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An Iconic Ecosystem Leader Joins Ultimate Guide to Partnering
I’m joined by an iconic leader steeped in the art and science of successful partnerships. Jenni Flinders shares how she’s pivoting an already successful partner program to ignite partner-led growth and why you may want to rethink your partner ecosystem strategy. As the worldwide partner leader at NetApp, Jenni Flinders discusses the driving factors leading to the transformation of her program, why she is the only ISV to develop strategic offerings with all three hyperscalers, BIG announcements this week at INSIGHT, and her career journey to channel chief at three leading technology organizations.
I hope you enjoy this discussion as much as I enjoyed welcoming Jenny Flinders.
In Jenni’s words
Jenni Flinders is the SVP for NetApps Worldwide Partner Group, responsible for developing
and executing NetApp’s overall partner strategy and programs for its global ecosystem of partners and ensuring NetApp’s customers reap the benefits of cloud and emerging technologies.
Jenni has astutely developed comprehensive partner organizations that bring together the power of marketing, sales, and partner development to rapidly achieve “selling at scale,” emphasizing cloud and hybrid-cloud markets. Jenni brings a wealth of industry expertise to partner ecosystems as a route-to-market as VP of Global Partners at VMware and as Vice President U.S. Partner Group at Microsoft.
What You’ll Learn in this Episode
- Introducing Jenni Flinders (1:51)
- Jenni’s Role & Mission at NetApp (3:23)
- Why NetApp is in a unique position (5:43)
- Value of the relationship with partners in building out the program (10:35)
- Her career journey from South Africa (15:07)
- Obstacles she faced as a woman leader (18:55)
- Announcement of the new program (20:39)
- Link to NetApp’s Big Insight Event
Creating Ultimate Partnerships
Let’s face it, we all have seen partnerships that look good on paper but never live up to their expected results. There are many reasons why partnerships fail, and at Ultimate Partnerships, we help you get it right by applying a proven set of best practices and frameworks. If you want to learn more, follow the link in the show notes, or visit our website.
Partner Ecosystem Leader Episodes
163 – A Partnership Leader Uniquely Growing Hubspot’s Ecosystem Community
162 – How You Can Unleash the Power of Data to 10X Your Partner Growth!
153 – Janet Schijins – Ecosystems & Megacosm
150- Celebrating 150 Amazing Episodes with a Five-Timer Guest, Jay McBain
149 – WTF is an Ecosystem? And How Partner Hacker helps tech companies PartnerUp with Jared Fuller
Other Links from this Episode
Transcription – by Otter.ai – Expect Typos
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
partner, customers, partnerships, NetApp, partnering, working, business, journey, technology, leader, cloud, market, portfolio, offering, delivering, Jenni, event, joins, vince, Microsoft
SPEAKERS
Announcer, Jenni Flinders, Vince Menzione
Vince Menzione
00:00
Why you as a partner ecosystem leader may want to rethink your partner ecosystem approach. In this next episode, I’m joined by an iconic leader, steeped in the art and science of successful partnerships. She joins to share how she’s pivoting an already successful partner program to holistically ignite partner-led growth.
Announcer
00:23
Welcome to The Ultimate Guide to partnering. And this podcast Vince Menzione. A proven sales and partner executive brings together leaders to discuss transformational trends and deconstruct successful strategies to help technology leaders like you achieve your greatest results through successful partnering. And now your host Vince Menzione.
Vince Menzione
00:46
Welcome to or welcome back to The Ultimate Guide to partnering. I’m Vince Menzione, your host and my mission is to help leaders like you unlock the leadership principles and learnings of the best in the business to get partnerships right, optimize for success and deliver your greatest results. Welcome to or welcome back to The Ultimate Guide to partnering. I’m Vince Menzione, your host and today I welcome Jenni Flinders, the worldwide partner leader at NetApp joins to discuss the driving factors leading to the transformation of her program, why she is the only ISP to develop strategic offerings, with all three hyperscalers some big announcements coming this week at her insight event and her career journey to channel chief at three leading technology organizations. I hope you enjoy this discussion as much as I enjoyed welcoming Jenni Flinders Jenni, welcome to the podcast.
Jenni Flinders
01:51
Hey, Vince, thank you for having me.
