CompTIA’s Advisory Councils held their 2014 Council Planning Meeting in Miami last week. I attended this meeting, and while the beautiful weather outside was certainly a perk, it was the conversation inside that made the trip most enjoyable and inspiring.
We kicked off the meetings with a round table discussion led by CompTIA President and CEO Todd Thibodeaux. Participating were the chairs and vice chairs of our Vendor, Partner and Telecom Advisory Councils, all senior channel executives with years of experience and rich insight.
Thibodeaux put this question to the advisors: “If you were to bet on a lucrative opportunity in the next three to five years, where would you put your money?” The first thing the advisors pointed to was integration as a service. With cloud, apps and mobile devices meeting legacy platforms, there is a need to successfully integrate these solutions that neither the IT team or individual vendors are prepared for. According to CompTIA’s recent Trends in Cloud Computing Study, nearly 60 percent of all cloud solutions are being procured without involving the IT department at all – exposing companies to risks.
Another advisor pointed to adoption and integration of apps in the SMB market space. This, as well as concepts like the Internet of Things, embedded technologies and dedicated PC-like devices beg the question; what will we do with all the information from these new streams of data? Integrating Big Data for real-time business modeling, product launches and sales represents a big opportunity. The advisors also discussed the syndication of marketing services, which allows solution providers to have a global reach and stronger presence and brand than their small staffs might suggest.
Everyone at the meeting agreed that the pressure is on the channel to offer wider scopes of services and that we have moved past the how-do-you-build stage to the how-do-you-use stage, with much of the buying decisions happening outside the CIO office and instead in the marketing and business management teams.
When asked what they would focus on in the near term, and how CompTIA could support their efforts in the coming year, the members of the Advisor Councils quickly brought the conversation back to reality. Insights and concerns shared included:
- “Regardless of all the talk of disruptive technologies, we are still selling hundreds of thousands of processors, laptops, servers, and miles and miles of cable.”
- “What we need help with is maximizing current revenue streams while also identifying the next best opportunity that works for our specific companies.”
- “Gradual business transformation is more realistic.”
- “We need to keep our feet on the ground while putting our toes in the water.”
- “Who is tomorrow’s solution provider and how do we engage with them?”
- “Who is the next gen IT professional and how do we entice them to join and stay with our organizations?”
- “How do we guide emerging vendors to the traditional channel with new go-to-market options?”
The conversation gave the Councils much to discuss and consider as they broke into workgroups to identify and prioritize initiatives for CompTIA to tackle in 2014. All of these topics will be explored at our upcoming Annual Member Meeting in April and we encourage you to participate. I am grateful to our advisors who volunteer to serve as our industry headlights and provide luminance as bright as the Miami sun. To learn more about CompTIA's Advisory Councils, click here.
