Navigating Customer Relationships during Covid-19: A Day in the Life of an Account Executive at Cummins

In March 2020, after eight years working in various roles at Cummins, Grant joined the North America Business Leasing Team—the day the world shut down. As an account executive, Grant handles customer relationships for big-volume truck leasers like Penske, PacLease and Idealease. 

"Penske has almost 100,000 vehicles with Cummins engines and claims six to seven thousand warranties per month," Grant says. "On any given day, something can go wrong, and it's my job to be the voice of our customers and help claims get through quickly for them."  

Grant escalates customer issues from home, often with his three young boys playing in the background. Working remotely has been an adjustment for someone like Grant who thrives on face-to-face interaction, but he credits Cummins culture for his success in transitioning to fully remote work. 

"It's an extremely large company with over 70,000 employees globally operating in 193 countries," he says. "We build over 1M engines per year. We're everywhere. So easily, in a company this size, you could get lost. The culture could get away from itself. But what I've seen, from the top down—and I've experienced three CEOs since I've been here—they've built this really special culture of collaboration. Everyone is willing to roll up their sleeves and support each other. Leadership is accessible at every level." 

As a former collegiate cross-country coach for a D3 university, Grant appreciates the value of peer-to-peer collaboration and the mentoring and coaching he receives from his managers, who always seem to be looking for where he might be an asset next.

"My previous bosses [at Cummins], and especially the one I have right now, we talk about that every month. They ask me, 'What do you want to do next? What's the best thing for you? What do you enjoy? What do you not enjoy?' so that when an opportunity presents itself, I can be opportunistic," he says. 

Even if the opportunity is not the perfect fit, he understands that new roles can still benefit your career by pushing you and helping you grow. 

"Traditional managers want to keep you in a function because it's easy. You know it, and they don't have to retrain you," he says. "But as a complex organization, Cummins realizes that the broader base you build, the better suited you are to grow the business."

In much the same way Cummins is focused on a zero-emissions future with emerging energy technologies, Grant also realizes, "You're not moving anything forward if you're not improving what's coming up after you." 

Because of Grant's undergraduate degree in biology, he views corporate culture as an evolving ecosystem.

"For anything— whether it's an animal ecosystem or a complex organization of people—to be long-term sustainable, you have to have diversity," he says. "When you meld together diverse cultures, people, socioeconomic backgrounds, personalities, and thought processes, you get a variety of ideas to create positive friction. Ultimately that's what helps any business be more sustainable in the long term." 

Grant admits that, as a straight, white man who grew up in the Midwest, he didn't have much experience with diversity before Cummins. During his Cummins internship, he was in a cohort of 12 people, and, he says, "I was the only person who looked like me, which I had never experienced in my life, coming from small-town Ohio." 

Now in Columbus, IN (U.S.), he marvels at how Cummins, a multi-billion-dollar company, has managed to maintain a small-town feel. 

"Imagine a town of just 45,000 people, yet you have folks from many different countries sitting at an Applebee's. It's almost surreal. It's cool, and I'm excited for my boys because just by living in Columbus, near Cummins, they'll experience different cultures that I didn't get to while growing up."

When it comes to his boys, like most dads, Grant says his biggest remaining goal in life is to see his kids be successful and happy. He mentions a quote from Ogilvy that says something to the effect of trying to replace yourself with someone greater. 

"As a leader, I believe that. As a parent, I believe that," he says. "I want my boys to become leaders and coaches and see them succeed and help their own kids succeed. If I see that, I will feel like it was a well-lived life. And if I can help others, improve the world or save wildlife through my work at Cummins—let's go for it."