Transcript:

Welcome to my house, Trisha. Hi, Rick. It's so good to be here. It's nice to have someone in person. I used to, my last company where I ran the podcast, I would only do them in person. But now that I'm on the startup travel budget, which is basically non-existent, like I'd say three out of four are virtual. And it's just nice to have one in person because I love doing these in person. Yes. I mean, it just, changed the dynamic. I've been on Zoom all day long, I feel like. So when you...

gave me this option. said, sign me up. It's funny because I, you and I agreed to do it. And then I sent you the zoom link just out of like habit. And I'm like, wait, you're like 30 minutes from me. Why don't I just have you have you over to my house and we'll just do this in person. So thank you for coming. So so tell me a little bit about yourself, where you work, what you do. Yes. So I am. I love partners. So just number one there. I currently

senior partner marketing manager at a company called Posit. And this is where I'm golden market strategies and partner marketing for our strategic alliance partnerships with our cloud and data cloud partners. So that would be AWS, Databricks and Snowflake. So those are my, they're like, you know, big hitters. I to stop you real quick. I just interviewed Carlos.

Carlos Roman from Databricks had a go at DataBricks yesterday. it's funny you say that because he'll be on the episode airing I think two weeks before you. So here we are, we're all talking. We're talking about the data AI cloud. Love it, love it. So that's a lot. mean, so you get the cloud, the data, it's all you. Typical partner marketer, right? Doing it all. Yes, yes. There's a lot of moving parts and pieces and...

You know, partner marketing, we are speaking to partner marketers. It's not just marketing, right? There's so many other layers beyond that direct marketing motion. And that is, makes your job a lot, but that's also what makes it so exciting because there's that whole building relationships with each partner and each partner is different. So how you go to market and how you do co-marketing is different for each partner. So it's an exciting adventure to.

Rick Currier (02:19.833)

to build those relationships and figure out how you're going to actually execute on the marketing. It's not. If the direct marketing you've got, I mean, it's still a lot. Marketing is a lot regardless, but there's just a lot of elements I feel like to manage. Yeah, I feel like we're going to dive right in because... Sorry, I went there. No, you're good. No, I love it because now my mind's already turning. I think everything we're trying to do in life is, or not life, but like in partner marketing, marketing business is how do we...

How do we templatize, scale, be more systematic, programmatic? But you're saying it, like the way I treat AWS can't be the same as this other cloud company, right? So we have to leave nuance and build on the relationships. So how do you manage the two? What's your approach for being programmatic but still leaning into the relationship and giving the relationship what it deserves? Yeah. Well, I don't know if I take the easy road. That's what I've always been told.

But I've also always been told after I have time to do the way I do things, so like how did you do that? Right? Or you built such a great relationship with your partners, which then usually when you have a good relationship, you can do great marketing or great partnership. It's not just marketing, right? But great partnership, whatever that is, whatever your goals are with that partnership. And these are, you know, we're talking strategic alliance partners. I think it's...

different when you're talking about potentially your channel marketing ecosystem and your service partners. still there's that relationship involved. But I think strategic alliance, your strategic alliance partners building that strong cohesive relationship where you're speaking with them once a week, sometimes multiple times a week, have your own Slack channel where you're talking to each other like coworkers because you really do become.

co-workers there. They are always say extension of your team. I'm I think not even extension of your team. They are your two. They're part of your team. Yeah, so I use talking with them as much as you talk with your internal teammates any tips or tricks in terms of how to build that relationship and I'm sure it takes time But I'm sure you've learned some ways at least you can get there a little bit faster or make it a little bit smoother What what works well any opportunity I get to be at a meetings as a partner marketing? Professional sometimes

Rick Currier (04:45.505)

Sometimes not always, you're not always invited to the conversation and they're like, that's your marketing. We'll get to you later. So whenever I have the chance, I speak up and I either invite myself or request to be at meetings, even if it's not marketing related so that I can be there and listen. That's the most important thing. Listen, understand where that partner is at and like any relationship, are they ready for you? What are they ready for?

You know, partnerships are relationships. So just, there's that intuition. Are they ready for me to start talking about co-marketing? No, or yes. Or are they, are we ready to just ask questions that might not even be partner related, partner marketing related, just about the product, about the roadmap, about the sales strategy. So just be curious and show interest. And of course people care when you do that. And that's you start to build relationships.

