Jon Pickering

Chief executive, Block Solutions

Career so far I have had various Cisco networking roles within the telecoms sector. I worked my way up to being network manager for Colt Telecom. Six years ago I set up Block Solutions.

If you could be anyone else for a week, who would you be? I have no great aspirations to be anyone else but would love to be a top golfer for a week and compete in the British Open.

What will next year’s most overhyped industry buzzword be? I tend not to take too much notice of buzzwords and certainly try not to use them. I am sure cloud will still be kicking around for a while yet.

Has 2012 been a good, bad or ugly year? Good. Overall 2012 has been another solid year for us, another 50 per cent organic growth and higher quality customer base as a result, which was fantastic.

What would you have as your last meal? Thai or Indian – it's too tough to choose.

What keeps you awake at night? Not much, I try not to let things get to me. I often think about monthly sales numbers and big deal decisions.

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

Have any of your predictions come true this year? I don’t like to be proved wrong so tend to shy away from predictions, but usually go for Man Utd winning the Premier League! I was three minutes away from that coming true.

What do you see as the channel’s biggest challenge in 2013? I believe that the market is very much making decisions based on service. The challenges for many channel organisations will be working out ways to differentiate based on the service they provide. I also think customers are taking a little longer to make buying decisions and things are more competitive than ever before, so dealing with the issues that brings is a constant challenge.