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learning opportunity that
makes us stronger. Today,
I am who I am because of
what I experienced.
What do you currently
identify as the major
areas of investment in
your industry?
you can’t be promoted’, so a leader should
coach a team member to be his successor
and reflect highly their achievements across
the corporate organisation. In the end, a
leader is measured by productivity, which
comes from the efficiency of his own team.
Today, I am extremely proud of the team I
lead at Riverbed.
What do you think is the current hot
technology talking point?
There are many in the new digital age; I
can name IoT, artificial intelligence, big
data and smart cities, but all of them are
meant to make human life better. Stating
that, I personally see end-user experience
management a hot technology of choice
since all these new trends are around the
end-user themselves. And today, I am lucky
to be working for Riverbed, which provides a
platform for me to articulate this.
How do you deal with stress and
unwind outside the office?
End-user experience
management: all industries
today are shifting gears
to become more digital in
every aspect of their business.
Edwards Deming, a data scientist, said:
“Without data you’re just another person
with an opinion.” So, if you are incapable of
measuring the effectiveness of your digital
infrastructure and the productivity of your
end-users, how can you as a c-level executive
make key decisions on how to shape your
business offerings, portfolio, go-to-market
and processes?
What are the region-specific
challenges when implementing new
technologies in the Middle East?
Taking the technology adoption life cycle
model into consideration, a sociological
model that describes the adoption or
acceptance of a new product or innovation
in a certain market, very few of the Middle
East customers are ‘innovators’. The
majority fall under the ‘early majority’,
while the remaining are quite divided
equally between ‘early adopters’ or the ‘late
majority’. Having said that, gaining the first
reference in the Middle East for a given new
technology trend is the biggest challenge.
What changes to your job role have
you seen in the last year and how do
you see these developing in the next
12 months?
As part of the regional leadership team,
being business centric and focused on
the regional growth, success is a must. I
was always leading the presales team at
Riverbed, but with my promotion to director
in early 2017, I was required to change gears
and become more strategic than tactical. My
role is to bridge the sales and presales teams,
by guiding them through the right go-to-
market strategy to gain a higher share of the
total addressable market.
What advice would you offer
somebody aspiring to obtain a
c-level position in your industry?
Henry Kissinger said: “The task of the leader
is to get their people from where they are
to where they have not been.” And, as such,
a c-level executive’s strength and success
comes from his own people. In technology,
we have witnessed great and innovative
companies failing because of the workforce
behind them. Hire smarter people, surround
yourself by them and always stay credible
to them and to your customers. A leader’s
strength is given, not taken. And I highly
recommend every c-level executive to have
a mentor even outside his field of work to go
back to for advice. n
I am a highly active person and throughout
my life sport has been a passion. I start my
day at 6.30am with a morning run or swim
and wind up in the evening by hitting the
gym for some weightlifting. And my work
entails covering a big region; it requires me
to travel constantly – once per week at least
– and I leverage the flight time to train my
brain via various management books.
If you could go back and change one
career decision, what would it be?
Honestly, nothing! As humans, we always
tend to say ‘I wish’ or ‘I hope’, but actually
everything happens for a reason and it’s up to
us to take whatever has happened in life as a
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