Sage Partner - Cody Manning on how AP Automation Improves Lives

In the podcast, Cody Manning discusses his professional journey and current role as the Chief Sales Officer. He shares his passion for helping individuals reach their full potential and highlights the potential for extreme efficiencies in AP automation. Cody also discusses a project with a small customer, illustrating how automation can improve work-life balance. He then shares his personal experience with implementing new business strategies, which has led to more efficient contract negotiations and bill payments. Finally, Cody talks about his father, who he considers his hero, and offers contact information for those interested in reaching out.

Cody Manning is the Chief Sales Officer of Yooz. He attended New Mexico State University and Collin County Community College before joining the Symantec and McAfee inside sales departments. Cody joined Yooz in 2020 as VP of Sales – North America and in 2022 was promoted to Chief Sales Officer for North American sales with plans to expand into Latin America.

Episode Transcript

Ed Kless (00:00):
Well, hi everyone and welcome to Our Podcast. I'm Ed
class and with me today is CodyManning. Cody is the Chief Sales
Officer of us. He attended NewMexico State University in
Collin County Community Collegebefore joining Symantec, and
McAfee inside sales departments.Cody joined us in 2020, as VP of
sales in North America, and in2022, was promoted to Chief

(00:23):
Sales Officer for North America,with plans to expand into Latin
America. Welcome to the sagethought leadership podcast. Cody
Manning.

Cody Manning (00:31):
ahead. Thanks. Excited to be here.

Ed Kless (00:34):
Well, first of all, Cody, why do you do what you do?

Cody Manning (00:38):
You know, that's a good question I, I just really
enjoy, I enjoy helping peoplereach their full potential, and
just seeing them grow intothings that they never thought
that they could, whether that'sfamily, employees, customers,

(00:59):
partners, everybody I come incontact with. And this is a
great opportunity in a greatposition to be able to do that.

Ed Kless (01:08):
Well, you weren't previously in network security.
So I'd love for you to justspend a little bit time and
contrast your work there withyour new role in AP automation.

Cody Manning (01:18):
So if you're familiar with network security,
that's, I know, we laughed aboutthis before it's It's cutting
edge, it's it's on theforefront, you're constantly
looking at new threat vectors,new people coming in that could
bad actors that could takethings from the business. And as
I made the shift from that sideto to the finance side, and AP

(01:42):
specifically, I realized therewas quite a difference in the
adoption, even what wasavailable, and what was known.
And the ability to bring extremeamounts of efficiencies, back to
the AP side was very compelling.And being able to see that even

(02:08):
inside the same company, thesame organization, could be
spending millions on tech gear,network security, and spending
fractions of that, on enhancingthe efficiencies and the
visibility into the organizationfrom a spin perspective, it was

(02:31):
just that the opportunity wastoo great. And the amount of
people that could benefit fromit was it's just, it just seems
like it was just seemed like avery, very fun place to be to
help people get from going fromvery manual tasks, to very
automated processes and freeingup, you know, freeing them up to

(02:54):
do what they probably went toschool for, you know, and what
their passions are, let them beable to go do those things.
That's it excites me. And that'sprobably the biggest difference
from where I came from, to whereI'm at now.

Ed Kless (03:08):
So it sounds like I see a difference in the
conversation that's had presales, it's a completely
different conversation talk alittle bit about that. It

Cody Manning (03:16):
is, you know, on the other side of the pendulum,
it's highly commoditized.There's, the education level is
high, and you're kind of justfighting on, you know, who do
you like better on this side, itis it is a true education
process. It is understandingthat you don't need to sit and

(03:37):
check the mailbox every day, youdon't have to go and print off
the emails that come in, so thatyou can type them in and put
them into your accountingsystem. Being able to have a
mindset of we don't need filingcabinets anymore, we may need a
ping pong table or we may need afoosball table over there, where
our people can come in and lovewhat they do enjoy the time that

(04:00):
they have together as a team,and not be so focused every day
on making sure that I only have10 hours a day to get this done.
And I've got 15 hours worth ofwork. You know, it's that
conversation is completelydifferent. And opening the eyes
to folks in helping themunderstand that there are faster

(04:23):
and easier and better ways to dothings that can improve your
quality of life that youprobably didn't even know
existed. That's probably thebiggest difference.

