Cisco pledges more harmony between sales and channel

Cisco Partner Summit will move to the autumn so it follows on from internal sales kick-off

Cisco is moving its Global Partner Summit from spring to autumn so it is "more closely coupled" with its global sales kick-off, as it makes moves to better align its direct and indirect units.

In a blog post, Cisco's senior vice president of Global Partner Organisation (GPO), Wendy Bahr, who started in the role in the summer, said making the channel and internal sales work better together has been a priority for her so far.

"Many of the conversations I've had with our partners over the past few months have been about the challenges around the breadth of Cisco's portfolio, our sometimes complex processes, and the transformation of our business to a more software-centric, ‘as a service' model," she said.

"It's clear that we need greater simplicity across our entire portfolio and better alignment between our partners and our field sales organisation."

To that end, Bahr announced that Cisco's Global Partner Summit, which is usually held in the spring, will move to the autumn from next year.

"While we're on the topic of alignment, I often get asked by partners why Cisco doesn't have its internal global sales meeting, which is held every September, more closely coupled with Partner Summit," she said.

"As I mentioned earlier, our partners are looking for opportunities to have our combined field teams more aligned on strategies and priorities for the coming fiscal year. So, after a lot of careful consideration, we've made the decision to move the timing of Partner Summit to the autumn timeframe, right on the heels of Cisco's global sales event."

Cisco already has a partner event lined up in San Diego in the spring, and this will go ahead as planned. But in November next year, its inaugural autumn partner summit will also take place, this time in San Francisco.

Bahr said that since taking on the job in July, she has been on a ‘listening tour' across the globe, finding out what partners want and how the firm can improve its channel relations.

With that in mind, she created a strategy based on four key ideas.

"Based on all of the conversations that I've had with partners over the past several months - as well as my previous experience working with our channel partners - I've created a set of guiding principles designed to help provide the best resources, programmes and experience for partners. These are centred around simplicity, alignment, and evolving our value exchange," she said.

"When I talk about alignment, what I mean is increasing alignment between partners and the Cisco field to help them move faster, drive greater agility, and increase growth. I've heard from our partners that one of their main objectives is to be in sync with our sales teams. We need to facilitate this alignment, as well as provide growth opportunities specific to our partners' respective regions."