Monitoring the quality of the air we breathe is no easy task. Taking on that responsibility for millions of residents living in Southern California requires endless innovation and a steady hand at the helm to roll out the network of human and technology resources needed to capture, analyze and share the data effectively.
In this episode of The Restless Ones, we’ll sit with a technologist who has spent his entire career working for the public’s greater good. As Deputy Executive Officer & CIO of the South Coast Air Quality Management District, Ron Moskowitz believes that process standardization is one of the keys to monitoring our not-so-standard air quality. From rolling out a homemade app to managing a network of over 100 remote air check station, Ron is focused on building consensus and confidence in IT as a human-centered organization. With the ultimate goal of enabling millions of phones and billions of devices to be individual smart monitors via 5G, Ron knows the network is only as strong as the people and the technology behind it.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're talking about huge data chunks that would take forever
to download. We're able to take that data, We're able
to use it quicker, We're able to display it in
near real time, if not real time. And again, the
connectivity between not just grabbing that data, but the connectivity
being devices and I T you always want things to
be faster than five G, provides that it's very exciting.
(00:24):
Welcome to the restless Ones. I'm Jonathan Strickland. I've spent
more than a decade really learning about technology, what makes
it tick, and then describing and explaining that to my audience.
But it's the conversations with the world's most unconventional thinkers,
the leaders at the intersection of technology and business, that
(00:45):
fascinate me the most. In partnership with T Mobile for Business,
I explore the unique set of challenges that see I
O S and C T O space, from advancements in
cloud and edge computing, software as a service, Internet of things,
and of course five G. We are often left wondering
how the leading minds and business continue to thrive. Let's
(01:06):
find out. Our guest today is Ron Moscowitz, the Deputy
executive Officer and ce IO of South Coast air Quality
Management District South Coast a q m D is a
government agency in California in charge of monitoring and reporting
on air pollution in Orange County and the majority of
(01:27):
Los Angeles, Riverside, and San Bernardino Counties. Ron's duties include
supporting the technology needs for the entire organization and implementing
solutions to provide improved service to stakeholders and citizens. Ron
has an extensive history in the public sector, and as
I found out, he and I have a lot of
common experiences that fostered a love of technology in general
(01:50):
and more specifically in using tech to solve big problems. Ron,
thank you so much for joining us, and before were
we really dive into your approach to leadership. We'd like
to get to know a little bit more about you.
And one thing I'm always fascinated to learn about from
my guess is how did you first get involved in technology?
(02:13):
Thanks for having me. It goes back all the way
to around and I was in sixth grade. There was
a doctor and he donated an Apple two plus two
my classroom, and I saw there was a power button
on the back of it, and I flipped it and
then I flipped the power button on the monitor, and
all of a sudden something came up. There was a
(02:35):
disc inside already, so it said adventure Land game and
it said what direction do you want to go? I
typed in go East, and it went on to the
next part of the game, and I was like, Wow,
this is really cool. This computer was talking to me,
and I just I thought it was magic. I was
(02:57):
just drawn in ever since, and so you're later, I
was able to buy an Apple twee. My two best
buddies and I just sat and hacked away for hours
at the machine, and we ran a number of bulletin
board systems and which is the precursor to the Internet.
And I won't get into the confessions of a teenage hacker,
but that's pretty much how I got into tech. You're
(03:19):
speaking to my very soul on My background is very
much like yours. I too had an Apple twee. I
do was a well. I was a frequent attendee of
bulletin board systems. I did not run my own, but
that is really exciting for me to hear someone who
has that same sort of background. How did that transition
(03:40):
to you deciding to make that a formal focus of
study and further on your career path. Well, everything happened
so organically. Back then, we didn't have really a lot
of manuals or classes to study. And I was around eighteen.
My mom's friend came over to our house. He was realtor,
(04:00):
and he said, he's having problems with his computer. And
he said, Ron, I heard you know a thing or
two about computer. Is gonna come and help me. I said, sure,
So I go over to his office. I sit down
and it's a it's actually it's an IBM PS two,
which I've never worked on an IBM before. I was
a complete Apple guy at that point. But I figured,
let me see what the Manuel says about it. What's
(04:21):
the problem, And so I asked him a few questions
and uh, and I sat down for about forty five
minutes and then I fixed the problem. And from then
on it just catapolted my career. I started doing some
odd jobs and opened up a little consulting business and
helped out doctor's offices and some manufacturers, mom and pop businesses,
(04:42):
and so that's how my career started. Fascinating. Well, what
brought you to South Coast Air Quality Management District? Well,
he was a lot of working in government and figuring
out where I wanted to be. I'm very fortunate that
I landed this job. When this job opened up, it
was it was really a dream to work for an
(05:04):
organization that is helping improve the quality of life of
my community and the community around us. The job is
right at my alley. As far as being a c
I oh, they needed somebody to come in to essentially,
you know, help reshape the I T team, and uh
I had that experience from my previous work in the government. Wow,
(05:27):
not only are you playing an important role in improving
the lives of those in the community, you are also
directly benefiting from that work as a resident and to
come in with an opportunity to make a real impact
as well. Can you talk a little more about that
process of overseeing a transition of the I T Department?
