Symantec 4.0: 'We needed to change'

"We've listened to our partners and employees around the world and the overriding consensus is that Symantec needed to change."

That's the honest view of Klasie Holtzhausen, Senior Director, Pacific Channel Sales at Symantec, who tells TechDay that the company needed to change when it came to dealing with the channel market.

Speaking after the security solutions provider announced wholesale changes to its global channel strategy, Holtzhausen was unwavering in his belief that a fresh approach was required for the business to succeed in the market.

"In truth, we weren't meeting our financial objectives and we weren't fully optimising our investments so we needed to make it clear that there was a need for change," Holtzhausen says.

"As a result, we're becoming more efficient as a company, through improving how we engage and work with the channel internally.

"We have designed a program which provides consistency and reliability to our partners as we believe this to be a key area for success.

"This announcement makes it clear to the channel that Symantec is a good company to invest in."

Responsible for building and driving profitable business outcomes by setting the channel strategy for the organisation, Holtzhausen's role also includes a focus on innovating with Symantec’s partners, laying a platform for enhanced customer support.

"Essentially, we want to make it easier for the channel to do business with Symantec," Holtzhausen says.

"We have evolved our market strategy and focused our efforts on investing more time and resources into the channel - centered around rewarding our partners for the value they bring to our company and our customers."

The program is set to launch in phases beginning in early 2014, focusing on achieving sustained profitable growth, greater than market, by leveraging joint assets to deliver value to the customer.

According to the plans, detailed on The Channel, Symantec is also transforming to become a market-led organisation, examining how the company can solve big customer jobs together with partners.

"This isn't just about short-term goals," says Holtzhausen, coming to Symantec with around 20 years of industry experience.

"We're focused on building a sustainable long-term business plan with the channel and our partners.

"From a portfolio perspective we realised we need to concentrate on becoming an integrated solutions company to make it easier for our partners to service our customers.

"This has led to the company simplifying the offerings we're taking to the market."

Holtzhausen joined Symantec following five years as Senior Director, Channel Sales at CA Technologies ANZ, prior to which he held a number of channel related roles at IBM during his eight-year tenure there.

Based in Sydney, Holtzhausen has a successful history in the channel, with demonstrated success in channel sales, channel development, strategic selling, coaching and mentoring.

"Since I joined Symantec nine months ago, we've been gradually putting these initiatives into place, and now the time has come to share our vision with the channel," he adds.

"We've previously had a very complex channel moral but now we want the market to know we've changed, for the better.

"For Symantec to be successful as a company we need to invest more time and resources into the channel, which is what we fully intend to do from 2014 onwards."

For more information about Symantec's Global Channel Strategy, click here