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Courageous leader with a distinguished career at Microsoft Corp spanning nearly 30 years,…
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Life after Microsoft…my next chapter
Life after Microsoft…my next chapter
After 28 amazing years, I have made the decision to move on from Microsoft in January. It has been an exciting and…
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David Willis shared thisVery exciting news for the MSP channel and M365 & Copilot adoption from two powerhouse Microsoft partners!!David Willis shared thisNews: Zensai’s Adoption Hub is now live in the Pax8 Marketplace! 🚀 We’re thrilled to partner with Pax8 to bring our Adoption Hub - built natively into #Microsoft365 - to thousands of MSPs around the world. This marks a major milestone in helping partners move beyond license provisioning into strategic enablement! ✨ This marks the first end-user training solution available in the Pax8 Marketplace - designed to help MSPs deliver Microsoft 365 and #Copilot adoption directly inside the apps their customers use every day 🧡 “Having spent nearly 30 years at Microsoft, with several years leading Microsoft’s US channel business, I know firsthand what enables partners to succeed. The combination of Zensai and Pax8 is a powerful example of how the right tools can help Microsoft partners unlock greater business value and accelerate adoption for their customers.” - David Willis, Chairman of the Board at Zensai. Explore more via the link in the comment 👇🏼 #Pax8 #MSP #Microsoft365 #Copilot #Zensai #AItraining
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David Willis reposted thisDavid Willis reposted this🚨 Big News: We’re now ALIANDO. 🚨 Today marks the beginning of a bold new era as we announce the official merger of Henson Group and myCloudDoor into a single powerhouse: ALIANDO - a name that means ally in Spanish. Because that’s what we are, an ally to our customers, partners, and employees. This union combines two industry leaders into one global cloud and AI-first solutions company, built on a shared commitment to excellence, innovation, and impact. From humble beginnings — one in Spain, one in New York — we’ve grown into trusted advisors for some of the world’s most iconic brands. Aliando is more than a new name. It’s a new standard. To our customers: thank you for trusting us. 🙏🏽 To our teams: thank you for building this. 🤗 And to the future: we’re all in. 👊🏽👊🏽👊🏽 We are Aliando. 😍😍😍 #Aliando #MergerAnnouncement #CloudSolutions #AI #DigitalTransformation #MicrosoftPartner #HensonGroup #MyCloudDoor #TechNews #Microsoft #MSFTAdvocate Microsoft Travis Walter Erwin Visser Chris Danelz Heather Gordon David Smith David Willis Francesco Rietti Ralph Haupter Heather Ehlenbach Jean-Philippe Courtois Kelly Obach Paul Bay Jose Gomez Cueto David Fuess Marcos De Pedro Javier Aguado La Iglesia Vanessa Sorenson Emma Da Silva Mitra A. Deb Cupp Judson Althoff
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David Willis shared thisThanks Rasmus Holst! I’m honored and humbled to take on the role as Chairman of the Board at Zensai, and excited to work with you, your management team, and the Board, to help Zensai achieve our incredible potential with our Human Success mission! Having joined the Zensai board just over a year ago, it’s been thrilling to see the outstanding progress that has been made in delivering excellent performance, continuing to enhance the quality of the team, the acquisition and integration of Weekly10, and the rebranding of the company to Zensai, the Human Success company. Definitley more than a years worth of progress in the past 12 months! I’d like to thank our out-going Chairman, Lars Damsgaard Andersen for his strong leadership the past number of years, and for assisting me with the transition. Zensai is delivering incredible value to customers with our AI-powered learning, employee engagement, and performance management platform, that is built on Microsoft Azure and integrated with Microsoft Teams. And I’m very excited with what lies ahead!David Willis shared thisDavid Willis - welcome as Chairman of the Board at Zensai 🚀 Firstly - I was very proud and thankful when you accepted to join the board last year - with the trajectory and plan to ultimately take over from Lars Damsgaard Andersen when the time was right 🙏 I know the team looks up to you - to the achievements you have accomplished and I am so much looking forward to you setting the next level standard for what we set out to achieve. The fact that you do this with the calmest - yet firm - direction and an amazing understanding of how to build great businesses - just makes you the chairman to bring us to the next level. As Dr Dre would say ..... welcome to the next episode 🙌 Let's go 🚀 Read the full release here 👇 https://lnkd.in/d5Atk9ar
