Introduction

I have designed my BLOG as an enhanced resume to assist me in my job search. A traditional resume is limited by paper size, file size and sometimes people's attention span.  This format will allow me to provide a dynamic way for people to see my skill set and the value that I can bring to their organization.

If you have any questions or comments, please use the facilities provided on the web site or feel free to email me. lockettfamily@gmail.com

CLICK HERE FOR WORD VERSION

Ben Lockett

(303) 907 8801

ben.lockett@gmail.com

 http://benlockett.blogspot.com

Enterprise Software Sales Executive

Enterprise Software Sales / Hunter / Marketing Automation / MRM / Database Marketing / Cross Channel / Business Development / Business Intelligence / JD Edwards / Entrepreneur / ROI / CRM 

Tenacious, innovative and experienced software sales professional with exceptional customer relationship management skills combining business acumen with proven sales track record to develop solutions for major organizations including Ameriprise, Qwest, PetSmart, Kendal Jackson, Microsoft & Gap.

Closed one of only 4 $1M+ deals in 2008

Top 25% of company in 2008

Quota Achieved in 2006, 2003, 2004

Salesman of the year 2006

National Diploma, Business / Finance, Plymouth University

Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst - Officer and leadership training

Unica – Interactive Marketing Leader, 2007 – Present

Regional Sales Manager

Managed the complete sales cycle selling the entire portfolio of Unica products into a defined set of prospective and existing brand name customers.  Managed sales through forecasting, resource allocation, account strategy and planning. Developed solution proposals based on customer’s business problems.  Negotiated pricing and contractual agreements to close the sale.   Identified and developed strategic alignment with partners.  Designed and executed multiple demand generation strategies.

RapidDecision – JD Edwards Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence Solution Provider, 2005 – 2007

Regional Sales Manager

Built sales organization from ground zero, conceptualizing and implementing strategic plan that generated $1.5 million in software and consulting revenue within one year. Created a $9m company wide partner driven pipeline. Created new product marketing strategy that was implemented by whole company.

Entrepreneur , Carlton Enterprises , 2004 – 2005

Took advantage of Crystal Decisions purchase by Business Objects to follow life long passion for entrepreneurial endeavor. Planned and executed $5M real estate acquisition strategy. Built 10 person team to find, fix and flip properties.  Successfully marketed New Mexico Properties to European market in London. Identified and invested in fastest growing real estate segments in Colorado.

 Crystal Decisions/Business Objects – $1B Business Intelligence Company, 1999 – 2004

 Major Customer Business Development , 2003- 2004.

Implemented next generation business development program focused on Fortune 50 customers with identified long term strategic value and revenue generation potential. Added $3M to sales pipeline resulting in $1.5M license and services revenue.

Professional Services Sales, 2002- 2003

Interface between Crystal’s sales team and customers to build technology based solutions, maximizing services, training revenue and ROI.

Posted $2M in services revenue.

Practice Manager . 1999 - 2002

Planned and developed Western Region Consulting Team growing from 2 to 18 consultants in 12 months. Set strategic objectives, tactical implementations, and priorities for the project staff. Assigned and reviewed tasks, managed performance and staffing requirements.

 Software Spectrum – $500M Global Company specializing in licensing and solution

implementations, 1996 - 1999

Project Manager

Implemented enterprise wide solutions based on Microsoft technology. Projects included deploying Microsoft Exchange for Credit Suisse First Boston in London, Help Desk solution for Motorola in Florida and Systems Management Server for Public Service of Colorado.

British Army - Captain, 1990 - 1996

Spent 6 years as an Officer in one of the most respected military organizations in the world. Received exemplary leadership training while studying at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. Gained entry to the Academy by beating 2/3 of all applicants. Led teams of between 9 and 150 challenging environments around the world including Central America and Cyprus.

Awards & Recognition

RapidDecision Salesman of the Year 2006

Panel Speaker – JD Edwards Real Estate Conference 2006

Crystal Decisions Project of the Year 2001— for deploying a Balanced Scorecard at ICBC.

#1 Contributor to the Crystal Decisions Customer Reference Program — 15 participating customers.

Completed Top Gun Sales Training Course – March 2003

Completed Pre Sales Boot Camp – August 2003

MCSE

Publications

“Deploying Business Intelligence Solutions” – Que Publications

My Target Position

I am a Hunter of new business. I excel at being dropped into a sales territory, finding and closing business and growing that business to drive maximum revenue.

