Playing the partner game

You can't generalize about partnering withMicrosoft Corp., said Vince Menzione, generalmanager of the company's U.S. Public SectorPartner Strategy.The company is big and ubiquitous, and ?because it sells to the government onlythrough resellers ? there are countless differentstructures for partnering, he said."We rely on small resellers who can get closerto the customer," Menzione said. Such connectionscomplement Microsoft's reliance onlarge-account resellers with large sales staffs.Microsoft tweaked its public-sector operationsin the past year, and it has elevated thepartners' role, Menzione said.Partners fall into three categories: systemszintegrators, large-account resellers and valueaddedresellers, and independent softwarevendors."Within these categories of partners, welook for specific expertise and skills to fulfillour customers' needs," Menzione said. Thecompany is seeing increased demand forinformation technology development, customerrelationship management and unifiedcommunications.He singled out SharePoint, a new collaborationplatform and tool from Microsoft, identifyingit as the company's fastest-growing business.The Defense Department and otheragencies are using it for document managementand other tasks.Under its new initiative to recruit government-focusedpartners, Microsoft uses several procedures.It counts on companies to registerthrough its secure partner Web site:https://partner.microsoft.com. It also findspartners though existing relationships,essentially partner-to-partner networking,Menzione said.In addition, government agencies andother customers alert Microsoft to companiesthey are using. "It happens all the time," hesaid, describing how companies that have trustedrelationships with a customer are recommendedby agencies they serve."Customer experience and customer partnersatisfaction [are] the key metrics. They gohand in hand," he said.Microsoft runs a monthly "What's ImportantNow" call for information about offers, contentand co-marketing activities. Details can befound at . The companyalso organizes events, such as the prospectivepartner meeting held at its Reston, Va., office inlate March.Menzione, who joined Microsoft early thisyear from another vendor, said the publicsectorgroup plans to participate in moreregional events in coming months.Microsoft requires prospective partners toenroll in its reseller program, which includessigning a legal agreement and completing aprofile. The online registration form asks abouta company's business focus, services offered,kinds of customers served and technologiesused in its solutions.Once a company enrolls, it must have at leastone employee who has passed Microsoft'sBusiness Sales and MarketingAssessment and a number ofother Microsoft software andnetwork online exams.Menzione pointed to several recent entriesthat demonstrate the range of teaming projects,including tasks for the Pinellas County, Fla.,Tax Collector on business management optimization,a customer service solution for theCalifornia Corporations Department and abusiness analytics project with ArcticInformation Technology for the DenaliCommission.Once a partner has established a relationshipwith Microsoft, the alliance often continues."As in many successful partnerships, we baseours on trust and predictable performance,which leads to repeatability," Menzione said."We work closely with our customers to assessthe best fit for a project and align to the partnersthat will help us deliver."