Scott Employee Profile:

Michele – Inside Sales

Accepting a Supplier of the Year Award from Wood-Mizer

Michele Riedlinger is celebrating 20 years at Scott Industrial Systems this year in our Indianapolis Office. Michele is an important member of our customer service and inside sales team with multiple accolades from the company.

Developing Skills:

Michele started at Scott in 1995 with a professional background in customer service. To gain expertise in hydraulics and pneumatics, she had to “learn by doing”. She developed a process with the office manager to learn about the industry and the customers.

At that time, a lot of Purchase Orders and confirmations were still in hard copy format, even with faxing, so she “went in and searched for that order and wrote down everything that was on it […] to get familiar with the actual products and the computer.”

Building Customer Relationships:

This process was the groundwork Michele used to develop the skills and knowledge necessary to interact with her customers.  She describes the rapport that she has with people who call in and talk to her casually or ask her about her vacations, “over the years you build that type of relationship with your customers, and some of your vendors too.”

Developing these skills has helped Michele achieve excellence in customer service. “Sometimes it’s not necessarily the price. It gets you in the door, but it’s the friendliness and communication that holds the sale.”

Company Culture:

Along with emphasizing the importance of maintaining a relationship with our customers and vendors, Michele values interacting with her coworkers in the Indianapolis office. She referred to the group as a “close knit bunch”.

Most of the Indianapolis employees have been with Scott Industrial for over ten years. Michele says that, “with being here so long, we’ve seen a couple people get married and have babies.”

When asked what has kept her with Scott Industrial for so long, she said that almost every day “you get a kick out of somebody, whether it be one of the inside sales people, one of the warehouse guys, or even one of the sales guys. I think that even with just the three people that we have here in inside sales, it’s pretty laid back, it’s pretty easy going, and with us being here as long as we have, we know what we have to do.”

Scott Industrial very proud to have someone with Michele’s knowledge and professionalism serving us in Indianapolis!