Sunday, May 6^th dawned bright, clear and cool; perfect weather for the challenging triPATHlon at Chastain Park. Six athletes from UTG prepared to take their place in history as the first ever UTG triPATHletes. Team UTG (Undefeated Triathlon Group) featured Bryan Brooks (swim), Alicia Cobb (bike), and Brian Miller (run) facing individual competitors Suzanne Daymude, Eric Dykes, and Brian Bassham.

The triPATHlon was also a UTG fundraiser for Camp TBI, a summer camp for children who suffer from traumatic brain injuries.  For the past few months UTG athletes, staff and friends have been actively raising money to support this great cause.

The triPATHlon began with a 400 yard swim in the Chastain Park Pool. Racers started at one end of the pool and snaked their way up and down each lane to complete the first leg of the race.

Eric prepares to join the thrashing throng of racers!

Next, the tireless athletes jumped on their bikes, or tagged up with a teammate, for the 15 mile scenic bike course over rolling hills and tree-lined streets of beautiful homes and some nasty potholes!

Hey Alicia, did you see the size of that pothole?

As racers came and went through the final transition, the anchor for team UTG, Brian Miller, prepared to run his first ever 5K. While Brian was waiting to take off, Eric was the first competitor from UTG to cross the finish line in a blistering time of 1:31.

Go Eric!

After tagging up with Alicia, Brian bolted onto the increasingly hot course. He ran a strong final leg but couldn’t overtake Suzanne who crossed the finish line next at 1:51. She was pumped! “I had so much fun and it felt so rewarding that Bash and I are doing another triathlon in June!”

Bash better train harder since Brian was able to overtake him and finish the race in 1:54 for Team UTG. But Bash did swim and bike before he ran!

Brian Miller charges to the finish line.

Bash came in right behind Brian and achieved his personal goal of 2 hours. Way to go UTG triPATHletes!

UTG’s 2012 triPATHletes: Bash, Alicia, Brooks, Brian, Eric, and Suzanne.

Eric was pleased with everyone’s results for the day. “The triPATHlon was a huge success in my mind. We had a relay team of all UTG employees as well as 3 individual entries from the company. Not only did everyone get out and do a fun fitness event together, but every one of our triathletes helped to raise awareness for Camp TBI. Their efforts raised enough financial support to pay the equivalent of four campers. I thought the event was a perfect blend of team building and service. But the highlight for me had to be when Kylie showed up to support us all. She even went as far as to bake us cookies, the perfect recovery food.”

That’s right, Camp TBI camper Kylie and her mom Rachel came to the race to cheer on UTG and provide sustenance with her special homemade chocolate chip cookies. Yummy! Alicia added, “The triPATHlon was a ton of fun and those hills on the bike were a great workout!  It was a gorgeous day and there was no better way to end the race than eating a handful of cookies made by Kylie!  Delicious!”

Eric and Kylie share a thumbs-up for a great event!

And the winner of the iPad was…
Brian Miller! That’s right, in a totally random drawing of all entrants and witnessed by at least five people, Brian Miller was the winner. But the story doesn’t end there. Brian generously chose to give the iPad to UTG’s number one fan, Kylie! She had wanted an iPad and some cool educational apps for over a year, so she was THRILLED with Brian’s gift! As a thank you, she brought us more delicious cookies when she came to the office to pick up her iPad and case.

Brian gladly traded the iPad for more of Kylie’s delicious cookies!

Thanks, Kylie and a SUPER BIG thank you to all of you who donated to the Camp TBI Fundraiser!! If you’d like to see more photos visit our Facebook page.

UTG has always had a true passion for ensuring the satisfaction of our clients. For years now, UTG has been sending out a satisfaction survey with each service ticket. This survey is intended to provide an avenue for immediate feedback. A few weeks ago, UTG emailed a quarterly survey to our customers to get additional feedback on how we’re doing. We chose to use the Net Promoter Score (NPS) which is a simple, widely accepted scoring system based on the perspective that every company’s customers can be divided into three categories:

- Promoters – loyal enthusiasts who will keep buying and refer others, fueling growth.