Vince Menzione
01:53
I am so excited to welcome you. Finally, as a guest on Ultimate Guide to partnering. You’re the Senior Vice President for the worldwide partner organization at NetApp. And we work together at Microsoft, didn’t we? So welcome.
Jenni Flinders
02:08
That is. Yeah, that’s correct. Many great memories over the years. And just fantastic to be with you today.
Vince Menzione
02:15
I am honored and excited I have to tell you, I am so looking forward to having you. You are an eminent leader in this art and science of partnering and iconic leader and many years as a channel chief at Microsoft, then VMware and now NetApp. For our listeners, though, maybe the one or two that don’t know who you are, can you describe Jenni Flinders,
Jenni Flinders
02:38
Jenni Flinders? Gosh, I would say a lifelong science lover of the technology industry, right? And as you referenced, since it’s the art of the science, I love the technology side. And really, I think embrace that throughout my career. But I’d say also lean into the art component, right? Because technology is just amazing in terms of what we can bring to fruition in the forefront. And then the art and the science of partnerships is what has been sort of the North Star. That’s that’s just guided me and everything that I’ve done. So yeah, I would say, Jenni, it’s all about the art and science right.
Vince Menzione
03:18
Tell us a little bit more about the role, worldwide partner organization, that’s a big job. So tell us more about your mission.
Jenni Flinders
03:25
So my mission is to really take the whole global strategy for NetApp as it relates to our partner business, and set our Northstar in terms of we want to accelerate growth and customer success, but with a very vibrant and committed partner ecosystem. Right. So our portfolio has expanded tremendously over the last couple of years vents. And that just gives us an amazing opportunity to open a lot more avenues of engagement for our partners and for NetApp.
Vince Menzione
03:58
So a lot of excitement coming out of NetApp Right, I’ve been seeing a lot of buzz around partnerships, ecosystem partner led growth. In fact, I recall on a recent post, tell us more about what’s driving this buzz.
Jenni Flinders
04:12
So if you look at what as I mentioned, our portfolio is expanded right? And so let me take a step back, we recently announced that we will be bringing a new program to the market at the beginning of our fiscal in 2024. So that’ll be in the spring of next year. And we’ve named this new program NetApp partner sphere to really sort of demonstrate that it’s holistic, and it’s it’s encompasses all partner types, all business models with an emphasis on cloud and services. And the reason why we brought this to market is just looking at NetApp. It’s not any storage, right? If you look at what we’ve done around cloud ops and the way it differentiates us now in the market, it was just time for us to sort of scrub how our program was set up. And what we needed to change going forward. Because our goal is to drive partner led growth. So this program, as I say, it’s encompasses all partner types and business models. And the big target there is to accelerate our growth together with our partners, right?
Vince Menzione
05:24
really insightful here, Jenni, because a lot of organizations struggle with this transformation. And it seems like you’re on top of this, right? This whole hyperscale their growth, changing the model, allowing partners to be more successful, right, moving away from the old models, what were the driving factors from your side to make this shift?
Jenni Flinders
05:43
Well, NETOPS in a unique position, I mean, it’s just started with that trial. If you look at the market today, we are so uniquely positioned than I would say, it’s the right time right now for our partners to engage with us. And if you say to me, Jenni, what are those differentiating factors? I’m going to say? Well, first of all, we do best in class and storage solutions. We are events, the only ISV to form strategic alliances with the three major cloud providers. And certainly the third thing I would say is offering a transformational Cloud Suite with Cloud ops solutions, right, which really help our customers see the most ROI from their cloud investment. So that I would say it’s been a driving force around this
Vince Menzione
06:29
diving in here on a topic that’s really important, this hyper scalar topic, right? This building these significant practices, these strategic alliances, as you discuss, tell us more about the first party solution you built with one of those hyper scalars.