And when you ask questions, yeah, people will not care. And I think that matters a lot. And then eventually you can bring the marketing in. Well, I, you know, obviously some great just relationship lessons there to begin with, it's, it's interesting. You really have to start with advocating for yourself to get that invite and be present early on so that you are in a position to listen. Exactly. Cause otherwise you're going to miss probably some fundamental things that are going to help you knowing the times right and an organic way to bring marketing involved. Right.

Honestly, I'm not saying that's the only way. I'm a curious person and I love information and I love listening. And when I'm on these calls, I'm not one who's doing three other things at the same time. I'm not flocking, you know, into these other things. So.

I guess that's important too for me. I know other people can do things in different ways, but for me, I would like to be present and really listen. That is the way I do things. Other people may say, why do you, you don't need to do all those things. And people may be able to do it a different way. No, it's funny to say that because I, I get caught up in that trap of doing things, especially virtually. Right. And I know it distracts me. Yeah. I've always been a big believer in in-person in-person meetings.

Rick Currier (07:03.797)

I'd love to go see my customers. And maybe it's because I'm thinking through this, you know, in real time on air that I know that just subconsciously I can limit those distractions and be fully present in the moment. And virtually I get caught up in the distractions and I'm not giving it what I should and I'm not getting out of it what I deserve. Yeah. And especially if you've like invited or asked to be on a call where you're not the main character, it's really easy. And I'm not saying I'm perfect, but it's real easy to get distracted. So

If you are going to get yourself in a position to be there, make sure that you're present and to get the most out of it too. Cause otherwise, we're like, you are wasting your time. Yeah, totally. Well, like I said, we don't, don't read in. we didn't even go. I just showed up here, like I'm going to just go where the conversation is. Literally you showed up, thought my dog was going to attack you. And then I'm like, oh, it's a friendly lab. No, but that's what I love about it. Cause you know, I wanted to get to your backstory, but I just.

I was caught by that because I think relationship building is it's fundamental to this job. I think there's a lot more that goes with it. But if you don't have that relationship, I don't care how good your templates are, your programmatic approach, your AI workforce, none of it matters. Absolutely. I was keeping a human in the loop, right? So how did you get to this point? Tell me a little bit about your journey here. Yeah, I'm like, do you know the movie Goonies? Yeah, of course. I'm not in any distress right now, but when is the...

woman wants to his hand in the blender and she's like tell me everything he's like everything because i really think honestly i was doing partnership type related marketing related things since was a child like with not even realizing it and we talked about how i had some time where i took a break from my professional career to start my own

community and company that was fitness related and built a partner ecosystem within the fitness and wellness community in Denver. And I didn't even realize I was doing that, but I was building like partnerships. And then from there, that's when I actually found my first, I started doing contract work for marketing and was given the opportunity to do a partner marketing role. And

Rick Currier (09:22.797)

I just said sure, because I needed a job. And didn't know necessarily what I getting myself into. it actually was great. mean, as soon as I learned, like started getting my hands dirty with partners, I was like, this is really exciting. And I love partners. I'm never turning back. I'm going to stay with partners. What is it about partners that you love so much? How do I?

It's so interesting. What is it, the subtle of the parts or something? I don't know. I always mess up the... I agree with in the whole, think. Then the better together. I know people hate... I don't know if people hate double-strong word. People get bored by that statement. I like better together. I don't know why people hate on it. I just think you can accomplish so much more when you collaborate and work together and partnerships. It's just always...

you're learning about someone else's business and how you can work together to help the customer, right? And then to help each other. So it's like a win, win, win. And again, that's like, so like, people say that all the time, but it's true. Like, you're working together, you're collaborating, you're helping more people and you're winning more together. And it's truly how you scale. from like a feel good, it feels good to collaborate.