(05:47):
What did that actually involve? When I came in, the
guy before me was retiring. He didn't really know how
to run an I T shop the way that at
all best practices dictate. And I have had the experience
of running a number of government I T shops, So
the staff, they didn't have the trust of the organization
to deliver. It's not that they couldn't deliver it, just
(06:08):
they didn't have process standardization. They weren't given as much
opportunity to really develop their professional skills, and and communication
was was horrible. So I came in, I sat down
and talked to everybody, let them know. You know, number one,
I have an open do our policy, and I had
a lot of people walk in and tell me everything
(06:28):
from these people don't want to work with us too.
I don't know how to support this technology because I've
never been trained on it, but what we're required to
support it. So I took all of that and I
implemented a number of processes within our Information Management team,
which is our I T team, and that is number one.
I made sure that everybody had the training that they
(06:51):
need to have so they feel confident and comfortable in
doing what they do. And I sent everybody off to
process standardization training that we're all speaking the same language,
so the application development team can talk to the network
team because everyone has to work together. But everybody has
been trained and skilled in their own area, and so
(07:12):
they don't appreciate or know really how to work sometimes
with the other parts of it. And then I also
introduced project management to the organization, so that all of
our projects they are thought of ahead of time. They
they have a budget, they have approval from the stakeholders,
(07:32):
everyone knows what's to be delivered. It changed everything. It
allowed us to be more successful. And with that success,
the executive management, the division heads just started to realize
this is a good team. We need to use them more.
Because before I came, people like I said they had
an I T solution, they didn't sometimes come to it.
(07:54):
They would try to do it themselves and whatnot. And
our executive officer and I had a conver station. I said, listen,
I need anything that's I T. I needed to run
through my shop. If we can support it, we need
to support it. So my executive officer was just fantastic.
He supported me a percent. You're absolutely right, and so
now everything comes through me. And because of the success
(08:16):
that we've been able to deliver, we're really a trusted
partner with the organization. Ron You've really covered a lot
of ground there and hit on some incredibly important things.
The establishment of trust, the establishing of communication lines, the
breaking down of silos of different departments where everyone is
hyper focused within, and they don't really have an awareness
(08:39):
of what's going on outside. All of these I think
are absolutely key to running an effective department. Out of curiosity,
how how large is your department? And what would you
say to someone asking, though, what does your department do
within the overall context of South Coast Air Quality Management District?
Can you tell us a little more about that? Sure?
(09:00):
So I have fifty seven staff members, some contractors that
do some application support to enhance the team, but essentially
we do application development, which is that we write apps
for the organization. Now we do a very specific type
of business in monitoring and pollution control, so a lot
(09:21):
of our stuff you're not gonna be able to find
off the shelf. That's why we developed them. Also have
an operations team that handles the data center that our servers,
our network, our help desk, database support, and document management.
I created a project management office. In turn, I've also
created an I T Steering committee, so there's a lot
(09:43):
of transparency there. Also do public records. I've worked for
a lot of governments and and I've done public records before.
We're the public, you know, asked for information on this
meeting or X Y, and z and I've never had
so many public records were quest of my career. We
last year we did over public records requests, which is incredible,
(10:05):
and then cybersecurity, which we didn't have before I came
on board. But cybersecurity is a big deal, especially today.
So I hired in a very competent individual and we're
doing a lot to make sure that our data is
protected and the organization has the information they need. If
(10:28):
there's one thing most businesses can agree on these days,
it's that change has never come about so quickly. New
ways of working have become the norm. As a result,
the status quo no longer cuts it when it comes
to helping businesses adapt and innovate. That's why T Mobile
for Business uses unconventional thinking to help businesses work smarter
(10:48):
and grow faster. Only T Mobile offers America's largest and
fastest five G network. It's just one reason they're better
able to help businesses solve the real world challenges they
face as they evolve. For instance, their new w f
X solutions help team members stay connected and productive where
work happens. With nearly two and a half times the
(11:10):
network coverage of a T and T nearly four times
more than Verizon and forty billion dollars invested in network
and business improvements over the next three years. T Mobile
for Business is better for your business right now and
into the future. See what they can do for your
organization at T mobile dot com. Slash Unconventional Open Signal awarded.
(11:32):
T Mobile Fastest five G network based on average speeds.
USA five G User Experience Report, January. Capable device required
coverage on available in some areas. Some users may require
certain planner features ceet mobile dot com. I think it's
a good time now we'll transition over to really drilling
(11:54):
down into your leadership philosophies and strategies. And you've already
alluded to it about your previous experience in other leadership roles,
including public offices. How have you leveraged your previous experience
in the public sector to develop your current approach toward leadership.
