Meet the channel manager: Symantec

Symantec’s senior director of Pacific channel sales, Klasie Holtzhausen, came to Australia 16 years ago from South Africa. The security vendor is undergoing a major program restructure, including the addition of 12 new Symantec Solution Competencies. The new program aims to reward partners for more than just transactional performance, and includes measurements of factors such as customer satisfaction.

Programs

"Symantec has always had a very strong and good partner program, but we continue to look for opportunities for improvement. We consulted a number of partners globally, including those in our region, about how we can improve our program. That resulted in us engaging an external consultant to build a new program from the ground up. To be launched in October, this program is centred on competence: rewarding partners for their capabilities, investment and outcomes. The program is also based on the partners’ business models – where our partners might have to support the ways customers want to consume services."

Transformation

"As an organisation, we’ve been going through a transformation. Part of that was the way we engage with the channel, and part of that was the channel program we had. I was immediately supporting and driving that transformation. Certainly while Symantec has always been a very strong channel organisation, it’s about becoming more channel-centric while moving forwards."

Training

"We continue to run tech nights, and we continue to do boot camps, which provides more in-depth technical training to really equip our channel partners to be successful and very predictive with their solutions that they provide to our customers."

Partners

"Our channel ranges from small to very large partners, including Data#3, Ethan Group, Insight Enterprises Australia, Intalock and Insentra."

Feedback

"We’ve certainly gone to our channel partners and solicited their feedback on where they believe we can improve as a vendor, not just from a program perspective but from an engagement perspective, and we’re continuously working with the channel to drive those improvements."

Lessons learned

"It is about being more strategic with the channel as an organisation. I think many vendors make the mistake – and Symantec certainly has in the past – of sometimes becoming too tactical through that engagement with the channel. So a key focus for me and my team is driving that strategic engagement. You’ve got to be more long-sighted because partners are looking for that consistency and looking to the future, because that way they can plan how they’re going to work with us and how our go-to market strategy is going to be beneficial to them as well."

Distributors

"We’ve got two distributors in the Australia region. We work closely with both Ingram Micro and Express Data to support us in taking our solutions and capabilities to the market."