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Blog • • 5 minute read

The Power of Pausing to Prepare

A dual‑perspective story on how GSP leveraged the Associate Academy to turn potential into immediate field impact through intentional investment and real‑world application.

In this blog

  1. A Week That Changed the Trajectory
  2. The Early‑Career Challenge
  3. The Light Bulb Moment
  4. From Learning to Leading
  5. Call to Action: Pay It Forward

By Tonya Stopke & Carson Barry

At WWT, we talk about investing in our people, but every so often, there's a moment that makes that investment feel real, tangible, and deeply impactful. For Global Service Provider (GSP), leveraging the Associate Academy was one of those moments.

When we hired Carson Barry, we made a deliberate choice: instead of rushing him straight into the field, we invested twelve focused weeks in his development. We pulled him out of the day‑to‑day, placed him in a cohort, and gave him the space, structure, and exposure to truly learn before being expected to perform. The result wasn't just readiness. It was clarity, confidence, and momentum.

 A Week That Changed the Trajectory

Carson:
Spending a week at Global Headquarters in St. Louis as part of the Associate Academy ended up being one of the most clarifying weeks since I started at WWT.

Because I was already aligned to an account on the GSP team, I experienced the  Associate Academy  with one foot in "Academy mode" and one foot in "real account team mode." That combination made everything feel immediately applicable. Concepts weren't theoretical. They mapped directly to conversations, planning sessions, and customer outcomes I was already seeing in real time.

One thing I didn't expect was how engaged our OEM partners would be. It's one thing to hear that WWT has strong partner relationships. It's another thing entirely to see partners show up, invest their time, and lean in on developing WWT talent. That level of involvement says a lot about WWT, and about the trust we've built across our ecosystem.

 The Early‑Career Challenge

Carson:
Early on, I ran into a pretty common challenge at WWT: we have a massive set of capabilities and differentiators. But if you can't articulate them clearly and connect them to a customer outcome, it all goes over the customer's head, and it becomes noise.

In a real account environment, especially with a major customer like I have, "being busy" doesn't equal being effective. I wanted to become useful fast, to my customer managers, to the broader team, and ultimately to the customer.

Specifically, I wanted to improve three things:

  • Telling WWT's value proposition in a crisp, customer‑outcome‑focused way
  • Being more organized and intentional in account planning and presentations, having a clear story, a clean structure, and better execution
  • Owning greenfield prospecting with original outreach ideas rooted in real WWT success stories, not generic "hope you're doing well" emails

 The Light Bulb Moment

Carson:
The biggest realization for me was that WWT's advantage isn't just "we can do it all." It's that we have a truly repeatable system for turning capability into outcomes. The   Associate Academy   gave me a much better way to understand and communicate this system.

Three things really clicked for me:

1. The value proposition is a story, not a slide deck
It's not about listing differentiators. It's about connecting those differentiators to specific customer problems, and clearly answering "why WWT" and "why now." When you can do that, the conversation shifts from pricing and vendors to outcomes and trust.

2. Mural is actually useful
I'll admit, it was frustrating at first. But Mural made a huge difference in how I approached account planning. The best plans aren't always the prettiest, but they are structured, aligned, and easy for the HPT to execute and update. I built the Mural board for our most recent APS, and it's something we still use and update today.

3. Greenfield prospecting works when it's backed by proof
"Want to chat?" isn't the move. What works is: "Here's what we're seeing, here's a pattern we've identified, here's a real success story, and here's a small next step to explore." I started owning prospecting motions into untouched orgs by pulling ideas directly from real WWT wins and turning them into practical, relevant plays.

 From Learning to Leading

Carson:
The Academy genuinely changed how I show up on my account team. I'm more confident leading with WWT's value proposition in a clear, customer‑relevant way. I take ownership of account planning blueprints: Murals, talk tracks, and summaries that make the team faster and more effective. And I'm driving greenfield prospecting using real WWT success stories instead of generic outreach.

Huge thanks to the leaders and partners who leaned in throughout the Academy. Their engagement made a real impact. Seeing how strongly WWT invests in its people reinforced why I'm excited to keep building my career here and why it's on me to make the most of this opportunity.

                                                                                                                              -Tonya Stopke

 Call to Action: Pay It Forward

If you're tenured at WWT, here's a simple challenge:
Send a recent, lesser‑known, or favorite WWT success story to someone early in their career.

That one story could become their next prospecting play, their next account conversation, or their next confidence boost. That's how we scale impact, and that's how investment turns into results.