Q&A: IBM's Dupaquier On x86, SoftLayer And Moving Partners Up The Stack

Did you find that the recommendations you were making were new ideas for them or were these areas that they were already looking into?

Yes. Amazingly way more than what I thought. I was shocked. We obviously run this [Business Transformation Initiative] on midsize partners, not the very large ones. When you get to midsize companies, it's very hard for them because they are always in the short term and having the strategic thinking is very hard. Even though they gut feel that they need to evolve, or they see based on their financials, they see that they make less money than before, they don't know where to start. When you arrive with this kind of approach, they really love it. Most of them decided to follow the recommendation. When you get to the sweet spot of the business partner, it's very, very useful and has been very, very followed.