What have you found the most helpful about going through a cloud education program?

Harding: I think it’s a combination of understanding the language and the technology that underlies it and how it works, but most importantly, learning about the actual impact that the solutions bring to bear to the organization. Understanding how important those impacts are [to a company] is important because if people don't know any better, they don't do any better.  Companies are used to what they have, and they often don't know there might be better services available that are ultimately cheaper than buying a premise-based solution. If I'm the one that brings [cloud] up to them, and I can show them how much benefit it could bring to their organization, you're in a very powerful selling position at that point.

The [sales staff] has to have a sense of confidence, understand how the technology works, who the best players are, and they have to be able to speak to it. IT managers understand it very well and can sniff out someone that doesn't know what they are talking about quite readily.