Peek Performance

We've Got the Power!

2011-10-18T09:17:00.000-07:00

I recently attended an excellent alliance training class in Boston by Vantage Partners. I'll be commenting in future blog posts about several of my takeaways from the class and my fellow alliance professionals (40 strong) that attended.

My #1 takeaway? ....

We've Got the Power!

We have more power than we realize. Despite the obstaclesand challenges inherent in building alliance capabilities in our organizations,despite all the things we feel we have no control over–we do have significant power in our role as “interventionists” in ourorganizations.

We can hone our skills as allianceprofessionals and learn the tools and techniques to manage conflict, negotiatebased on interests versus positions, identify and manage differences tomaximize mutual value of the alliance. The extent to which we build our own skills in these areas is the extent to which we can lead by showing our organizations abetter way to think, a better way to make decisions, a more effective frameworkfor managing conflict and thus, a better way to manage and optimize our alliance relationships.

People follow competence. We can indeed change our organizations – one stakeholder at a time…

Badda bing Badda boom!

2011-09-27T05:39:00.000-07:00

Please I beg you - don't be this guy. This is the badda bing, badda boom guy. The guy that starts calling partner prospects "because hey, we need partners!" without a thoughtful strategy.

I know the temptation to do this can be strong, especially if you work at a small company, or if you are under pressure at a larger one. But calling a partner prospect, without understaning why you are calling and why they should care, is a big mistake.

I've been there. While working for a startup, one of the founders came into my office one day and said "we have to partner with XYZ company, we need them!" When I said, "yes, but why do they need us?" he had no ready answer. I suggested we might want to wait until we thought this through before making that first call.

There are three things you must do before making that first call if you want to make a good first impression, and they are not always easy, especially #1.

Know your company's product strategy. This can be difficult for small companies, but I've found this to be a challenge at high tech companies of all sizes. With technology, you can "do anything", so NIH (not invented here) mentality is often a barrier.
Know what's in it for the partner. This requires you to understand their business. Walk in their shoes. Understand their market pressures and aspirations. Do your homework!
Develop a "partnering proposition". This is critical. Your partnering proposition should articulate what it is you are proposing to do together. Since it's a strawman proposal - a starting point, you may not end up here, but please do not make the prospect figure out what you're asking to do! Tell them. Simply. And make it as compelling as you can. "Here's what we do, here's what you do, we'd like to collaborate to deliver X and this is how it will benefit you and our mutual customers."

For more on developing a partnering proposition, see this Partnering Proposition Worksheet I developed for use in exploratory partnership discussions.

In the "friend zone"

2011-09-14T19:17:00.000-07:00

I was having lunch with an alliance colleague a few months agoand he was diagnosing a problem with one of our alliance relationships. He said the problem we're having is that the partner was "treating us like a partner instead of like a client."

He went on to say, that if we were a client, they would be doing everything they could to understand our organizational structure, our culture, our internal capabilities, etc, in order to build a strategy for success. In other words we were relegated to "the friend zone".

It got me thinking that good alliance managers should use some of the same techniques to understand how to navigate and understand their partner's organization that good sales people use to understand the same about their customers'.

For example, the Global Alliance Manager on one of our key partnerships built an influence map of her partner's organization. For each key partner executive, her team identified their:

Authority and influence
Attitude toward our company (positive, neutral, negative)
Personal style
Relationships with other influencers

She's found this map very helpful in explaining the partner organization to internal executives and for understanding how to build support for joint initiatives.

There's a great article on influence maps on the Mind Tools website here.

Can't Get No Respect!

2011-08-30T04:45:00.000-07:00

I often hear alliance managers complain that our roles are not valued by our organization. That company executives don't appreciate the value of alliances. That "alliances can't get any respect" in the organization.

While a lot of this grousing is somewhat justified - we have made great strides in our profession over the years, but we do have a ways to go - I do find myself challenging my colleagues on the grousing from time to time.

When a fellow alliance colleague comes to me complaining about his organization's ambivalence towards alliances, I ask a few questions:

Do you have a formal, consistent process for qualifying, developing and executing new partners and new initiatives?
Do you have a formal approval process for new partner ventures?
Have all internal stakeholder roles and responsibilities been clearly defined, documented and agreed to?
Does your Alliances Management team treat the alliance managers on the team like professionals? Is there a formal career path? Are there alliance training/professional development plans in place?
Is your company a member of ASAP (Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals) and do you have certified alliance professionals on staff?
Are strategic alliance teams staffed with people with the right skills and experience to do the job effectively?
Is there formal alliance measurement and reporting in place to company executives?
Do your partners clearly understand what's expected of them and the partnership in order to drive value for your company?
Do you have documented joint business plans and quarterly business reviews in place for each of your most strategic partnerships?
Are alliances managed as a portfolio with periodic inspection on performance? Are poor performing alliances addressed or are alliance relationships like the roach motel - they check in but never check out?!

I'm not saying that doing these things guarantees that alliances will be respected in your organization - but you will at least have done your part to earn the respect, which is "table stakes" for discussions.

We can't expect our organizations to change, if we aren't willing to do so. Change must start with us!

Captains of Change - Part V: Making Course Corrections

2011-08-21T17:13:00.000-07:00

In the last several posts, I've been talking about the role Alliance Managers as "captains of change" in managing alliance relationships. This is Part V: Making Course Corrections.

Making course corrections on the journey goes hand in hand with Part III - Measure & Inspect. As Alliance Managers, once we develop the joint business plan with our partner, we must "inspect what we expect"in order to ensure that our plans are on track and delivering results. You can't know what to correct if you aren't measuring progress and results!

In my company's journey to improve our alliance competencies, we created a process for consistently qualifying, approving and launching joint partner initiatives. We managed these initiatives as a portfolio and measured them against performance standards - revenue, pipeline, sales traction. We discovered that the #1 reason for failure of a partner initiative was lack of sales sponsorship.

The course correction we made was to require a sales executive sponsor for all partner initiatives. This change improved our success rates.

Any successful alliance journey should include course corrections!

Captains of Change - Part IV: Navigate Around Turbulence

2011-07-26T11:43:00.000-07:00

Change is the raison d'etre of alliance management. As Alliance Managers, we're constantly managing change. Whenever you embark upon any project involving change, whether it's onboarding a new partner or developing a new solution with an established partner, you are going to encounter "turbulence" - forces working against change. Your job as the Captain of Change is to navigate around the turbulence.