I have spent my career moving up through organizations based on my natural relationship building, planning, execution and leadership skills. Whether this is selling million dollar software deals, managing multi million dollar, high visibility technology projects, multi million corporate relationships or multi million dollar armored fighting vehicles, I have always been able to keep things moving forward in a symbiotic and mutually beneficial manner, while keeping most of the people happy most of the time and generating revenue.

If you review my customer references; all from Fortune 100 companies, all from senior level management, you will see that all of my experiences have led to happy customers who feel that the skills that I posses bring value to their companies. All these customers bought more software as a result of my engagement.

My LinkedIn profile will also provide you with some recommendations.

Ben Lockett's CUSTOMER References

Martin P., VP Finance - Insurance Corporation of British Columbia (ICBC)

"I'm a big fan of yours and really (truthfully!) a big part of the reason why we chose Crystal here at ICBC, even more important, was that after the sale was done you actually delivered on your promises. I found you to be customer service oriented and overall a good guy that I could trust in doing business with.."

Pam Y., Sr Dir, Corporate Information Technology - Genentech

“Ben Lockett has been one of only 2 people who have remained in contact with Genentech during the last 2 years. If I call him I know that the issue I raise will be channeled to the right people at Crystal who can take the fastest action to achieve resolution. He has built close business relationships with my team at all levels and continues to develop relationships when new staff arrives. I find him to have a can do attitude, incredibly professional and has a good grasp of Crystal Technology and understands how this technology can benefit my organization.”

Gary P., Manager Enterprise Reporting - Discover Card

I just wanted to take the time to send you an email to let you know how appreciative I've been of you over that last few years. If you can remember three years ago when Discover first signed "The" contract and we chose Crystal (at the time Seagate) as our reporting tool; I was very unsure at how all this would work. With the help of many people at Crystal, including you Ben, I can say that it has been very successful.

The Crystal Decisions Professional Services orginization were critical to the success that we have had here at Discover Card. Let me just recap some of the things you have helped me with:

We hired you to help us plan out our 25 server, 5 APSs Seagate Info 7.5 originally to support our Aspect Call Center reporting. When it came time to build the reports you helped us with finding
consultants. You were always making sure we were happy with the people and successful in what we do.

We used professional services to train our Seagate Info Admins.

We brought in many partners and Crystal employee's into our company over the years for many different jobs including, Holos training, Crystal Enterprise help, Report Development and training. In addition there were many small jobs that you were able to find people to help with when I didn't have the staff to do it myself.

We involved you as we started planning on migrating to Crystal Enterprise. The origional plans we made are being used now to make sure our migration is successful.

As our needs changed you were able to help us with additional resources and ideas.

Even when things didn't go as smoothly as we would have hoped. I can not remember once thinking that Ben isn't doing everying he can do to make this a success.

Again, I just wanted to say thanks for all your help. Even though Crystal has been changing and I have different people that I work with now, I really value our partnership. You have helped make my job successful.

Three years ago I was given a project to change our reporting tool. Now I am the manager of Enteprise Reporting and I have staff reporting to me.

Our team is involved in most every project that goes on in Discover becasue reporting has now become critical to it's success.

Thanks,

Doyle B., VP Enterprise Reporting - Diner's Club

As you know *********** is a key part of CitiCorps Diner's Club's strategic vision, providing an essential analysis tool for our corporate customers. Crystal Decisions' involvement in Global Vision began in early 2001, since that time you have played a very strategic role, becoming the interface that I use most when I need prompt reaction and follow through. Even if this is sometimes the back door approach!

Your knowledge of the internal structure at Crystal Decisions in superb and you always know who to call to when we need serious issues resolved. Almost a break glass in case of emergency situation!

Last April, as we were heading towards our go live date, we hit a major technical hurdle regarding a 3rd party COM wrapper. You were instrumental in getting the right players from Crystal to support us during this "down to the wire" time. As a direct result of this support we were able to go live as planned. While we continue to have Seagate Info related issues, ******* receives good reviews from our customers, the acid test of every Application Project.

As we move in the direction of other Crystal technologies, I look forward to continuing the partnership you have fostered between Diner's and Crystal Decisions and to seeing you in the "customers' champion" role that you have played over the last 2 years.

Greg P., Mgr, Information Architecture Services - Novell

Approximately a year ago, we started our relationship with Crystal. One of the key selling points the Crystal people stressed during the sales process was the Customer Quality Manager program. Initially I was skeptical, because my past experience in working with several other business intelligence vendors over the years has been anything but a partnership. However, the concept seemed very powerful, and definitely an added benefit to Novell. When we talked to customer references for both Crystal and ******** (the two finalists), we definitely got a much stronger feeling from the Crystal customers that they felt more of a commitment to satisfaction from Crystal.

