Company: Veeam, Atlanta, GA
Company Description: Veeam® is the leader in backup solutions that deliver Cloud Data Management™. Veeam provides a single platform for modernizing backup, accelerating hybrid cloud and securing your data. Our solutions are simple to install and run, flexible enough to fit into any environment and always reliable.
Nomination Category: Sales Awards Individual Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Sales Training or Education Professional of the Year
 Nomination Title: Chad McKinney, Senior Global Program Manager
- Which will you submit for your nomination in this category, a video of up to five (5) minutes, explaining the achievements since July 1, 2020 of the nominated individual, OR written answers to the questions? (Choose one):
Written answers to the questions
- Briefly describe the nominated individual: history and past performance (up to 200 words):
Total 146 words used.
Chad McKinney has been with Veeam for 6 years. In his role as Global Program Senior Manager, he has transformed the process for the development of product launch enablement. Chad program manages the development of Veeam’s product launch enablement, designed to ensure that both Veeam’s internal sales employees and Veeam’s sales partners can identify opportunities for and articulate the business value of Veeam’s latest product releases. Product launch enablement aims to support participants to:
-Understand how the release furthers and enhances Veeam's corporate narrative in the current market
-Know the capabilities and how Veeam is positioning them to solve customers' pain points and achieve their desired outcomes
-Execute a sales conversation with customers about the release
-Differentiate Veeam from competitors
-Know the Packaging, Licensing, Pricing Options they can utilize to sell the product
-Understand how this feature set helps a partner/service provider/alliance partner set themselves apart
- Outline the nominee's achievements since July 1 2020 that you wish to bring to the judges' attention (up to 250 words):
Total 245 words used.
Prior to Chad being in role, the existing process was not optimized for frequent product launches, diverse audience needs, or scalable deliverables. Collaboration happened, but often too late. Teams and key personnel lacked visibility into the process.
Current state and desired future state were mapped out collaboratively by both the Sales Acceleration team and Product Marketing, and a matrix of owners, approvers, reviewers, and participants (OARP) was created from the workshop output.
The outcome of the past year, headed by Chad, is that training was created and provided for stakeholders and teams supporting product enablement efforts. At Veeam, this includes Sales Acceleration, Product Marketing, and External Partner Support teams.
Once the new process was designed, a training session was hosted by Chad for stakeholder audiences. Detailed documentation for each step was posted internally. This included inputs, outputs, descriptions, roles, and success indicators for each step. This provided an outcome of all stakeholders understanding the process of product launch.
The process outlined above has been implemented in 11 launch cycles in 2021 and 2022. In 2021, each of the steps listed above were completed for product launches of:
2022 launches for:
Implementation of the new process resulted in a 20% increase in product launch module consumption and a 25% increase in NPS.
- Reference any attachments of supporting materials throughout this nomination and how they provide evidence of the claims you have made in this nomination (up to 250 words):
Total 56 words used.
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- If you are submitting a video of up to five (5) minutes in length, provide the URL of the video here, OR attach it to your entry via the "Add Attachments, Videos, or Links to This Entry" link above, through which you may also upload a copy of your video. If you are submitting written answers to the questions for this category, provide them in the spaces below.
- Explain why the achievements you have highlighted are unique or significant. If possible compare the achievements to the performance of other players in your industry and/or to the nominee's past performance (up to 250 words):
Total 249 words used.
Chad’s core achievement is leading the transformation process for product launch enablement. Veeam’s product launch is released globally and is delivered to large audiences. The roles within the target audiences are numerous and varied, with many roles requiring additional or customized content to be created specifically for them. Chad manages creation of a “What’s New” module, and a review of all existing “evergreen” modules to keep them up to date.
Veeam product launches and updates are continuous, with an average of one major product launch per year and two or three less significant launches or updates per quarter. There is no specific release cadence, so their timing can be very unpredictable. Updates can also be triggered by changes to the product messaging guide. Chad should be awarded Learning Professional of the Year because of his ultimate impact of the re-vamped Product Launch Enablement process. He implements clearly defined steps, clearly defined roles between Product Marketing and Sales Acceleration, and defined ways of producing enablement depending on the type of launch. All these items, implemented by Chad, have resulted in a staggering increase of participation and consumption of learning materials. Before the re-vamp of product launch education, results needed improvement. The 2020, compared to the 2021 results are as follows:
- Average Tier 2 Product Launch module consumption in 2020- H1 2021: 660
- Average Tier 2 Product Launch consumption H2 2021 - Present: 794
This statistic shows a +20% increase in module consumption after the new product launch process was implemented.
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