CHANNEL CHIEF
KOOROSH KHASHAYAR is Vice President , Global Channels at 11:11 Systems , an IT service management company that offers the most advanced networking and infrastructure solutions in the market today . The company provides cloud , connectivity and security solutions from its global footprint of data centres throughout North America , Europe , Middle East , Australia and Asia . Khashayar talks about his current role and how he is working with partnering ecosystem worldwide .
dDescribe your current job role and the parts that are somewhat challenging ? As the vice president of global channels , my role is to engage , enable and educate our partners on our cloud , connectivity , and security solutions across the globe . With the right tools , our partners can truly be the champion for their customers , address business challenges and confidently implement our industry-leading solutions . Two of the biggest challenges I face in this role are first , to familiarise our partners with making the transition from selling products to selling solutions . Second , in an increasingly noisy market it ’ s our responsibility to help our partners stand out among their competitors and ensure we are always providing them with enough information , education , and context to talk about the differentiators .
Can you explain how your company works with channel partners ?
We provide certification , training and sales enablement to our partners and creative ways for them to promote those solutions . Our enablement team has done a fantastic job creating the courses needed to make any partner a subject matter expert on Security , IaaS , DraaS and BaaS . Our marketing team has created campaigns in a box that enable our partners to go to market without a lot of heavy lifting . Beyond that , our goal is to work with our partners to help them become trusted advisors to their customers in our core solutions of cloud , connectivity , and security . We do this by ensuring they are well informed and have access to all the tools they need .
How do you ensure channel partners flourish in a highly competitive market ?
We offer a range of training and enablement programmes to ensure partners have an edge when it comes to staying ahead of the competition . To specifically address this , we launched a continuing education “ Lunch and Earn ” series of virtual training events which has seen great success . These monthly webinars help get our global partners up to speed on the latest industry trends and challenges , customer pain points and where our solutions fit in .
What are the latest trends you see emerging across the channel ?
The biggest shift I have seen lately is that customers don ’ t want to make decisions based on pricing alone . Particularly since security has become a key focus for executives at all levels , there has been a shift in what buyers are looking for as they seek out solutions – they want a trusted vendor to work with much more than a deal or a discount . A vendor who can identify the pain points and recognise the customer ’ s needs provides value far beyond those that offer a discount or a deal just to grab attention .
What is your management philosophy ?
We have a rigorous recruitment process to identify the right candidates for each role and once we have hired them , my job is to remove
Koorosh Khashayar – Vice President , Global Channels at 11:11 Systems
INTELLIGENT TECH CHANNELS 63