It feels good to help people like solve their problems. And especially now, like partnership is just so important to solve the complexities because there's so many different ways to solve problems. And for one company, they'll solve all of your problems. That's just, it's impossible. I think anymore. So you're solving your client, your mutual clients problems. and I don't know. lost my train of thought. No, I think it feels good. you're, as you're saying it, I'm kind of reflecting on my own approach and

You know, for me, it's when I, hey, we're trying to solve problems, right? To your point. And when you find a partner, it's almost like, there's something new here, a new way we can solve this problem. it's almost like you have like hope and inspiration. it's for, to me, it's very future forward-looking. And like I've been in sales for 20 years and closed a lot of deals and I've never like, you know, in the movies they're all high-fiving and ringing the bell. I've never gotten a lot of personal satisfaction out of that close. For me, it's always,

Rick Currier (11:38.498)

when I'm going into a meeting and I uncover someone's challenge and I think we can help them, like that is the high for me as a sales rep and that's where I get my energy from. think partnership is very similar. Like that collaboration to achieve something great and solve some real problems. Like it's very forward looking, isn't it? Absolutely. Absolutely. So, all right. So, so you got into a very roundabout way and then did you go straight into like tech partner marketing? Yeah. Yeah. So I, it was,

So I started a company called TipGo, which was a data science company as well. Well, as Posit is a data science company, so I don't think I've mentioned that earlier. So I was there and did partner marketing. And it was more on the programmatic side and working within the partner ecosystem and building those programs and communicating those programs. did a lot of partner communications and engagement and getting the partners engaged and on board with.

the new program that was launched, getting them engaged with the campaign in the boxes we were creating and how are we getting out their joint success stories? Like what is the, and what is the like architecture of how the partnership and integrations work? So it was more that to partner and getting things ready for the with partner marketing, but I didn't actually execute on that like.

demand gem component per se, I was working with the partners to get those elements ready and to do the programmatic channel type partner marketing as well. Do think you picked up any skills there in the two motion that's really helping you out? I worked a lot with some executives and especially the executives on our partner team. So working with them to understand what their vision was for the partner program and

get that funnel to the partners and getting the partners to engage. So being that person that there was that executive communication component of understanding what the executive vision was, understanding what the partners need, and then how can we have this all come together and make it work. Things didn't work out perfect. But then you to try and fail.

Rick Currier (14:04.653)

we did get on a great cadence of monthly communications. We've got our monthly newsletter, but we got into a really nice group where eventually people really wanted to be a part of that, having a monthly call with our executive to speak to the partners. at first it kind of started slow. And then again, we started having people wanting to pitch ideas. So it became like this call we could plan a couple months out on how we were going to...

put together like what our direct business wants, what our partner executives want, and then what the partner wants and doing a webinar. I feel like I'm starting to come off. No, this is good. Were you, this new job at Tipco, were you thrown in directly to working with these executives off the bat? is that something you built up over time? No, that kind of evolved over time. Okay. But yeah. So what worked in terms of like establishing credibility to get to the point where now you're

you're at the executive level, at least in terms of working with the executives on these key initiatives, what helped you kind of move up?

I think kind of similar to what you work with partners. Showing up, listening, and asking to be involved, doing work, probably doing more work than necessary, which I don't know if that's a good or bad thing, honestly, as I listen to Eckhart Tolle, really. But going above and beyond sometimes to create

based on what I'm hearing, what we're challenged internally and understanding what partners are challenged with and being creative and pitching ideas and sharing them and testing things out, not being afraid to try something out. And they're like, okay, I'm like, look, how about we do this? Okay, we're gonna go do it. I had to work on the weekends sometimes. We've all been there. Just make it happen. And I say that cautiously because where I'm at

Rick Currier (16:11.059)

it is that I love this company. They're a PBC, public benefit corporation. They're also B-corp certified. So they're really about getting back their open source community, as well as they have their enterprise tools. But they're really about taking care of their employees, taking care of people. And they really, really enforce like, don't overwork yourself, which is refreshing to be at a tech company to say that. So it's interesting to be at

here and there's so much to do and to do things the way I do things, but also realizing that it's working so hard isn't necessarily the right thing to do. So that must be tough though, because you're, you know, from someone who's relatively new in a company, you, you know, that you'd have to work weekends and nights, but you do want to work really hard to like prove yourself, right? So, so like, all right, just blanket advice for someone who's new in a company, like what, what

What advice do you have for someone that's new that, know, obviously I can tell them to work weekends and nights, but like, what should they be doing to build trust and credibility for that role? say they're a brand new partner marketer at a new organization. What are things they should be doing? Well, I'm not saying I'm perfect by any means, because I'm figuring it out as I go. Because each new role I've had has been different too. And I think we've talked about, that's like what partners have taught me. Each company is different. Each culture is a little bit different.

