Commercial Integrator is proud to continue our #AVLivingLegends series, this week announcing John Laughlin, CEO of CTI as our 92nd inductee.
Laughlin has led an illustrious career at CTI, with nearly 30 years of experience serving the company. He first joined as an accountant and bookkeeper in 1997 and gradually rose to become the CEO in 2009.
Laughlin also guided the company through its many acquisitions and has helped shaped the company as one of the largest commercial AV integration firms in the U.S. Under his leadership, CTI has received the title of Integrator of the Year in 2024 by CI and the 2025 Integrator of the Year for Talent Development by CI, SSI and NSCA.
In this #AVLivingLegends profile, Laughlin reflects on his journey at CTI, the motivation that continues to drive his passion for AV and why it is crucial to be prepared in an ever-changing industry.
Read on to learn more about John Laughlin, Commercial Integrator’s newest inductee in the #AVLivingLegends series! And don’t forget to visit our hub page to explore all of our past honorees.
Interview with John Laughlin
Commercial Integrator: What motivated you to join the commercial AV industry?
John Laughlin: A little bit of pure luck. It was supposed to be a “steppingstone” job before my wife and I opened up our own restaurant. But while I was working at CTI, I absolutely fell in love with the industry.
I grew up in western Kansas, not far from the family farm. The discipline (like helping my grandfather haul feed to cattle through the January snow) was just a huge influence. I liked tech, but computers were pretty rare back then. By college, I had a strong skill set in economics and math, started working in restaurants, and I was just trying to find ways to consume knowledge.
A few years later, I moved to St. Louis to join the woman who became my wife. I was running a restaurant there when a friend told me his company needed some help with their books. That was Conference Technologies, which ultimately became CTI.
At that time, CTI was building really cool things with technology, solving problems for people and helping their companies be better. And I thought, “Holy cow! This is for me!”
After I joined, Dennis Woodhouse, the founder, taught me everything he knew about AV. I also like to think my background, studying economics, the discipline my family taught me and my energy to grow the business were the catalysts for where CTI is now.
CI: What kept you motivated and engaged in the decades that followed?
Laughlin: Motivation has been pretty easy because I really enjoyed what I was doing.
CTI has no shortage of customers who needed us to execute. Moreover, I always enjoyed getting up in the morning, going to the office and hanging out with people that were like-minded.
Even today, I’m 57, and motivation is never one of my challenges. I find this industry easy to work in. Meeting more and more customers and finding out more and more things we can do as a company — now that’s just fantastic.
CI: Reflect on your role as both a mentee early in your career and as a mentor later in your career. Who helped shape the trajectory of your professional life? How have you tried to help shape others’ careers?
Laughlin: A lot of people helped me early. As I mentioned earlier, Dennis Woodhouse hiring me to work in AV was certainly a lucky thing.
Once I started getting into the industry, two more people really stand out.
One is Mark Swiderski of Crestron. He had a really strong grip on how to sell in this industry and what customers needed. He helped me not only navigate Crestron but also understand how to strategize with customers we were working with. I found that to be very helpful.
Another was Chris Ferro, who was with NEC. Chris went out of his way to help me understand customers and why they wanted an LCD projector. (I know. I’m a dinosaur; this was a long time ago.)
Chris showed me how the physical sizing, the lensing, brightness and pricing all worked together, as well as how to really understand and be a student of customer buying habits.
Not only that, but Chris also helped CTI level up on recruiting talent in the industry. He was instrumental in bringing Steve Reust to CTI. Reust was, and still is, one of the elite people in the industry. That allowed us to recruit the likes of Eric Snider, our CTO, who’s a legend himself. The list goes on.
These gentlemen were instrumental in helping me and CTI grow in the St. Louis market. They didn’t have to do that, and I’ve always appreciated them for it.
There were lots of others along the way, but those two really took the time to help me.
John Laughlin Reflects on Mentoring Newcomers
I really enjoy mentoring. It’s not uncommon for me to do consulting work with a business owner. And the way you work with them is definitely different than a project manager who’s maybe struggling or looking to boost their career. But there are a few things they all share.
For instance, coachable individuals are so much more fun to work with and excel so much more quickly. Because they’re coachable, we can go back to basics.
