Meet Stee O’Brien, our Senior Business Development Manager in Ireland

My name’s Stee. I work for Westcoast Cloud in Ireland as a Senior Business Development Manager.

I’ve been into computers since I was a kid, and cloud ever since I was in college (you can tell I was one of the cool kids). My lecturer told me cloud was the future, and he was right. But I don’t think even he in all his wisdom could have envisioned the transformative impact cloud would go on to have on the world.

Take consumer technology, for instance. I remember installing my first PC game on MS DOS. It was a nightmare. Even for a good coder like me (again, cool kid here). Now, you just log into a cloud service like Microsoft Game Pass, and your games are all there ready to play.

It’s the same in business. Workers can switch between Office 365 applications and edit files while they’re on a train or in the car park before a meeting. Storing data no longer takes up a room or floor of your business. It’s in the cloud and literally at your fingertips.

I’ve been in the industry for over a decade, moving between numerous roles at multiple companies and agencies. Despite my experience, however, I’ve never stopped learning and love to discover new things about the tech industry.

My job is all about people – understanding them, building relationships and providing the solutions to fix their tech problems.

Like if your customers need better cybersecurity, Business Premium licenses, Microsoft Intune and multi-factor authentication add-ons can protect them from malicious attacks. A client wants to make hybrid working easier? Just integrate Microsoft Teams with their traditional phone system. That’s the kind of outside the box thinking I help our partners to develop.

It’s not just me doing all the work though, obviously. There’s a fantastic level of expertise across the board. And all of us share the same goal of delivering as much value as we can to all of our partners.

I work to deliver more value to partners, and I make sure I know the products I’m offering inside out. I firmly believe in the value of the solutions I sell. Microsoft, are fantastic because they always know of any software faults two or three months in advance, pushing out fixes constantly and responding quickly to users’ needs.

As great as that is what really matters is a strong relationship with your customer. At Westcoast Cloud, we run a relationship-focused ecosystem. In the digital market, there isn’t always a great understanding of customers’ needs and wants, so we’ve made satisfying our customers a top priority. Every meeting should start with a conversation, and I’ve been told that I’m particularly personable, and able to meet people on their level, whoever they are.

We all have our passions, and mine range from sports to cooking. I’ve been meaning to get into rock climbing, but, despite my people skills, I’m yet to convince anyone to tag along with me!

Luckily, I’ve had more success on a personal level with my customers. I reach out to them daily, whether it’s advising them of changes from Microsoft or introducing them to a new webinar we’ve set up. I make sure to give every customer the time they need.

We at Westcoast Cloud are here, ready and waiting. We have the knowhow, the solutions and most importantly the priority of helping you and your needs. If you want help with your digital transformation, or you know anyone who fancies going rock climbing, drop me an email here: Stee.OBrien@westcoastcloud.ie