It really wasn't planned that I was worked for so
(12:14):
many counties and for the public sector, but I just
kind of kind of happened. But I've certainly learned from
each one of them. I started off at Orange Country
health Care Agency, and that's where I really cut my
teeth on my technical skills, and I learned how to
navigate procurement and other government processes. And then I worked
(12:35):
for the county Executive Office, where again I learned to
navigate the political environment because I had to deal with
the board of supervisors and department heads. That's really where
I learned foster processed enterganization and form of project management.
The district Attorney's office, I learned to understand the business
more intimately. I had to talk to a lot of attorneys,
(12:55):
so I had to speak their language. That's important as
far as leadership because that again it gains the trust
and that opens that communication channel. And then my current
job at South Coast has just been amazing. I'm able
to not provide technical guidance and deliver almost every project
and service successfully, which is really solidify the trust between
(13:17):
my team and the rest of the district. And I'm
I'm very lucky also to have the support of our
executive officer and the governing board and the rest of
the executive team. And my leadership style really comes down
to providing or trying to achieve excellent customer service. My
team needs to feel comfortable and confident in what they
do and to know that I'm there for them, so
(13:38):
I invest in their professional development. I give them opportunities
to explore their technical skills, and so I basically do
my best to build them up so they can shine.
That that leads me to ask, have there ever been
any sort of defining moments in your career that really
helped shape this approach to leadership or or tested your
(14:00):
approached leadership. Yeah, so I will never forget. It's really
kind of early in my in my government career, and
it's what propelled me to see I O level. I
think it was two thousand and one there was a
virus called love Letter, and this virus was massive. It
was released and millions of computers were just taken down
(14:22):
and nobody knew how to how to stop it. And
the companies that were providing virus definitions they were trying
to put out one that works, and even if you
had it, you couldn't install it because the systems were broken,
and as soon as you turned it on, it started spreading.
I mean, it was a disaster and governments and businesses
alike were down for a long period of time. Anyway,
(14:44):
I was looking at all the technical information and we
were sitting around the table talking about it with our
c I O. And I was a senior network engineer
at the time, and I just said, I know how
to do it. I know how to fix it. And
I explained it at the table and it just went
over his head. And so he just turned me and said, Ron,
(15:04):
just do whatever you need to do, just get it done.
And so I'm like, okay. So I deputized secretaries and
application developers to basically execute the plan, and I created
a central base where everybody called back, but there was
open communication. That's what's key, solving any issues and making
sure people know what's happening. And and so within about
(15:27):
three days we were clean. We were the health Care Agency,
which is an important function and organization we provide health
services to the public. So three days we were done.
After that, people looked at me a little differently. They
saw that I could pick up the reins and take charge.
That was quickly promoted, which is hard to do in government.
(15:50):
But that's really a defining moment in my in my
career from my leadership perspective. Yeah, I think response to
a massive computer virus US is certainly a trial by
fire experience and one that really can forge leadership. Well,
let me ask about this because with South Coast a
q m D and with the climate both figuratively and literally,
(16:14):
we've seen environmental awareness has been on the rise. How
does that affect the work of your organization and your
department in particular. Well, there's a lot more requests for
real time data and requests for transparency and a focus
on community based ammissions reductions, which ties into the California
(16:37):
State Assembly Bill six seventeen to address air pollution impacts
and environmental justice communities which are really disadvantaged communities economically disadvantaged.
So we've been tasked to build solutions such as the
mobile app, also real time air monitoring and fence one
monitoring and flare notifications. So there's really, like you said,
(17:00):
there's a big awareness and we're delivering well and that
that's great. I would like to learn a little bit
more about the technologies that you're using in order to
detect things like changes in pollution levels. What are you
actually using to monitor and then process that data and
send it out in a way that's consumable to the
average person. Right, So, we have forty three major air
(17:27):
quality monitoring stations and these are ep A regulatory monitors. Recently,
we're able to use low cost sensors, which are organization
created a a special organization within to just evaluate these
sensors to see if we could use them. So we
analyze hourly data from these monitors and lend that with
(17:49):
National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Air Quality Model to produce uh
AN air quality indexed right down to the localized level.
We have now more than distinct patients. So we're grabbing
all this data and we're analyzing it, and we're doing
it in almost real time, which is pretty amazing. And
(18:09):
to me, the cool thing about that is not just
the immediacy of that data, but then the ability to
contextualize that in a way that is meaningful to other people.
I mean, as any leader in the text space understands,
it's one thing to have access to information, it's another
thing to make that information meaningful to your in customer,
(18:31):
whether that is a citizen or a consumer, or another
business or even someone within the same organization. I'd love
for us to kind of segue now into talking about
emerging technologies. You've You've mentioned one that I think kind
of falls into the Internet of things category with these
(18:55):
sensors you were talking about, do you foresee further use
of Internet of things technologies in your work over at
South Coast a q M d well the low cost
air quality sensers our IoT and we're using these devices.
It's really enabled us to do more and provide more
accurate equality information. So I see it just moving light speed.