Likewise, I go back to the basics regularly. Every January, I read the book Atomic Habits. And I reread Atomic Habits because I know that if my habits are strong, the rest of what I do will have a better trajectory.
I tell people to make time and create a habit of educating yourself by reading at minimum 30 minutes a day. I don’t care what you read — it can be industry information, technology, technical information or sales strategy. Heck, most of the salespeople that I mentor have never even read a sales book. And if you’re looking for a magic pill? You’re putting your energy in the absolute wrong spot.
Instead, we tell our folks to improve 1% every day. If you make a mistake or if you have a bad day, a bad week or a bad month, as long as you’re learning from it, your trajectory is up and to the right.
I find that the people who understand this, over a long period of time, are 10 times better off than the people who don’t.
CI: What’s the most memorable story/anecdote of your career in commercial AV?
Laughlin: Tyco’s a good example. At the time, CTI had just two offices in St. Louis and Kansas City. This project was in Wall Township, N.J., which was pretty far from our Midwest roots. It was our first multi-million-dollar project and we won that design-build job through a relationship with architectural and engineering firms based in St. Louis.
That was 25 years ago, and that $3 million project was as big as our entire company! It also set us up to be really strong in the mission-critical space. If you fast forward 25 years, we’re still very strong there.
We also completed that project a few months before September 11, when the world shut down. The POs and projects stopped for six months. Luckily, we were more prepared to weather that than we might have been otherwise.
There have also been a couple of jobs that are a little bit more negative. I call them my $1 million MBAs.
John Laughlin on Lessons Along the Way
For instance, dipping our toes into residential AV and finding out we were much more suited for commercial AV. There were also jobs where we missed a few things during the bid process or there was scope creep that was just impossible to charge for or a product we installed that didn’t meet expectations and cost us $1 million to rip it out, replace it and do right by the customer.
At the end of the day, CTI has always done right by the customer. I think it’s the right thing to do, but there have been some very expensive lessons along the way!
CI: What has been your greatest professional accomplishment?
Laughlin: I’m not sure yet. Ask me after I retire.
CI: What has been your biggest professional regret?
Laughlin: I have no real regrets. However, there’s certainly been some mistakes like one or two companies we could have acquired that I passed on because the timing was off or the person was expensive or their location was a little off.
But I knew I liked them. They fit CTI’s culture, but I passed on them due to personal fears or timing. Maybe I don’t regret it entirely, but in hindsight, I know that if I had done it, it would have been good for CTI.
The one thing I have learned from this is to play the game to win.
If you see a really talented individual who fits your culture, find a way to get them onboard. Or when you find a company that’s a culture fit, make that work. Because super-talented people who fit your culture…they’re not a dime a dozen.
CI: What’s the best advice or pearl of wisdom you either received during your career or came to realize on your own?
Laughlin: Be prepared. It goes all the way back to Boy Scouts in junior high and high school. It’s the Scout Motto, and it sounds simplistic, but it’s served me well.
When I was in sales, being prepared with my proposal and presentation was a really valuable asset in comparison to a lot of sales consultants who just showed up and winged it. Having a better set of drawings and a better equipment list that had been tested and built was part of being prepared.
When I was an install tech, I was a [terrible] install tech and most of the time, I was the assistant. But I always made sure my van had the right equipment, tools and cable so that when I got to the job, I was prepared. That was pretty advantageous.
Finding ways to help the next generation be prepared is also incredibly advantageous and that is no different in my role today.
Whether I’m consulting with an organization or working with the team at CTI, I prepare. I learn everything I can before I get there. What has that company been through over the last three years, or even 30 years? What can you learn about that? Be prepared for that meeting.
I think that’s the best advice that I have: Be prepared. Then roll up your sleeves and do the work that you need to do.
Getting to run CTI for the last 29 years has just been an incredible privilege. I’m really grateful to everyone that helped us get to where we are today and I really hope I get the opportunity to do it for many more.
Would you like to nominate a peer or colleague — or perhaps yourself! — to be featured in this #AVLivingLegends series? If so, just email Dan Ferrisi, group director of content + editorial, industrial + tech, Forge.
