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Julie Parrish, Symantec

Channel Chief NameJulie Parrish
Channel Chief TitleVP, Global Channel Office
Company and DivisionSymantec
Markets Served: Security
Storage
Company's overall 2007 revenue:5,199.37 (in millions of USD)
Percentage of revenue from solution providers:n/a
Number of years with the company:5.5
Number of years involved with indirect sales:20+
Number of employees in channel organization:n/a
To whom do you report in your organization?Enrique Salem, COO
Does that individual report to your CEO/president?Yes
Describe your channel organization's major accomplishments over the past year:Improving partner satisfaction more than 8X over the course of the year through focused efforts in Ease of Doing Business (ordering, licensing); Product Quality; and Partner Program Benefits for SMB partners (NFR software, free training, specialized access to support).
List up to 10 of your top products sold through the channel:o Symantec Endpoint Protection 11.0 (SEP 11.0) -- Market leader o Symantec Backup Exec 11D -- Market leader o Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery -- Market leader o Symantec Enterprise Vault -- Market leader o Veritas NetBackup -- Market leader o Veritas Storage Foundation -- Market leader o Veritas NetBackup Pure Disk -- Emerging -- hot market: data dedupe o Altiris -- Compliance suite -- Market leader o Norton family of products -- NIS, 360, Systemworks (Norton Utilities) -- market leaders o Symantec PCAnywhere
Describe how your partner community has grown over the past year:Symantec has maintained a base of approximately 60,000 partners globally that sell products into all market segments around the globe. This base has contributed strongly to Symantec's overall revenue growth in the past 12 months. We have seen the most growth in partners coming into the Registered level of our program, likely due to the strength of our SMB products, programs and newly created SMB specialization track.
Name the one individual who has had the most profound impact on your life:I have had many great managers, mentors and professional acquaintances in my career. I would have to say the 'one' individual that has had the most impact on me and my career is actually 'two' -- my two children. Balancing motherhood and career has created a greater amount of focus, resilience, action and diplomacy than I believe I would otherwise have had. The strategies and techniques I've learned throughout my career would not have developed as they have, had I not had the balance of being both a mother, and a business woman.
Please name the single most innovative initiative for which you were responsible for the past year?The most innovative program we put in place this year was the Partner Experience initiative which created a cross-functional, executive sponsored approach to measuring and improving partner experience across all partner touchpoints -- Products, Licensing, Support, Ease of Doing Business. The initiative included quarterly partner surveys, regional data reviews, executive outreach to dissatisfied partners and bi-weekly meetings chaired by Symantec COO, Enrique Salem. The result has been an 8X increase in partner satisfaction, creation of new internal processes to drive continuous improvements (vs. one time improvements) and heightened awareness within all functions (IT, finance, support, engineering) of the needs of our partner community.
What were the key channel partner investments you made in the past year?From a partner program standpoint, the top investments (outside of the Partner Experience initiative) were: Partner Portal, Online Training and programs for SMB Partners.
How are you attracting the next generation of solution providers?Symantec's portfolio of market leading products is the number one reason partners choose do to business with us -- that is the best 'tool' we have to attract new partners. We have today, a very strong portfolio of partners that we work with to deliver today's solutions, and likely tomorrow's solutions.
What is the greatest challenge you overcame in the past year?The greatest challenge we overcame in the past year was winning back the confidence of our channel partners after the merge of our ERP systems last year. The merge of our systems (and licensing programs, buying vehicles, support programs) was very disruptive to our partners' businesses and we've had to work very hard to win their confidence back. Survey scores show that we are winning them back, but need to stay focused on continuous improvements in these areas
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