- Passives – satisfied but unenthusiastic customers who are vulnerable to competitive offerings.

- Detractors – unhappy customers who can damage your brand and impede growth through negative word-of-mouth.

We asked our customers to answer one question on a 0-to-10 point rating scale: How likely is it that you would recommend UTG to a friend or colleague? From their responses, we were able to calculate our NPS by taking the percentage of customers who are Promoters and subtracting the percentage who are Detractors. The resulting score gave us a clear benchmark for our performance and a way to measure our progress as we continue to strive for the best possible customer experience.

We also asked one other question of our customers: If I were UTG, I would change… Responses to this question included many like these:

- “Nothing. Great company, great support.”
- “Nothing. Love UTG!”
- “Nothing. I love working with UTG, they are always there when I need then.”

While we were pleased to get so many positive comments, we were also thankful to have received constructive comments. We heard all of the critiques loud and clear and are focused on benefiting from these insights. In fact, several of the issues our customers brought up were already being addressed by initiatives that are underway at UTG.

As a thank you to the customers who took the time to complete the survey, they were entered in a drawing to win a $100 Amazon Gift Card. As the survey was anonymous to ensure honest feedback, we don’t know who the winner is but we hope that you enjoyed the prize! Thanks to everyone who takes the time to help us serve you better by participating in our customer surveys.

Don’t wait for the next survey to let us know how we’re doing—good or bad—we want to hear from you. Please click here to send us a note or feel free to call your Account Executive or Eric Dykes, UTG’s CEO. We are looking forward to your call.

Last week the UTG team gathered for our Q1 2012 Quarterly Growth Meeting. These offsite events give us an opportunity to review financial results of the previous quarter and celebrate our efforts and teamwork. We also recognize an individual whose actions best displayed the company’s value of growth by helping UTG grow, helping clients grow and/or showcasing personal growth. This luncheon was held in the private room at Olde Towne Tavern & Grille in Suwanee Town Center.

Eric Dykes reminded everyone that UTG exists to be a catalyst for growth—for our clients, our relationships, and our employees—and that sometimes means that our employees grow in a different direction. Such is the case as we sadly said goodbye to Sandi Chalker, an AE in Augusta. Sandi has decided to move into a management role with a company there. While we’ll miss her, we know Sandi will do an excellent job in her new position.

Eric also shared a touching video of the campers at Camp TBI living the summer camp experience to the fullest. You can watch the full video here. Don’t forget, there are only a few days left to donate to our fundraiser for Camp TBI. This Friday we’ll draw for the iPad, and on Sunday our triathletes will compete in the Chastain Park triPATHlon. Help support this great cause!

Other news from the Growth Meeting included:

- Celebrating a strong Q1 sales performance, and welcoming several new clients to the UTG family

- Welcoming our newest employees, Michael Andrews, Derian Meyer, and Neil Gainey

- Congratulating Rafiq Al-Mahdi on 8 years of service and Patrick Nixon on 2 years of service

- Sharon Harding received a special recognition for her 5 year anniversary.

- Celebrating 8 birthdays: Brian Bassham (2/5); Brian Miller (2/17); Gina Thomoff (2/19); Ron Clark (2/24); Richard Hardt (3/18); Michael Andrews (3/18); Eric Dykes (4/4); and Sharon Harding (4/7)

Finally, we announced Tamara Lopata as the winner of the quarterly Growth Award by presenting her with The “Bright, Shiny People” Award for maintaining an upbeat, positive attitude during a challenging time this past quarter. Tamara was presented with a smiley-face vase of flowers, a smiley-face candy dish and a gift certificate to P.F. Chang’s. Now that’s something to smile about!

Q2 looks to be an exciting time for UTG as we continue to be a catalyst for growth for our clients, our employees and our organization. We look forward to celebrating our achievements and recognizing those who have contributed along the way.

