Smartsheet Revamps Partner Program Emphasizing Simplification, Alignment And More Targeted Incentives: Exclusive

The work management and collaboration platform developer, which was acquired by a consortium of private equity companies in early 2025, has undergone a near total change in its top executive ranks over the last year, including the company’s channel management.

Smartsheet is undertaking a broad redevelopment of its Smartsheet Aligned channel program as the company looks to simplify the program’s partner categories and tier designations and offer expanded partner incentives and benefits.

Smartsheet, which develops a market-leading work management and collaboration platform, is providing additional incentives for partners who grow their client accounts and refer deals to the company and offering back-end rebates for partners who generate new customer opportunities for themselves and Smartsheet.

The program revamp, which also includes additional partner training, enablement and marketing resources, is designed to improve the partner experience and better align Smartsheet’s AI strategy with its channel, said Michael Hull, Smartsheet business and corporate development vice president, in an exclusive interview with CRN.

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“I realized in talking to a lot of our customers and partners that there was a lot of good going on. It was a strong foundation to build upon,” said Hull (pictured), who joined Smartsheet earlier this year.

“I also recognized that there were a couple of strategic changes that we could make to double down on those efforts and really take the program to the next level, especially considering all the changes to enterprise software and AI and everything,” he said.

Smartsheet, headquartered in Bellevue, Wash., was acquired and taken private by a consortium of private equity companies including Blackstone, Vista Equity Partners and Generative Capital for $8.4 billion in a deal announced in September 2024 and completed in January 2025.

That, in turn, has led to numerous changes in the company’s leadership including hiring former Concur and Accolade executive Rajeev Singh as CEO in October 2025, former SAP Concur chief revenue officer Scott Torrey as CRO in December, and former Insightsoftware chief financial officer Josh Schauer as CFO in May of this year.

Hull, a partner at Generative Capital, joined Smartsheet in his current capacity in February. Former channel executive Eva Schonleitner is no longer with the company.

Smartsheet today works with some 800 channel partners including such giants as SHI International Corp. (No. 12 on the CRN Solution Provider 500) and Zones (No. 40 on the CRN Solution Provider 500). The company also partners with Carahsoft (No. 6 on the CRN Solution Provider 500), a leading provider of IT products and services to the U.S. government and the public sector, and Climb Global Solutions, a specialty IT distributor focused on emerging and cloud-based technologies.

The company signed a multi-year reseller deal with CDW (No. 5 on the CRN Solution Provider 500) in May 2025.

“We’re proud of the momentum we’ve built together and of the role Smartsheet plays in CDW’s ongoing MarTech commitment,” said Kartik Venkateswaran, head of MarTech at CDW, in an email exchange with CRN. (MarTech is CDW’s initiative to leverage agentic AI-based marketing technology as part of its partner and customer experience systems.)

“Together, we’re helping customers transform the way work gets done, and we’re excited about the opportunities ahead to deepen our collaboration and deliver even greater business impact with Smartsheet and Brandfolder,” said Venkateswaran, referring to Smartsheet’s digital asset management software, Brandfolder.

The latest changes to the Aligned partner program follow a number of enhancements Smartsheet made to the program in late 2025 as the company looked to recruit more systems integrators to its partner lineup to help fuel its expansion into Asia and Europe.

Partner Program Revamp Details

Perhaps the most significant change to the Smartsheet Aligned partner program is the consolidation of partner categories from nine to four and the replacement of an older points-based rewards system with a simpler tiered program.

“With so much going on and the pace of innovation accelerating, we recognized an opportunity to really simplify the program,” Hull said. “We just made it easier to understand how to do business with Smartsheet and to understand if you are a partner, how do you stack up? If you’re doing well, if you’re trending well, what do you need to do to continue progressing.”

“In talking to partners, this was really important because partners were making meaningful investments in their Smartsheet practices. And so having an idea of where they stood and how they could be successful was a top priority,” he said.

The new partner categories are:

Adapture is an Elite Smartsheet partner, the highest level in the new partner program. But that status is “more than a designation—it represents a deeper level of alignment with Smartsheet that helps us continuously strengthen our capabilities, create greater value for customers, and grow together in the enterprise market,” said Kevin Miller, vice president of strategic alliances at Adapture, in a comment emailed to CRN.

“The new partnership program includes new incentives for Elite partners that we stand to benefit from, in addition to a heightened focus on strategic account management that will positively impact our customers,” Miller said. “Combined with our significant investment in a dedicated Smartsheet Center of Excellence and a team of experienced architects, the strength of this partnership is reflected in our 99 percent renewal rate for Smartsheet licensing.”

Hull said there has been some “rebalancing” of partners who resell the Smartsheet product and those who refer sales to the vendor. He said more partners prefer to devote their time and resources to developing and providing solutions and services for customers and leave the mechanics of sales processes to the vendor.

In terms of incentives, Hull said Smartsheet is now offering improved benefits to partners that grow their existing customer accounts, expanded benefits for referral deals, and a new back-end rebate program for partners who originate new opportunities.

“We wanted to improve the incentives for partners so that there are many paths towards partner success,” the channel executive said. “And for each of those paths, the incentives were aligned between the customer, the partner and Smartsheet.”

Smartsheet is also investing in partner training and certification programs, providing more marketing resources, and simplifying deal registration processes.

Smartsheet also has been adding to its channel management ranks including hiring Derek Downs as head of the Americas partnerships and alliances ecosystem; Hillary Maxwell as senior director of strategy; and Derek Safko as director of global partner programs and operations.

AI Wave A Major Market Driver

Hull said the AI technology wave sweeping the IT industry makes the changes to the Aligned program all the more important. Smartsheet has a number of built-in native AI capabilities, including the Smart Assist embedded AI companion that helps users query, analyze and act on project data using natural language. Smartsheet also can connect to a wide range of other systems via MCP (Model Context Protocol) connectors.

“What I hear from customers every day is how fast they have to move, given the pace of change. Solution providers play a critical role in deploying and delivering a lot of these solutions for customers,” Hull said, citing AI transformation projects, IT consolidation efforts and vertical solutions. The Aligned program changes, he said, will support partners’ business models and go-to-market strategies and help them get the most value out of the Smartsheet platform.

The channel executive said that systems integrators and consulting firms are playing an especially important role today in AI-driven transformation projects for enterprise customers. And partners that go deep into developing and delivering vertical industry solutions are working more closely with Smartsheet’s own research and development people, sales team and professional services team.

Hull said the total number of partners Smartsheet works with is currently around 800 and will likely remain around that number for the immediate future.

Smartsheet has been introducing the Aligned program improvements to partners over the last several weeks. Hull said the new tiering system will be fully effective in February, giving partners time to develop a performance track record on which their tier positions will be based.

The overall goals, Hull said, are “ensuring that the experience our partners have with our program, with the customers and with the company is constantly improving – and that’s something that will continue to be a priority for me. We believe that this program improves the way that [partners] can be successful and sets us up for long-term success.”