What we do
At Build Ecosystem Advisors we are focused on providing actionable support to early to mid stage B2B SaaS and Agentic Software companies who are invested in working with partners. Our guidance is based on building partner ecosystems at Salesforce, Slack and OpenAI. We work with the C-suite & Senior Leadership team to make the key decisions required to effectively establish or scale a partner ecosystem that has a measurable impact on the revenue growth of the company.
Our approach
Assessment
We first run an assessment to get a high level understanding of how the business is operating today and how the C-Suite and key Senior Leaders envisage working with a partner ecosystem and/or a partner leader. Establishing a partner strategy that actually works, starts with getting a perspective from the CEO. Regardless of how much previous experience a CEO has in working with a Partner Leader and/or a Partner Ecosystem, any downstream decisions start with understanding how we can best support the CEO to play the role required to effectively establish and leverage a partner ecosystem.
Report and key decisions
Based on the assessment, we provide a report to the CEO and identified Senior Leaders that outlines the company readiness to work with partners and what key decisions need to be made in order to solidify an 18 month partner strategy and in addition, any associated investments that need to be made in order to execute that strategy.
Action plan
Once the strategy has been solidified, we work with key stakeholders to build a plan of action with assigned accountability, milestones and deliverables. We facilitate one or more workshops to ensure that cross functional stakeholders are aligned on a path to execution.
Some companies may want just one component and while we are open to working with companies in specific areas, we believe all 3 components are required in order to effectively lay the foundation for sustained impact from the Partner Ecosystem.
Engagement Model
Our focus is working with clients where there is a good fit between their expectations of a partner ecosystem and where we are best positioned to support their aspirations. We’ve lived the pains of establishing and scaling partner ecosystems and we’re focused on working with clients who are ready to invest the time to explore what it takes to effectively work with partners, even if they ultimately decide that now is not the right time to invest.
We will do an initial 45 minutes introductory call with first time clients. This call will be preceded with a questionnaire, the answers to which we will review as part of the introductory call. After the initial introductory call, if there is mutual desire to proceed, we will propose the next steps in the engagement, usually starting with an assessment (as referenced above).
We provide three main commercial models
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Hourly - for ad-hoc requirements we provide an hourly rate.
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Retainer - for ongoing engagements we provide a retainer model that can range in terms of pre-defined monthly hours.
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Project based - for tightly scoped projects we provide a fixed cost fee.
Who we are
Managing Partner
Rich Hasslacher
Build Ecosystem is led by Rich Hasslacher who has built and scaled partner ecosystems at the early to mid stage of 3 of the fastest growing technology companies of their respective generations - Salesforce, Slack and OpenAI. His experience spans global executive positions, strategy and operations and mid-level management to senior individual contributor roles. He has worked with an expansive set of partner types, from global and regional services partners and MSP (managed service providers), to ISV, to tech partners, resellers and distributors. All of his roles have included being the lead for establishing strategy, hiring the team, defining the program, negotiating contracts and being accountable for execution and delivery.
Rich has a network of other seasoned partner specialists located in the US and Europe that can be deployed as needed depending on the clients specific needs and any geographic location requirements.
