We are counting down to power up the Sales Enablement Forum 10 short weeks from now. Please hold the dates, February 14-15, so you can join hundreds of your peers and a bunch of Forrester analysts, executives, and our own CEO George Colony in San Francisco to explore our theme, "New Buyers, New Demands: Accelerating Sales Performance."

We worked hard on that one, by the way, because the stark reality that buyers have changed already and that technology sales people, and the supply chains behind them, are scrambling to catch up is leading to a real sense of urgency amongst our clients. The economy is thawing, and sales enablement professionals are looking for the disciplines and practices they can seed and nurture in their organizations to drive the volume, velocity, and quality of sales' pipelines. Hard challenge, that. Change, cross-functional work, new thinking, new behaviors.

Now imagine the range of perspectives that bear on that challenge. Do we change the message, the messenger, the portfolio, or maybe all of it, to get the outcomes we desire?

To help, the Forum will center on a new organizing focus for sales enablement that our Principal Analyst Scott Santucci will reveal in his keynote. A tease, I know, but he is still doing the research . . . Then we will explore that focus in detail from a sales management, marketing leadership, and portfolio management perspective, with executive keynotes from Julie Meyers of Xerox, David Irwin of Allant Group, Mitch Little of Microchip, and Hagen Rickmann and Tamara Schenk of T-Systems. In practical track sessions delivered by Forrester analysts and more sales enablement practitioners from Cisco, Avaya, ADP, and BMC, we will give attendees the ideas, steps, and new confidence they can take back and begin applying at their own organizations the next week.

I can promise some fun too; hey, it's San Francisco, after all, so I hope you can join us at the stunning Palace Hotel in February. And since we are still working on some details, if you have an idea to share on what would make this an A+ event for you, give me some comments here or contact me off-blog.

The Palace Hotel