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David Willis shared thisJamie Tozzi, it was an immense pleasure catching up with you to discuss our leadership journeys! You are one of the most impressive executives I had the opportunity to work with at Microsoft, and I love that you are starting up this podcast to share with others some proven approaches to enhance their leadership impact. It was also fun just catching up and reminiscing about some of our great times together. I’m looking forward to seeing your future leadership podcasts!David Willis shared thisWe had the opportunity to partner alongside Jamie Tozzi and produce her new podcast, 'Executive Access'. Episode 1 is live today! You can listen to this week's episode on our website! Go check it out! https://lnkd.in/d42zvdga
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David Willis shared thisI’m thrilled and honored to be joining the board of LMS365! LMS365 customers truly benefit from the tremendous value this learning & performance management solution provides to their employees. And it’s a very important solution for Microsoft as it amplifies the value of Microsoft 365 while also driving Azure consumption through the Marketplace! The future is very bright for LMS365 and I’m excited to be a part of the journey!David Willis shared thisI am so proud to welcome David Willis to LMS365🚀 The fact that a capacity like Dave is joining our journey feels unreal - for someone who operated $8bn business' for Microsoft to "pay-it-forward" to the LMS365 team - is beyond what I could have imagined when I started here 18 months ago. For me personally - I get a sparring partner who is absolutely outstanding - understands our business, our growth mindset and how to shape a future path for the business. I am always wanting to learn from the best and Dave will push me and the executive team and all of LMS365 to be even better 🙌 Welcome Dave - and thank you so much for believing in LMS365 🙏 #microsoft #microsoftteams #learnlikeyou #weekly10 #leadership
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David Willis shared thisCongratulations to Sherlaender Phillips (Lani) for being named GlobalMindED's Inclusive Leader in Technology for 2020 and being recognized for your commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
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David Willis shared thisI recently spoke with Andrew Welch, Director of Cloud Applications Strategy at AIS (Applied Information Sciences), about how Microsoft’s Return to the Workplace Solution, built on Power Platform, is helping large companies return to the workplace with confidence and return to growth as quickly as possible.
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David Willis shared thisPlease share this link! Microsoft is helping over 25 million people develop new digital skills and find new jobs in the Covid-19 economy.Free online digital skills courses revive hope and careers for millions amid the pandemic - StoriesFree online digital skills courses revive hope and careers for millions amid the pandemic - Stories
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14h
Tom, welcome to the Paz8 team!
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisStarting off Q4 strong with a brand new leader joining our team. We are excited to announce that Tom Gavin has joined Pax8 as our Chief Marketing and Communications Officer. Gavin brings thirty years of diverse leadership experience across corporate, government, and nonprofit sectors, and will lead global marketing, brand, and communications across Pax8. Learn more: http://pax8.io/C4Tc50X58fJ
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisTwo unforgettable years as COO ✅ → New chapter as Chief Business Officer 🚀 I’m excited to share that I’m stepping into the Chief Business Officer role to lead our newly formed Platform Business Unit, bringing together our Vendor Experience organization with new teams we’ll continue to build out through 2026 to deliver on our platform vision. After four years of internally focused work as Chief People Officer → COO, I’m excited to have the opportunity to work more closely with our amazing vendors and partners to accelerate growth, deepen strategic alliances and deliver more value for the entire Pax8 ecosystem. As my learned friend Nick Heddy likes to remind me, "Offense is more fun!" Here’s to what’s next.. 🙌