Turbulence is inevitable because people generally abhor change. A former manager of mine talks about "organizational antibodies" that rise up against change. The metaphor is apt, since antibodies are proteins in the immune system that neutralize foreign objects in the body. Organizational antibodies always rise up to neutralize any organizational change viewed as a threat to the status quo.

Seth Godin says it best:

People who fear they will be hurt by a change speak up immediately, loudly and without regard for the odds or reality. People who will benefit from a change don't believe it (until it happens), so they sit quietly. And that's why change in an organization is difficult.

The best way to navigate around this turbulence is to get the "leading 10 percenters" on board first. These are your key influencers, stakeholders and floor leaders. They'll help you get to smoother waters by influencing the "hesitant middle". Sometimes you'll also have to proactively neutralize some of the most virulent antibodies (see my blog post on Toxic People). The most effective neutralizers tend to be facts, excellent execution and successful results.

Your role as Captain is to anticipate the turbulent seas, prepare your team and successfully navigate around (and sometimes through) the rough waters

Next post: Captains of Change - Part V: Making Course Corrections.

Captains of Change - Part III: Measure & Inspect

2011-07-05T17:42:00.000-07:00

You must "inspect what you expect" if you want to effectively manage change. This is an important way to build trust. You have to show folks what you're measuring and why and most importantly, what decisions you will be making as a result of the data you are collecting and reporting on.

Measurement also helps you assess if you're on track or if some course corrections might be in order.

And lastly, measuring results, tracking status with visible reporting to management - helps communicate to the troops what measures are important to the leader. What's most effective is personal inspection by the leader - quarterly reviews with the executive, for example. This helps demonstrate the executive's commitment to the change.

Up next - Cheerlead success and navigate around turbulence.

Captains of Change - Part II: Set the Cadence

2011-06-15T19:17:00.000-07:00

One of the responsibilities of Alliance Managers in our roles as Captains of Change is to "Set the Cadence". What does this mean?

Setting the cadence is setting the pace of change. It requires having an in depth understanding of both the requirements of the collaboration as well as your company's culture so that you understand what kind of pace is possible. It's understanding what needs to happen and when it needs to happen in order to affect change. It's prodding and encouraging stakeholders to create a sense of urgency when it's necessary and knowing when to take a moment to measure progress.

Up next - Measuring Progress..

Captains of Change - Part I

2011-04-18T18:11:00.000-07:00

One of the things I love most about alliance management is that at it's heart, it involves managing and driving change. Think about it, two companies are getting together to create something that they couldn't do on their own. And often getting to that compelling mutual value proposition requires persuading people to change from the status quo.

So, really, alliance managers are "captains of change".

So here's part one on a series on change - the role of the captain. What do alliance manager's need to do to be captains of change?

Set the cadence
Measure progress
Cheerlead successes
Inspect what you expect.
Navigate around turbulence
Make course corrections
Ensure safe arrival

Emergency "off switch"

2011-03-28T18:22:00.000-07:00

I went on a 12-mile hike on Saturday. It was a beautiful spring day and the scenery was lovely. Our guide was an experienced hiker who was a volunteer who maintains local trails and leads hikes. He had a lot of passion about the outdoors and hiking in particular. His passion was infectious - he motivated me to plan some additional hiking trips for the spring and summer.

What occurred to me is that passionate people make the world go round. Think about it - most of the things we enjoy or that make our lives easier, were created, developed and supported by people with passion.

As I've mentioned on previous blog posts, the best alliance managers (or doctors, lawyers, nurses, teachers, housekeepers, etc.) have passion about their jobs. Their switch is in the "on" position.

Beware of those that try to dampen your enthusiasm or extinguish your passion. These people are toxic and should be avoided at all costs. Don't let them into your head and most of all don't let them into your heart. Use your emergency "off switch" to turn these people "off". Protect your passion. Despite the sideline jeering of the lazy cynics, passion is what makes the world go round!

The No Complacency Zone

2011-03-21T18:35:00.000-07:00

In the early 90's, I worked for a Branch Manager who was an exceptional leader. His branch was consistently the top ranked sales branch in the region (of 25 branches) and in the years I was there, the branch was the #1 branch office in the country (out of 250 branches).

He was a master both at understanding people and how to best motivate and reward them and in building a high performance culture.

Some of the things he did were completely counter intuitive. For example, during good times - when we were blowing away our numbers - he would be absolutely brutal in our management staff meetings. Maniacally drilling down on the numbers, pipeline, etc. My fellow managers and I would look at each other like we were in the wrong meeting! Conversely, when we were having a tough quarter or two, he would make passing reference to the numbers, but there was no drilling.

I finally came to realize that Harry was building a high performance culture. He did not want anyone in his organization, particularly his management team, to be complacent. He was establishing a "No Complacency" Zone.

A website for safety officers defines complacency as "self-satisfaction, especially when accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies". Harry knew that complacency is death. It is the beginning of the end. Excellence, innovation and risk taking can not thrive in an environment where complacency lives.

Harry didn't have to apply the hammer during tough times, because he never let us get complacent during the good times.

As you manage your alliance relationships, make sure you establish a "no complacency zone"!

The "hole in the donut"

2011-03-14T18:02:00.000-07:00

Do you know someone who revels in pointing out obvious problems with nary a thought of possible solutions?

I worked for a manager back in the early 90's that used to call these people folks who "point at the hole in the donut". He told us not to be caught doing this ......You know this person - Captain Obvious - the one who shows up at the meeting pointing out all the reasons your idea, your partnership, will fail.

As Alliance Managers, we don't have the luxury of simply pointing at the hole in the donut. If there's a hole in the donut, our job is to figure out how to address it, or identify risk factors to help management make go/no go decisions. Our job is to find the path to success...analyze ...problem solve and decide.

Pointing at the hole in the donut is for the weak, passive and afraid. That's not us!

Out of Your Head - Into Your Heart

2011-03-07T19:21:00.000-08:00

I attended a networking luncheon today where the guest speaker was a life coach and personal friend of mine. Her topic was about getting "unstuck" and she said something that really resonated with me - to get "unstuck" you have to "get out of your head and into your heart".

What does "getting into your heart" have to do with alliance management?

Being good at managing alliances requires passion. I'd argue that being good at anything requires passion. Passion is what keeps you going when the going gets tough and things seem hopeless. You have to have something in you that motivates you, that makes you excited about attacking the day to day challenges.

