Expect the Novell brand to be more visible in the Canadian enterprise market this year. Making that happen is one of the primary goals of newly appointed Novell Canada Ltd. president, Katie McAuliff, in the next few months. "It’s the most exciting time to be at the company," remarked McAuliff, a 13-year-veteran at Novell. The new executive at the helm of Novell’s Canadian operations officially assumed her new role on January 24, but has been going around the country meeting with channel partners and customers as early as November last year. In a one-on-one interview with ComputerWorld Canada’s Mari-Len De Guzman, McAuliff gave us a glimpse of her outlook and objectives, as she takes over the reins at Novell’s Markham, Ont. operations.
What will some of your key priorities be in 2007?
What I am going to focus on at Novell Canada in 2007 are three things: first, I want to increase the visibility of our organization, our brand, our capabilities, the solutions, the people. We are going to do that in many different ways. I have been out to see dozens of customers across the geography in the past 60 to 90 days. And we have a great opportunity just to increase the visibility of our success in all of the spaces we play in.
The second area I am focusing on is increasing leverage, and this coincides with the strategy we already have in place for our channel and our partners. We have done some great things for them to increase profitability in partnering with Novell. But we are suggesting they get a little bit more focused: become a Linux specialist, become an identity or security specialist.
We will work with the entire channel eco-system – distributors, integrators, consultants, other OEMs, other manufacturers – to increase our leverage. I call it "increasing leverage" because people need to know our story, be able to repeat it; and the channel partners, who represent us [should] be as good as or better than we are at everything we do.
The third area is focus and execution. If I am going to do the first two, from a focus perspective I am going to also say, 'Let’s take this partner, who is excellent at security, take our award-winning identity and management solution, and go after healthcare, which is a vertical that has a great need for that solution.' So the right partner, with specialization on the right solution, and going after an industry vertical with that business need today. That’s what I mean by focus.
What are your expectations of the Canadian market?
Customers in Canadian enterprises and partners have been very welcoming. They have a desire to learn more about some of these technologies and solutions, and the advantages they can bring. My expectations are also that geographically, we will do a whole bunch of open source in Halifax and Toronto. But maybe in Calgary, they are really interested in identity management. In Canada we will look specifically across the market, across verticals, such as retail, financial services, healthcare, and go after needs that they have today.
I also believe that geographically some markets are a little bit more of risk-takers some are more risk-adverse. Literally, the CIO communities have a different personality in Halifax versus Calgary, versus other areas.
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