Kathleen Schneider

Executive director, global channel marketing & programs, Dell

Career so far I started in brand management for food and beverages and moved into IT after getting my MBA. I very much enjoy the dynamic pace of the tech industry and the impact it has on the world.

If you could be anyone else for a week, who would you be? It would be fun to be Yo-Yo Ma and see how it feels to be able to create such amazing music. I have no musical abilities and am incredibly impressed and envious of that talent.

Has 2012 been a good, bad or ugly year? It's been a challenging year, but also a great year for learning. In the "easy years" you can sometimes get a bit sloppy and let things go, but a challenging year drives you to focus on strengths, eliminate inefficiency and excess and get better at measuring results. It is also good for improving one's sense of humour.

What would you have as your last meal? My mother's lasagne and a big bowl of gelato.

What keeps you awake at night? Thinking about how quickly time goes by.

What piece of technology could you not be without? My Dell UltraBook.

What do you see as the channel's biggest challenge in 2013? There are still a large number of customers who have yet to make the transition to a cloud model and are trying to figure out what they need. Channel partners more than ever need to have the knowledge, skills and support capabilities to help customers architect the right solution along the continuum of "I own it and manage in-house" and "I pay for the compute usage I need". This is a very long continuum and the channel has an opportunity to expand their business model and grow by becoming an expert in areas along that continuum.

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