Finally, as I've stated in other blog posts, fundamentally, alliance managers are leaders. I recently read "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance?" by Lou Gerstner, former CEO of IBM. It chronicles his turnaround of IBM and reads like a manifesto on leadership. In his book, Gertstner states -

Passion is the single most important element of personal leadership. I believe managers at all levels of a company should strive to develop the emotional side of their leadership skills.

When you demonstrate to your internal and external stakeholders the passion you have about the alliance and its possibilities, you pull a powerful lever of influence. Alliance management is all about influencing without authority. Passion is one of the best tools at your disposal.

Note that I'm not talking about manufactured passion. I'm talking about genuine, in your bones, "would you shut up about this already" passion!

Passion is infectious, and it's critical if you want to lead.

Faster Horses

2011-02-26T06:52:00.000-08:00

I was in a brainstorming session with colleagues recently to come up with messaging to the field on developing a playbook for working with a partner/competitor. The facilitator led with the below quote from Henry Ford:

"If I asked people what they wanted, they would have said 'faster horses'".

The point was that to harness the value of co-opetition we have to think differently.

It occurs to me that as alliance managers, we're charged with collaborating with our partners in ways that drive innovation and create value for both companies. Doing this requires creative thinking, busting up the status quo and thinking outside the box.

Getting beyond "faster horses" thinking isn't easy, but that's one of the advantages collaboration with a partner can bring to the table. A fresh perspective and new thinking. And that's what makes our roles as alliance managers so valuable!

Best Practice Makes Perfect?

2011-02-20T14:14:00.000-08:00

There was a recent thread on the ASAP (Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals) LinkedIn group about best practices. Here are my thoughts on "best practices in applying best practices"!

Tailor to the culture of your company. Company culture provides the "current" for implementing best practices. What works at one company, may not work at yours and vice versa. Be sure to think about cultural dynamics when applying best practices and adjust accordingly.
Use your tailored best practices to develop your alliances playbook. You need some kind of consistent framework for qualifying, developing and executing partner initiatives. The playbook defines how you "get alliances work done around here".
Combine your best practices playbook with professional development. A great playbook in the hands of unskilled alliance managers will not get you very far. Build a training and professional development plan for the alliances team to help them to understand why these are best practices and how to apply them.
Build in flexibility. Once size does not fit all alliances. Mike Leonetti, Chairman Emeritus of ASAP, used to say "when you've seen one alliance, you've seen one alliance".
Align measurement and comp. Beware the law of unintended consequences. Make sure that your teams are properly incented and that you are measuring what you expect.

What say you?

Go Ugly Early!

2011-02-07T19:02:00.000-08:00

I was speaking to a colleague today and we were comparing notes on the difficulty some alliance managers have in asking the tougher questions in the qualification process. I told him that a sales executive I worked with long ago told me something that has stuck with me ever since.

He told me that the best thing you can do in these situations is to "go ugly early". He told me that he always wants to know what the show stoppers are in month 1 of discussions, vs. month 9.

I told my colleague this story and he laughed. He said that he believed that this was exactly the right perspective. If you're having discussions with a partner about joint development, don't you want to know their position on IP, pretty early in the discussion? It's amazing to me that some alliance folks will say - "oh, I don't want to bring that up now, I might scare them off". I think that's the completely wrong approach. You should be thinking, I want to find out their position (and tell them mine) early, because if we're far apart, I need to know that now.

Being afraid to have a tough conversation, doesn't make the need for the discussion disappear. All you're doing then is kicking the can up the road, only to have to deal with it later, when both parties have invested a lot of time, and perhaps also reinforced some bad assumptions.

Now that's ugly!

Cynicism is not Leadership!

2011-01-26T06:27:00.000-08:00

Why is it that often the hopes, dreams and goals that accompany a new year, give way to cynicism before Valentine's Day?

Somehow we sometimes get so beaten down by the status quo, that we think it's "naive" to hope for something more. So we fall into the old patterns of cynicism. "That's the way it's always been around here". "They'll never accept my new idea". "Things will never change".

Well this thinking might be safe, and it's sure a nice place to hide, but it's not leadership.

As alliance managers our job is to lead. To believe that change is possible, that better is possible. I'm not talking about being blind to the realities and challenges of the current environment. I'm talking about being fully cognizant of the obstacles and challenges before you, but deciding that you are going to try to make a difference anyway.

As we attack our alliance plans and strategies for 2011, let's resolve to lead.

Happy New Year!

2011-01-13T11:23:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! With the New Year comes reflection on 2010 and thoughts about how to improve in 2011.

I had the pleasure today of hearing Debbie Yow deliver a keynote address at a professional women's luncheon. Debbie is the Athletic Director at NC State University, one of only three female ADs in the nation. She's an impressive professional and a pioneer in her field. She delivered an inspiring talk today.

Her words were about success. She laid out a 3 step gameplan, that I believe is particularly prescriptive (and timely) for evaluating alliance relationships.

Assess the current state. Honestly and accurately evaluate where you are now.
Set the right goals for the right reasons.
Guage progress.

She also outlined what she coined "dream killers"

Tradition. "I honor the past, but I don't want to live there."
Fear.
Stereotypes.
Complacency.
Fatigue.
Short term thinking.
Ineffective communication.
Lack of vision.

As you evaluate your alliance organization and partnerships, her words would be good to keep in mind...

What's in it for me? WIFM

2010-12-04T08:00:00.000-08:00

There was a recent question posted on an alliances discussion board asking how do you get sales teams in your key partnerships to work in harmony?

This is a question worth asking, since in my experience, this is where alliances most often fall down. The only way to validate your joint selling proposition is to sell your first customer, and the only way to get to the customer is to get your two sales teams collaborating.

How?

Fundamentally you have to address "WIFM" (what's in it for me?) for each sales team. Will selling with this partner get me access to decision-makers? Increase my deal size? Facilitate upsell/cross sell? Will I make money through and be rewarded for collaboration? The tops down "you will sell it cuz management says so" only gets you passive aggressive compliance. There must be something in it for the sales guy or gal, and that something is usually money, but could also be prestige, props, career leverage, etc.

Identifying the WIFM for each sales organization, developing a clear sales engagement process, and focusing on both as a central part of your alliance strategy is critical if you want to get sales traction. As we used to say at IBM - nothing happens until you sell something!

The Truth and Track Shoes

2010-11-17T10:13:00.000-08:00

I had a recent conversation with a Global Alliance Manager who manages our partnership with a company that happens to be both our biggest partner and our biggest competitor. You can imagine what her days are like.