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David Willis liked thisThrilled to Join Sage as Executive Vice President | Excited for the Road Ahead I am pleased to share that I’ve joined Sage Group as Executive Vice President of Strategic Partnerships & Business Development. It’s an invigorating moment to be part of a company with such deep heritage, bold vision, and enormous opportunity ahead in cloud, AI, and partner-led growth. During my time with Microsoft and most recently with Splunk, I had the privilege of seeing firsthand how powerful an ecosystem approach can be: building trust, partner profitability and delivering joint value to our customers. My experience building global, diverse ecosystems will guide my work here at Sage — especially as we scale our partner network, deepen ISV integrations, expand our co-sell motion and unlock new vertical adjacencies. To the Sage team — thank you for the warm welcome! To my former colleagues and partners — your support, feedback, and collaboration have been invaluable. I look forward to building bridges, breaking new ground, and delivering meaningful value together! If you’re an ISV, integrator, VAR, accounting firm, or hyper-scaler interested in exploring partnership with Sage, I’d love to connect. Here’s to the journey ahead! — Gretchen #Sage #ERP #Cloud #AI #Partnerships #EcosystemgrowthDavid Willis liked thisWe’re thrilled to welcome Gretchen O'Hara as our new EVP, Strategic Partnerships & Business Development. Gretchen is a recognised channel leader with 25+ years of experience and a passion for partner success, AI innovation, and driving growth for SMBs. She’ll be leading our partner ecosystem to: 🤝 Drive partner growth 📊 Unlock new routes to market 🚀 Accelerate AI innovation “With Sage’s brand strength and innovation in AI for SMBs, we’re well positioned to expand the partner ecosystem and deliver solutions that drive real business outcomes.” – Gretchen O’Hara Full announcement here: https://lnkd.in/erY7xcAy
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisAfter a stop in Chicago last week, I’m in Toronto today keynoting the Microsoft AI Tour. It’s been a privilege to connect with thousands of customers and partners on how we’re helping them become Frontier firms through our AI Transformation success framework. I am always energized by my engagement with customers, and the communities we serve. I get a chance to see first-hand how they are using our products and services to obsolesce the mundane, democratize intelligence, and unlock creativity and innovation to help their organizations grow. This is how transformation happens. Microsoft is at our best when we marry our technology portfolio with customer needs today, while preparing them for the future. Every day, we aspire to get even better at tightening the feedback loop across product strategy, sales, support, marketing, and operations to deliver more value. This is why I am excited and humbled to take on a new role as CEO of Microsoft’s commercial business, with new team members and new responsibilities. Together we will continue to strengthen our mission in the era of AI: to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. https://lnkd.in/ejw3p8GN
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked this1 in 4 women in corporate experienced mental health challenges last year (Deloitte 2025) In male-dominated fields, that number is certainly higher. But what if we have a way to change this? And it’s easier than we might think? It took me years of cycling through burnout and a major health scare to finally realize this: Women don’t burn out from hard work. We burn out from rejecting our feminine energy in corporate settings. For too long, we have been taught that success comes from grinding harder, controlling more, and competing like men. That conditioning doesn’t empower us.. it disconnects us. It strips away the very strengths that make us powerful, like empathy, creativity, and connection. Research shows that when we suppress our feminine energy at work, our nervous system stays in fight-or-flight. And the cost is high… perpetual stress, exhaustion, resentment, burnout, and for many of us, even health issues. Once we embody our feminine energy, we can tap into an endless source of energy that makes us uniquely us. That’s when the grind stops feeling heavy and work starts aligning with who we truly are. I promise you, when we lead from that place, everything shifts. So to all women reading this, today I invite you to bring your feminine back. The moment you embrace your softness, silliness, creativity and intuition, is the moment you stop burning out and start thriving. If this resonates, share it can reach more women that need it. 🌸