(19:20):
Especially when we have the ability of five G coming out,
We're gonna be able to pull a lot of data
chunks and provide more information quicker and better. What I'd
like to see is every phone and device have like
a little er monitor on it and make everybody essentially
a point where we can grab data so we can
(19:42):
better serve our communities. To me, that sounds very similar
to the accelerometers that are in phones that can be
used to detect things like earthquake shocks, for example. So
to have that similar approach with an Internet of things
perspective powered by something like five G, where you have
that low latency and high throughput and you can get
(20:04):
that data in real time that people can very quickly
act on it, I would imagine that that would be
an incredible tool in your toolbox to provide the services
to the region. Right, it's really near and dear to
my heart because I was born and raised here. I mean,
I'm a lifelong Angelino. And when I was a kid,
we had smag days and we'd go out and our
(20:27):
lungs would hurt from the smog. We had no way
of knowing information that we're trying to get, like what
is the level of small but what are the pollutants
in the air, what is those on? What is the
particular matter, what what's the carbon monoxide? And none of
that and where I work. Now, this is what we do.
This We provide that information and the app that we
(20:48):
developed it gives people all of that information. So you
can open it up now and see what you're You
know what your air quality is around you, and you
can make better decisions on I don't live your life.
I also love that with this discussion you always see
where the little bottlenecks are in the road through technological improvement. Right,
Occasionally your bottleneck is that the technology itself is lagging behind.
(21:13):
Maybe it's more on the connectivity side where you need
to have better solutions to transmit information. I think we're
now reaching a point with the five G rollout where
the communication side is in a really good space, and
I'm really excited to see from the hardware side people
developing things like the sensors that could be incredibly precise
(21:35):
and hopefully low maintenance so that the deployment of said
sensors could be beneficial. Right. With five G, it's a
total game changer. We'll be able to collect and distribute
data faster. It allows us to collect betterer chunks of
data more often, better use experience for a mobile app.
(21:55):
We could potentially replace even our campus WiFi and provide
toilet working capabilities for employees. That's just vastly improved. I mean,
we have a number of field inspectors that go on
site to various locations and with five G with that
infrastructures but don't allow them to pretty much instantaneously connect
with their office and the apps they used to do
(22:17):
their work. So it's yeah, it is an exciting time.
I'm just curious, are there any other emerging technologies that
you find particularly interesting or exciting, either within regard with
your work at South Coast a q m D, or
just personally. Well, I mean I can get into things
like quantum computing. Please, I'll talk about cubids, but you
(22:43):
know things like chat bots from the customer service experience
that's getting really good and every day is just getting better.
That AI based feedback five G. I mean, it's going
to change everything from our phone to our vehicles. We're
all going to be connected. It's really transformational. Before I
(23:07):
could let Ron go, I of course needed to ask
him one more thing. Who in the world of tech
leadership do you think is really killing it right now? Well,
Elon Musk, because he has just gone against a grain
every time and as winning almost every time. But even
(23:30):
when he loses, he's still winning because he's proving that
you have a dream, you have an idea, and it
makes sense, you can go for it. I mean, he
took on the automotive and oil industries and change the
way we drive. They forced them to develop fuel efficient,
if not completely electric vehicles and improve the world as
(23:53):
we know. So he's killing it. Well, Ron, thank you
again for taking time out your schedule to talk with us.
This was a fascinating conversation. I find the work you
do to be really inspiring, and your approach to leadership
with that team focus, wanting to foster and support a
team so that you can actually achieve the mission that
(24:17):
is uh speaking to my heart. So thank you again
for joining us. My pleasure. Thank you. Something that really
impressed me with Ron was how his love of tech
informs and shapes the way he approaches work. He uses
technology to connect people and projects, sometimes literally, and he
(24:41):
gets them all on the same page. Leadership and tech
are tightly intertwined in Ron's world. Teams without tech solutions
will find their jobs more difficult, but tech solutions without
a good team aren't likely to be implemented in any
sort of meaningful way. And while things in the public
sector move at a different pace than in the private sector,
(25:02):
the focus and emphasis around climate change has fueled a
sense of urgency in Ron's world. I'm really excited to
see how the next generation of IoT devices will give
us more insight into the world around us, potentially allowing
us to detect problems early enough so that we can
address them before they develop into serious issues. Imagine a
(25:23):
world in which devices with a persistent connection can, through
the power of five G, set a solution in motion
that addresses a problem before any human is even aware
of it. Now apply that same idea to every industry
and you really see the power of IoT and five G.
Be sure to subscribe to this podcast so that you
(25:44):
don't miss any of our upcoming conversations with more leaders
in the tech space. We'll be speaking with a wide
variety of visionary tech leaders and discover what sets them apart.
This has been the restless ones. I'm Jonathan Strickland. These days,
(26:05):
new ways of working have become the norm, and the
status quo no longer cuts it when it comes to
helping businesses evolve and grow. That's why T Mobile for
Business uses unconventional thinking to help businesses sees innovation only.
