Feeney president embraces the change
Katrina Ralston, president and co-owner of Feeney, the railing and building products manufacturer and distributor, doesn’t romanticize her childhood memories of pushing brooms in hot warehouses. There were even the occasional rats to contend with.
After college she forged her own path into the lucrative dot-com business, where she carved out a successful career in that other male-dominated industry. Then one day, amid a tech-business takeover, she reflected on her role and her family ties, especially to her father, Ernest Ralston, who bought Feeney in 1979.
“I thought that if I’m going to make money,” she said. “I’d rather make some money for my family than for somebody else. So I told my dad: “Listen, you’ve been bugging me to come and work with you.” So I did. And let’s just say it was a very interesting transition.”
She joined Feeney in an official capacity in April of 2001. And what she walked into on day one was in need of a major tech upgrade.
Katrina’s wave of advice
During the course of conversation with the president of Feeney Inc., the following well-worth-repeating advice emerged.
• “Don’t be afraid to take credit and to acknowledge the things that you have done It doesn’t make you less of a leader to claim it and say, ‘Hey, that was my idea.’”
• “Human communication is not just about the words that you use, but how you also portray yourself in a conversation.”
• “If you’ve written more than two emails on any single topic, don’t write a third. Instead, you need to pick up the phone.”
“I was coming from the cutting edge of the technology world,” she said. “So when I walked back into my dad’s shop, which was still doing handwritten receipts, we had a dot-matrix printer and a DOS based program screen that was black and yellow. And I just remember walking in and saying: ‘OK. I have some work to do.’”
[Another major tech upgrade is coming to Feeney by the end of the year: a new and improved Feeney.com web site.]
Her professional transition was interesting from a technology perspective, and also a gender perspective.
“When I started, and it’s been 20-plus years, there was only one other female that worked at the company, and she was the receptionist. I’ve had men tell me on the phone, ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’ I’ve had many interesting conversations with men through the years, and I am happy to say that, yes, it has changed quite a bit. It’s changed a lot in the last 10 years. And it’s really changed a lot in the last five years.”
Ralston estimates that women account for about 40 percent of the Feeney workforce today.
Ralston also guided the company’s business transformation — from a company selling to consumers to a company selling to retail businesses. Her father, who she describes as the ultimate mentor, was cautious about that kind of dramatic shift.
But when Katrina stepped in to the president’s office, she began to put in place the major shift. At first, it was slow going.
[Learn more about HBSDealer's Top Women in Hardware & Building Supply program here.]
She distinctly remembers a conversation with a sales manager who resisted the change based on a fear of losing existing customers.
“I had to take a breath and I had to do something that I’m very uncomfortable saying. I had to say, ‘Yes, We will lose business.’
“But I also said to her: ‘We may lose some of our customers in the short term, but in the long term, we’re developing partnerships with people that will continue to help grow the business exponentially. So we might lose one today, but we’re going to get 10 tomorrow, and I need you to stick with me on this because this is where we’re going.’
“And that’s where we are.”