She told me that a story had been circulating that this partner "poached" one of our people and for this reason, one of our country managers had issued a "cease and desist" order to his team to "stop all strategic work" with this partner.

Of course, this edict was issued pre-fact finding mission. Turns out that the employee had posted for the job. There was no poaching. Oh, and that we'd recently hired 5 folks in this country from this partner, so apparently we'd been doing some "poaching" of our own. Oops. Never mind. Literally a lie traveled around the world before the truth got its track shoes on.

It occurs to me that when we talk about managing co-opetition, mostly we talk about operational considerations (ensuring we have proper firewalls, managing and protecting IP, etc. etc.)..

Seems to me that the biggest hurdle, and the thing that requires the most vigilant focus, is managing the rumor mill, lowering the emotional temperature by applying liberal doses of fact and overall paranoia management. Now that is a full time job.

Are you a "Straight A" student?

2010-10-27T19:11:00.000-07:00

I attended a recent webinar hosted by Vantage Partners entitled "Managing Difficult Alliance Conversations".

Stu Kliman was the speaker and he encouraged alliance managers to move from "positional bargaining", where the role of the alliance manager is to claim maximum value from a fixed pie - to "joint problem solving", where the role of the alliance manager is to work together to create and distribute value.

Sound good in theory, why is this so difficult to do in practice?

The ladder of inference
Stu talked about the concept of "partisan perceptions". We each form perceptions based on the data we access (or that we choose to filter). Imagine you have a ladder and you sit it in a pool of data. You then "move up the ladder" by forming conclusions and a point of view based on where you placed your ladder. Imagine that your partner is doing the same thing. Two parties, two different ladders, two different perspectives on the seemingly same situation.

Psychological studies have shown that we each have an operating principle that partisan perceptions exist in "other people", but not in us!

Alliance management is all about managing differences and these differences contribute greatly to partisan perceptions. For example, you partner with a company that that has complementary skills or products. Because of differences in your cultures and business models, they see you as slow and bureaucratic, you see them as arrogant and imprudent. Partisan differences abound.

The best way to break this logjam is to make sure that you are striking a balance between advocacy and intimacy in your alliance conversations.

Advocacy vs. intimacy
Advocacy involves advocating for your position. It's a completely self-centered perspective. Intimacy involves "learning through dialog" - assuming that you are not in possession of all the facts, and engaging in an open conversation with your partner to understand their perspective.

Learning through dialog requires an authentic, genuine curiosity to understand the partner's ladder of inference. You have to climb down from your ladder, see where your partner has planted his ladder, and climb up his ladder of inference to truly understand things from his perspective.

Stu invited us to think about our last difficult alliance conversation and then to "script" the conversation by writing down the dialog (what we said, what they said). He asked us to put an "A" next to statements that we made that were all about advocacy and an "I" next to statements that were about intimacy. Not surprisingly most of us had a lot of "A's" on our paper!

Don't be a "Straight A" student!
When parties get stuck in alliance discussions, it's usually because they were "straight A students" solely focused on advocacy!

Next time you have to have a difficult alliance conversation, make sure you "check your ladder". This is one of the few times in your life when you want to avoid being a straight A student.

Stu indicated that the recording of the webinar should be on their website shortly. You can check for it on Vantage Partner's website.

How can you tell if an alliance will succeed?

2010-10-07T21:04:00.000-07:00

I saw this question posed on the ASAP (Association of Strategic Alliances Professionals) LinkedIn group, and it generated quite an active discussion!

With alliance success rates hovering at at less than 50%, it's a good question to contemplate. How can we as alliance managers identify predictive behaviors or dynamics that might be clear indicators that a potential new alliance will fail (or that an existing alliance is headed for trouble)?

In the book "Getting Partnering Right" by Rackham, Friedman and Ruff, the authors did extensive research in order to answer the question - "what makes partnerships successful?" They found that in successful partnerships, there were always three consistent elements: Vision, Impact and Intimacy.

If even one of the three elements is missing, the alliance will ultimately fail, or fall well short of expectations. This book was published way back in 1994, and yet as I look back on the alliances I've either managed or observed over the years, for every one that failed, I was always able to identify the missing element(s) that were at the root of the failure.

Something to think about if you're managing an existing alliance or embarking upon a new one. I've talked about trust in previous blog posts. A few thoughts about Shared Vision and Market Impact in upcoming blog posts..

Cheers...

Are you serious?

2010-09-29T13:50:00.000-07:00

How do you know whether or not your dealing with a partner that takes partnering seriously?

6 signs that the company is serious about partnering:

They staff their alliance organization with true alliance professionals. I worked for an exec at IBM who was serious about hiring the best and brightest (and firing those who weren't). He didn't want "Statue of Liberty people" - ('send me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses') on his team. It was his slang for the mediocre. Is your partner's alliance organization staffed with alliance professionals who are passionate about alliance formation and execution?
They provide professional development and training to their alliance staff. See 1.
They have a mature and sophisticated sales organization with "partner mindset" A company that's serious about partnering hires salespeople with experience collaborating with partners to identify new opportunities and then incents them appropriately.
Their CEO walks the walk. Alliance strategy should be part and parcel of the business strategy. The CEO should not only talk about the importance of alliances at internal company meetings, but also to customers, and the press and analyst communities.
They've got a full time alliance executive. Or if it's a relatively small company, a designated exec with alliance responsibility. I think that when your company gets to a certain size you need a DEDICATED alliance executive. If the company is serious about alliances, and they've built a portfolio of partners and planning on building more, there really should be an exec that's focused on alliance strategy and execution. Doing it right is not a part-time pursuit.
They inspect what they expect. Companies that are serious about generating results from their alliances are serious about measuring and managing alliances. They establish alliance business plans with goals and objectives. They manage their alliances portfolio against a set of performance criteria. If the company is inspecting what they expect as it relates to alliances, they're likely serious about it.

What say you?

Channel Managers vs. Strategic Alliance Managers

2010-09-21T17:31:00.000-07:00

Recently there was a discussion thread on the ASAP (Association of Strategic Alliances) LinkedIn Group about the differences between folks who manage channel partners vs. folks who manage alliances. In my experience, Alliance Managers that are successful managing channel/reseller partnerships (typically called Business Development Managers) generally have a sales background. Channel relationships, by design, are more tactical relationships. The basic job here is blocking and tackling, managing the sales cycle, tracking pipeline, managing sales conflicts etc.