So, that led us to believe the Customer Quality Manager program was real. After the deal was closed, and Ben Lockett was introduced as the Customer Quality Manager, it quickly became apparent that for the first time ever in working with a business intelligence vendor, we had an advocate looking out for our interests back at Crystal. Issues get resolved faster, and in a way that is more of a permanent solution, not just a "band-aid". Ben also is helpful in staying on top of communications so everyone on both sides are clear about who has agreed to do what, when, and the status. This saves substantial time and effort on both sides. Things move forward more smoothly, so one side or the other isn't always waiting on the other, and wondering where things are. All this has contributed to an unprecedented feeling of partnership with Crystal. Its an acknowledged principle in customer/vendor relationships, that getting to a partner level makes it very difficult for the customer to go a different direction in the future. So, this clearly was a strategic advantage for Crystal. Hopefully it will remain so now that Business Objects is in charge.

Ben Lockett's Peer and Management References

Sharon G., Business Objects
Director, Solution Partner Channel Sales

Ben remains an instrumental part of the successful team attending to Novell's needs. I am so grateful that we have made the committment to the CQM position and that some of my accounts can enjoy the attention of Ben's professional and proactive approach.


Kevin E., Business Objects
VP Western Region
Ben: Congrat's, your trip to Hong Kong & subsequent engagement with Gap Hong Kong was instrumental in improving the client relationship & closing the sale. Well Done.

Ben Lockett's Resume-PDF

Click here for a PDF version of my resume

Tactical Withdrawal From The Coasts!

Here we go? Is this the news we've all been waiting for? Looks like the people on the coasts and over priced real estate ecosystems are beginning to think twice. This is precisely what happened to launch the CO real estate market in the 90s when the Californians cashed in and moved to the mountains.

'Take this house and shove it'
More and more Americans are moving to get away from overheated housing markets.
December 6, 2005: 11:06 AM EST
By Les Christie, CNNMoney.com staff writer

NEW YORK(CNNMoney.com) - Many residents of high-priced housing markets around the country are cashing out and moving to more affordable areas.

In Massachusetts, a quarter of the people in the state said they would leave if they had the opportunity, according to a poll by MassINC, a non-profit public policy think tank. They would join some 170,000 Bay Staters who left for other parts of the United States between 2000 and 2004.

The No. 1 reason cited by those who want to leave: The high cost of living. And the No. 1 area needing major improvement: Housing affordability.

On the other side of America, Hawaii faces a similar mindset -- two out of every five residents say they have considered leaving the islands because of the cost of housing, according to a poll co-sponsored by the Hawaii Business Roundtable and Pacific Resource Partnership.

There are other places that have been affected.

California suffers a net loss of about 100,000 residents a year to other states, according to Economy.com. In recent years, many have cashed out their rapidly appreciated homes and moved to Arizona, Washington, and Oregon.

But now that prices have climbed in those states as well, the latest trend is that Californians are turning to the Midwest, where spacious houses are available for half of the cost of similar space in Los Angeles.

"It makes increasing sense if you can buy more house and still live in a good area," says Conrad Egan, president and CEO of the Center for Housing Policy, a non-profit group that seeks to make sense of the nation's housing policy.
Compelling math

On Long Island, the once bucolic suburb but now heavily developed region next to New York City, about 70 percent of residents are at least somewhat concerned that high housing costs will drive their families from the region.

And this is not a far-off issue -- 45 percent said it was at least somewhat likely that they would move out during the next five years.

There are two factors at work, according to Carrie Meek Gallagher, project director of the Long Island Index, which published the findings.

The first is that younger Long Islanders aged 18 to 34 are unable to afford decent homes.

"Many families spend more than half their income on housing," says Egan at the Center for Housing Policy.

The second is that older residents who already own increasingly valuable property find they can sell their present homes, buy in less expensive locales, and have big nest eggs left over.

For them, the numbers add up like this: A Long Island couple with income of $100,000 wants to move to Daytona Beach. Florida as well as Georgia and the Carolinas are prime destinations for Long Islanders.

According to CNNMoney.com's cost of living calculator, they would need only about $68,000 a year there to live as they're accustomed to. (Try different scenarios with the tool calculator above.)

And selling their house and buying a new one down South would produce a big fat dividend. The American Homebuilders Association reports that a comparable home in the Deltona-Daytona Beach area, for example, costs about $194,000 compared with $434,000 in Long Island's Nassau County.

