Jason Walkley
Since joining Wireless Logic just six weeks ago as UK Sales Director, Jason Walkley shares with us a little bit about himself, his background and first impressions of Wireless Logic…
Before we find out a bit about your first few weeks at Wireless Logic, tell us a little bit about yourself…
Whilst I now live in Leamington Spa in Warwickshire, I was born and brought up in South Wales.
I follow my father with a love of sport. He was significantly better than average in most sports but it’s football in which he excelled. Whilst he never showed it, I’m sure that he was quietly disappointed that neither my brother or I shared his love or talent for football. I loved to play rugby although, unfortunately I was never anywhere near a level that would have seen wearing me the Welsh red jersey!
Today, my passion is road cycling which allows me to spend time with my mates, trying to ride faster and further, drinking coffee, trying to stay somewhat fit, fuelling my competitive, analytic and data obsessions through Strava! I’m a firm believer that the lessons of sport, individual and team, translate into business.
Where were you prior to Wireless Logic?
As a teenager, I wanted to be either a fighter pilot or a barrister, neither of which came into fruition! Instead I started my career as a Business Systems Analyst at Mitel, a unified communications business, working on transformation projects. In my first year I was spotted and convinced by the then Sales Director to start a career in sales. This led me to various sales and leadership roles across the technology sector, including Vodafone where I built out the unified communications sales practice in the UK. Following this, I lead the integration of three existing sales teams to form the Mobility Solutions Practice introducing IoT solutions to help deliver operational efficiencies for a wide variety of private and public sector organisations.
In 2018 I had the opportunity to join Olive and support the scaling of its Enterprise division focused primarily on a unique disruptive Cloud Managed Service Platform, offering organisations world class customer experience, unified communications and contact centre applications and tools.
Why Wireless Logic?
Since leaving Vodafone in 2017 my ambition was to secure a leadership role in the IoT industry and when the Wireless Logic opportunity emerged late this summer, I was keen to learn more.
To me Wireless Logic is a market maker, not just a market leader and I’m hugely impressed by how it has, after 20 years, continued to not only remain relevant, but continue as a leader in the industry, deliver constant innovation, and despite significant growth, retain true agility. I believe that some of the most innovative applications are yet to even be conceptualised and that’s the exciting part. I see huge opportunity for Wireless Logic to play a pivotal and leading role in connecting the world of IoT for a very long time to come.
What do you like about working for Wireless Logic and what have been your highlights?
To put it simply for me it’s the culture and, in turn, the people that form Wireless Logic. There are a lot of highlights (too many to list!) but what I would say is that the social side of Wireless Logic is always great fun – whether this be end of year, summer, Christmas, or even end of the month, there’s always something going on, and it’s a great way to socialise outside of work.
Although only here for a few weeks, what are your initial impressions of WL?
My first few weeks have flown by! For me there are three key parallel activities when joining a new organisation; Discover, Plan and Execute. I always look back to reflect on achievements. However, I feel like I am at a point that I’d not expected to achieve for another few weeks and I put this down to the people. Everyone has been incredibly welcoming and willing to answer my endless (and sometimes bizarre) questions.
There’s a shared Wireless Logic DNA which makes the business so successful. I’ve been massively impressed to observe not only people helping me as the new (old) kid on the block, but a genuine sense of shared purpose and collaboration.
What do you hope to achieve in the next few months personally and with the wider team?
On a personal level the next few months mean continuing to accelerate my understanding of the organisation, its people and the vast array of markets, both established and evolving, that we have the capabilities to serve.
I am incredibly fortunate to inherit from Matt, a strong and high performing sales organisation built on solid foundations, sales practice, and principles.
For me, the next few months are all about ensuring the UK sales team continue to deliver a fantastic performance despite the challenges of COVID-19 and that we close out the current financial year with a really strong performance. I’m excited about harnessing the great talent and energy across the team to ultimately ensure that we outperform the market and our competitors.
Thank you all for making me so welcome.
