In my previous stint for a reseller, I was in the trenches doing implementations with very little pre-sales work. But now, in an almost pure pre-sales engineering role, I get the benefit of seeing things from a reseller’s point of view and the manufacturer’s point of view. Instead of having my head down letting all the sales people play their games, I get to be right in there with ‘em. And I am getting to see a world that I have never seen.
I knew there were a lot of things about the IT and security world that I did not know. I know there still are.  But the distinctions I find between the end-user world (security and IT management) and the reseller and manufacturer world are spectacular. And to be honest, even though the differences are obvious, it is hard to put a finger on it. Really defining it is difficult.
I guess it may come down to the basic pressures of the job being different. A security or IT manager has day-to-day pressures of taking care of a network and the staff that runs it. A sales person (even a sales engineer) does not have that constant pressure. So the intensity in the look just doesn’t seem to be there. Yes, the sales folks have to meet quota, but that’s not a constant, daily driving force. Deals usually come in bits and spurts. Thought the sales person always wants that next deal, the over-arching responsibility of a day-to-day operation is not there, and it shows. Even the sales engineer, who many times has been in the shoes of a security or IT manager or admin and has dealt with those pressures, knows that the anxiety of operations is not there, and it shows there as well.
I know I will learn more differences over the coming months as I get used to the job. And I know that I will not be able to share some of those differences (I can’t give away all the secrets - my boss reads my blog sometimes). But if I ever do get back into security management, I know the knowledge will serve me well. Not that I plan on leaving any time soon. This is too much fun!