Jenni Flinders
06:44
Absolutely, so I can touch on on a few of them for you. So obviously, AWS, Azure and Google Cloud, right. So if we look at what we actually doing with the hyper scalars, so we’ve got Amazon FSX, X for NetApp, ONTAP, right, we’ve got Azure NetApp files, and then we’ve got NetApp cloud volumes, which add service on Google Cloud. Now, these are sold and managed funds by each of these respective cloud providers directly in their own marketplace. And this has just opened up a floodgate for us of partners that want to drive this digital transformation with their customers to their cloud of choice, right? So why isn’t it up so unique? Well, we give customers choice across any of the three providers. And it’s that level of freedom of choice and flexibility that our portfolio, as well as the deep partnerships that we offer, help differentiate NetApp partners so they can manage customers, hybrid, multi cloud environments. So it’s a really strong compelling offering, and position that we have in the market.
Vince Menzione
07:53
I want to emphasize here because maybe not everyone listening understands this, right? And ISPs often struggle working with the tech giants. And I come at the world this way, because I see it firsthand in the work that I do. But you have built first party solutions with the hyper scalars, which is very unique. How did you get there? Like, was there a path to get there?
Jenni Flinders
08:14
Yeah, I think it was listening to customers, right? They wanted hybrid multi cloud flexibility. So what better way to deliver that than partnering with three of the leading providers out there? So Microsoft, AWS, and Google?
Vince Menzione
08:28
And it’s really all about partnership, right? And you have come at this from many years of experience a rich history of experience working with partnerships, what have you seen from the best of the best?
Jenni Flinders
08:41
Ooh, that’s a great question. I would say the best of the best strive to meet customer needs, as I said, the reason why we are partnering so closely with Google Cloud with Azure as well as AWS is listening to customers. And I’d say the best of the best strive to meet those customer needs, across an entire lifecycle and technology journey, right? Whether it be hybrid, whether it be on-premises, whether it be full cloud environments, I think today’s differentiated with Customers is offering that flexibility of choice, I would say events best to the best. They’re not only delivering value throughout the buying process, but what we’ve seen become so evident of value in the market with customers is ensuring that your customer is getting the most of their technology from integration and implementation, all the way through to usage and consumption. So we have to engage with customers across that value cycle, right? I would say the other thing I’ve observed is partnerships come in all forms, whether it’s a partner working together with us to build solutions, or delivering services that help our technology run more effectively. I would say even influencing a customer By showing the value that the network portfolio can bring, and it’s just this common theme around customer value and customer success. And then I would say I’ll top it off in terms of commenting on best of the best. So I would say, let me top it off by saying collaborate and CO file with your partners, right? That’s the only way we’ve seen you can win really effectively out there while providing customers with great solutions for their most pressing business needs.
Vince Menzione
10:30
I love what you have to say, because you are covering the ecosystem, right? There’s a lot of talk around ecosystem, but you just basically talked about, we talked about the five seats at the table, right? The customer is not just making a transactional purchase, right? They’re thinking about their entire cloud strategy. They’re thinking about how they’re going to implement the solution. They’re thinking about the support of this. So you’re thinking about each of the swim lanes each of the partner types as well, as you know that this program added? Did you need to think about things differently in terms of the value of the relationship with the partners as you built out this new program?
Jenni Flinders
11:06
Yeah, totally. If you start with the customer value journey, right from when the idea comes into mind all the way through to realizing what that value is being consciously aware that there are several partners engaged with a customer at any point in time, right? All delivering a unique service or a value somewhere along the customer value journey. So we want to recognize that it’s not just one partner, one customer, it is a customer that has a breadth of partnerships with companies out there that are helping them realize the value of the solutions that they’re putting in place to get the business outcomes. So recognizing partners through these business models and what they deliver right to customers was really important to us. So it’s going way beyond the transaction burns. This is about Integrated Technologies. This is about migration. This is about professional, and advisory services, where we have amazing partners in our ecosystem that helped customers along that valley journey, you know,
Vince Menzione
12:09
what was striking to me is it sounds like or appears like an abundance mentality towards partnership as opposed to this scarcity mentality we’ve all seen right where one partner owns the deal and tries to drive it covets the relationship, they may or may not have that relationship. So you’re looking at holistically Are you rewarding partners, and maybe putting on the spot here with some announcements coming your way. But you’re going to reward multiple partners on the same customer. So
Jenni Flinders
12:37
again, that’s that’s our focus as we go forward with this program, right? So I want to make sure that partners fear when it’s going to like us it sort of all partner business models, right? Which, which means, hey, we’ve taken into account the whole customer value journey. And yes, you want to acknowledge you want to reward partners for delivering value throughout that customer journey. So that is an objective and a goal for us to achieve as we bring this this new program to market,
Vince Menzione
13:09
and spheres. So now that now I’m getting it right, because it’s yours. So it’s
Jenni Flinders
13:15
a nice deck. Yeah, holistic,
Vince Menzione
13:16
I love this. I’m happy to announce that partner tap has become a founding sponsor of ultimate guide to partnering. I’ve been friends with the founders of partner tap for many years. And partner tap is the only partner ecosystem platform designed for the enterprise. Their technology makes it easy to align channel teams with automated account mapping, letting you control what data you share, while building a partner revenue engine. I’m so excited to have them on board. Be on the lookout for events, content and more. And I’m so excited to continue working together and our exciting year ahead. So why should partners listening to our podcast today work with you and your organization?