T Mobile offers America's largest and fastest five gene network,
which makes their new WFX solutions possible, letting businesses stay
(26:26):
connected and productive where work happens. See what T Mobile
for Business can do for you at t mobile dot com.
Slash Unconventional Open Signal awarded T mobile fastest five G
network based on average speeds. USA five G User Experience
Report January. Capable device required converts on available in some areas.
Some users may require certain planner features see mobile dot
Com
You're talking about huge data chunks that would take forever
to download. We're able to take that data, We're able
to use it quicker, We're able to display it in
near real time, if not real time. And again, the
connectivity between not just grabbing that data, but the connectivity
being devices and I T you always want things to
be faster than five G, provides that it's very exciting.
(00:24):
Welcome to the restless Ones. I'm Jonathan Strickland. I've spent
more than a decade really learning about technology, what makes
it tick, and then describing and explaining that to my audience.
But it's the conversations with the world's most unconventional thinkers,
the leaders at the intersection of technology and business, that
(00:45):
fascinate me the most. In partnership with T Mobile for Business,
I explore the unique set of challenges that see I
O S and C T O space, from advancements in
cloud and edge computing, software as a service, Internet of things,
and of course five G. We are often left wondering
how the leading minds and business continue to thrive. Let's
(01:06):
find out. Our guest today is Ron Moscowitz, the Deputy
executive Officer and ce IO of South Coast air Quality
Management District South Coast a q m D is a
government agency in California in charge of monitoring and reporting
on air pollution in Orange County and the majority of
(01:27):
Los Angeles, Riverside, and San Bernardino Counties. Ron's duties include
supporting the technology needs for the entire organization and implementing
solutions to provide improved service to stakeholders and citizens. Ron
has an extensive history in the public sector, and as
I found out, he and I have a lot of
common experiences that fostered a love of technology in general
(01:50):
and more specifically in using tech to solve big problems. Ron,
thank you so much for joining us, and before were
we really dive into your approach to leadership. We'd like
to get to know a little bit more about you.
And one thing I'm always fascinated to learn about from
my guess is how did you first get involved in technology?
(02:13):
Thanks for having me. It goes back all the way
to around and I was in sixth grade. There was
a doctor and he donated an Apple two plus two
my classroom, and I saw there was a power button
on the back of it, and I flipped it and
then I flipped the power button on the monitor, and
all of a sudden something came up. There was a
(02:35):
disc inside already, so it said adventure Land game and
it said what direction do you want to go? I
typed in go East, and it went on to the
next part of the game, and I was like, Wow,
this is really cool. This computer was talking to me,
and I just I thought it was magic. I was
(02:57):
just drawn in ever since, and so you're later, I
was able to buy an Apple twee. My two best
buddies and I just sat and hacked away for hours
at the machine, and we ran a number of bulletin
board systems and which is the precursor to the Internet.
And I won't get into the confessions of a teenage hacker,
but that's pretty much how I got into tech. You're
(03:19):
speaking to my very soul on My background is very
much like yours. I too had an Apple twee. I
do was a well. I was a frequent attendee of
bulletin board systems. I did not run my own, but
that is really exciting for me to hear someone who
has that same sort of background. How did that transition
(03:40):
to you deciding to make that a formal focus of
study and further on your career path. Well, everything happened
so organically. Back then, we didn't have really a lot
of manuals or classes to study. And I was around eighteen.
My mom's friend came over to our house. He was realtor,
(04:00):
and he said, he's having problems with his computer. And
he said, Ron, I heard you know a thing or
two about computer. Is gonna come and help me. I said, sure,
So I go over to his office. I sit down
and it's a it's actually it's an IBM PS two,
which I've never worked on an IBM before. I was
a complete Apple guy at that point. But I figured,
let me see what the Manuel says about it. What's
(04:21):
the problem, And so I asked him a few questions
and uh, and I sat down for about forty five
minutes and then I fixed the problem. And from then
on it just catapolted my career. I started doing some
odd jobs and opened up a little consulting business and
helped out doctor's offices and some manufacturers, mom and pop businesses,
(04:42):
and so that's how my career started. Fascinating. Well, what
brought you to South Coast Air Quality Management District? Well,
he was a lot of working in government and figuring
out where I wanted to be. I'm very fortunate that
I landed this job. When this job opened up, it
was it was really a dream to work for an
(05:04):
organization that is helping improve the quality of life of
my community and the community around us. The job is
right at my alley. As far as being a c
I oh, they needed somebody to come in to essentially,
you know, help reshape the I T team, and uh
I had that experience from my previous work in the government. Wow,
(05:27):
not only are you playing an important role in improving
the lives of those in the community, you are also
directly benefiting from that work as a resident and to
come in with an opportunity to make a real impact
as well. Can you talk a little more about that
process of overseeing a transition of the I T Department?