Younger Long Islanders, says Gallagher, often find that they may have to take a slight pay cut when they move to the Sun Belt, "but they more than make up for it by being able to buy a brand new house for half the price it would cost on Long Island."

The trend has already taken root and seems to be accelerating.

"There was a big jump, from 62 percent to 70 percent, in one year of the 18-to-34 age group who think they are likely to leave within the next five years," according to Gallagher.
Eroding affordability

On the other coast, an exodus of Californians leaving for Nevada has helped transform the housing market in Las Vegas into one of the hottest in the country.

But there are signs that Vegas is about played out. The median house there has leaped to $283,000 and the ratio to median income is now about 4.8, nearly as high as Long Island's ratio of about five to one.

The jump in Vegas has caused many Californians to think elsewhere.

For example, California money pouring into Arizona has helped make Phoenix the hottest house market in the country, with home values ballooning 55 percent over the last 12 months, according to the latest statistics from Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, which regulates Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

It's even been reported that Las Vegans are starting to pull up stakes for the cheaper markets such as Phoenix, Tucson, and Chandler, all in Arizona.

Now, what odds could you have gotten betting on that a few years ago?

Investing in Denver Real Estate

Investing in the Denver Real Estate Market

Current Situation

The Colorado real estate market has seen better times. At the end of the 1980s the Colorado economy relied on oil. When the mining of oil became unprofitable and supplies dried up, so the economy went into recession. After this crisis some very forward thinking individuals decided that technology; software, hardware and telecommunications, was a great area upon which to base and broaden the economy. As a result of this decision, the Denver Technology Center (DTC) was created and Colorado became one of the most prosperous States in the Union for over a decade. However, 9/11 and the end of the NASDAQ bull market dealt Colorado a double whammy and created a very similar environment to the end of the 80's.

Discouraged by poor job prospects (Colorado lost over 50,000 from 2001-2003) and high housing prices, thousands of residents left Denver after the tech meltdown. Metro net domestic migration losses exceeding 20,000 residents ensued, slicing the rate of demographic growth in half.
Colorado is now one of the most foreclosed states in the country and bankruptcies are running at an all time high.

The result of this is that there are now approximately 25,000 homes on the MLS. Adding to the situation, builders continue to build new homes on Colorado’s flat prairies, along newly constructed and improved highways, adding to the glut.

The Berkshire Group

Following the rules of supply and demand 1.01; too many houses, not enough buyers, leads to a buyers market, very low to negative appreciation and more than 90 days on market expectations.

Low Markets Create Buying Opportunities

This market low however creates some phenomenal opportunities for investors. Where properties can be purchased for between $0.90 and $0.65 discounts.

According to RealtyTimes Denver has gone through a period of pricing readjustment so that property prices are an estimated 4.2% UNDERVALUED.

All signs point to the fact that the economy is showing some strong signs of a strong recovery. According to the WSJ CO rates 10th in the nation for job growth and 3rd in new technology start ups and the jobless rate stands at 5.1%.
The following graph shows Denver building permit applications since 1960. It clearly shows Colorado’s traditional boom/bust cycle and the graph would appear to show a positive trend showing itself after 6 years of decline.

Denver New Residential Building Permits

There is more good news. As money gets more expensive to borrow so people in low income brackets have less of a choice between buying and renting. The rental property, a great strategy for landlords to hold property while allowing someone else to fund the mortgage is showing signs of recovery from one of the worst markets in living memory.

Conclusion

So, it would appear then, that the real estate play for the Front Range is to acquire discounted property during this buyer’s market. Put renters into the property to take up most of the mortgage payment slack (positive cash flow is still a distant goal) and hold. Sell when the market returns to a period of good appreciation, maybe in 3-5 years.

Corporate Dashboards = Demand Generation

Using Dashboards To Create Demand For Software Sales


An airline pilot sits in a cockpit surrounded by an environment that he is intimately familiar with. The ergonomically tuned cockpit has been designed to provide him with precise tools that enable him to do his job in an efficient, timely manner, getting his plane from point A to point B.

So, a corporate dashboard must do the same. It must provide an environment that the user is intimately familiar with, an environment that is precisely matched to requirements and a graphical environment that drives interest in the use of the product.

When I left the software industry 18 months ago, a lot of work was being done in the area of demand generation rather than demand satisfaction. Waiting to be asked to compete with all of the BI vendors when the customer has already put the dots on the paper ready for someone to connect them. And the pen connecting the dots is provided by IT and the picture is normally a solution solving a legacy business problem for the finance team. And the solution was normally nothing more than a report production exercise.

