three years and sold the company to Click Commerce, a public supply-chain company. Prior to bTrade, Stephen was President and CEO of AFX Technology Group International, a wireless telemetry company. He developed the overall company strategic direction and secured their initial key customer before leaving to join bTrade. In the mid to late 90's Stephen was the Chief Operating Officer at IEX, a telecommunications software products company. He led the company's expansion globally, growing the company to over $50 million in revenues and was instrumental in IEX's acquisition by Tekelec, a public telecommunications company, for $163 million. Earlier in his career, Stephen held various senior level positions at Dalfort, Pepsi, A.H. Belo, LTV and American Can. He is also a mentor at STARTech, a Richardson, TX high-tech accelerator that works with startup companies in their early stages to develop their business plans and assist them in securing venture capital funding. Stephen received a MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and also earned a BS in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania with majors in Finance and Accounting, graduating Magna Cum Laude.


Subscribe to Stephen Lynn's RSS feed and never miss a post.

Posts by Stephen Lynn:

Clarify CRM: Successful Migration & Modernization is our Standard

March 1, 2018 What More could a Clarify CRM Customer Ask for? How about a Modern Solution at a Low Risk Migration CIOs and Heads of Customer Support have nightmares thinking about changing their customer support software. It is quite the dilemma. Their current solution has many issues and it doesn’t do everything they want, but “it works”. Therefore, the lesser of evils seems to be to continue to use their current solution because of the fear of what could happen if they attempt a migration strategy to a new solution. Many companies have suffered tremendously by selecting the wrong enterprise software, and there is the further possibility of limiting one’s career, or worse, losing your job if you are part of a project involving the wrong software selection. What is your current situation? This is the situation for all users of Clarify…

Why “Happy Employees” Leads to a Successful Software Vendor Relationship

September 28, 2015 As I was pondered a topic one of my colleagues, Rayanne Thorn, wrote about, Understanding Employee Engagement, it got me thinking deeper about a vendor’s employees, and whether prospects should consider how engaged or happy employees are at a software vendor they are considering as part of their decision-making process. I think they should and let me take you through my reasoning.Evaluating VendorsWhen a customer is evaluating vendors, at the top of their list is usually the vendor’s ability to meet their technological needs. If they can’t meet that, all of the other considerations are mute. After that, close behind are: 1) price; 2) the vendor’s ability to deliver on what they commit to; and 3) the vendor’s customer support. At the end of the day, I consider #2 and #3 to be the most important considerations prospects should consider.…

Customer Service and Enterprise Software

September 11, 2015 Customer Service in Your Selection of Software VendorsI was reading Naomi Bloom’s blog post, “In Enterprise Software and Luxury Accommodations, Details Matter and No Disappointment Accepted” and it got me thinking.  While Naomi is referencing HR software, her points apply to all Enterprise Software and she makes a really good comparison, yet I will add another element, Customer Service. Things will happen, whether at the luxury accommodations or with your Enterprise Software. The key question becomes what does the establishment/vendor do when there is a problem? That will probably be what you remember more than the actual problem.Addressing Enterprise SoftwareIt is inevitable that there will be problems during implementation. Any software vendor who tells you they never have problems is lying to you. Expectation differences, communication gaps, the customer environment is slightly (or vastly) different than the vendor was told/expected…

Great Opportunity for a Great Marketing Mind

May 8, 2015 Being a Stay at Home Mom is really rewarding, but unfortunately, it robbed Dovetail of its Marketing Director. I applaud Emily (our former Marketing head) on her decision to be with her daughter. While it created a short-term gap for us, it is a great opportunity for a marketing whiz to step in and lead Marketing at Dovetail. As the position description on our website details, Dovetail is a great environment for people who want the opportunity to make an impact without dealing with functional barriers and company politics. Take a close look at what we are looking for, and if you think you can make an impact, contact us!

More on the Right Questions to Ask your Software Vendors During the Selling Process

December 11, 2013 Yesterday, I posted a blog that suggested that many Companies weren't asking their Software Vendors the right questions during the selling process. Ironically, I saw two other blog posts yesterday that suggested other criteria companies should consider in their vendor selection process, both with great suggestions. The first, by Dovetail’s own Chief Strategy Officer, Kane Frisby, Vendor Evaluation - Know Your Vendors! looked at the technical aspects you should cover in your due diligence process. They addressed:Ease and speed of implementationHow to configure, today and into the futureThe importance of the upgrade process and the effort requiredHow well the application works with other applications The other blog post, by The Cynical Girl, Laurie Ruettimann addresses 6 Characteristics of Great HR Tech Companies. While not saying it directly, what Laurie is implying is that you should consider these characteristics in evaluating your software vendors because a great technology…

Do you ask your Software Vendors the Right Questions During the Selling Process?

December 10, 2013 I try to make as many visits to prospects, both to show Dovetail’s commitment, and also to get a sense as to what is going on in the market segments we compete in. During these presentations we talk about who Dovetail is and then go into a detailed demo of our product. Most of the questions the prospects ask relate to our product – what does our product do, how does the implementation work, and how good is the security of our product. All good questions, but they may not tell you everything you should know about the vendors competing for your business.   Here are a number of other questions customers should ask and why they are important:   1) Tell us how you deal with the problems that will develop during implementation, and give me an example? We…

Value of Software Maintenance and Support

August 27, 2009 We pride ourselves on the value we provide our customers for maintenance and support, whether it is on our own software products, or on the Clarify software products we also support. I have writtenfrequently about the level of service we provide, often citing customer examples to back up our claim.   We are often asked by customers who are considering switching to our Clarify Help Desk Program why we are better than Amdocs. Here’s what we highlight - First, Dovetail charges considerably less than Amdocs charges for support. In tough economic times, this is an important factor. We then talk about our customer service and how our customer support staff is top notch and the service they provide is fabulous (OK, I’m bias, but our references back us up). We go on to say how support cases are immediately handled by…

Record 1st Quarter Through Superior Customer Service

April 8, 2009 In one of our recent blog posts we wrote about how important great customer service is to keeping your current customers during these difficult times. Our just completed first quarter speaks towards the importance of great customer service.   We had a record first quarter for Dovetail Software. Customer Service had a lot to do with this. First, we had a 100% renewal rate with all our current customers. Added on top of this, we secured a number of new support customers from one of our competitors. Why were we able to achieve this? Two reasons: 1) We offer great customer service (in fact, superior to our competition) at a lower price; and 2) This competitor (I will refrain from naming them) doesn’t care about their customers. Let me elaborate.   Our philosophy in our company is to do whatever it takes to…

Maybe Amdocs Should Call Dovetail for Clarify Support

February 16, 2009 Last week, I blogged  about a recent support issue an Amdocs customer was facing. They had contacted Amdocs, but couldn’t get assistance. We helped the customer solve the problem even though we have no support agreement with that customer. Well, we are at it again.   Last week, Jorge posed a question on ITtoolbox for the Clarify experts. Seems Jorge “tried Amdocs' tech support but they said it would require an enhancement ($$$) of their doing.”  Not content to have another Amdocs customer go away unhappy, Gary Sherman solved Jorge’s issue. You can see the full exchange , but as you can see below, Jorge got the answer he was looking for:   Reply from jcruz1965 on 2/16/2009 10:32 AM “Hi Gary, I was able to squeeze on some time on Friday and implement your fix in our development system. Worked flawlessly. I now have to talk to the business…