GTT's Ken Bisnoff: Commissions, Channel Structure Remain Intact During Bankruptcy Process
"We're not starting from scratch. I'm kind of sprinting to catch up with the team that's already running," Bisnoff told Channel Futures.
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Channel Futures: What brought you to GTT?
GTT’s Ken Bisnoff: I spent a little over 20 years at my former company, TelePacific/TPx, where I was one of the founding executives. I was principally in charge of revenue generation with a special focus on the channel. We built up a competitive channel program there, and that’s how I got to know Jim Delis.
I’m happy to be here at GTT. I turned down a lot of channel chief type jobs that are out there and didn’t pursue some because I’m pretty careful of whom I attach my brand to. Especially in the channel. It’s a small world, and the channel’s even smaller. I needed to understand where GTT was today. I know the history. I understand how they’ve evolved, coming out of a prepackaged bankruptcy. I’m not the expert on that. It’s waiting routine regulatory approvals, and that will occur sometime in the first half of 2022. It’s noteworthy that it didn’t impact any partners, customers or employees. Before I joined the business, I reached out to some partners to ask about their understanding of GTT. I didn’t really compete head-to-head with GTT in my former role. The comment on the bankruptcy was that [vice president of strategic marketing and communications] Randy Slack and the team and the C-suite did a really good job of communicating, sharing, and, of course, keeping the commissions coming, which is nearest and dearest to partners’ hearts.
KB: The reason I joined GTT tells the story of where it is today. To me, it starts with people. That’s what hooked me into coming on board here. Jim Delis, who has several weeks’ head start on me, took over as the president of the Americas. Jim has a tremendous history in the channel and the industry. He ran XO’s sales, including the channel. He started up and built up the Time Warner Cable channel program. He dealt with all the national and regional players in the space. We had an opportunity to work together at our last company, where he came in and helped us take our program national. We were more of a regional player at the time. We peered together and worked hand-in-hand on the channel and focused top-down, bottoms-up in working with the partner community – the selling partners, the [TSB] partners – and helping evangelize what we did.
So I know Jim well. We have the same train of thought on the channel. We don’t disagree on how to run a channel and what’s needed in the channel and the resources the partners are looking for. He asked me to come in and help him take over the channel here at GTT. When I looked around, I thought, ‘For starters, it’s an established channel program and has a good reputation from that standpoint.’
KB: I was very fortunate in my process to be able to talk to CEO Ernie Ortega and to [COO] Don MacNeil. I’ve learned a lot of lessons in our world. It’s nice that they like you. It’s nice that they pay large commission checks. And it’s nice that you have shiny slicks that say you’re going to be the most wonderful company. But ultimately the strength of where I came from was the strength of being a quality service provider. In our business, things can go bump in the night. It’s a commitment and a consistency to service that you’re looking for. When I spoke with Ernie and Don, they shared the commitment to customer-first that makes up what GTT is today.
GTT grew from organic growth, but also a lot of acquisitions – more than 44 acquisitions. That was great. It gives us a lot of great assets, which I’ll touch on. But it also brings a lot of debt in. So they cleaned all that out as part of the prepackaged bankruptcy. Today it’s all about organic growth. The company knows that when you’re a service provider like we are (especially a managed service provider), you’ve got to take care of customers. It’s not just lip service; it’s by action. Everybody wants to be a great service company, and they’ll say it is. But Ernie and Don went through specific operational excellence efforts and investments in people, processes and systems that GTT has done, is doing and will continue to do. It’s an ongoing evolution. That’s the commitment that hooked me into the business.
KB: I like their mainstream products and services. As for the connectivity piece, they have a scope and scale on a global basis that very few rival, and those very few are usually big incumbents that are really not known for being nimble, quick, service-oriented, etc. And then migrating to where the world is today: managed SD-WAN, managed security, SASE. Those products are in high demand, and [partners] are looking for a company who can be one throat to choke, pull all those pieces together nationally and globally, and leverage a backbone that the company built.
CF: You mentioned this emphasis on organic growth going forward. Do you think that leads to them seeing the channel as more important?
KB: Yes, very much so, and that’s kind of the third point of why I came to the business. There was a top-down channel commitment from Ernie to Don and obviously Jim Delis. We’re all believers in the channel. The market has shifted and will continue to shift, [increasing] the importance of the partner community. The trusted advisers are positioned to lead that success.
The investment in the channel is one of the key areas of growth that the business sees. Obviously we have other channels as well, but this is the one that they’re putting emphasis on and that I and Jim are now charged with working to create a world-class channel organization. As I said earlier, I’m starting from a really strong foundation. I was very pleased to come on board and see the type of tenure that exists regionally at the leadership level in the business. I was pleased to see that they have dedicated channel resources. They call them customer advocates and customer success managers. They’re there to take care of customers and support them. They are channel-specific; they are aligned with the partners, with the regional sales leadership and the regional sales people. And there’s a tremendous dialogue there to take care of customers within the channel. I just did a call with our dedicated solution architect team, which is there to support efforts as need be, whether it’s on a deal level, or training, support and best-practice sharing. There’s a dedicated channel project management team. We typically get involved in projects versus a transactional activity. That group is dedicated to channel, and from my experience (and the same with Jim) we get the fact that it’s not just a one-to-one with the partner and the customer. There’s a triangle there, and the triangle is collaboration and communication with the partner. To have organizations that know the partners and vice versa is important. There are also dedicated channel marketing resources. We look to build from there as part of what we’re doing to grow the channel.
CF: You touched on this with the comment about collaboration, but what does teaming between direct and indirect selling look like?
