‘When I meet with founders of a new company, my advice is almost always: Do fewer things. It’s true of partnerships, marketing opportunities, anything that’s taking up your time. The vast majority of things are distractions, and very few really matter to your success.’ - Evan Williams
Large technology organisations provide many businesses with information technology services. Very often, the people representing these organisations are not the technical experts, they are sales and marketing people, and they have a target to achieve. However, their organisation has technical capability available when it is requested in the right manner. Organisations should explore and select a range of possible partners based on their digital potential for their business. Some of these digital aspirations may depend on emerging operational and customer technology capability, and achieving access to it will be dependent on executive sponsorship. Avoid placing your eggs in one basket; the process requires some competitive tension. You will likely need to talk with several organisations to explore sponsorship options for your organisation and the various initiatives. Technology executives will sponsor initiatives when:
An idea is good
There is a team of people who will partner as peers with their team
They have confidence in the capability of the individuals within the organisation.
Many organisations become frustrated with those organisations providing technology services due to the lack of ingenuity, but sometimes the issues reside within the organisation searching for the service. So before embarking on deepening your relationship with a technology partner, consider asking:
Are they working with others globally in this capacity?
What attributes do these organisations have?
Would they consider working with you and your organisation to explore possibilities? What could you change so they would?
The likelihood of a symbiotic partnership is with larger organisations, as they have partnership investment funds. They can offer great global sponsorship for either emerging technology or the deployment of mature technology that shows leadership within your industry. The beauty of the latter is it will be used as a reference to others and help market your business too!