Channel Executive of the Year: Symantec's Seelinger

Partner satisfaction, financial performance and program execution all come to mind. Flexibility to change policies and a willingness to go to bat for partners are good indicators, too. When those and other factors were taken into account, it was clear that of the several promising candidates VARBusiness identified for its 2002 Channel Executive of the Year Award, Symantec's Allyson Seelinger stood out.

Take partner satisfaction, for example. This year, Symantec won the 2002 Annual Report Card (ARC) award for best-in-class in the security management software category. Symantec not only took home top honors for the main category, but also swept the subcategories, garnering the most praise among partners for product innovation, support, and partnership and loyalty.

In terms of financial performance, Symantec again distinguished itself in an otherwise down market. For the quarter ended June 30, 2002, sales,90-plus percent of which go through partners,jumped 39 percent to $316 million, compared with the same quarter last year. Also in second quarter, 2002, Symantec's enterprise security business grew 35 percent, while the company's consumer business grew 90 percent.

Seelinger's contributions to the company are one reason why it has excelled.

A longtime Symantec veteran,she joined the company in 1987 when her then-employer, Living Video Text, was acquired by Symantec,Seelinger is currently responsible for sales and marketing activities for Symantec partners, including retailers, distributors, OEMs, VARs and corporate resellers. Officially the vice president of North America enterprise and consumer channels, Seelinger's roots are in sales. In fact, she started her career at Symantec as the company's first outside salesperson.

"When I came to Symantec, I was offered a job in inside sales. But I wrinkled my nose at that," says Seelinger, one of Symantec's first 125 employees. Seelinger persuaded her supervisor to give her a shot at outbound sales and became Symantec's first field sales representative, working for one of four regional managers. She was told that if she were successful, Symantec would add other reps in other regions. She took to the job like a duck to water and made the most out of Symantec's growing portfolio of consumer titles. She focused her attention on then-growing software retailers, including Babbage's, Software City and Egghead Computer.

"I sold to anyone with a pulse and never worked so hard in my life," she recalls. And it showed. She quickly rose through the ranks as Symantec's sales grew. She took a job in sales management, heading up Symantec's Western region, then moved into channels marketing before returning to sales, where she ran the company's consumer channel sales initiatives. Seelinger was given responsibility for OEMs, distribution and VAR sales, too.

Although the early part of her career was spent cultivating ties to consumer-oriented partners, Seelinger played a key role in helping to shape Symantec's channel strategy when the company made the decision to invest more heavily in business and commercial product lines. At the time, company insiders,including some senior managers,considered building a large direct-sales force to go after commercial accounts directly. But Seelinger and others prevailed upon Symantec's management and persuaded it that a leveraged partner-sales model was the better, more cost-effective, approach. Management relented.

In just three years, the company's business has grown from approximately $600 million in sales to more than $1 billion, and its balance of consumer-to-business-customer sales has shifted from a ratio of 65-to-35, to 35-to-65. Symantec's CEO John Thompson told VARBusiness earlier this year that the company's long-term target is to increase that ratio of enterprise sales to consumer sales to 75-to-25. To do that, he added, he'll have to continue to rely on partners and, by way of extension, Seelinger.

She says she's up to the task.

That's not to say it has been easy. This mother of a 7-year-old son, like many, struggles to maintain balance in her life. Although extensive

travel to industry events, customer meetings and company retreats puts pressure on her ability to maintain harmony, Seelinger says her tenure with the company gives her the stability to make it all work.

"Sure, I was tempted for a period to leave and join a start-up dot com like everyone else, she says. But every time I thought about leaving, I'd think about the potential Symantec offers. And running channels for a company of this size, I thought, couldn't be a bad thing."

Not that it doesn't come without worries. "One of my biggest challenges is to see through the fog that surrounds the horizon," she says. That means sorting out the good from the bad in the things that others do. For example, she says Symantec is not seriously looking at implementing a software-licensing program similar to Microsoft's controversial Software Assurance program. But, she adds, the company continues to hone its subscription model for various virus products. Seelinger is looking at ways to reward companies that influence the sale of Symantec products, but that don't necessarily resell them. She's also looking at ways to provide partner training more effectively.

Earlier this year, for example, a new training initiative brought new, online resources to channel partners and customers. The moves put Seelinger's company in the enviable position of being the trusted go-to partner for information on general security, antivirus and content filtering, VPNs and more.

Having achieved significant momentum inside and outside the company, Seelinger now finds herself playing a larger role in the industry. She has completed media training and is increasing her profile, taking part in more industry discussions and leadership forums in the channel.

Not bad for a plucky upstart who invented her first job and parlayed it into a successful career at one company.