KB: At GTT we have an ink rules environment that does not include teaming. We have selling channel managers. GTT’s own channel resources will sit side by side with the partner and help them sell. There is a case-by-case basis where teaming could be done in the business. If I were to start up a brand-new company, and I didn’t have the resources and the scope and scale that GTT does, it makes sense to have a channel-only architecture and have everybody team up. Usually that means the piece of the pie is only so big. So then you’re just dividing it more ways with more people.
I came from the environment that GTT is – a competing environment. They have a special deals team, and I’ve spent time with them already. That’s an important group, one of many. The pricing is always going to be even and fair, and the level of service everybody gets throughout the process will be the same. But if you have a customer and you need help selling it, we have resources to bring and deliver to support that client.
CF: Are there any lessons you’re taking from your past job at EagleTEQ Advisors?
KB: After I left my former role and the pandemic hit, I took a little time off. When I started to get back into it, I thought through what it is I like to do. I like to work with people I respect, admire and like, and that correlates to GTT. I like helping a business grow, and that’s what we were doing with EagleTEQ, and that will continue. My DNA is someone who’s customer-facing and partner-facing. My favorite part of my job is to be helping them with their business. Growth, problems, issues as the case may be. At EagleTEQ I continued that in a consulting role. I enjoyed that opportunity. I worked with several different types of companies. Some boutique managed services providers. Some UCaaS companies. We worked with the investor community, which is always trying to really get a street-level view about a variety of companies, trends and product sets.
I leave EagleTEQ in good hands. I formed it with four good friends of mine with ties to the channel: Cardi Prinzi, Curt Allen, Steve Braverman and Mike Cromwell. They have a wealth of knowledge and experience to continue to support those customers. My DNA is to get into a business and help build the business. I came to realize that, and then the opportunity came. As I said, I really wasn’t looking or chasing. It was just that everything lined up and matched well with me and where GTT is looking to go.
CF: Any goals for the GTT partner program in 2022?
KB: We need to get on the map with the partners more. We kind of took a hiatus a bit from a marketing and presence standpoint. The pandemic had a part in that, and obviously the bankruptcy had an element in it as well. We’re now ready to get out and tell our story. The good news is the company has an established channel program. They are aligned with all the key master partners out there. These are people I’ve known in my past, and I’m excited to be working and engaged with them at the national, regional and then selling-partner level. But we need to get in front of them and leverage the partner with the [technology services brokerages]. They’ve created very strong ecosystems to enable dialogue. It’s not selling; it’s educating; it’s training. We need to elevate the GTT story. Some people know us in one capacity or another. ‘Hey, I know you can do global connectivity.’ And that’s great; that’s a unique element, and [we’re] someone they can trust for it. But [there are also] the WAN capabilities, the SD-WAN capabilities, the providers that we have, the security offerings and then SASE. And then to have a company that could be one throat to choke for all those areas. Again, we have to evangelize the transformed GTT 2.0 story.”
Obviously, my goals are related to getting partners, to introducing them to clients and to have winning solutions with those partners so that the customer gets their requirements taken care of and the partner gets the success of bringing the customer on board. But selling it is one thing. [The other] is caring for the customer throughout the life cycle. That’s the type of commitment I’ve seen here.
CF: You’re talking about getting in front of partners. Does that entail adding more TSB partners, or is that list already set?
KB: If you checked down the top partners, they’re already on board and connected. You have some that got gobbled up – like in the AppSmart world – and combined. There are some new emerging ones that are coming from the VAR world. I’m already having a dialogue about getting added onto their preferred vendor list. There’s a balance. If you’re a golden retriever, you can’t try to get three or four tennis balls in your mouth. You’re going to end up dropping all of them.
The challenge for us is to maintain presence and have meaningful dialogue with the [TSBs] and their subagents. I know they already have some 80-20s. I’m not going to share who the top engaged partners are, but I know some from my past who should be and could be. The types and scale of customers they deal with are aligned with who we are and the resources bring to bear. We have a tier one global backbone that carries about a third of the world’s internet traffic. I wasn’t even aware of that capacity. But we’re translating, what does that mean to a partner? What does it mean to their customer?
CF: Is there anything you want to say to the partner audience?
KB: We’re coming out of a bankruptcy. We’re not the first in our industry to go through it. But we’re coming out more focused on customers and on the key product sets, assets and resources that this business has to deliver on a global reach. This year we’re gonna make noise. We have the team to do it. We’re not starting from scratch. I’m kind of sprinting to catch up with the team that’s already running. And the good news is I’ve got lot of people helping me along there. Partners should be looking out for GTT and looking at how we could help them and their customer opportunities.
CF: Is there anything you want to say to the partner audience?
KB: We’re coming out of a bankruptcy. We’re not the first in our industry to go through it. But we’re coming out more focused on customers and on the key product sets, assets and resources that this business has to deliver on a global reach. This year we’re gonna make noise. We have the team to do it. We’re not starting from scratch. I’m kind of sprinting to catch up with the team that’s already running. And the good news is I’ve got lot of people helping me along there. Partners should be looking out for GTT and looking at how we could help them and their customer opportunities.
GTT Communications’ channel partners have experienced smooth sailing and haven’t lost commissions amid the company’s chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings.
GTT’s Ken Bisnoff
That’s according to Ken Bisnoff, who recently joined the service provider as its channel chief. Bisnoff, who gained a reputation in the channel during his 22 years at TPx Communications (formerly TelePacific), joined former coworker Jim Delis, who serves as GTT’s president for the Americas.
Channel Futures caught up with Bisnoff who most recently was working at the consultancy EagleTEQ Advisors. He shared that the company is investing more in the channel as it seeks an organic growth strategy. GTT has acquired dozens of companies over the last decade, including Interoute and Global Capacity.
Scroll through the 10 images above to see Bisnoff’s comments about GTT, its channel program, commissions, its recent bankruptcy and his past experiences.
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