Alliance Managers covering strategic relationships, where joint collaboration and innovation are the raison d'etre of the alliance, need a different skill set. The ability to think strategically, high emotional intelligence, and an entrepreneurial mindset, are all key attributes of successful strategic alliance managers.

Both jobs require people with fundamental sales skills, it's really a question of degree. I believe Channel Managers need to have stronger skills in this area, but Strategic Alliance Managers also must have very good sales skills, and not just because of the amount of internal selling the job entails! SAMs need to have a clear understanding of the selling process and sales engagement process in order to successfully build and execute initiatives with the Partner. At IBM we used to say "nothing happens until you sell something" - all the great strategy work in the world is meaningless unless it can be translated into a selling proposition that two sales teams can assimilate and sell!!

- Donna Peek

The Wonderful World of Disney

2010-09-15T14:35:00.000-07:00

I heard Michael Eisner (former CEO of Disney) interviewed on the Diane Rehm show on NPR today talking about his new book – “Working Together: Why Great Partnerships Succeed”. The book is about business partnerships on a personal level (ie. Warren Buffet’s partnership with his #2, Eisner’s partnership with his #2, etc. etc.), but from what he described, it would have applicability to partnerships between companies.

He has high regard for Frank Wells, former President of Disney, and attributes Disney's success to their 10 year business partnership. (Frank Wells died tragically in a helicopter accident in 1994).

It was an interesting interview of a man that is either viewed as an icon or pariah depending on your perspective. It got me thinking about the recent Mark Hurd/HP/Oracle high drama. Hurd's departure from HP and the ensuing escalating rhetoric from both HP and Oracle executives, has caused a serious rift in their longstanding alliance relationship. As a result, both SAP and IBM are swooping in for the kill, both with PR and sales campaigns targeting Oracle-Sun and HP customers. This debacle is a perfect example of how a strategic alliance can go from asset to liability in 60 seconds. Ellison and Hurd have a long standing friendship (they play tennis together).. It will be interesting to see if that personal friendship will allow them to forge a successful business partnership, like the ones Eisner profiles in his book... Might not have a Disney ending..

- Donna Peek

More on Trust - How do alliance managers build trust?

2010-09-11T13:20:00.000-07:00

As I've mentioned on previous blog posts, building trust is critical to forming and maintaining positive alliance relationships. In this post, I'll describe a few techniques I use to build trust with my partner.

Do my homework!
Before that very first meeting or conference call, I do my homework. I learn everything I can about the partner and think through the partnering possibilities: What are their issues and challenges? What is their company culture? How are they viewed in the market? What are they afraid of? What can we do for them? What can they help us with? What kind of partnering proposition makes sense?
When I come to that first meeting prepared, the partner trusts that I'm a professional and I'm taking these discussions seriously.

Document goals and objectives
As the discussions progress, I make sure that I get joint agreement on the 3-way value proposition - (what's in it for them? what's in it for my company? what's in it for the customer?)... so that we are all anchored in what we're trying to accomplish. I find this very useful in keeping us on the same page and focused in our discussions. As we go through the contract negotiation process and beyond, I work with the partner on developing the joint business plan, where we document our mutual goals and objectives. Knowing where we're going, and working together to get there, really helps to build trust.

Set expectations early and often
I lay out the internal decision making process for the partner. Here's who we'll have to get involved, here's the business case we'll have to make, here's who has to say yes, etc etc., so that they know the lay of the land and there are no surprises. As Seth Godin, best selling author and marketing guru says, 'Someone needs to say, "here's how we do things around here," and then they they have to tell the truth. '

Get the executive sponsors together
Just as it's important for me to build a good working relationship with my counterpart, I try to find ways to facilitate relationship building between the two executive sponsors (mine and the partner's). It's much easier for sponsors to work together to resolve disputes and work through intractable obstacles to success when they know and trust each other.

Build the governance plan = > communications plan
The scope and complexity of the determines how formal the governance plan needs to be, but at a minimum, I make sure that we set expectations regarding the formal and informal communications plan and that we understand the process for dealing with disputes. Effective communications at all levels are the best tool we have as alliance managers to build and maintain trust.

As an Alliance Manager, I play a key role in building a framework for trust in the alliance relationship!

How do you build trust in an alliance relationship?

2010-08-18T17:57:00.000-07:00

I've done a few posts on the topic of trust because it is so critical in cementing a successful partnership. Trust takes time to build, but it can be destroyed in an instant. We all know how powerful trust is, but what can we do as alliance managers to lay a foundation for trust?

Everything we need to know about building trust we learned in kindergarten:

Lying is bad.
It would seem to go without saying, but being honest with our partners goes a long way in building trust. Sometimes when we have bad news, the tendency we have is to avoid the truth, or worse, shade the truth. The partner wants to focus on the retail sector and your retail sales director wants to work with another partner. Or the partner wants me to kick in $2M to a matching market development fund and my finance guy says we can only do $1M. Or, or or... pick your bad news. I tell the partner the bad news early. I worked with an exec who used to use the phrase "go ugly early" - meaning if you've got bad news, get it out of the way early. Nothing builds trust faster than being honest about bad news.

If you bully people, they won't like you.
Have you ever had to partner with a company that was much larger than yours? Or that had a dominant market position? Did they let you know it? When you throw your weight around without any sensitivity for the needs and concerns of your partner, they'll feel taken advantage of.

Say you're sorry when you make a mistake.
Sometimes despite our best efforts, we make a mistake. We forget to engage a key stakeholder. We neglect to inform the partner about an important change in policy or personnel. Or maybe we didn't actually make a mistake, but our partner feels aggrieved. In either case, a genuine, heartfelt apology will go a long way to restoring or building trust.

Say what you mean and mean what you say.
This is a bit of a corollary to the first rule, but being clear in your communications with the partner is critical. I can recall many a kerfluffle that I unnecessarily caused by being loose with an email or phone conversation.

Some more tactical/practical thoughts on building trust in the next blog post...

Random thought on lucite blocks

2010-08-07T01:02:00.000-07:00

If you have to enshrine your company's core values on a lucite block in order to remind your employees of what they are, they can't be all that "core" can they? I'm just sayin'.

A Tale of Two Islands - A Profile in Building Trust

2010-07-27T09:59:00.000-07:00

Picking back up the blogging mantle after several weeks enjoy the lazy hazy days of summer.

During my vacation break, I heard a story on the National Public Radio program "This American Life" that really brought home to me the power of trust.

