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At ASM, we are extremely proud of our workforce and are committed to developing skills and experiences across the team. Investing in our people is a vital part of the culture at ASM and lends itself to our core values as our people are our greatest asset and make all the difference. Our team is made up of driven individuals who are constantly contributing and adding to the wider team. Our dedication and determination mean that we can best serve our clients and generate real long-term value and benefits.

We are exceptionally proud of Leanne Ogden, Head of Business Development for being shortlisted as a finalist for CRN’s Women in Channel awards Outstanding Returner category. For this category, the judges were looking for someone who has been inspirational in returning successfully to a career. In this blog, we allow our readers to get to know the woman behind the nomination and gain an understanding of Leanne’s personal and professional journey so far.

Tell us about your role at ASM?

As Head of Business Development, I am responsible for managing the growth and development of our reseller account base and the external team. We pride ourselves on building and maintaining strong relationships with our key clients, helping our customers to explore the latest emerging technologies within the market to save our customers money and disrupt the status quo. As a team we look at innovative ways to add value to our existing clients using our extensive partner network to offer new opportunities. A typical week (pre Covid) for myself and the team involved four days a week on client sites. I think I speak for all the team when I say that we each thrive off the variety the role brings and the need to be ready, think on your feet and to expect the unexpected.

What led you to this career?

My mum. She is truly the inspiration for pretty much everything that I have achieved. Without her I am not sure what I would have chosen as a career. It’s true to say that I never really had any burning desire to work in the channel, in the beginning I just needed a job, and to quote my mum at the time “a proper job”. When I was offered my first job in IT, initially I declined it as I was scared. Scared that I couldn’t do it, scared of the unknown, scared that as a 21-year-old girl, I wouldn’t succeed. It was at this point that my mum stepped in with her words of wisdom and gave me the encouragement I needed and assured me that I could do it and would be successful. Fast forward 16 years and I absolutely love working in the channel – no two days are ever the same and I thrive in a fast-paced environment and working with ever evolving technologies. I only hope that one day I can be just as good an inspiration to my daughter.

Tell us about an accomplishment that you are proud of?

I have worked on several of ASMs key accounts, but my biggest achievement to date must be taking one of those accounts from a relatively small spend with ASM to now being our largest customer, transacting across multiple countries. Whilst this took around 12 – 18 months to achieve I loved every minute of it. There were lots of early mornings, late nights and overnight stays but there is no better feeling than living and breathing the success as it happens over time.

What personality trait do you most credit your success to and why?

I am a very organised person and believe that my approach to life and work have helped me to build a successful career. Whilst trying to juggle a busy work and home life, organisation is critical. In my role, I often have multiple deadlines to meet whilst supervising the team and managing my own account base so being organised enables me to work through my never ending to do list.

Good luck to Leanne as a finalist for the Outstanding Returner award at the CRN Women in Channel awards – we have full faith in you and look forward to watching you continue to grow in what will be an exciting future at ASM.

I wrote my intentions for 2020 down on the first day back at work. Be efficient, learn and communicate – it was all a bit fluffy, even by my own admittance.

Two days in and I was packing a bag for a working week in Orlando, Florida. “When are you going on your holiday” everyone would ask, and I would bite. Inside I’m thinking… work hard at school kids, get a good job, be good at it and you too could be packing your sun cream with your laptop. After a few weeks’ family time over Christmas, new year is the perfect time to go on a business trip, soak up some Vitamin D between meetings, and escape the cold, dark mornings. Yet I felt the need to play it down. If anything, family and colleagues should feel sorry for me – I had to put my Dry-Veganuary on hold.

One of ASM’s strategic vendors LogMeIn (now rebranded to ‘GoTo’) had invited us to their 3-day global Sales Kick Off event at Universal Studios. The theme was “Be the Catalyst”. They were embracing Channel Partners in a big way, letting us into their world and treating us like their own.

It’s not easy for a vendor to navigate a multifaceted $Billion business towards the channel. Not least because THE CHANNEL, is not one thing, it is many channels. Traditional channels and shadow channels want differing things from a vendor partner. The old Telecoms channel that is morphing into the UCC (Unified Communications and Collaboration) channel, behaves differently from the CySec (Cyber Security) specialist channel, which differs again from the new emerging/disruptive tech channels pushing the likes of A.I (Artificial Intelligence) and RPA (Robotic Process Automation). It’s horses for courses as the old British proverb goes.

LogMeIn have solutions that fit into each of these channels and more besides. Could “Be the Catalyst” as a theme, be relevant to their direct sales teams AND their channel partners, or is it as fluffy as my own new year’s resolutions? I was just glad not to hear anything like the launch of a Platinum-Gold-Silver Partner Program. Even A.I can surely come up with something more 2020 than that.

