Cisco Partners are the backbone of a global, scalable and consistently excellent Cisco customer experience. And, just as we work to make improvements that will ensure our customers are always delighted with their Cisco experience, we also pay special attention to the unique Partner experience. This ensures we are best enabling you to deliver the right solutions to solve our customers' most complex business challenges. 

We've heard you say that our online tools are too complex and too disconnected. You've told us you want a seamless online experience that helps you do your job faster and better, without frustrating and potentially costly delays.  To that end, our Partner team is rolling out tool improvements, taking into account your specific feedback and distinct needs.  I've invited Jennifer Petty, Director of Cisco's Partner Experience Transformation team to give an update and explain some of the improvements.

 By Guest Author Jennifer Petty

Using Cisco's Partner tools can put your multi-tasking skills to the test. For example, there's an online tool to register for a program, another to check sales figures and yet another to get quotes. We know this is not an ideal experience and we want to simplify this for you in every way possible. A redesign is underway to streamline the user experience with all our Partner tools. It will take some time to complete, but we have a few early changes to share with you.

First, recent enhancements to theGlobal Navigation Barmake it easier to navigate between Partner systems. The Global Navigation Bar allows users to jump between the Sales & Marketing and Onboarding & Administration systems. Additional enhancements implemented in May enable you to jump directly to Cisco Commerce Workspace. Enhancements have also been added for those with Partner Administrator access, with an eye toward saving time and enabling you to more effectively manage your company's enrollments and certifications. For more information about this specific change, click here.

The Onboarding and Registration processhas been upgraded for new and renewing 2 Tier Partners to include a due diligence questionnaire and application validation by their Distributor(s). Effective May 2015, Solution Partners  follow a similar process. This will help Cisco ensure Partner eligibility and limit risk to Cisco and its Partners. For more information, follow these links for Partners and for Distributors.

The new interactive click-to-chat buttonin Customer Service Central will display chat availability immediately in a refreshed user interface. Additionally, chat transcripts will be available to view in your case details immediately following your chat session. For more information about Customer Service Central, click here.

To give you more control over your deals,Pricing Optimizationintroduces the ability to automatically update expired promotions, copy deals, and reopen deals with rejected incentives. For more information about Pricing Optimization, click here.

We would like to say thanks for your ongoing attention and support in these efforts.  Your feedback has been critical to helping us deliver the right changes to improve your experience. By readily adopting these and other upcoming improvements, you'll help ensure that we operate even more effectively and efficiently together, on behalf of our customers.

If you have any feedback on these changes or any changes that you'd like to see, please comment below or shoot us an email at [email protected].