The program contrasted the approaches of two different countries - Jamaica and Barbados - in dealing with similar financial crises. Barbados emerged from their crisis a much stronger nation - median income is currently twice that of Jamaica's, and its literacy rate of 95% is four times better than Jamaica's. By every economic and socioeconomic measure, Barbados is significantly outperforming Jamaica. Why? Primarily, because during a time of crisis, Barbados chose to use trust as the fundamental lynchpin of their economic recovery strategy and in so doing - reinvented their approach to running the country.

Here's what happened. In the early 90's, oil prices skyrocketed and threw the world into a global recession. This created a real foreign currency crisis for Barbados. Essentially they did not have enough foreign currency to pay for imported goods and wound up having to borrow significant money from the IMF. Barbados' leaders "chose trust" and established a partnership between business, workers and the government to build an economic recovery plan based on shared sacrifice.

Business and the unions, previously adversaries, learned to trust each other, and their close collaboration essentially saved the country. Together they did extraordinary things - labor took an 8% across the board pay cut. Business collaborated with labor and government to make sure that layoffs did not affect both breadwinners of the same family. The results of this partnership were astounding - within 5 years, Barbados paid off their loan to the IMF, wages reached pre-crisis levels. And most importantly, the collaboration established between government, business and labor - still endures and forever changed Barbados' governance model.

Jamaica, and it pains me to say this since I am of Jamaican ancestry, had a very different response when faced with the same crisis in the early 70s. The Jamaican Prime Minister did not build trust between rich and poor, business and labor. He made autocratic decisions and famously said in a speech that if Jamaicans didn't like what he was doing "there were five flights a day leaving for Miami". As a result, thousands of middle class Jamaicans (including many of my relatives) left the country. This crippled the economy and Jamaica has never fully recovered. In fact, now 50 cents of every $ the government collects is spent on paying down interest on IMF debts.

Tony Wolcott, Executive Director of the Barbados Employers Confederation, sums up the bottom line: "Trust is the key factor in the whole cohesion of the social partnership we've got here."

Such is the power of not only a partnership mindset, but of building trust.

More on how to build trust in future blog posts.

Trust me!

2010-06-16T10:18:00.000-07:00

I was recently advising an alliance manager who was desparately trying to manage expectations with a new partner in the face of a sales manager who is fond of "gentleman's agreements". The sales manager's logic was that he "trusted" the partner and therefore the parties "didn't need to have anything in writing".

Here's the problem with that logic. Is there a time and a place for "handshake" agreements? Yes. Is that time when you are establishing a partnership with a new partner. Decidedly no.

In these scenarios, I am very wary of parties who do not want to put things in writing, especially when the rationale is essentially "trust me". This is not trust. It's "faux trust" - bet hedging masquerading as trust - and a sign of someone who does not want to commit.

Here's why. In my experience, when you embark upon a collaborative initiative on a handshake, when things go either very well or very badly, people tend to get situational amnesia. When things go badly, people normally start heading for the exits. On their way out the door, sometimes they also try to shift blame for the failure to the other party. When things go swimmingly well, sometimes greed ensues, and one party will seek to cut the other party out of the action. That's why being committed to the venture (you both either sink or swim together) is an important success factor.

My advice to the alliance manager - if the venture is worth the time to do, it's worth the time to document. Depending on the situation you may not need a formal contract, but at a minimum, you should document the expectations, roles and responsibilities of both parties, and most importantly, what happens if expectations are not met. You should also make sure that ALL the stakeholders that are impacted by the joint plan are informed of the plan and expectations and that they sign off on those expectations!

When you take the time to put things in writing you are saying to the partner, I respect your time and investment in this project and I trust that our odds of mutual success will be much better if we have clarity around our joint gameplan and the expectations for execution.

"Bad deals don't last"

2010-06-08T06:53:00.000-07:00

Trust has been a big topic in the news lately - Facebook's questionable privacy policies, UK Google Earth gathering personal information from people's computer's via their unprotected wifi networks. (As if me leaving my front door open gives you the right to enter my home and steal my television set! Not.)

It got me thinking about the importance of building and maintaining trust in alliance relationships. Too many organizations don't get it when it comes to the currency of trust.

I recall working for an internet startup where the CTO and founder would brag about "screwing the partner over", as if this was something to brag about! I'd commiserate with our VP of Sales, who was fond of saying "Bad deals, don't last". He was absolutely right. You may be able to get a partner in a tight spot where they feel compelled to accept a deal in the short term that is not in their long term interests. Ultimately, however, I don't care what kind of contract you put in place, if a deal is not good for one partner, they will find a way out. One way or the other. So you may win in the short run, but you will lose in the long run. Not only with this partner, but your reputation in the partner community will suffer - and then good luck finding ANY company that will partner with you!

For more on this topic, check out this white paper by Robert Porter Lynch (Chairman Emeritus of the Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals) and Paul Lawrence (Professor Emeritus of Organization Behavior, Harvard Business School) - Building a System of Trust for Strategic Alliances.

I'll share more thoughts on this topic in a future blog post.

AMFM - Always Maintain Forward Motion

2010-06-01T06:41:00.000-07:00

I read an article in the Sunday Parade magazine a few months ago about an entrepreneur who's daily mantra was "AMFM" - Always Maintain Forward Motion. I loved that! That mantra was so applicable to our partner efforts that I adopted it as our divisional slogan for 2010..

We have been implementing formal processes for qualification, development and field execution of partner initiatives for the last 2 years and one thing we've learned is that momentum is your friend. When partner initiatives stagnate, particularly in the qualification phase, it's typically symptomatic of a project that has waning sponsorship or waning enthusiasm (either internally or within the partner organization).

Partner initiatives tend to be like produce, they go bad when they sit around for long periods of time.

So what we encourage the alliance managers to do now is carpe diem! If you've got sponsorship and a well qualified idea, execute quickly. The market moves quickly, and your sponsors and stakeholders might lose interest and get distracted by the next new "shiny thing" if things get stalled and bogged down.

Always Maintain Forward Motion - or as my nephew would say - "Keep it movin'"!

Breaking Up is Hard to Do - Part III

2010-05-03T16:37:00.001-07:00

So what about when you've come to the point where you feel you need to invoke the exit clause and end the alliance?

It's certainly not a good feeling. I've been there. I was VP of Business Development for a startup. One of the co-founders had entered into an agreement with another company that seemed good on paper, but was just not making business sense for us. We were expending a lot of precious technical resources on the project with absolutely no hope of a return.

