Title: Senior Vice President
Years in current position: 10
Years with current company: 10
Years in the indirect channel: 15
Past jobs in the indirect channel: agent/reseller/VP, sales and marketing
Annual revenue responsibility: New Sales: $19 million
Main channel goal:
“To create and maintain an environment which rewards our agents for securing and maintaining quality business for TelePacific. Our team motto of “Simplicity, Support and Success” reminds us that, as a company and a team, we must consistently provide agents with the most user-friendly, supportive and rewarding agent program in the marketplace. Hiring and maintaining the best team of agent managers and support personnel allows us to develop strong relationships built for long-term success.”
Biggest challenge:
“Time. There is only so much of it in a day, week, month and the year. This is true for our agents, our employees and our common customers. We value the time our agents spend engaged in business related to TelePacific and our customers. We consider the importance of time when we develop new training, promotions, appreciation events, extranet tools and during any provisioning and customer care required activities. We recognize that there is value for everyone to affording our agents and our agent managers with more selling time.”
Please comment on the importance of the indirect channel to your organization and tell me what you see as the future for your channel operations.
“The agent channel has consistently delivered 35-40 percent of all new sales revenue for TelePacific. Our success in becoming the largest competitor by far to the ILEC in California and Nevada and achieving success as measured by Inc Magazine’s fastest growing private companies in America is directly related to our agent sales. The agent channel is valued at TelePacific for reasons beyond just the new sales revenue. Agent-related sales typically are a higher quality customer, that install faster and cleaner, pay their bill more timely, generate higher revenue per circuit and are considerably stickier with a lower churn rate.”
To what extent do you, personally, show leadership within the companies you have worked for, the business community at large, the communications industry and the channel?
“At TelePacific, I was responsible for creating and growing the channel at the executive level. I have been involved in strategic and tactical level aspects of the program since its inception. I am a member of the PHONE+ advisory board and have actively been involved in the agent community on TelePacific’s behalf, and through networking with my peers across the country. One of my biggest contributions has been to offer agents a customer-focused, rewarding and consistently stable carrier alternative for nearly a decade during some turbulent telecom times.”
Why do you consider yourself to be innovative in bringing new ideas to the channel?
“I am not certain I bring new ideas as much as I try to accentuate the better aspects of the channel program to support our agents and customers. My goal is to maximize the reward for both the agent and TelePacific through constant improvement of products, pricing, promotion, systems, tools, trainings and relationships. Our success has come from eagerly listening to the feedback and suggestions of the agent community through trade shows, advisory panels, roundtables, events and meetings.”
To what extent do you engage in activities to promote or advance the channel?
“We advertise via PHONE+ and are very committed sponsor and attendee of the Channel Partner shows. I have recently become an advisory board member of PHONE+ and contribute feedback, ideas, resources and content. Our best manner of advancing the agent channel is to continue to provide our agents with the best program we can to help in their ongoing success.”
Pet: Odie – his family has had five generations of Smooth Hair Fox terriers
Words to live by: “The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.” -Thomas Edison
Favorite fast food joint: Nathans
Favorite song: “Sweet Melissa,” by the Allman Brothers
Least favorite vegetable: Eggplant
What others are saying about Ken:
“Ken is truly a hands-on leader. He will go out of his way to insure my customer’s are delivered 100 percent satisfaction. He is always open to suggestions and new technologies.”
-- Jon Sullberg, President and Owner, Data-Tel Communications LLC, Agent and Consultant
“All I needed to know about Ken I learned from our first T1 install with TelePacific. In 2005, a key client of ours opened a Los Angeles office (we are New York City based). Industry contacts put me in touch with Sandler Partners to help source a Los Angeles T1 provider. After a thorough review we chose TelePacific. I happened to be on vacation on the day of the install, and I forgot to tell my partners (and the client, oops!) what day the circuit was going in. No one was at the client’s office to let the TelePacific technicians in. Instead of walking away (like some carriers I won’t mention), the technicians contacted Ken (and Alan Sandler). Ken took the time to work the phones, and somehow tracked down one of my partners. Together they got the client on the phone, and sorted out the access issue for the space. The T1 was installed successfully. That level of commitment defines Ken.”
-- David Jones, Partner, Saxon Technologies LLC, Technology Broker |
