Interview Julian Fay
I support my colleagues in their work as Presales Consultants by providing them with direct advice and assistance and passing on my experience from over ten years in the role of Presales Consultant. This involves technical details in the context of noris’ capabilities, but also process-related topics.
Presales acts as an interface function between different units, bringing with it technical expertise, innovative strength and a lot of soft skills.
Starting with support within sales, as the “technical conscience” of account management or inside sales, through coordination with technical colleagues and subject-matter experts to advisory or mediating functions in project implementations.
The Presales Consultants spend a lot of time liaising with customers – sometimes on site, but also following up on these appointments with internal coordination. Due to the fact that the team is still somewhat understaffed, which will ease considerably towards the end of the year, I still accompany major projects in Presales as the “second man” to take some load off my colleagues’ shoulders and to contribute my professional expertise.
In addition, like many of my Presales colleagues, I carry out technical checks on quotations to ensure that they have a standardized minimum level and do not result in unnecessary loops or even contract adjustments during implementation.
Furthermore, all team members provide support at trade fairs and events, where they can also contribute their expertise and communication skills.
When I was looking for a further development from my role as a “system engineer” at a system house, which also involved advising new and existing customers, the position at noris caught my eye. I knew a few people who worked at noris at the time and decided to move away from administration and focus more on customer consulting. With my experience from my previous job, I could look back on a wide range of technical solutions and customer requirements, and continue to use these as part of the technical focus of the presales’ consultant.
In addition to the skills that a team leader should have, such as empathy and strong communication skills, competences such as technical understanding, quick comprehension, even for complex enquiries and solutions, are among the tools of a presales’ employee. In this context, a high level of customer and service orientation enables communication at eye level – with the customer and the technical departments.
In addition to providing technical support for enquiries from existing customers, I am currently actively involved in acquiring two new customers.
I try to realize my part of the overall task, i.e. the design of the services for our customers, in such a way that the subsequent departments can do their work as efficiently as possible.
Whether as a team leader or as a presales’ consultant, I face new tasks and challenges every day: our customers continue to develop, the market brings new products and solutions, and the basis on which applications are provided today is also becoming increasingly complex.
The variety that the technical development of the IT market brings, combined with the encouragement and support of the presales team members – whether in the first week or after a few years – you never stop learning here.
I have always been able to contribute to the acquisition of new, exciting major projects, some of which involve a high degree of innovation, and to maintaining relationships with our top customers, so there is no one big project for me.
Within Presales, there are career paths that are also familiar from the operational teams: from junior to professional to senior to principal. In addition, we will very soon be looking at the topic of specialization and, alongside the generalist role, we will also develop a focus on our core technologies.