The CEO asked me to "fix it". Great. The first thing I did was read the contract and pray that there was a well written exit clause. Luckily, our corporate counsel, who I eventually developed a great partnership with for future alliance work, had written a very good contract with an exit clause that provided me with the right level of flexibility.

The second step for me was to organize my thoughts and think about the matter from the business partner's perspective. I knew he was not going to be happy. Were there any mitigating circumstances? Was there a way to leave the door open to working together down the road in a more mutually beneficial endeavor? Was I on solid ground in invoking the exit clause? How could I articulate our position in a dispassionate way and in so doing remove the sting?

The third step? After reviewing my thinking and game-plan with our corporate counsel , I wrote a succinct letter to our business partner's CEO, informing him of our desire and intent to terminate the agreement (required per the contract). I followed up with a phone call asking for a face to face meeting with him.

When I met him in the lobby and walked him into a conference room, I'm not going to lie, I was nervous. He was clearly not happy. But I have to say, at the end of the meeting, we shook hands and he said "I'm not happy with the outcome, but I understand your position and I respect how you've handled this". Whew! Thankfully, we were able to exit out of an unprofitable partnership while still preserving our relationship with the partner (and our reputation in the partner community!).

Next time you're negotiating a new partnership agreement, imagine the conversation you'd want to have with the partner in the event things don't work out and you found yourself in that conference room. Thinking about that conversation should help you plan for a positive exit

Find your "Avis" - They'll Try Harder!

2010-05-03T07:30:00.000-07:00

When choosing a partner, the conventional wisdom holds that you should pick the #1 player, the proverbial 800 lb gorilla - the Hertz of the industry. But in my experience, sometimes the guy who is #2 (or even #3 or #4) is often hungrier and therefore more willing to take risks and put more on the table - in short - more like Avis and willing to try harder.

Have you ever tried courting the market leader? How long did it take to get them to return your phone call? Ugh. Since they're #1, they are getting a lot of phone calls. They are probably the media darling and getting lots of press as well, and that combined with years of success sometimes breeds a certain amount of arrogance. I know I always have to "gird my loins" when making those calls, and the pressure is really on to have an exceptionally strong partnering proposal and compelling case. And even then, you might not get their attention.

When there's a #1 player that I really do want to win over, sometimes what's worked better for me is to go after the #2 or #3 player in the market. They are typically much easier to approach and they're hungry (they want to be #1!). They are usually more willing to take risks and try new approaches to gain marketshare over the larger players. So, as a result, they sometimes are more fertile ground for exploratory partnership discussions. Additionally, if you win them over and the two of you can build some success together over a period of time, you will be in a stronger negotiating position once (or if) you approach the #1 player.

Food for thought..

Breaking Up is Hard to Do - Part II

2010-05-03T07:28:00.001-07:00

So what should you think about including in the exit clause? You'll probably want to ask yourself a few questions...

What circumstances should trigger either party invoking the exit clause? What would need to happen for your company to want out?
What kind of notice should each party be required to give?
What about Intellectual Property (IP) - what happens to any jointly developed assets?
How will customer support be handled in the event of a breakup of the alliance? (typically covered in a "wind down" clause).
Should there be any penalties for termination (or contract breaches)?

Think about the worse case scenario and what you would want to see happen, especially as it relates to any joint customers or prospects. Having this discussion during the initial contract negotiations is sure to save you potential headaches in the event that things don't work out the way everyone planned...

Breaking Up is Hard to Do

2010-04-26T08:03:00.000-07:00

According to the 2009 State of Alliance Management Survey of 430 companies, alliances success rates are improving, but still less than optimal at a reported 57% . Our goal as alliance managers is to increase our success rates and make sure that our alliances are successful. However, sometimes no matter what you do, an alliance may come to an end - often for reasons completely out of your control - market forces, a company strategy change, pressures from a down economy, among other factors, can all conspire to precipitate a break up.

Breaking up is indeed hard to do, but it doesn't have to be excessively painful, and it can be done in a way that preserves the relationship and keeps the door open for future joint endeavors.

How?

Well, this might seem counter-intuitive, but the best time to plan for the break up is during the "coming together" process. Why? Because that is typically the time of the greatest goodwill. Both parties want things to work, both are operating in good faith. Both parties are relatively positive and happy. That's the perfect time to have the "exit clause" discussion. You are more likely to discuss sticky separation issues sans the emotion.

Next up - what should the exit clause contain?

The "Barney Hug" Alliance

2010-04-08T14:25:00.000-07:00

Hi, there. For my family's spring break vacation this year, we went to Costa Rica! You will often hear Ticos (folks from Costa Rica) using the term "tuanis" (too-ahn-ees). It means "cool" or everything is wonderful. Which brings me to the topic for this week!

This week's topic is something that as Alliance Managers we have all encountered at one time or another - the dreaded "Barney Hug Alliance " or BHA. "Barney Hug Alliance" is my catchphrase for those vacuous "I love you, You love me" (queue the music) partnerships. You know the type - they start with a flowery joint press release extolling the virtues of the partnership and hyping all the great things the partners are "gonna" do together. A virtual lovefest of goodwill. Six months later, 1 year later, 2 years later - nothing... All you hear are crickets chirping. The partnership seems to have just evaporated into the ethers.

How and why does this happen? Here's how to tell if you might be headed for (or in) a BHA:

No real resources committed to business plan execution. You've issued the press release, now it's time to get down to brass tacks. If you are having difficulty getting the partner to the table to build out an execution plan, that's a sign that the partnership is not a priority. If you don't get this fixed, you might be headed for a BHA!
No sales sponsor. The field sales organization is where the rubber meets the road in partnerships. Sales executives should have a seat at the table in the partnership discussions. If you have been sitting in the exploratory joint meetings and you don't see any sales people in the room, be very afraid. If there are no sales executives clamoring for the partnership and willing to apply sales energy to promoting the joint solution, the partnership is going to go nowhere fast! Which brings me to the next sign...
No customer validation. There's nothing like a joint customer to validate the value proposition of the partnership. A partnership with no customer validation is a big red flag. What sounds nice on paper, doesn't always translate with customers. Until you have some customer validation (preferably a win!), step away from the press release..
Your partner is a start-up. Not all start-ups are guilty of this, but having worked as the Business Development exec for several start-ups, I can say that there is incredible pressure to announce a partnership with a major established player in the market. Such an announcement often has a material impact on the start-up's valuation. Additionally, many startups (and many established companies!) underestimate the time, effort and investment required to develop and execute a successful alliance. So they may enter into the relationship with the best of intentions, but simply not be able to execute effectively.