Jenni Flinders
14:08
I would say there’s no better time right now than to be a partner with NetApp. Private on, on everything that that I was just mentioning, I think we uniquely differentiated. We have deep partnerships with leading cloud providers offering these first party native services, right? So giving align partners to give the customers choice, right. But Vince, I’d say it’s not only just our storage capabilities with the acquisitions and the expansion of our portfolio, if you just take one like Cloud ops as an example, that is setting us apart from the competition to provide partners with access to a broader set of cloud-native tools to help manage their customers cloud journey with cost optimization, automation as well as security right security is top of mind, cyber resiliency. So when you look at what net that app has pulled together in terms of the portfolio, it’s just I would say there’s no better time than now to partner with NetApp. We’ve got the flexibility. And we also have Keystone arrangements where we’re providing the offering around consumption flexibility for customers. So there’s, there’s just so much goodness, that is coming out of what we have to offer. Tell us more about Keystone, Keystone. So there’s more to come on that fence. And, and you and I can do a follow up on that. The mid November, right? Because we have our insight event coming up soon. And customers and partners, we’ll be hearing more from our insight event.
Vince Menzione
15:41
All right, just a little tease then for I love it.
Jenni Flinders
15:46
Always gotta gotta keep you on your toes. Pavan.
Vince Menzione
15:50
Yes, you have had this amazing career journey, we had the opportunity to work together, I got to work in your organization, in fact, and you are an amazing leader, just an amazing channel chief, very thoughtful about customers partnerships, more so than candidly I’ve seen for many in my career, it started in South Africa. And I heard some of the journey with you. We’ve talked many times over the years. But for our listeners, I would love if you could take us through a little bit of that journey, maybe a spark or propellant that got you to where you are to this amazing leadership role as a woman leader in technology. Yeah,
Jenni Flinders
16:29
that’s a great question. Thank you for asking, and I appreciate your kind words to Vince. So I would say gosh, yeah, I did. I started in South Africa. And my journey into the global world started when I joined Microsoft in South Africa. And I have a fantastic rolling with them, just establishing the whole mid market business. And you know, working in South Africa, you really had to think outside the box to be competitive. And that’s exactly what we did. We sort of pushed the the barriers of innovation, right? How can we do things differently to set ourselves apart in that market led to best practices that were shared across the world. And one of the defining moments I always say to people don’t, don’t be afraid of change and take risks. And I found myself in that situation when I got the phone call to say, hey, we want you to come to Latin America, and Ron midmarket and the partner business there, and I thought, oh, gosh, I didn’t speak a word of Spanish or Portuguese. But here we go. So that was, that was sort of the the big change for me in my career where I learned so much, but working in a different continent, different languages, different culture, learning to listen to understand, versus learn, like listening to respond, you know, so I started building out my leadership principles, when I was in that situation in litem to help me become a better leader. And to just, I would say, always have this learning mindset, right? And, gosh, just an amazing time working in Latin America that taught me a lot about leadership, working with people and fostering innovation around ideation on how to grow the business and being creative, right? And I would say the rest is history events, gosh, and then worked for Microsoft Clavell. It’s had a fantastic time and VMware, sort of reconstructing a lot of how we thought about partnership, therefore, VMware, and, gosh, I’m blessed to be at NetApp. What a wonderful company, great culture, fantastic people, and just an amazing sort of portfolio of offerings that we can take to customers. So I can say my journey has been blessed. I’ve learned to take risks, I’ve learned to be open to change. And I’ve learned to be a lifelong learner. So that’s definitely a theme for me.
