This year’s DMP Owners Forum took place on April 14 at the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas. An all-day event that began with breakfast at 7:30, the Owners Forum was filled with informative and interesting speakers, networking opportunities, and great food. The agenda focused heavily on developing leadership and bettering business practices.

Jon Adams, dealer development manager, Los Angeles sales region, DMP, welcomed the attendees and allowed them to introduce themselves.

Adams then introduced the forum’s first speaker, Dan Rockwell, stating that Rockwell’s leadership career began in the non-profit world at age 19. Rockwell’s speech, “Finding Fire,” focused on several key points: 1) Leadership is about being yourself; 2) Leadership is about how to be, not how to do; and 3) Leaders must be reflective to know themselves and lead themselves before they can lead others. “One of the greatest gifts you give to people on your team is moments to reflect,” Rockwell said.

Next, DMP President and CEO Rick Britton gave a look into the next six months at DMP, and Adams introduced the next speaker, Arvin Singh, director – corporate technology, Verizon. Singh discussed CDMA life expectancy, explaining the shift from previous generations. He described the inevitability of the transfer to 4G, but said that with Verizon, it would be done in the smoothest way possible with minimal impact to customer experience.

After Singh’s presentation, the audience was invited to participate in a Q&A with Carl Tannenbaum, a partner in the Philadelphia-based law firm of Kleinbard LLC. Audience members tapped his knowledge on topics ranging from dealing with available policy limits when designing contracts to assignability for those buying or selling accounts.

After lunch, Rythym author and serial entrepreneur Patrick Thean spoke on “Rockefeller Habits: How to Differentiate, Execute and Win!” In this speech, Thean offered three ways for a company to improve: eliminate mistakes, shorten cycle times and improve business models. Citing Verne Harnish’s Mastering the Rockefeller Habits, Thean listed four decisions leaders must get right to grow their businesses: people, strategy, execution and cash. Attendees received a handout to allow them to begin setting goals and working toward the Rockefeller habits Thean was teaching.

The final speaker was Paul Calvaruso, Akron Police Department captain in Akron, Ohio, who reported on the city’s verified alarm response program. Calvaruso said his department had been responding to 98.5 percent false alarms before implementing the program, with an average response time of around 25 minutes.

Short on money and facing layoffs, the department began exploring options for a verified response program. After meeting with alarm companies, they settled on a program that combined video verification, reliable audio verification, and visual inspection by a security guard or a witness, in addition to adding perimeter and internal breach. Out of the 2,934 burglar alarm they received in the next six months, 656 were verified. Those that were not verified were still broadcast to cruisers, so officers not on a call could respond. Of the non-verified alarms, Akron police still responded to 65 percent, said Calvaruso.

Calvaruso reported that response time to verified alarms dropped to 5 minutes or less. As a result of the policy going into effect, alarm calls dropped by 21 percent and burglary dropped 4.5 percent.  Calvaruso estimated they will receive 4,000 fewer calls this year, saving the city $110,000 while freeing up police officers to attend to more important things than false alarms.

Calvaruso said that police departments are not anti-alarm, they are anti-false alarm, and that if the alarm industry is able to move forward with a program like this, law enforcement will embrace it.

Jeff Britton, DMP’s vice president of product design, and Kevin Ellison, DMP’s director of IT, then introduced DMP’s newly released video verification system, which is designed to be efficient for operators and fit into their workflow.

 At a closing reception attendees mingled and spoke with some of the speakers. It was a strong conference and a great way to kick off ISC West.