UTG’s hardworking TAC team recently commemorated the successful completion of their 200,000th support ticket with a Braves tickets giveaway. You read it correctly—200,000 tickets! That’s a lot of all-day, everyday support keeping our managed services customers’ networks running smoothly and their hardware and software systems up to date. Local Advertising Agency, Group 1201, was the winner of two Dugout Tickets and a Gold Parking Pass for a Braves Game thanks to a support ticket for an automatic alert about a backup. Just one more benefit of automated monitoring!

Group 1201’s Creative Director, Staci Richards, was the lucky winner of their ticket raffle.

Have fun, Staci! GO BRAVES!!

Eric Dykes with Alice Salley and Vicki Greene, Development Officers at Walton Foundation.

Last week Eric Dykes attended the Sixth Annual Undercover Artists Show which was voted “Best Fundraising Event of 2011″ by Best of Augusta magazine last year. The lively event was held on the grounds of Walton Rehabilitation Hospital and featured an auction of artwork from 100 well known artists, community leaders and local celebrities.

All proceeds from the Undercover Artists Show benefit Walton Foundation’s Camp To Be Independent, a five day overnight camp for children, ages 8-21, with an acquired traumatic brain injury. Camp TBI is held every July in Rutledge, Georgia at Camp Twin Lakes, benefiting as many as 45 campers, at no cost to their families.

You may wonder why it’s called the Undercover Artists Show. In a creative twist, the names of the artists are “undercover” or covered by a piece of tape. During the evening, the names are unveiled to encourage more bidding and participants are able to truly experience the notion that “art is in the eye of the beholder.”

Eric summed up the evening saying, “I was honored to attend the 6th Annual Undercover Artists Show. This art auction is a really creative way for the community to come together to support the children who attend Camp TBI. The evening was filled with music, food and of course, art. I was thrilled to represent UTG and meet many more of the people who make Camp TBI possible.”

Reminder: There’s still time for you to help support Camp TBI through UTG’s Triathlon Fundraiser. Every $5 you donate gets you one entry into the drawing to win an iPad on May 4th so DONATE NOW!

It starts early…UTG’s youngest—and cutest—team member Cohen Brooks, son of April and Bryan, already drooling over the new iPhone!

If your business is like most, you have employees who always have to have the latest and greatest iPhone, iPad, Droid, etc. Whether they bring their personal devices to the office (BYOD) or they’re provided by the company, they all connect to your important corporate systems and valuable corporate assets. With more smartphones sold in the US last year than PCs, the demand to use these devices at work has created a huge burden on IT to provide the right security, provisioning, tracking and management for them.

UTG can help. We’ve made the investment to become part of the Apple Consultants Network (ACN) for mobility, and we’ve expanded our Managed Services to include Mobile Device Management (MDM) to securely support your mobile devices and your mobile workforce. Through the support of strategic partners including the ACN, UTG can proactively manage the mobile devices within your company.

For just $10/month per device, UTG’s Mobile Device Management service will provide:
• General Support for iOS 4+, Android 2.2+, Blackberry 4.5+ and Windows 5+
• Security for devices with centralized password policies
• Remote locating, locking or wiping misplaced devices
• Encryption of device contents at the file/block level
• Configurable privacy policies for employee-liable versus corporate-owned devices
• Alerts and reporting capabilities
• Management of configurations including password, VPN, Wi-Fi and app distribution
• Remote control of device and viewing of screen contents (Windows Phones only)

So let your employees drool all they want over the new iPhone, Droid, or whatever. When these devices show up at the office, UTG will be there to help deploy, configure, secure, monitor, manage, support, and retire them when the next newer, better, faster thing comes along!

Eric Dykes presents our lucky winner, Tricia Dempsey, with the Masters Experience Package.

Tricia Dempsey, Founder and CEO of Agile, said she and her husband Jeff made the most of her win of UTG’s Masters Experience Package at last Monday’s practice round. “We had the best time! I’ve never won anything. It was amazing!”