Each manager is different and having to meet them where they are and what their expectations are. Each CEO is different, right? And what they expect of their employees and of their team. So that would be first is figure out what your cards are, right? Figure out what your culture is. I know you need to be yourself too. Be yourself. also, like, this is where I'm battling with be yourself and be who you are because I actually love.

work. love to do, I do enjoy working and solving problems. But yeah, meet your, meet, because ultimately you want to make sure you understand what your leadership wants and what your manager wants or whatever, you know, what the organization wants. And even though you may see another path or another way, so having to under, having to deliver on what those expectations are, but how can you like,

Rick Currier (18:37.737)

and incrementally bring in your vision of what you can see as possible that they might not quite see. What's the best way to present that? that like, all right, boss, I'm 90 days in here. I want to sit you down and run you through a PowerPoint on what my vision is here. Like, I mean, what practical advice do you have for folks where like maybe they have a vision that's little different. So obviously, you got to understand that the company culture and the goals, but like.

What's the best way to deliver that in your point of view? Yeah, just go for it. Be bold, huh? Be bold. actually recently, yeah. So put it together, take some risks. I'm scary. least I think it's a little scary. Totally. But can you lean into that? Do something even though, because follow your intuition. you feel it, I can feel it. I can feel it. I'm like, this is something I should do, even though it may not be.

like what everyone's expecting or what everybody wants. And then I think and I calculate, I meditate and I calculate, okay, is this something that I really need to lean into and take that risk, you know, and balance it out? And I might fail, right? But it might be successful. And it might be a little rocky because for me, my process is a little messy sometimes when I explain myself and you can't tell from this interview so far, all over the place. So,

So you also have to realize you have to be willing to take that risk. And I really lean into vulnerability and I know my intentions are good. So I hope that that shows in whatever I'm going for. Like I present a plan. I guess that's really what I want to say is present your plan of what you want to do. You just got to do it. You just got to do it. And someone, there may be some, I don't understand that. And believe most of the time I get people in like, I don't understand that. But you might have some people like, wow, that was awesome.

And that's exactly, you know, what I'm used to experiencing. So you have to be able to lean into uncertainty, a little bit of fear and having people not quite understand you, but don't necessarily let that stop you. But know that that not to necessarily bulldoze people over. Yeah. Yeah. So it's a balance. It's an intuitive, intuitive dance. Yeah. You know, that, that could be tough for, I think, someone that's newer in their career. Yeah.

Rick Currier (21:02.325)

Right. But that doesn't mean they can't have great vision and great ideas too. you know, now I'm thinking about generations, know, generationally, we all think differently. I mean, we're all as humans, we all think differently. And, and really, you know, don't hold back. guess because we're all unique and we all, if you, if you have like an idea, like we need to get it out there. I mean, we're in tech and innovation, like innovation.

The great innovations never happened without someone taking a risk. So I want to ask you about in terms of managing expectations. So you're working with not you personally, but just in general, working with executives. They want to do things, try things, you know, and I love partner markets because they're like, yeah, let's try it. I they're very, you know, from my experience, like risk is part of the job, right? Let's do it. What advice do you have or practical advice in terms of managing executive expectations and

when things don't work out or they fail? Any advice you have in terms of communicating back and managing the executive track? So another one I'm not going to say I'm perfect at, it depends on your executive. I'm very honest. I don't know if that always serves me, right? So I prefer to be transparent. But again, know your culture because that sometimes doesn't serve me.

because I've been told you're saying too much. You don't need to say all that. So paint a better picture. And that's actually something I'm working on. Because I'm usually harder on myself than, and so I am like, this isn't exactly how I want. it's like, not everyone needs to hear about that, right? Like talk about what is going well and keep talking about the vision of where you're going along the way.

