"Creating A Safe & Engaging Environment "

April Weatherly, Director of Solutions and Integrations, BluIP®, brings over 20 years of combined contact center and hospitality experience. With her myriad of experience managing and developing organizations, teams, and projects in these industries, creating strategic initiatives and new technology, and challenging the norm, BluIP®is able to push the boundary of what is expected and offer solutions not already adopted.

Being a support system to female business owners out there trying hard to establish themselves comes naturally to April. From serving as counsel in the hospitality space to developing future female business leaders by serving as today’s mentor, April creates a safe and engaging environment to help develop each of their opportunities to allow for individual growth. “In each female lies a future business owner or leader, but each one requires a mentor or coach to help strengthen their talents, whatever those might be, and allow them to see themselves as great, no matter what the world might make them feel,” says the steadfast leader. April makes it her mission to inspire and empower her team members to become great leaders of tomorrow; by mentoring and teaching, she has spent dedicated time and resource to ensure that each of her team members not just become great leaders but also find that makes them happy, grow, and succeed both personally and professionally.

Even though April has been managing and leading organizations and individuals for the last 20 years, it’s only the last few years that she’s learned what real leadership is about. She explained, “Several years ago, I had a life-changing experience which caused me to reflect on what was most important to me and adapt to life and my surroundings in ways I never thought would be necessary. Overnight, my world changed and, like it or not, I had to change with it. Realizing this shift in myself, understanding the challenges I was experiencing, it made me see others in a more empathetic and personal way than I had before. Nobody thinks that they’ll wake up and their life will change without their permission but sometimes, it does. I realized people needed more compassion and more grace from me. Leading isn’t always about being right or taking charge but instead sometimes it’s just about being present and aware.”

“Mentoring and leading aren’t always easy because sometimes, you want to fix everything and help the person through the storm”, April went on. She described how she began running after these life-changing events caused her to focus on health and growth and in a moment of desperation during a marathon, when she felt she couldn’t continue, her closest friend sent a harsh but necessary text message “You didn’t train all those months to give up now. Get moving!” That message carried her the last 6 miles of the London Marathon and she confessed “I likely cried most of those miles, but I did it because I knew that sometimes even though life is hard, sometimes it takes someone on the other end to tell you to get moving to carry you the last 6 miles. I’ve been pushing people all of my life and that day, I needed to be pushed. So, if you want to know how to mentor or lead, sometimes you just listen and sometimes you tell them to get moving. Either way, being a leader is whatever the other person needs.”

Today, April surrounds herself with people who are encouraging, inspiring, and passionate enough to tell her when she’s wrong. This is one of the brilliant qualities that guide her into becoming a successful leader and passing on her knowledge to others. With this astute mindset, April has been taking the company to new heights. Since 2010, BluIP® has been helping businesses get connected to their customers via Cloud UC/PBX and SIP Trunking. Today, they develop the AIVA Connect™ platform, which April assisted in developing several years ago. This single-pane-of-glass combines AI Virtual Agents with over2,800 low-code, no-code integrations, and a web-based operator console with business intelligence. This product allows their clients to manage all customer interactions from a single interface while also saving on labor costs.

However, like most industries, COVID-19 has impacted BluIP® and its customers. “We have had to adjust our sails and support them where they needed, which happened to be a reduction in the workforce,” elucidates April. “Before COVID-19, we had already developed and implemented an Artificial Intelligent Virtual Agent, named AIVA™, part of a full suite of products under the umbrella, AIVA Connect™.” Since AIVA™ was already developed and available for deployment, BluIP® customers could take advantage of this product when the workforce and staffing augmentation began without disrupting their businesses. AIVA™ has continued to grow and deploy across all its customer verticals, helping customers solve staffing challenges daily.

BluIP® CEO Armen Martirosyan once said, “just have fun. If you aren’t having fun, nothing else matters.” April believes this approach impacts employees, customers, and partners to the core because they know that BluIP® is developing products and solutions that don’t just matter but also have fun developing. “Our employees create our success, and if they aren’t happy with what they are doing, how can we develop products, deliver services, and support our customers successfully?” says April, who believes individual growth should never stop. Hence, her list of goals is long enough to fill a room. “However, professionally, Armen, our CEO, would likely say that I could work to use less words, and personally, my friends would likely say I could be less serious,” adds April. “But for the time being, I’m focused on continuing my education, developing my communication capabilities, teaching others what I’ve been taught, and the life-long pursuit of success.”

For the days to come, BluIP® is working on improving their AI, AIVA™, and April and her team are working towards witnessing record growth in the next year in this area. “I love working with our customers, solving challenges, creating solutions, and developing new technologies. Each day, I learn something new, work with an amazing team of people, and can impact change, so if the future stays just as it is today, that’s ok too,” she says.