Vince Menzione
18:58
I love the learning mindset you referenced. And you’re being modest. You got several phone calls. I mean, you went from labs, and you went to the worldwide organization in a leadership role. And then you ran the whole US partner business. It was a significant role at Microsoft. Were there as a woman leader in technology, or maybe just in general, were there any obstacles you needed to overcome?
Jenni Flinders
19:22
obstacles? Events? I would say you always face obstacles, right? Depends on the situation. And I think I often put myself in other people’s shoes to try and understand different perspectives right for me to overcome obstacles, whether it’s business transformation, whether it’s engaging different teams or groups, and I keep going back to be a learner, right? Never assume you you always know because somebody’s got a different perspective. And when you open yourself up to learning and just appreciating different perspectives, it really helps you overcome some obstacles. So I think there’s always going to be obstacles. And one thing that’s consistent is change that fence. So I would say, having that player mentality and not a victim mentality has also been really important to overcoming obstacles, thinking about what you can do differently, instead of expecting other people to do things differently.
Vince Menzione
20:22
You reminded me In fact, I just got to meet Ryan Holiday, just last week, stoicism and big, big advocate in that area. And his book is called the obstacle is the way and it just reminded me of that great book.
Jenni Flinders
20:34
Yeah, you’re gonna learn all the time, right? So I look at obstacles as an opportunity.
Vince Menzione
20:39
Absolutely. And tell us more about the big event that’s coming up.
Jenni Flinders
20:43
So we have our customer and partner event inside. So we are getting ready for that very exciting, we’re going to have some great announcements. So I would say encourage everybody to register for our insight, digital event. And come and join us and hear all the fantastic things that we’re going to bring to market.
Vince Menzione
21:03
And we’re going to provide links for our listeners in the show notes so they can register today. That’s great. So Jenni, you have been an amazing guest, and I can’t wait to have you back again, this follow up conversation. And you’re just I think you are trailblazing in this industry. And I think our listeners, I believe our listeners really need to listen to what you’re doing. And take note. But can you add to our listeners journey, and help share with them? How can they best optimize for success with you and your organization,
Jenni Flinders
21:36
I would say reach out to NetApp and learn about our portfolio and what it has to offer. And you know how you can or be or how partners can work with our field teams to determine joint opportunities with us, right? I would say getting up to speed on the new program, the features, and what it’s going to mean for our partners is going to be really exciting, right? So try and try and get as much information as you can on that. And it’s we’re excited for this launch. But I can’t tell you, it’s just going to be it’s going to lay the foundation for the future of partnering with NetApp. And we are a partner led company, we love our partners and making it easier for them to do business with us and to expand their offerings. And customer choice is really top of mind around the whole construct of this new programs. So yeah, it’s the right time right now.
Vince Menzione
22:33
So excited to see the partner led growth and the partner mindset and your organization. I wouldn’t expect less, Jenni, I want to thank you have been an amazing friend, and mentor. So excited to have you today. And hopefully have you back again soon. Yes. Thank you for your time.
Jenni Flinders
22:50
I look forward to it. Vince, it’s been fantastic chatting with you today. Thank you again. And as you always say Happy partnering.
Vince Menzione
22:59
Happy partner. I love it. So there you have it. Another amazing guest joins Ultimate Guide to partnering. And I hope you enjoyed this interview as much as I did. Odds are if you’re a technology partner, executive and hearing my voice, chances are you, too, are looking to accelerate your success through partnerships. I mean, let’s face it. We all have seen partnerships that look good on paper, but never live up to their expected results. There are a lot of reasons why partnerships fail. And at ultimate partnerships, we help you get it right by applying a proven set of best practices and framework that’s used by leading partners working with Microsoft and other technology giants. If you want to learn more, follow the link in the show notes, or visit our website at Ultimate Guide to partnering.com.
Announcer
23:54
Thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Ultimate Guide to partnering with your host Vince Menzione online at Ultimate Guide to partnering.com and facebook.com/ultimate Guide to partnering. We’ll catch you next time on The ultimate guide to partnering.