(05:47):
What did that actually involve? When I came in, the
guy before me was retiring. He didn't really know how
to run an I T shop the way that at
all best practices dictate. And I have had the experience
of running a number of government I T shops, So
the staff, they didn't have the trust of the organization
to deliver. It's not that they couldn't deliver it, just
(06:08):
they didn't have process standardization. They weren't given as much
opportunity to really develop their professional skills, and and communication
was was horrible. So I came in, I sat down
and talked to everybody, let them know. You know, number one,
I have an open do our policy, and I had
a lot of people walk in and tell me everything
(06:28):
from these people don't want to work with us too.
I don't know how to support this technology because I've
never been trained on it, but what we're required to
support it. So I took all of that and I
implemented a number of processes within our Information Management team,
which is our I T team, and that is number one.
I made sure that everybody had the training that they
(06:51):
need to have so they feel confident and comfortable in
doing what they do. And I sent everybody off to
process standardization training that we're all speaking the same language,
so the application development team can talk to the network
team because everyone has to work together. But everybody has
been trained and skilled in their own area, and so
(07:12):
they don't appreciate or know really how to work sometimes
with the other parts of it. And then I also
introduced project management to the organization, so that all of
our projects they are thought of ahead of time. They
they have a budget, they have approval from the stakeholders,
(07:32):
everyone knows what's to be delivered. It changed everything. It
allowed us to be more successful. And with that success,
the executive management, the division heads just started to realize
this is a good team. We need to use them more.
Because before I came, people like I said they had
an I T solution, they didn't sometimes come to it.
(07:54):
They would try to do it themselves and whatnot. And
our executive officer and I had a conver station. I said, listen,
I need anything that's I T. I needed to run
through my shop. If we can support it, we need
to support it. So my executive officer was just fantastic.
He supported me a percent. You're absolutely right, and so
now everything comes through me. And because of the success
(08:16):
that we've been able to deliver, we're really a trusted
partner with the organization. Ron You've really covered a lot
of ground there and hit on some incredibly important things.
The establishment of trust, the establishing of communication lines, the
breaking down of silos of different departments where everyone is
hyper focused within, and they don't really have an awareness
(08:39):
of what's going on outside. All of these I think
are absolutely key to running an effective department. Out of curiosity,
how how large is your department? And what would you
say to someone asking, though, what does your department do
within the overall context of South Coast Air Quality Management District?
Can you tell us a little more about that? Sure?
(09:00):
So I have fifty seven staff members, some contractors that
do some application support to enhance the team, but essentially
we do application development, which is that we write apps
for the organization. Now we do a very specific type
of business in monitoring and pollution control, so a lot
(09:21):
of our stuff you're not gonna be able to find
off the shelf. That's why we developed them. Also have
an operations team that handles the data center that our servers,
our network, our help desk, database support, and document management.
I created a project management office. In turn, I've also
created an I T Steering committee, so there's a lot
(09:43):
of transparency there. Also do public records. I've worked for
a lot of governments and and I've done public records before.
We're the public, you know, asked for information on this
meeting or X Y, and z and I've never had
so many public records were quest of my career. We
last year we did over public records requests, which is incredible,
(10:05):
and then cybersecurity, which we didn't have before I came
on board. But cybersecurity is a big deal, especially today.
So I hired in a very competent individual and we're
doing a lot to make sure that our data is
protected and the organization has the information they need. If
(10:28):
there's one thing most businesses can agree on these days,
it's that change has never come about so quickly. New
ways of working have become the norm. As a result,
the status quo no longer cuts it when it comes
to helping businesses adapt and innovate. That's why T Mobile
for Business uses unconventional thinking to help businesses work smarter
(10:48):
and grow faster. Only T Mobile offers America's largest and
fastest five G network. It's just one reason they're better
able to help businesses solve the real world challenges they
face as they evolve. For instance, their new w f
X solutions help team members stay connected and productive where
work happens. With nearly two and a half times the
(11:10):
network coverage of a T and T nearly four times
more than Verizon and forty billion dollars invested in network
and business improvements over the next three years. T Mobile
for Business is better for your business right now and
into the future. See what they can do for your
organization at T mobile dot com. Slash Unconventional Open Signal awarded.
(11:32):
T Mobile Fastest five G network based on average speeds.
USA five G User Experience Report, January. Capable device required
coverage on available in some areas. Some users may require
certain planner features ceet mobile dot com. I think it's
a good time now we'll transition over to really drilling
(11:54):
down into your leadership philosophies and strategies. And you've already
alluded to it about your previous experience in other leadership roles,
including public offices. How have you leveraged your previous experience
in the public sector to develop your current approach toward leadership.
It really wasn't planned that I was worked for so
(12:14):
many counties and for the public sector, but I just
kind of kind of happened. But I've certainly learned from
each one of them. I started off at Orange Country
health Care Agency, and that's where I really cut my
teeth on my technical skills, and I learned how to
navigate procurement and other government processes. And then I worked
(12:35):
for the county Executive Office, where again I learned to
navigate the political environment because I had to deal with
the board of supervisors and department heads. That's really where
I learned foster processed enterganization and form of project management.