Ed Kless (04:33):
Is there a particular customer story that comes to
mind when you think about thework that you've done with with
folks in the last time your timeat us? Yes,

Cody Manning (04:42):
many. I will give you an example. We worked with a
customer a small customer thatwas running with two AP staff.
They were processing 300 to 500invoices a month to people And
we're completely bogged down.The AP manager had been in the

(05:05):
seat for over 30 years. Soeverything was done exactly the
same. All the books, all thecabinets, everybody is in line.
over 30 years her children grew,her children had children. And
she's really struggling with thefact that every end of month,
every end of quarter, every endof year, she is not able to

(05:28):
attend grandchildren's games,being able to be a part of the
family activities, just the waythat it had been before. Except
now she's missing out on thistime with our kids and our
grandkids. And she sent an emailafter, after we automated a lot
of their processes for him. Andit had a picture attached to it

(05:49):
when she's at soccer game, andthis was the first of the month.
Like I have never been able todo this before. And I have zero
fear, and a completeunderstanding of what's
happening in my organization.Now, thank you for giving me
this part of my life back.There's a lot of those stories,

(06:12):
there's a lot of those people.On the flip side, from a
business perspective, we've hada lot of customers that find
negotiating their contracts andpaying bills much earlier, has
become very profitable for them.Being able to have multi, multi

(06:32):
location businesses scatteredout across the country, where
you want to be part, you know,you have local businesses, and
you want to support local, andbeing able to go back to those
local vendors and say, hey,look, we buy the same part, at
15 locations across the country,you're about, you're about 50

(06:54):
cents higher on the part thananybody else, I don't need you
to go down 50 cents. But if youcould meet me a little bit
closer, I'll continue to supportlocal, and that'll help me save
some of my costs, too, has beenvery powerful. It just
strengthens those vendorrelationships where there's not
as many phone calls coming in.And so we get a lot of those

(07:15):
calls to like, hey, it's reallyquiet in here. Now, our phone
used to ring all the time. Andnow I've got maybe a few calls.
And I've actually got time tocatch up on the things that I've
been setting off. So I don'tknow if that answered your
question or not? It

Ed Kless (07:31):
does. And Cody, we have an exit question that we
ask all of our guests, and thatis who is a hero of yours? And
why are they a hero?

Cody Manning (07:40):
My dad, absolutely. My hero. And my dad
I grew up my dad is that as ahard working, blue collar worked
his way into leadership and inmany, many different facets. But

(08:01):
watch my dad worked two andthree jobs growing up with the
sole focus of providing forfamily. He is a man of faith and
leads our family from the front.And as of late is diagnosed with
cancer, and is a trueinspiration in his attitude and

(08:21):
his faith and his commitment tostill making sure that everybody
else is the focus for him. Andhis attitude, the way that he
carries day by day. It justgives me strength and he's he's
absolutely my hero. And thenwe're asking me that.

Ed Kless (08:39):
Sure. And lastly, Cody, how can somebody contact
you? Oh,

Cody Manning (08:43):
easy. You can obviously you can hit me up on
LinkedIn. You can you can reachme via my work email. But most
importantly, I'm gonna give youmy cell phone number. It's
214-493-8208. It's been the samefor 20 years. I still get calls
from Intel and Symantec. And youcan reach me anytime there to

(09:07):
144938208.

Ed Kless (09:11):
All right, and we will put a link to your LinkedIn
profile in the show notes CodyManning, Chief Sales Officer for
us. Thanks so much for being aguest on the stage thought
leadership podcast. Thanks.

Cody Manning (09:21):
Appreciate it.