Insights Success has honored Feras El Hajjar, as one of “The 10 Most Inspiring CEOs to Watch.”
Digital transformation is vital/crucial for any business. It has become mandatory for business leaders to rethink old operating models with the new one, to become more experimental, and more agile in the ability to respond to customers and competitors.
Feras El Hajjar, Founder & Chairman of Infosysta, and Founder & CEO of App4Legal is an exceptional leader who has managed to make his mark in the business world with his outstanding performance in IT as well as management sector.
Usually, the integration of digital technology into all areas of business results in fundamental changes regarding business tactics. If done correctly, this can prove much more beneficial for the company. Infosysta is one of the leading companies to provide digital transformation solutions for your business by challenging the status quo with market-proven strategies.
Moreover, Legal technology is quite essential, as it particularly provides and aids legal services. Currently, most of the companies struggle to acclimatize their practices and are falling behind hence, the rise of legal tech has considerably influenced the concurrent legal markets. App4Legal is a provider of best-of-breed Legal Practice Management Software that provides solutions to keep your Legal Teams ahead of time with a detailed and organized approach.
Into the Shoes of Leader
Meet Feras El Hajjar, the Founder & Chairman of Infosysta, a company specialized in the Digital Transformation in EMEA and the Founder & CEO of App4Legal a company specialized in Legal Technology. With more than 18 years of multi-national experience in the Software industry including CRM, ERP & HRMS solutions, Feras proved himself as an expert in Information Systems. Being a Software Engineer with solid Management and leadership skills, graduated from Ecole ParisTech in 2002 & Paris Dauphine (Paris IX) in 2003, has earned years of experience in multi-national companies in Paris, Singapore, Dublin, Beirut, Riyadh, Cairo, & Dubai. This solid experience in the domain of Information Technology, with the most known solutions in the market, is the success key to building a sustainable two mature multi-national companies. Moreover, he is a permanent speaker at Agile Summits in the Middle East and a board member of different organizations including Heriot-Watt University in Dubai, Industry Advisory Board and also at Atlassian Partners Board Member in San Francisco.
“Nowadays, it is crucial to align the business with technology. Follow the right processes and, using the right tools can be a game-changer when it comes to reaching objectives, on-time,” adds Feras.
Appreciating the Talent
Feras states that with a clear strategy and communication plan, employees of his company are involved at the early stage of strategic decisions and company’s yearly objectives. Employees are becoming partners of decisions instead of Task Achievers. Talents are compensated and accelerating their careers by giving them all the needed sponsorship to excel.
Overcoming the Volatility in the Markets
Feras states that, he and his team firmly focuses on the ongoing as well as upcoming technology and the market needs to swiftly overcome any dilemmas. The company helps people to be agile and how to be more flexible in order to adapt to changes. It also build quarterly objectives at the management level and cascade them down to all teams and employees. He also addresses that the objective may or can change from a quarter to another and the dynamics of the market are the main drivers of the company’s objectives.
Eye-opener for Better Life Approach
In 2012, Feras resigned from his job as an IT Director in a multi-national company in Paris to exercise his entrepreneurship skills and build his first company, Infosysta from Beirut to become in less than 6 years the leader in the Middle East in the Agile & Digital Transformation. Later, he launched a unique solution called App4Legal, helping lawyers and legal practitioners to resolve their daily issues with one complete solution to innovate their legal practice. In 2019, App4Legal became a leader in GCC and a major player worldwide recognized by Gartner as a Legal Technology leader.
Advice to Rely On
Feras believes in the word Focus. He advice that, one must move by small iterations to close milestone by milestone until one reach its goal. Also suggesting that one must accept the fact that every individual need to sacrifice some ‘less important’ activities while focusing on the ‘critical and high’ ones.
He also emphasizes on some of the attributes that every leader must posses. By quoting, “the Skill to stay macro and to go micro when needed are the ingredient of a successful CEO”, he states that Genuine Leadership is showing the way to others. An excellent communicator who can by a simple email or a meeting pitch gets actions into efficient executions.
He also put some light, on why is it necessary to be an organized person driven by objectives. As he states, an objective-driven organized person knows where to stop putting efforts and where to focus.