Pegasystems’ Director of Premier Accounts Spencer Lentz advises to ‘gravitate towards technology.’

Spencer Lentz, Director of Premier Accounts at Pegasystems, gives us an insight into Pegasystems’ unique AI Platform, shares his thoughts on challenges faced by the marketing industry and why it is important to embrace technology.

Significant growth requires significant investment – in time and yourself.

MEDIA 7: Thanks for doing this with us! Could you please walk us through the incredible career you’ve had?
SPENCER LENTZ:
I was fortunate enough to begin my career in an incredible environment at Disney. In the early 2000s, they were focused on transforming their customer experience years ahead of where others in the industry were. It was a massive effort with thousands of people focused on defining their business from a customer-centric point of view. A Vice President at Capgemini that I worked closely with offered me a job in Atlanta for another massive opportunity – building a greenfield Telco from the ground up. It was an incredible challenge and was a great fit for where I wanted to progress with my career, so I joined Capgemini. I spent just over 14 years there and was exposed to so many different industries and client challenges. About 6 years ago I was introduced to Pegasystems while still working at Capgemini. I fell in love with the platform and found them to be leaps ahead of their competitors. I also found the culture to be a great fit. I am proud to say I joined Pegasystems in April of this year. I’m incredibly excited about my future here.


M7: Quite an interesting journey! Pega is the Official Enterprise Software of the 2020 Ryder Cup. Would you like to share the experience behind this excellent achievement?
SL:
Pega is a $1B market cap company, so certainly we are not small. We recognize our goal of achieving $5B requires significantly more investment in our marketing and brand awareness. We’ve had some great new leaders recently join to help drive that growth, and I think sponsoring an event as prestigious as the Ryder Cup is a great example of their leadership. We also have recently welcomed two incredible Brand Ambassadors – Marc Leishman and Mel Reid of the PGA and LPGA, respectively.

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On a 5-10 year arc, I think we’ll see the integration of our IoT ecosystems become more of the expectation.



M7: Pega delivers innovative software that crushes business complexity. Could you please give us an insight into your dynamic solutions like Pega’s AI-powered CRM suite?
SL:
Pega began in 1983 as a rules engine focused on business processes and our Founder Alan Trefler has been unflinching in his commitment to being the best platform for both.  Our platform capabilities have evolved over many acquisitions, but we do have a portfolio strategy that separates us from the rest. Each and every acquisition, from Chordiant for AI in 2010, to OpenSpan for Robotics and WFI in 2016 – all of their IP is deconstructed and rebuilt natively into Pega’s suite. This gives our platform, and our customers, the most agile and capable platform purpose-built for the enterprise.  The combination of AI to drive insights plus the world-leading case management and rules engine capabilities literally gives us insights into action out of the box. Our AI is unique and it is the only platform that can truly resolve to an individual customer amongst millions, and it can make decisions end-to-end in milliseconds. 


M7: Sounds astounding! The recently held webinar ‘Data Deprecation, 1st Party Relationships, and the Impact on CX’ addressed the challenges faced by the marketing industry. Could you please give us a few highlights?
SL:
Yes, all marketing departments have always been challenged to connect their messaging across all of their channels – to become omni-channel or channel-less. To illustrate the impact of not being able to do this, consider the customer who gets a call to upgrade their service, yet their service was recently interrupted? The response rate for typical campaigns is roughly 1%. What’s changed is the expectations of the customers. 20 years ago, no company could personalize like what Telecommunications and Tech companies can do today, but now they set the bar. The volumes and variety of data have made this both easier and harder to execute. The fundamental challenge is to create insights that can come from any channel and connect that to any channel, and to do so with degradation of response times. The other set of challenges comes from responsibility once you attain these superpowered AI brains. Customer privacy is an ever-growing concern and heavily exploiting customer data is never more in the spotlight than today in 2021. There is also a responsibility to monitor our decision engines and make sure they aren’t acting with unethical bias. These are the types of challenges I’m helping customers solve at Pegasystems.

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Customer privacy is an ever-growing concern and heavily exploiting customer data is never more in the spotlight than today in 2021.



M7: Could you please share your opinion on the future of ‘Next-generation Artificial Intelligence and Digital Process Automation’?
SL:
I think that the ultimate combinations of those AI and process automation are in the form of ambient ‘helper bots’ or advisors that can connect across many aspects of our lives and do things for us. We’ve matured the capabilities in the enterprise, what we’re focused on now is creating non-invasive versions of those that are unique to customers on an individual basis. I see that progressing even more in Healthcare, where 1:1 personalized journeys are extremely relevant and can literally change lives. The key will be to balance the depth and timeliness of insights with the perception of being non-intrusive and not annoying. On a 5-10 year arc, I think we’ll see the integration of our IoT ecosystems become more of the expectation. My smartwatch will be plugged into my insurance plan and my provider, perhaps for lower rates or more expedited service and ease of scheduling. There are many wonderful use cases to imagine – and this is also why I love my career.


M7: Lastly, what would you advise aspiring professionals who are stepping into such a dynamic market today?
SL:
Do not fear technology nor technical careers – gravitate towards them. Be the master of your own career and realize that significant growth requires significant investment – in time and in yourself. Business and technology are so intertwined now it’s becoming hard to separate them. Getting close to the technology, whatever your industry, will build your own confidence which will invariably translate into better career outcomes in the long run.

ABOUT PEGASYSTEMS INC.

Pegasystems Inc. is an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1983, Pegasystems develops software for customer relationship management, robotic process automation, and business process management. The company has been publicly traded since 1996 as PEGA.

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Pegasystems

Pegasystems Inc. is an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1983, Pegasystems develops software for customer relationship management, robotic process automation, and business process management. The company has been publicly traded since 1996 as PEGA....

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