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisMy Next Chapter After 3 unforgettable years at Splunk (now part of Cisco), I’ve made the difficult decision to move on, with my last day in mid-September. Splunk has shaped me in countless ways—professionally and personally—and I’m deeply grateful to the Splunk community for the support it gave me and my family. I had the privilege of working with exceptional colleagues, partners, and customers around the world. Together, we drove channel transformation, strengthened our cloud and AI capabilities, and created new profitable opportunities for partners. Leading this work with such talented teams was truly an honor. Now, I’m excited to begin an incredible opportunity to help transform another market with an organization that has a rich legacy of business criticality, innovation, deep commitment to cloud and AI, and passion for supporting organizations globally. Thank you, Splunk & Cisco—this chapter has been extraordinary. Stay tuned for what’s next! Christian Smith Gary Steele Claire Hockin Tom C. Brad Murphy Liz Vacca Ines van Daalen Thornburg Petra Jenner Simon Davies Frank Dimina Joe Repetti Alexandra Turbitt Aly Shivji Jackie Smith Dina Grimstead Scott Powers Ram Krishnamurthy Akther Ahmed @amandawang Anush Jayaraman Amit Harjani Cécile Willems Betsy Cook Lisa Stifelman-Perry Hitu Chawla Suzanna (Barnard) Lenk Megan Conyers #splunkpartners #opportunities #community #thankyou #mynextchapter
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisFive years ago when we packed up in the middle of the pandemic and moved from the US to Norway, we thought Oslo was going to be the city in which we raised our children. We adapted to the Scandinavian lifestyle, enjoying weekends at the cabin, trying to navigate the language, and appreciating Norway’s beautiful nature and people. (I also fell in love with kanelboller and the brown cheese.) As Co-CEO of SoftwareOne, it was clear that it would be too difficult to spend my time away from my family, and I've always put family first. So last month, we packed up everything again, this time driving more than 20 hours to our new home in Switzerland. I want to thank everyone who supported us throughout the last five years! Norway will always be a special place for us as a family, and we are excited for our next life adventures. #SoftwareOne Crayon
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisAfter 23 incredible years at Microsoft, it’s time to turn the page. To say I’ve learned a lot is an understatement. This journey has been nothing short of a masterclass in growth — professionally and personally. I’ve been sharpened by bold challenges, shaped by a fast-moving industry, and energized by the opportunity to work alongside some of the brightest, most driven and passionate people in tech and business. From launching new businesses to re-shaping old businesses, from building strategy to strategy shifts, the experiences have left a lasting imprint. I’m walking away with a toolkit of lessons, a network of remarkable humans, and a deep appreciation for what it means to build something that matters. My next step — stay tuned. For the time being, I’ve swapped out my blue badge for a fly rod and my golf clubs. A few weeks of recharging before I dive into the next chapter. It’s been an unforgettable ride — see you out there!
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David Willis liked thisDavid Willis liked thisBig News from Zensai! 🚀 We’re thrilled to announce that the Zensai Adoption Hub, powered by Learn365, is now live in the Pax8 Marketplace! This isn’t just a launch—it’s a movement. Together with Pax8 and Microsoft, we’re on a mission to make AI everyone’s superpower. 💡 Why it matters: Too many organizations invest in Microsoft 365 and Copilot… only to see those tools gather dust. The Zensai Adoption Hub changes that. - Plug-and-play training built natively into Microsoft 365 - No extra logins, no context switching - Courses delivered directly in Teams, Outlook, SharePoint, and Copilot - Real-time dashboards to track adoption and engagement - Multi-tenant deployment for MSPs to scale across customers This is the first end-user training solution in the Pax8 Marketplace—creating a whole new category of strategic enablement for MSPs. Our mission: Help MSPs move beyond license provisioning into true technology adoption. Because shelfware doesn’t drive ROI—adoption does. 🧠 And now, with Zensai, Pax8, and Microsoft working together, we’re turning Copilot into a catalyst for transformation. From SMBs to mid-market enterprises, we’re equipping every user with the skills to unlock the full power of AI—right inside the tools they already use. A huge thank you to our partners at Pax8 and Microsoft for helping us bring this vision to life. And to the Zensai team—your work is powering a new era of AI readiness across the SMB segment. Let’s go turn shelfware into software that sticks and drives real business impact. 💥 #AISuperPower #Pax8 #Microsoft365 #Copilot #AIenablement #MSP #Learn365 #AdoptionHub #DigitalTransformation #HumanSuccess
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