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Alliance Challenges

Increase Relevance and Mindshare

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Questions to Ask

How do I stay top of mind?

How do I gain executive commitment?

How do my partners know and understand my value?

How do I stay top of mind?

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Watch Video of Deb Barnard on staying top of mind – 2:30

Empathetic Value

One key is to understand the level of each part of the organization that you are talking to and to adapt your value messaging to the stakeholder. Whether you are speaking to an executive, a manager, or the frontline, you have to r tailor your message to what matters most to them. Their goals and needs are very different, and you as an alliance professional have to bring contextual and relevant value messages to each stakeholder. It often will come down to your ability to connect with those people on a personal level so that they believe that you are someone they can trust to meet their objectives.

Paint the Picture
For every one you are trying to influence, you must to be able to help them see where and how you work together to achieve their goals through servicing r mutual customers.

Create the Win 4x
Be crystal clear about what the win is for you, the partner, and the customer. And what value the partner ecosystem delivers by coming together.

Lead them to the water
Work backward from what you are each trying to accomplish to see every step to get there and how each party can help to achieve that. Identifying quick wins is critical so that your initial successes give other stakeholders the impetus and confidence to join with you.

How do I gain executive commitment?

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Watch Video of Deb Barnard on gaining executive commitment – 1:32

How do my partners know and understand my value?

Play Video

Watch Video of Deb Barnard on gaining executive commitment – 1:32

You know when there is value when something is easy for the customer to buy and easy for the salesforce to sell. When you have to look hard to find it, there is not enough evidence, or it’s not clearly communicated what the value is, it makes it that much harder for the partnership to succeed. You know the value is there when it’s clear, easy to consume, you understand what the points of differentiation are, what is helping you achieve, and it’s aligned to a business outcome.
  1. When customers are asking for it.

    There is nothing like customer demand. When listening to your customers, it can be very important to pick up on partnerships they would like to see take place.

  2. When Peers Are Pleased

    When your peers are telling you, “You should take a hard look at this company, because they did these great things. I really love working with them.” then you know there may be value in partnering with that company.

  3. When it empowers you

    If you are seeing that partnering with an organization does something for you that you can’t do on your own, then you know the value is really clear.

Facilitated Program for Collaborative Customer and Supplier Account Planning


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Other Alliance Challenges

Increase Relevance and Mindshare

Gaining Partner Preference, Bias, and Affinity is paramount. Partners have options. How do I stay relevant and top of mind while gaining executive commitment?

Orchestrate Heightened Complexity

Alliances are no longer two-way partnerships anymore: multi-partnering and coopetition is the new norm. With so many moving parts and so many aspects out of direct control, how do I navigate the waters and make the right decisions to drive the greatest impact in an ever-changing market landscape?

Improve Your Way of Working

Working with Partners is an afterthought for my company, not a way to accomplish our initiatives. How do I evolve our organization to be partner-first? How do I get senior leadership, management and the frontline to “get it” and make partnering built-in vs. bolted on.

Differentiate Value Messaging

How do I rally the right resources from both my organization and my partner to come together to help us craft a message that will stand out?  How do I get leadership and other parts of management on board to communicate the key messages to their troops? How do I keep them engaged to reinforce the key messages and drive the new behavior?

Boost Team Performance

In order to achieve remarkable results, we need a new kind of leadership. How do I create an organization that is viewed as “catalyst for change,” not an overlay?  What is the model needed to create a high performance team?  What are the roles needed? What is the right compensation? How do I motivate and drive the other parts of the org?

Create Meaningful Measurement

I am constantly having to prove my Alliance team’s value to my internal stakeholders.  What are the best methods to demonstrate ecosystem and partner impact:  What measure/metrics matter, how do we collect them, how do we show them in dashboards and scorecards, and how do we make them pertinent for both internal and external stakeholders?  And how do I do this all in a way that is believable?