Foiz Ahmed, COO, Constor Solutions
We’ve taken on about 10 Dell staff in India over the last year or so. I remember taking on six who were made redundant at the beginning of January. We’ve also taken on a couple of Dell people in the UK this year.
The layoffs were a reflection of the market, which was correct in a way because the first six months of 2023 were very slow.
What we’ve seen in the last couple of months is a trickle down of requirements coming through where Dell are coming to partners like us and saying ‘we’ve lost a load of skills in this area; we need you to come and help us win business here’. They are coming to us to do demos and proof of concepts.
We’re one of the highest certified partners and this has given us the ability to engage more closely with Dell.
Rickie Sehgal, CEO, Transputec
We’ve taken on two people [from Apple], after having interviewed eight people [in the area of service delivery].
Taking staff on from vendors is by no means a quick fix to the problem of talent acquisition. There is a massive difference in culture and operation styles, and this is often a negative for those seeking a career with MSP or resellers.
The main challenges in onboarding and integrating new starters from the [vendors] into MSP is the realisation that the smaller organisation is more immune to the downturn in the economy because they are agile, lean and have developed long-
term relationships with their customers. I haven’t come across a vendor in 35 years that doesn’t rotate their staff amongst different accounts, for whatever reasons. Solid, bilaterally trustful relationships are just not formed in that ecosystem.
See interview with Sehgal here
Simon Williams, CEO, Trustmarque
Did we take on vendor staff? Yes, 100%. We were very clear with our vendors and leant into the process and said ‘if you’ve got people being laid off, these are the areas we’re recruiting in; feel free to give them our name and contact details and we’ll interview anyone you put forward’. We spoke at senior levels across a number of the vendors.
There are good people out there, so we’ve brought in some excellent people to help us. And not only do you get their technical expertise, you also get that emotional engagement and trust. If the person we employed used to work in Microsoft and they were friends and colleagues with a whole bunch of people in Microsoft, they’ll then have that relationship and level of trust, which is only going to help us.
Doug Woodburn is editor of IT Channel Oxygen
