Two sales directors wave goodbye to Dell

Dell has embarked on a search for two new shiny-suited sales directors amid a senior-level revamp of its UK channel ops.

Steve Holmes, UK commercial channel sales director, is leaving the firm after two decades. Ed Owen, regional sales director for managed service providers and resellers, has already cut and run.

Under the new setup, Dell’s local channel GM Sarah Shields has taken on management of reseller titans in Dell's fold, including Insight, Computacenter, Kelway and Softcat.

“I am initiating a real shake-up,” she told us, “I need to be closer to the [channel] business, and having direct responsibility for the biggest partners let’s me see what they need”.

As a result of the changes, she has relinquished control of the SMB and consumer teams.

One of the sales directors being sought will take ownership of MSP sales, an area where Dell said it will “double down” on investments.

“We see this as a huge growth area,” Shields told The Channel. “We have a team in place and had some good wins but I need someone to tie this together”.

The second sales head will manage “high performing” accounts. These are resellers and integrators of all sizes who are giving Dell more share of wallet. Specific details on this were not yet available.

The person to be hired in this role will run the field-based partner development managers, backed up by Dell internal telesales account managers in Ireland and India.

“I am making sure I align my team around the right partners to drive business,” said Shields.

Clearly, neither Owen nor Holmes were thought of as the right men to lead the charge, our sources pointed out. We asked both for comment and will update when – or if – they reply. ®