Jeff & Tricia Dempsey on the beautiful Masters course.

Tricia said she and Jeff got up early, had breakfast and headed to the course. The light crowd and mild temperature, along with picturesque views and player sightings made for an exceptionally memorable day. “We spent seven hours walking the entire course. We were following one golfer in particular for two hours not knowing who he was. When we finally asked someone about him, we learned he was Charl Schwartzel, the 2011 Masters Champion. No wonder he was so impressive!”

Tricia and Jeff were also impressed with the exceptional care and hospitality they received from the team at Executive Management Services who provided the Masters package. “The EMS team was great! They really took care of us. The whole experience made for a very special day with my husband.” Apparently Jeff needed a good memory of the Masters. On his last trip there 10 years ago, he got food poisoning the night before and spent his Masters experience feeling sick between holes. Jeff, we’re so glad you had a much better experience this time!

Tricia shared a little known fact about concessions at the Masters. “We stopped and ate three times over the course of the day and spent less than $20! The food is so inexpensive. Their famous pimento cheese sandwiches, turkey and ham wraps, everything costs $1 or less, so we ended up spending all the money we saved and more on hats, shirts and other fun stuff for family and friends at the Gift Shop!”

Tricia knows what it takes to produce a memorable golf event. Since 2004 she has produced Agile on the Green, the premier golf charity for Atlanta’s technology community. This year’s event will be held on Monday, October 1st at the Alpharetta Athletic Club. Net proceeds for the event will benefit Susan G. Komen for the Cure – Greater Atlanta Affiliate and 75% of these dollars will benefit the 10-county metro Atlanta area with low-cost and no cost mammograms. For more information or to register for Agile on the Green visit http://www.agileonthegreen.com.

UTG’s not done giving away great prizes! You still have a chance to WIN an iPad and help some deserving kids get the summer camp experience of a lifetime at Camp To Be Independent. For every $5 you donate, your name will be entered into a random drawing for this great prize!  Donate today! To learn more about Camp TBI visit http://www.wrh.org/camptbi.

Meet UTG’s newest team members (L to R) Suzanne Daymude, Michael Andrews, Richard Hardt, and Derian Meyer.

Welcome Suzanne Daymude who joined UTG late last year as a staff accountant. Originally from Tuscaloosa, AL, she received a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Alabama. Roll Tide! Prior to joining UTG, Suzanne worked as a Senior Accountant with Jones, Lang, LaSalle and then worked even harder raising two active and energetic boys, Caleb, now 15, and Caden, 11.  Suzanne is excited to rejoin the workforce with an innovative, growing company like UTG after raising children for the last 10 years. When she’s not crunching numbers and talking to clients, she enjoys reading, baking and running (which is a good thing since she likes to bake!)

In January UTG’s Professional Services Team welcomed Michael Andrews as a Systems Engineer. Born in Auburn, AL, Michael earned a Bachelor of Business Management from the University of Alabama and his Masters in Information Technology from AIU. Before joining the UTG team, Michael worked for Georgia Credit Union Affiliates as a Network Administrator. He enjoys spending time with his 7 year-old daughter, Semira, hanging out with friends, and playing basketball, kickball, dodge ball and paintball.  Obviously a sports buff, Michael also enjoys watching and attending sporting events, and when he’s tired from all this activity, he likes to wind down watching a good movie. Michael is looking forward to the opportunity to learn more and advance his career as an IT professional with UTG.

Richard Hardt joined the UTG team as a Principal Engineer late last year. He brings with him a plethora of degrees and certifications including: B.B.A.; Bachelors in Management Information Systems; Cisco CCNP; Cisco CCNA; Microsoft MCSE; and Microsoft MCTS. Richard is originally from Lake Charles, LA and previously worked with NCR Corporation as a Senior Network and Systems Engineer. When he’s not busy learning and earning more certifications, Richard likes to spend his time playing the guitar and watching documentaries. He also likes quirky comedies and can recount all the best lines from memory! Richard joined UTG to learn new technologies and work in a diverse mixture of environments and business types to help our clients grow and succeed.