The district Attorney's office, I learned to understand the business
more intimately. I had to talk to a lot of attorneys,
(12:55):
so I had to speak their language. That's important as
far as leadership because that again it gains the trust
and that opens that communication channel. And then my current
job at South Coast has just been amazing. I'm able
to not provide technical guidance and deliver almost every project
and service successfully, which is really solidify the trust between
(13:17):
my team and the rest of the district. And I'm
I'm very lucky also to have the support of our
executive officer and the governing board and the rest of
the executive team. And my leadership style really comes down
to providing or trying to achieve excellent customer service. My
team needs to feel comfortable and confident in what they
do and to know that I'm there for them, so
(13:38):
I invest in their professional development. I give them opportunities
to explore their technical skills, and so I basically do
my best to build them up so they can shine.
That that leads me to ask, have there ever been
any sort of defining moments in your career that really
helped shape this approach to leadership or or tested your
(14:00):
approached leadership. Yeah, so I will never forget. It's really
kind of early in my in my government career, and
it's what propelled me to see I O level. I
think it was two thousand and one there was a
virus called love Letter, and this virus was massive. It
was released and millions of computers were just taken down
(14:22):
and nobody knew how to how to stop it. And
the companies that were providing virus definitions they were trying
to put out one that works, and even if you
had it, you couldn't install it because the systems were broken,
and as soon as you turned it on, it started spreading.
I mean, it was a disaster and governments and businesses
alike were down for a long period of time. Anyway,
(14:44):
I was looking at all the technical information and we
were sitting around the table talking about it with our
c I O. And I was a senior network engineer
at the time, and I just said, I know how
to do it. I know how to fix it. And
I explained it at the table and it just went
over his head. And so he just turned me and said, Ron,
(15:04):
just do whatever you need to do, just get it done.
And so I'm like, okay. So I deputized secretaries and
application developers to basically execute the plan, and I created
a central base where everybody called back, but there was
open communication. That's what's key, solving any issues and making
sure people know what's happening. And and so within about
(15:27):
three days we were clean. We were the health Care Agency,
which is an important function and organization we provide health
services to the public. So three days we were done.
After that, people looked at me a little differently. They
saw that I could pick up the reins and take charge.
That was quickly promoted, which is hard to do in government.
(15:50):
But that's really a defining moment in my in my
career from my leadership perspective. Yeah, I think response to
a massive computer virus US is certainly a trial by
fire experience and one that really can forge leadership. Well,
let me ask about this because with South Coast a
q m D and with the climate both figuratively and literally,
(16:14):
we've seen environmental awareness has been on the rise. How
does that affect the work of your organization and your
department in particular. Well, there's a lot more requests for
real time data and requests for transparency and a focus
on community based ammissions reductions, which ties into the California
(16:37):
State Assembly Bill six seventeen to address air pollution impacts
and environmental justice communities which are really disadvantaged communities economically disadvantaged.
So we've been tasked to build solutions such as the
mobile app, also real time air monitoring and fence one
monitoring and flare notifications. So there's really, like you said,
(17:00):
there's a big awareness and we're delivering well and that
that's great. I would like to learn a little bit
more about the technologies that you're using in order to
detect things like changes in pollution levels. What are you
actually using to monitor and then process that data and
send it out in a way that's consumable to the
average person. Right, So, we have forty three major air
(17:27):
quality monitoring stations and these are ep A regulatory monitors. Recently,
we're able to use low cost sensors, which are organization
created a a special organization within to just evaluate these
sensors to see if we could use them. So we
analyze hourly data from these monitors and lend that with
(17:49):
National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Air Quality Model to produce uh
AN air quality indexed right down to the localized level.
We have now more than distinct patients. So we're grabbing
all this data and we're analyzing it, and we're doing
it in almost real time, which is pretty amazing. And
(18:09):
to me, the cool thing about that is not just
the immediacy of that data, but then the ability to
contextualize that in a way that is meaningful to other people.
I mean, as any leader in the text space understands,
it's one thing to have access to information, it's another
thing to make that information meaningful to your in customer,
(18:31):
whether that is a citizen or a consumer, or another
business or even someone within the same organization. I'd love
for us to kind of segue now into talking about
emerging technologies. You've You've mentioned one that I think kind
of falls into the Internet of things category with these
(18:55):
sensors you were talking about, do you foresee further use
of Internet of things technologies in your work over at
South Coast a q M d well the low cost
air quality sensers our IoT and we're using these devices.
It's really enabled us to do more and provide more
accurate equality information. So I see it just moving light speed.
