Kristine Stewart – Partner strategy and success thought leader with an in-depth understanding of the unique needs of today’s evolving, ecosystem focused companies…
September 28, 2022 • 3 Minute Read
Kristine Stewart
Partner Strategy & Success Thought Leader
Are you looking for an executive with expertise across the entire go-to-market journey? Would you like to find a partner for a critical project or even a fractional role on your team? We know the person—Kristine Stewart!
Kristine Stewart is a partner strategy and success thought leader with an in-depth understanding of the unique needs of today’s evolving, ecosystem focused companies. She guides clients to transform their go-to-market strategies for the changing business environment, including supporting recurring revenue business models and ensuring that partners serve as profitable brand and sales extensions of the vendor’s customer experience objectives. She is an IT industry veteran in the unique position to have held numerous executive leadership roles across sales, channels, business development and marketing organizations. She continues to serve on several industry organizations (CompTIA, Partnership Leaders) particularly around mentoring women in technology. In her free time, she loves volunteer opportunities, and she enjoys travel, golf, photography and hiking the beautiful mountains of Colorado.
Please meet this IT Wondrous Woman™, Kristine Stewart!
Our 10 Questions for this IT Wondrous Woman.
Fun Facts
1. What’s the one thing about you that your business colleagues don’t know about you?
I used to sail competitively with my father in regattas all across the US.
2. Before the pandemic, how many air miles/KMs did you flying annually?
Probably only 20K, but in my Cisco days I was running at about 100K – glad those days are past.
3. What is the most adventurous food you have eaten and what city/location did you eat it?
Pig eyes and shark fin soup in Bejing….don’t recommend either.
Your Career
4. What are the top two experiences, achievements or failures that shaped your journey as a successful leader?
Taking on the opportunity to run a large international sales team when given the chance, I’d never owned a direct significant sales target previously. Second, having to fire a fairly new employee that was disrupting my entire team – lesson learned on checking out references better.
5. Did you have a mentor in the early part of your career and, if so, what is the biggest lesson you learned from your mentor or influencer?
Yes, a male VP I had very early in my career. He told me to use my team leadership skills from playing basketball when working with and building my own organization.
Walking In Your Shoes
6. What is one piece of business or career advice you would give to your younger self?
Don’t be nervous to leave an organization or role to try something totally new.
7. As a leader, how do you remain a resource for people early in their careers?
You have to be willing to spend the time, and sometimes that is your personal time if necessary. It is amazingly rewarding.
Today’s Business Environment
8. What is the most interesting project you have worked on in the last few years?
I am very passionate about working with companies to understand how to scale their customer success/experience practice with their partner community.
9. What skills are you currently developing or refining (in yourself) that will make you a more successful leader in the digital economy?
I love working with smaller, early-stage software companies and learning how they can go-to-market with a variety of ecosystem partnerships.
10. What is your greatest business challenge today?
Keeping up with all the changes brought upon by the transformation to the cloud and how quickly new platforms are being developed.