The newest addition to our Managed Services group, Derian Meyer joined the team in February as a Systems Engineer. A homegrown Yellow Jacket from Norcross, GA, Derian received a BS in Discrete Mathematics from Georgia Tech and holds a multitude of Microsoft certifications including: MCPS; MCSA; MCNPS; MCITP; MCTS; and SA. Before coming to UTG, he worked as a Systems Engineer with BlueWave Computing. Derian is excited about the opportunity to learn new technologies and work with UTG’s customers in many different environments. He and his wife enjoy snow skiing and trying new and unusual foods. Derian also enjoys competitive gaming and laser tag. It looks like we could have another Whirlyball competitor in our midst!

Please join us in welcoming these four star players to the UTG team!

“Bouncing with excitement” seems to be a common pre-camp activity for many of the campers at Camp To Be Independent (TBI) sponsored by the Walton Foundation for Independence in Augusta, GA. Kids whose daily lives are filled with limits, disappointments, and just plain frustration over the many things they can’t do are suddenly in a place where they can do almost anything. From splashing down on a water slide, riding a bike, and kayaking to cruising on a zip line, riding a horse, or mastering a ropes course, these kids get to experience the joy of living without their normal limitations. Being wheelchair-bound, visually impaired, or cognitively challenged doesn’t stop the kids at Camp TBI. It’s set up so they can do it all!

Kylie, next to UTG’s CEO Eric Dykes, and some her friends from Camp TBI.

Kylie, now 16, has immersed herself in the Camp TBI experience since she was 8 years old. Suffering since the age of 3 with a recurring brain tumor and a subsequent stroke, Kylie has many limitations both physically and cognitively. One result of the brain tumors was the complete shutdown of her endocrine system. All the daily activities of her hormones and glands have to be regulated with medication. Kylie also suffers from chronic fatigue, limited vision, and can easily become overheated, but that doesn’t keep her from enjoying swimming, games, and arts & crafts at Camp TBI.

With a 1:1 ratio of campers to counselors (the majority of whom are Occupational Therapy students at GHSU), Camp TBI enables kids like Kylie to fully enjoy a camp experience while getting their medications and being closely monitored. Because the campers have such a wide range of disabilities, Camp TBI also has an onsite medical staff equipped to handle any medical issues that come up.

The amazing counselors at Camp TBI build trusting relationships with their campers and encourage them to develop life skills and increase their independence. Kylie’s mom sums it up, “Kylie is bouncing with excitement waiting for Camp TBI! It has given her a place where she can be a kid and be accepted for who she is. She feels the love and encouragement there and she runs with it!”

This incredible camp experience is completely free for the campers and their families. It is totally paid for through sponsorships and donations. That’s where you can help. Join UTG in reaching our goal to raise $10,000 so that Kylie and other children like her can experience that same joy and freedom of summer camp that we enjoyed as children! Please donate today!

To learn more about Camp TBI visit www.wrh.org/camptbi.

UTG is working as a team to fundraise for Camp To Be Independent, a camp for kids with traumatic brain injuries. Several staff members are running a triathlon on May 6th on behalf of these deserving children and young adults, and we would love to have your support as we look to raise $10,000 for this worthy cause.

To sweeten the deal, we’re giving away two amazing prizes, an iPad and an exclusive PGA Masters Tournament Experience in gorgeous Augusta, GA.

The Masters Tournament Experience includes:

• Two badges for Monday’s practice round
• Full hospitality tent (unlimited food/drink)
• Lodging on Sunday, on or close to the property
• Transportation to the course
• Parking, if needed

Tickets for the Masters Tournament will be drawn on March 28th, so please donate now to enter this competition.

Donate today to support these wonderful children and become eligible for these incredible prizes!