From 1985 to 2005, U.S. corporations spent nearly $5 trillion on computers, enterprise resource systems, giant databases, and local area networks to make business as efficient as possible. Business still has some way to go to reach nirvana.

Peter Drucker said “Executives have become computer-literate. The younger ones, especially, know more about the way the computer works than they know about the mechanics of the automobile or the telephone. But not many executives are information-literate. They know how to get data. But most still have to learn how to use data.

Few executives yet know how to ask: What information do I need to do my job? When do I need it? In what form? And from whom should I be getting it? Fewer still ask: What new tasks can I tackle now that I get all these data? Which old tasks should I abandon? Which tasks should I do differently? Practically no one asks: What information do I owe? To whom? When? In what form?

Phase 1 of the internet provided many promises and dreams of what could be but few companies were able to deliver on those promises. Today the internet is in Phase 2, many of the dreams are now reality. A standard service of many web sites are RSS feeds, point cast was delivering this in the 90s but went the way of pets.com.

Business Intelligence has followed these trends and is now also in phase 2 but few companies have yet to truly take advantage of the promises made in the 90s.

So, how then to draw all this into a huge opportunity for a Business Intelligence company? Here is my concept.

Adoption of a BI standard has to come from the very top. The CEO. Get rid of IT. Get rid of the finance guys. This has to be a business user decision.

Pick a vertical that has historically sat on a googolplex of data. Get a couple of ex vertical specific executives to sit down and provide THE cockpit instruments for that particular vertical. Engage THE designers who can create an Apple esque user environment. Engage THE statistician who can make a few numbers say a thousand words. Engage THE technologists to bolt the cockpit together.

Then, present the cockpit to the Vertical’s CEO community using a presentation that will guarantee a Eureka moment. Not a “solution” to a problem he has, but a new way of doing things.

Creating a demand creation environment will be critical. Partnering with current and new people will be critical. Creating channel and VAR outlets also very important. I do not think that this will be a job for most of the field sales team, rather a separate but integral part of creating a new way to drive corporate adoption of a BI environment so that everyone is taking advantage of the information that currently sits in vast silos within a company.

The following comes from an article in Business 2.0 under the title Hot Trends of 2006.

“This is the next revolution in information technology: a field-level nervous system for every business. Commoditized technologies, wired employees, cheap storage and processing power - Until recently only major delivery services like FedEx and UPS enjoyed the benefits of an automated work chain. Now the entire logistics industry -- truckers and bike messengers, for instance -- is adopting technology en masse. On their most-wanted list: handheld computers, wireless networking gear, cellular devices, and applications that tie it all together”

We find ourselves in the business of the future, the business that our fore fathers could only dream of. A business environment where CEOs are the pilots of hugely complex planes, and all the passengers sit viewing constantly updated maps of their progress as they make their way from point A to point B.

Deploying a Business Intelligence Solution

I wrote this article on the deployment of a business intelligence solution for the Que publication, "Deploying Crystal Enterprises 8.5".



There is a direct relationship between the time spent planning a deployment of Business Intelligence solution and the success of that deployment. In other words, failing to plan is planning to fail.

This year in North America, 75% of IT software deployment projects will fail due in part to inaccurate requirement gathering, inexperienced project team members, and insufficient executive interest and sponsorship.

All too often, the average scenario when deploying technology consists of placing the application CD into the CD tray, double-clicking setup.exe, crossing fingers,and hoping for the best. Whether the person in charge of deploying Crystal Enterprise is an experienced system administrator or a novice at deploying applications to a small or large group of users, certain steps can be taken to increase the deployment success and adoption of Crystal Enterprise.

With its system architecture and flexible SDK, Crystal Enterprise provides organizations with the capability to build uniquely customized information delivery environments scaling from a single-user or workgroup to enterprise-wide deployments with thousands of users.

Because of this broad scope of functionality, project teams will find themselves planning to deploy an enterprise reporting environment as well as providing application development support to customize the user interface.

As a result of this, the first part of this chapter defines a project management planning approach that will enable a Crystal Enterprise system administrator or deployment manager to form a framework around which a Crystal Enterprise deployment project can be successfully built and delivered, thus increasing the rate of success.

The second portion of the chapter focuses on the specific topics related to actually deploying Crystal Enterprise, from organizational reporting requirements to server sizing and architecture.

To read the rest of this article please click here.

My Contact Details

303-907-8801
lockettfamily@gmail.com