So there you have it. Watch for these signs and save yourself from a "dolor de jupa" (headache) down the road!

The Alliance Conversation - featuring yours truly

2010-03-19T08:57:00.000-07:00

Simoons & Company, an alliance consulting organization based in the Netherlands, recently had me as a featured guest for the latest installment of their podcast series - The Alliance Conversation. You can check out the podcast at the link below!

Alliance Conversation with Donna Peek

Step 8: Create an Alliance Plan

2010-03-17T16:46:00.000-07:00

Before you uncork the Champagne bottle, realize that after the alliance agreement has been signed your work has just begun. You now need to work with your new partner to develop an alliance plan that outlines partnership goals/objectives, action plans, rules of engagement, and checkpoints , and you will need to assign an alliance manager to manage the relationship and execute on the plan.

Step 7: Negotiate Partnership Agreement

2010-03-16T20:14:00.000-07:00

The negotiation process effectively starts when you make your initial call to the partner prospect and you should be continually establishing your value in all your interactions, up through and including the negotiation process. Before you start drafting contracts, first sit down with your business sponsors and gain agreement on general business terms. Make sure that everyone is on the same page before you engage your respective attorneys.

Step 6: Conduct Due Diligence

2010-03-15T10:52:00.000-07:00

In this step both you and the partner prospect will be evaluating the "fit."

Technical fit: This will typically involve technical product walthroughs by your respective product teams. In these sessions, you are both trying to find out if the product is "real and ready".

Marketing fit: What are the products' strengths and weaknesses relative to the market needs? How do we complement each other? What are the areas of potential competitive conflict? How will customers view the value this partnership?

Cultural fit: Don't give this process the short shrift. Talk to the prospect's current partners. Talk to analysts or experts that follow your market. You are trying to get a sense for what this company would be like to do business with.

Go back and look at your Partner Selection Criteria in Step 2. Validate any of the assumptions you may have made about this partner prospect.

Finally, you will need to layout the business case for the partnership. Based on what you find out during the due diligence process, what investments will be required to make the partnership work?

Step 5: Conduct Recruitment Calls

2010-03-10T12:48:00.001-08:00

Once you've done your homework, you are now ready for that initial call. Depending on the size of the firm, your target will either be a VP of Business Development, VP of Marketing, or perhaps the company founder or president. Use your friends and family network to identify the right contact and perhaps get an introduction. Send them a copy of your completed partner proposition worksheet and step them through it. You will win points with them simply for being prepared and demonstrating knowledge of their business.

If all goes well, they'll request a follow-up call or visit and the due diligence process will begin.

Step 4: Prepare a Partner Proposition Worksheet

2010-03-07T18:21:00.000-08:00

You only get one chance to make a first impression. Don't blow it by indiscriminately calling your targets and "winging it." Approach partner recruitment with the same care and preparation that you would if you were trying to land a marquee customer.

Prepare a "Partner Proposition Worksheet" (http://www.entrepreneurship.org/Resources/Detail/Default.aspx?id=12194) for each partner prospect. Start by thinking through "WIIFT" (what's in it for them). Here you must stand in the target partner's shoes. Why would they want to partner with you? Why do they need to partner with you? What capabilities do you have that they need in order to compete more effectively? Do your homework. Understand the company's goals, objectives, and strategies and what's happening to them in the market. Think through what your combined value proposition would be to customers. Identify a compelling vision for the partnership and articulate the impact of that vision on the marketplace.

Finally, clearly articulate your partnering proposition — what it is that you are proposing that you do together. Be as specific as possible. Perhaps you can even identify a few options.

Step 3: Identify and Prioritize Partner Candidates

2010-03-03T19:43:00.000-08:00

From the gaps you identified in your market validation work in Step One, start identifying companies who possess your missing capabilities. Read the trade rags, contact trade associations, search the web, and leverage your investor and advisor networks including your accounting and law firms. Who do the industry analysts say are the important companies in the space you're targeting? Add these companies to your recruitment target list. Using the criteria you identified in Step Two, prioritize your target list to whittle it down to a manageable number of companies to target.

Step 2: Develop Partner Selection Criteria

2010-02-28T05:38:00.000-08:00

As with just about anything, if you don't know what you're looking for, how will you know when you've found it? Sit down with your management team and identify the most important criteria for selecting the right partner fit for your business. Areas to consider:

What is the potential for impact? The most important criterion is the potential of an alliance with this target to deliver strategic value to your company. What would be the impact to your competitive position, brand awareness, market acceleration? How quickly could you get traction with this partner in the marketplace?

Are the two companies compatible? This is where your friends and family network and reference calls with existing partners will prove helpful. Is this company's culture and management team compatible with yours, and do you have compatible core competencies?

Are their goals and strategies consistent with yours? The stronger alignment there is between your company goals and the target company's, the greater the likelihood of forging a successful alliance. Identify what the target companies goals and objectives are and determine if they are synergistic with yours.

Is this a good environment for partnering? It's very helpful to know what kind of partnering culture the target organization has. Do they have a good reputation with their partners? Do they demonstrate a commitment to partnering? One of the most effective ways to ferret this out is to talk to one or more of the target company's existing partners and ask them what their experiences have been.

What are the risks with this partnership? Risks of doing? Risks of not doing?

What access can they provide to other potential partners? Companies tend to settle into one or more partner networks. Consider the partners that your target company has. Would any of these companies be desirable targets? Are any of them already on your partner target list?

8 steps to finding the right partner - Step 1

2010-02-23T19:42:00.000-08:00

Picking a good alliance partner is a lot like finding the right tennis partner — find the right one you win; pick the wrong one you lose.

Strategic alliances can deliver significant benefits to startups including reducing your time to market, providing to strategic markets and increasing your company valuation to name a few.

But how do you determine who you should partner with? How do you evaluate potential candidates? I recommend an eight-step process for effective alliance partner recruitment.

Step One: Clearly Define and Validate Your Market

The first order of business of any startup.The goal of market validation is to identify your target market — the customers experiencing the most significant pain and who need your solution the most. Through this process you identify the gap between what constitutes a total solution and what minimal functionality you can realistically deliver. That gap represents your partnering roadmap — where you need to partner to deliver the total solution.

This is why market validation is the first order of business for any startup and the first order of business in any strategic alliance strategy. One of the biggest mistakes startups make is trying to build the perfect solution or killer app. You will never have enough capital or resources to ever be able to do this, so focusing on your core competencies is the best approach. Fill the gaps with partners.