I believe the key
to having staff
go the extra mile
for one another
is creating an
environment where
communication is
encouraged and
healthy.
prevalent and everyone is empowered to
make decisions to run their sector or region.
Do you work differently with
channel partners in the Middle East
compared to Africa?
The way partners are handled can be at
risk of spiralling out of control if we start
managing the foundations of how we engage
differently based on regions, or other
factors. The key here is that the partner
programme is the ruling guideline. Of
course, there are cultural considerations to
think about and our local presence in many
markets allows us to acknowledge these and
behave in a recognisable and respectable
way towards all our partners. We do not
have different standards or requirements
– the programme guidelines apply to all
which provides a fair, well-constructed equal
playing field for all.
How do your partners deliver
Centrify solutions to end-users?
We recently launched some exciting
professional services training in our Centrify
university which actually means that for
the first time, it’s not a requirement for our
channel to buy services from Centrify in order
to deliver our solutions. The benefits here are
abundant but in short, it gives that partner
even more value in the customer’s eye, allows
them to build a revenue stream from their
own in-house services and of course, allows
the customer to procure these services at
local rates in local currency which is a massive
ask from the majority of our end-user base.
How do you ensure channel
partners flourish in a highly
competitive market?
We shall be building on enablement and
empowerment in 2019 as a priority. We want
our channel to be the most knowledgeable
player in the privilege management space
and more than that, we want them to take
that conversation to a higher level around
our Zero Trust Privilege Security, which
we also offer training on. This deepens the
customer conversation to look at overall
maturity models of their security posture
60
and allows for a really engaging, beneficial
conversation for the end-user. It’s often
referred to as the ‘value exchange’: when
a potential customer has given you 30
minutes of their time to meet and have a
discussion, they offer their time as the value.
It’s important to ensure that you’re bringing
something of equal or higher value to the
table in the exchange and that’s where we
want our partners to stand out.
What are the latest trends you see
emerging across the channel?
I’m a keen believer in trying new things and
working to keep our channel ahead of the
market curve. One aspect we have been
working on which was driven by market
trends over the past 24 months is a solid
and fully functional MSP (Managed Services
Provider) offering. With the combination
of vendor consolidation and outsourcing,
many customers are looking to put their
infrastructure – and now security – in the
cloud. It presents an opportunity to reduce
costs, complexity and makes for a very
strong OPEX versus CAPEX conversation.
Centrify has always been very strong in our
cloud architecture and it has therefore been
at the forefront of this evolution, partnering
with the likes of AWS to deliver security
around the infrastructure component.
Which regions do you see offering
the most opportunities for Centrify?
The Middle East market continues to perform
strongly for us and we have yet to see a mass
drive towards cloud adoption. I remember
attending the first Middle East Cloud Summit
in Abu Dhabi 10 years ago where it was said
that cloud would take at least five years to
become a natural option in that market. We
are starting to see that more and more and is
especially relevant to Centrify when we are
focused on securing your access and privilege
to those apps and content which you’ve
already placed there, rather than focusing on
moving data to the cloud.
Our other markets also continue to
grow. The UK, Nordics, Germany and France
have all seen Centrify investment either in
resources or a focused channel rollout.