Though he’s been filling the role behind the scenes for the past five months, James Foxall today officially became president of Tigerpaw, the software vendor that makes CRM, PSA and other business productivity tools for managed services providers and other channel organizations.
Foxall takes the reins at a time of major activity for Tigerpaw. In an interview with Channel Insider on Wednesday, he described how the company is going through an overhaul of its branding, messaging, training and education programs and support operations. This comprehensive recasting is planned to coincide with the forthcoming upgrade to its flagship product suite, expected in the May-June timeframe, he said.
“We have a huge product release coming out in a couple of months, and it’s the most impressive I’ve ever seen in my time here,” said Foxall. “And along with this, we are shaking everything else up.”
Among the changes that are coming is the streamlining of marketing materials, collateral and messaging across all the different departments in the company to create one unified vision for Tigerpaw, he said. In addition, the company is diving into community building, looking to involve their VAR customers in peer meetings and other interactive forms of communication.
Tigerpaw has formed a new professional services division, which will expand its training and support beyond technical education around products to provide its channel customers with business-oriented training to help them run their organizations better.
“A lot of VARs started as technicians, but then realized they didn’t want to work for anyone but themselves,” Foxall said. “But then they find they need to know how to run a business, how to make payroll, how to delegate and scale. We are teaching them how to build a better business.”
That training will come in the form of in-person peer group workshops, Webcasts and other collateral.
For Foxall, the year ahead feels promising – albeit busy. He’s especially jazzed about the new product release, though details were scant.
“This is a major upgrade to our product suite and we’ve really done some interesting things,” he said. “The user interface is completely revamped and there are bunch of new efficiencies. It’s the kind of release with some really neat new features but also new functionalities that all users enjoy.”