When you're when you're building a plan or presenting a vision or you're making this bold risk, you know, have you worked with mentors in your life? Are you mentoring anybody? What is what does it look like in terms of do I go at this alone or do I get some help? Yeah, absolutely. I have mentors along the way. I currently have like a official career coach mentor who

Rick Currier (23:24.753)

I actually used to work with a long time ago before partners. And so happy to be working with her now because she was like my mentor, like I worked for her and then she mentored me naturally. And then now I'm like officially like working with her as just a coach and mentor. And that has makes a huge difference. Interesting. I also can ask her real quick before you get off on others.

What about the coaching is actually know very little about like official coaching type type relationships like is this Do you guys get together once a month and there's a set agenda? Do you have to bring work to it to get the most out of it? Tell me a little bit about it. Yeah, so for us

Her name's Wendy, and I am happy to share her with other clients if you would like. She's executive coaching as well as mid-career coaching. My wife will tell you I need all the coaching I can get, right? I all the coaching. I told you there was more. So she does an intake kind of interview to kind of understand kind of what your concerns are, priorities are, and then before each call, just it checks in.

on how you're thinking and feeling, but she also doesn't make it like a heavy lift project that you have to come prepared. So what I love about her, she's someone that I learned from because she was someone in my early career about listening. I mean, can only hope I can be as good as Wendy. Like I wish I could be as good as her. She really listens. so.

Rick Currier (25:04.397)

It's just her ability to listen. It's not like I have to come with a lab because she listens from meeting to meeting. And so she kind of already knows or checks in with a text to see how things are going. So she already is like, so I think you do we want to talk about what would you like to talk about? I was thinking maybe we could talk about this or was there something else because she's already like along the way listening and having an idea of what I'm seeking to talk about. Of course, you have to share it. Like, I mean, if you're getting a coach and you're

paying for them, you're probably sharing what's on your mind. And you're probably working through very specific problems or objectives. How does that differ from other mentors that you might have in your life? Yeah, there's a lot of mentors, right, that it's not an official. And I've actually in my past missed when I was being mentored. that's good or bad thing.

But now, one time I realized I missed that I was being mentored and I made that realization. And now I try to be really aware if I'm like, this person is taking the time to mentor me right now, like off on the fly or just in general and recognizing when that's happening, because it can be subtle. And when that's happening, that's actually like a huge gift. If someone's taking the time to give you like,

helpful feedback and wisdom, et cetera. I mean, I think from what I'm getting from this episode is you're very self-aware. You're a good listener. So you're probably, well, I mean, I think it's good advice because I bet people are getting that kind of gift all the time and just not realizing it. And I think that's also okay. Yeah. But I think, know, just being present and aware of, you know, what I see, are blessings all around us. Yeah. think that's hugely important.

All right, so I think early in the episode, we were talking a little bit about Ford looking in the future. What excites you the most, whether it's at your role, your company, or just in partner marketing in general, in tech, what's got you all pumped up looking ahead? like I said, I'm just really excited to be at Posit. I'm really excited for what they do. They've been around since 2009, so they aren't a new company.

Rick Currier (27:31.329)

But it's about 350 employees. So they're very agile and move quick. They're so well respected in the data science community. They have almost like a cult following. So I'm just really excited to be in this environment, in this culture, and around leadership that so far I'm just very inspired by.

soaking it in. See, I'm listening. I'm still soaking in and listening, but I feel like there's so much in store for me here. And I'm really excited with this role to be working with the cloud partners and the data cloud partners. That's been on my mind in my previous roles. I did dabble, but I didn't get to have that direct be responsible for those.

like go-to-market strategies and partner marketing execution. And now I have that. So I'm thrilled because it's been something I've been wanting to do that happened. you have an achievable challenge ahead of you. I think it's so big. I'm a big believer that if the next role doesn't scare you a little bit, it's not big enough for you because we all need roles that are big enough for us to grow into.

You know, so that's great. get to experience that new side of it and bring your own vision and ideas to it, you know, because I think we always need new perspective too. Yes, absolutely. So very cool. Well, Trisha, thank you so much for coming on. It's great. Now I got to start listening better because I think people have been mentoring me and I haven't been appreciating it. So I'm going to start listening now. I don't want to give anyone like, you getting your head about it.

No, but I think it's great advice and that just thank you. Thank you for coming to my home. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.