Whilst meeting and socialising with the LogMeIners, there was a great sense of team, yet the talks and awards seemed more focused on individual performance. CEO Bill Wagner summed this up quoting the weekends NFL play-off debutant Deshaun Watson saying, “Somebody had to be great – why not me?” Right on theme with being a catalyst. I love a sporting analogy and with that quote, I was ready to be motivated.

COO Marc Van Zadelhoffs catalyst story kept the motivation high with the type of energy and enthusiasm you get at a Microsoft or Apple product launch, living up to his very credible pedigree.

The US high fiving and whooping culture was perfectly counter balanced by the quintessential charm of SVP Worldwide Sales Chris Manton-Jones. LogMeIn’s very own Mr Darcy.

Enter another outsider, Lisa Bodell. She reset my new year’s resolutions within 10 minutes, and those of probably all 1200 people in the room. 1. Ask Killer Questions. 2. Kill a Stupid Rule. 3. Be Chief Simplifier. Then she told us just to try just 1 of these things. She is my kind of influencer.

Evidence of success and future growth was aplenty. The Channel message was effectively ratified with proof of higher AOV’s (Average Order Values) and greater chance of upsell/cross sell when partnering with the channel. They didn’t use the word “stickiness”, but I think it fits well here.

Next up, the channel partners from across the globe were given a glimpse of things to come. It was a soft launch gently easing us into their more cohesive new focus, rather than a grand “ta-da” moment. An immaculate big bang theory of channels colliding to form a new world would’ve been a tough sell. The refreshing theme of the success stories were people and relationship centric rather than too product or channel program heavy. Some role playing was threatened by thankfully avoided.

And so, to beer and cocktails by the pool. Not on the formal agenda, but a welcome choice of location for a breakout meeting with EMEA Channel Sales Director Gerald Byrne and some of his team.  I say meeting, but when I was proper belly laughing to the point of tears, it was easy to forget to take minutes!

Universal Studios City Boardwalk and Harry Potter World were exclusively ours for that evening. I say “ours” because I was feeling very much a part of the LogMeIn family by that time.

The second full day of proceedings dived deeper into the varying parts of their business, yet the focus remained deliberately, and refreshingly, on case studies and success stories. Prestigious customers were there to champion the products and the process of engagement. The channel message remained strong.

The final evening was an awards ceremony. After celebrating with the winners and some great conversation, I did the classic escape trip on route to the bar. This time I was not the last man standing – how very sensible of me.

In summary this was an excellently organised event. LogMeIn are an established successful company, who are evolving and innovating. The overriding take-away was that this is a “people” driven business where relationships with customers and partners, and colleagues are key to its success. They communicated their message well and are keen to learn about how the channel can make them more efficient. Perfectly on theme with my own and ASM’s intentions for this year. Well done and thanks to the LogMeIn team.

Stephen Dale

Account Director – Systems Integrators – sdale@asmtech.com

There I was, packing my bags for my forthcoming business trip, singing an abundance of songs about San Francisco, dreaming of taking in the fantastic Californian views. 

How wrong could I be. Let’s get this bit over and done with, the travel was hard work, but I mustn’t complain – I was in San Francisco!  I was keen to take it all in but arriving at night left nothing but an air of of trepidation – mainly around my alarm going off the next morning. 

As someone who has been working in IT for… well let’s say lots of years, it was wonderful to be in the heart of innovation and see some incredible businesses. Even the adverts in the airport were of tech companies; it was like being in a microcosm of IT and I loved it.  

As I had never visited the city before it seemed only logical to see some of the sights while I had this great opportunity. So I spent the early morning walking around finding the offices of everyone we needed to visit. I’d walked so far and wide learning the streets and buildings my boss renamed me sat nav for the remainder of the trip. 

I’d arranged a busy week visiting our key business partners alongside the Opswat Partner Summit.  

Our partners, Elastic, were so welcoming and I really felt that our business partners appreciated the time we took to visit and utilise the time we had. We often meet the UK and European teams to learn about their software and how it makes data useable for our customers in real time, so it was fantastic to learn more about the US markets and meet their teams. 

PDF specialists Nitro had the most amazing offices I have ever seen, with a beautiful view over the bay and bridge. We were totally blown away to be welcomed by the CEO/Founder and the Head of Global Channel. It’s great to use the opportunities with our partners to throw around ideas, talk about our successes and see what more we can do to support our customers.  

At the Opswat Partner Summit the CEO and Senior Vice President welcomed partners from all over the globe. As the UK approved partner for Opswat it’s great to spend a few days gaining a deeper insight into the product, the values and the company’s future. Hearing successes from partners in other countries enables us to expand our knowledge which we can then pass on to our customers. On the Saturday we had the most wonderful boat trip into the bay to watch a display by the Blue Arrows while sharing the day with the wider Opswat team and their families. I really did feel part of the team and it goes a long way to continuing our strong business relationship. 