(19:20):
Especially when we have the ability of five G coming out,
We're gonna be able to pull a lot of data
chunks and provide more information quicker and better. What I'd
like to see is every phone and device have like
a little er monitor on it and make everybody essentially
a point where we can grab data so we can
(19:42):
better serve our communities. To me, that sounds very similar
to the accelerometers that are in phones that can be
used to detect things like earthquake shocks, for example. So
to have that similar approach with an Internet of things
perspective powered by something like five G, where you have
that low latency and high throughput and you can get
(20:04):
that data in real time that people can very quickly
act on it, I would imagine that that would be
an incredible tool in your toolbox to provide the services
to the region. Right, it's really near and dear to
my heart because I was born and raised here. I mean,
I'm a lifelong Angelino. And when I was a kid,
we had smag days and we'd go out and our
(20:27):
lungs would hurt from the smog. We had no way
of knowing information that we're trying to get, like what
is the level of small but what are the pollutants
in the air, what is those on? What is the
particular matter, what what's the carbon monoxide? And none of
that and where I work. Now, this is what we do.
This We provide that information and the app that we
(20:48):
developed it gives people all of that information. So you
can open it up now and see what you're You
know what your air quality is around you, and you
can make better decisions on I don't live your life.
I also love that with this discussion you always see
where the little bottlenecks are in the road through technological improvement. Right,
Occasionally your bottleneck is that the technology itself is lagging behind.
(21:13):
Maybe it's more on the connectivity side where you need
to have better solutions to transmit information. I think we're
now reaching a point with the five G rollout where
the communication side is in a really good space, and
I'm really excited to see from the hardware side people
developing things like the sensors that could be incredibly precise
(21:35):
and hopefully low maintenance so that the deployment of said
sensors could be beneficial. Right. With five G, it's a
total game changer. We'll be able to collect and distribute
data faster. It allows us to collect betterer chunks of
data more often, better use experience for a mobile app.
(21:55):
We could potentially replace even our campus WiFi and provide
toilet working capabilities for employees. That's just vastly improved. I mean,
we have a number of field inspectors that go on
site to various locations and with five G with that
infrastructures but don't allow them to pretty much instantaneously connect
with their office and the apps they used to do
(22:17):
their work. So it's yeah, it is an exciting time.
I'm just curious, are there any other emerging technologies that
you find particularly interesting or exciting, either within regard with
your work at South Coast a q m D, or
just personally. Well, I mean I can get into things
like quantum computing. Please, I'll talk about cubids, but you
(22:43):
know things like chat bots from the customer service experience
that's getting really good and every day is just getting better.
That AI based feedback five G. I mean, it's going
to change everything from our phone to our vehicles. We're
all going to be connected. It's really transformational. Before I
(23:07):
could let Ron go, I of course needed to ask
him one more thing. Who in the world of tech
leadership do you think is really killing it right now? Well,
Elon Musk, because he has just gone against a grain
every time and as winning almost every time. But even
(23:30):
when he loses, he's still winning because he's proving that
you have a dream, you have an idea, and it
makes sense, you can go for it. I mean, he
took on the automotive and oil industries and change the
way we drive. They forced them to develop fuel efficient,
if not completely electric vehicles and improve the world as
(23:53):
we know. So he's killing it. Well, Ron, thank you
again for taking time out your schedule to talk with us.
This was a fascinating conversation. I find the work you
do to be really inspiring, and your approach to leadership
with that team focus, wanting to foster and support a
team so that you can actually achieve the mission that
(24:17):
is uh speaking to my heart. So thank you again
for joining us. My pleasure. Thank you. Something that really
impressed me with Ron was how his love of tech
informs and shapes the way he approaches work. He uses
technology to connect people and projects, sometimes literally, and he
(24:41):
gets them all on the same page. Leadership and tech
are tightly intertwined in Ron's world. Teams without tech solutions
will find their jobs more difficult, but tech solutions without
a good team aren't likely to be implemented in any
sort of meaningful way. And while things in the public
sector move at a different pace than in the private sector,
(25:02):
the focus and emphasis around climate change has fueled a
sense of urgency in Ron's world. I'm really excited to
see how the next generation of IoT devices will give
us more insight into the world around us, potentially allowing
us to detect problems early enough so that we can
address them before they develop into serious issues. Imagine a
(25:23):
world in which devices with a persistent connection can, through
the power of five G, set a solution in motion
that addresses a problem before any human is even aware
of it. Now apply that same idea to every industry
and you really see the power of IoT and five G.
Be sure to subscribe to this podcast so that you
(25:44):
don't miss any of our upcoming conversations with more leaders
in the tech space. We'll be speaking with a wide
variety of visionary tech leaders and discover what sets them apart.
This has been the restless ones. I'm Jonathan Strickland. These days,
(26:05):
new ways of working have become the norm, and the
status quo no longer cuts it when it comes to
helping businesses evolve and grow. That's why T Mobile for
Business uses unconventional thinking to help businesses sees innovation only.
T Mobile offers America's largest and fastest five gene network,
which makes their new WFX solutions possible, letting businesses stay
(26:26):
connected and productive where work happens. See what T Mobile
for Business can do for you at t mobile dot com.
Slash Unconventional Open Signal awarded T mobile fastest five G
network based on average speeds. USA five G User Experience
Report January. Capable device required converts on available in some areas.
Some users may require certain planner features see mobile dot
Com
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.