Small Town, Big Innovation: Town of Cary Invests in Digital Transformation

Technology use is critical to the lives of all citizens and many organizations in the private sector use the latest tools to make advances in their fields. However, their counterparts in the public sector are often lacking those tools to work and serve their communities.

On this episode of Excellerate you’ll hear about the transformation that one town went through as it stepped into the world of technology to enhance the lives of its citizens and employees. Listen in to hear host Andrew Gilman, NWN Carousel’s CMO, as he chats with Nicole Raimundo, the CIO at Town of Cary, NC, as well as NWN Carousel’s Regional SVP, Shannon Ludwig, to discuss the NWN Carousel–Cary partnership.

You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in…

• Nicole’s journey to CIO of the town of Cary [1:22]
• The vision for the future of the town of Cary [11:20]
• How Nicole helped the town envision a future that embraced technology [15:43]
• How Cary used the technologies they had incorporated to sustain them during the pandemic [19:32]
• The projects that Nicole and Shannon have been working on [22:46]
• How to balance the needs of the community [27:17]
• How Nicole and Shannon are creating a bright future for Cary [31:08]
• How to vet all the requests from town residents [36:46]
• How to get more women into leadership roles in tech [42:28]

Nicole Raimundo leads her city to incorporate fundamental technology

Nicole Raimundo is an award winning technology executive and the CIO of the town of Cary. Nicole started out in the private sector working for Fidelity and made the transition to the public sector by first working with the City of Raleigh, NC before moving on to her role at the town of Cary.

She felt that the move into the public sector was a special opportunity for her to give back to the community. However, the shift caused her to realize that the technology used in the private sector was vastly different. The technology used in the public sector was far behind that used in other fields. The employees of Cary did their best to use the technology they had, but they didn’t know what they were missing.

As Regional SVP, Shannon Lugwig works with terrific customers

Shannon Lugwig, NWN Carousel’s Regional SVP, started working with a technology company way back in the dot com days. That company was acquired, then acquired again, and is now NWN Carousel. She enjoys her job because she continues to be challenged and has the opportunity to work with fantastic customers like the town of Cary.

When she first started working with the town, she realized that there was no wireless infrastructure. She knew then that the town had chosen the right partner to lead it into the future of technology.

From no wireless infrastructure to smart city

Shannon and Nicole knew they needed to put the town first before anything else. They took the town from an organization with no wireless infrastructure and showed them how they could leverage technology to create a smart city.

By using active listening, they discovered what the organization was trying to achieve. Together they came up with a plan to drive the town forward into the future using technology. Nicole and Shannon helped the employees understand wan and lan security and why moving to the cloud was important. They turned the campus into a laboratory where they could test and integrate new technologies.

Listen in to hear how Nicole and Shannon are creating a bright future for Carey. The partnership between NWN Carousel and the town of Cary lifted this organization into the future by infiltrating and changing the culture of the town.