What is your role at IRIS?
I’m responsible for scaling IRIS through partnerships across EMEA. Most days will be enabling my partners' full potential, as well as showcasing the value and competitive advantage of being an IRIS Partner. However, the majority of my first month here has been spent networking and uncovering new partnership interest.
You’ve been leading channel sales within CX for quite some time now, what drew you to this role in this industry?
My early career was in direct sales, which I loved, but I always had a knack and passion for building long standing relationships. The natural progression was to move into Partnerships or Channel. This is where I can blend my direct sales experience and relationship building skills. For me IRIS is a company that will have such a huge impact on the market. What the team has built with IRIS Clarity is such an essential part of what is needed in the voice world — a true innovation of simplicity. The roadmap is not too shabby either!
At our Christmas party, you showed us all how crazy-golf was done. Tell us where your passion for golf came from and how you became so good at it?
I love crazy golf and it was a great way to meet my new IRIS colleagues!! I first picked up a golf club at 12 years old. My uncle was a scratch golfer and offered to teach me once I could hit the ball in the air. Not long after, I called him to say I did it, so gave me a few lessons.
I did a paper round to finance my new passion, which earned me £25 per week, and I used £23 on playing golf (green fees) each week and £2 for sweets.
At 16, I applied to a golf academy, but my handicap wasn’t low enough to be accepted (I was playing off of 5 at the time), so I decided I'd just play socially thereafter.
Now I play a few times a month. I've only ever had one hole-in-one, but I still enjoy playing and can definitely give my friends a tough game.
Some quickfire questions:
App you couldn’t live without: WhatsApp
Favourite pair of shoes: Nike Air Max 90 ‘ infrareds’
Least favourite noise: Cutlery scraping on plates
Something your colleagues don’t know about you: I LOVE chocolate Cringiest sales story: I sold cars in my early days. I took an oldish lady out for a test drive and she crashed into the central reservation on a dual carriageway, narrowly missing two other cars. The driver’s side of the car was so badly damaged, she had to climb out over the passenger side and then fell out of the car, flat on her face. Both of us were ok, albeit a little shaken up (she had a minor graze from the fall, not the crash). When we returned to the dealership showroom, I presented her with an offer to buy the car she’d just crashed, (once it had been fixed of course). She bought it, out of embarrassment I guess.