Overall it was very exciting to experience part of a technology driven state with so many business leaders and innovation that it just screams from the buildings and billboards. It was a pleasure to visit San Francisco and be welcomed by our business partners and I look forward to visiting again. 

Adele Hope-Urwin

Software Channel Manager – ahope-urwin@asmtech.com

Who lets a salesman into a procurement conference? Imposter I hear them cry!

Risk taking conference founder Matthias Gutzmann linkedin.com/in/matthiasgutzmann opened Digital Procurement World 2019 with the inspiring story of how he gave up his job to pursue his idea of starting a new type of conference, and thanked his Mum and Dad for letting him move back into their house. Any adult willing to move back in with parents to follow their dreams deserves success in my eyes.

When I was hustled into a side room after the opening talks, it wasn’t to be asked if I was at the wrong conference, it was because I had applied for and been selected to take part in the IBM sponsored Hackathon event. Another risky idea from Matthias, this time encouraged by IBMs Bob Booth linkedin.com/in/bobebooth. So not only am I a salesman at procurement event, I am a salesman at a hackathon at a procurement event, in Amsterdam, without a bike. At this point I said goodbye to my comfort zone.

Group Dynamics v Great Ideas

What do you get if you cross a salesman, a procurement analyst, and a data scientist, with a company founder, 2 IBM mentors and a PhD student of AI and Cognitive Science? started no joke ever.

Over the years I’ve clocked up plenty of hours working with great procurement people in the technology sector, so I rocked up armed with a few reasonably bright ideas. Other than a few experienced “hackathoners”, most of us didn’t know what to expect. Students and professionals alike had heard about the abundance of free food and felt that was a reasonable pay off for helping IBM invent some new patents to file.

The room was buzzing with dreams of the €3000 prize pot which was surely to be issued on a big pretend cheque, causing the winner many issues with carry-on baggage restrictions.

Proceedings kicked off with the inevitable introductions process, and I was soon clammy palmed when I realised we were doing the whole personality trait self-analysis thing. I thought so hard about what personality characteristics I would like to have that I forgot all my bright ideas. I thought I had played it safe and stuck my post it note near Bobs on the quadrant, but it turns out he (and now I) were both rather extreme.

Despite my scepticism (very possibly fear) of the personality trait exercise, it sent me off on a path of self-discovery which framed my 2-day experience. The bright ideas about digital procurement innovation ebbed and flowed, but the group dynamic remained constantly delightful. Early on, I gingerly proposed we adopt a leaderless approach, not wanting to appear too assertive. Nobody objected, so clearly they enjoyed this. Although I have to wonder, if by suggesting this method, I had therefore become the leader.

To Sleep or Not to Sleep

Our Team were challenged to create new value and measurements in procurement. We all know that procurement only care about savings, right? I think this was why they let a few outsiders in, to think differently. The challenge called for bold and brave, but it had to be feasible and ready to demo by the next morning. I believe our team’s solution was the only one of all the entries that was truly new and innovative. The atmosphere was positive as we set to work and ploughed on past dusk, powered by pizza with some sleeping in situ and some coding through the night. Another team were having a tough time and abandoned their idea near the end of the first day only to start again from scratch. After the morning rehearsals, we felt our team were sitting pretty.

Our Solution

Our team decided to measure the positive and negative experiences internal stakeholders and suppliers have when dealing with procurement. The industry currently relies on measurements from the structured data in ERP, SRM and CRM systems. SLA attainment, adherence to process, and savings amount for example dehumanise the people behind it all.

A lot of the real value, and human endeavour, in the procurement process is not captured because it resides in emails, phone calls, meetings and video conferences (unstructured data).

The traditional measurements don’t capture the behaviour of the people involved that lead to the outcomes. By using Sentiment Analytics and Natural Language Programming we can capture this data, and correlate it with the structured data, to discover which behaviours, sentiments and language relate to the positive outcomes.

We can then use all the clever AI, Machine Learning, Cognitive stuff to identify the good the people do and try and get them to do more of it, whilst also gaining insights that could teach the future robots what to do. I’m probably not making it sound very simple, because it’s not. Keep going, the judges said.

How did it all end?

The final vote was taken by the conference audience via the event app. Maybe championing “the value of people” at a digital conference, offended the bots that counted the votes so unfortunately our team didn’t win.

The team that was having trouble the day before, who ended up designing another solution in half the time, ended up coming second. An excellent advert for agile working and the principles of failing fast but coming back stronger.

The whole experience has been great for me – pushing myself well out of my comfort zone into a world I didn’t think a salesman was even allowed into. I’ve always held a long-term goal of starting or being part of an actual think-tank and this positive experience has re-energised me. Well done to the winners who were cool throughout, coded through the night and communicated their concept with excellence. Although when I stepped on the plane for home, I did have a little laugh thinking of them trying to get that cheque home.

Stephen Dale

Account Director – Systems Integrators – sdale@asmtech.com