Four Female Avaya Executives Named to the 2024 CRN Women of the Channel List

Avaya understands the importance of fostering a culture that provides employees with a supportive and empowering work environment and an inclusive workforce – and how that translates to improved employee satisfaction, and ultimately, to business growth. Avaya takes all opportunities to celebrate our impressive female leaders and their achievements – which is why we are proud to share that four of our leaders have been named to CRN’s Women of the Channel 2024 list. Through this list, CRN – a brand of The Channel Company – honors the impressive female channel executives for their positive impact on the technology industry through creativity, strategic thinking, and noteworthy leadership.  

Included in CRN’s 2024 Women of the Channel list are Avaya’s very own: Alison Barney, Director, Avaya Edge Program; Lisa Frederick, Senior Director, Growth Partners; Deborah “Deb” Keeney, Channel Leader; and Florence “Flo” Sollo, Director, US Channel. Avaya is beyond proud to employ these four outstanding women and channel leaders, all of whom are receiving this honor for the second straight year, which is a true testament to their role as inspiring female leaders. These four women and their combined decades of work in the channel have prompted intangible results and contributions to Avaya’s business and have empowered Avaya’s partners and customers to successfully deliver first-class solutions and experiences. 

See below for more information on these four outstanding female channel leaders and join us in congratulating them for this recognition. 

Alison Barney 

Throughout her career, Alison held a multitude of roles at the likes of Avaya, Oracle, Infovista, Spirent Communications, all within the partner program development and partner enablement realm. She’s passionate about working with channel partners, as well as the network of internal teams and team members, all driving to ensure partner success. 

Alison earned her recognition on this year’s CRN Women of the Channel list for leading her team in introducing incentives to reward partners for supporting customer migrations to cloud at their pace, supporting Avaya’s overall “Innovation Without Disruption” strategy. In parallel, she led projects to enhance partner experience, which was key in driving positive customer outcomes. 

“The greatest pleasure my role at Avaya brings me stems from enabling partners with the right tools, programs, and options needed to be successful,” said Alison. “Avaya’s ‘Innovation Without Disruption’ strategy has empowered us to do just that – by giving our partners these options, they allow customers to choose their deployment methods, related tools, and ultimately their cloud journey,” said Barney. 

Lisa Frederick 

Lisa started her career in a direct sales role selling voice solutions at a channel partner, an experience she credits as the culprit for her passion of channel sales. Her previous experience as a Channel partner not only allows her to better understand the challenges partners face but reinforces the importance of being laser focused on delivering simple, effortless, and profitable experiences for them. 

This year, Lisa earned her spot on the CRN Women of the Channel List for her leadership in shifting her team’s focus to Avaya’s new generation of solutions. This translates into focusing on the CX and EX experience and continuing revenue growth through Avaya’s world-class partner ecosystem – further empowering partners to provide extraordinary value for their customers by aiding in their cloud transition at their own pace. 

“Staying laser focused on the partners’ skills, competencies, and expertise, I manage my team to assist their partners with their shift to Avaya’s new generation of solutions while staying focused on their customer’s experience,” said Frederick. “Our expansive portfolio provides partners and their customers with a lot of great choices. I coach my team to recognize the unique features Avaya’s solutions offer and align them with each individual partner’s unique strengths to exceed customer expectations.” 

Deb Keeney 

Deb has worked in the Channel for over a decade leading high-performing sales and channel teams. She prides herself on driving positive outcomes for customers, partners, and shareholders, due to her passion for delivering first-class service. She has a proven record of coaching and inspiring sales teams to focus on the partner experience and end user customer requirements to drive partner success. 

Deb earned her spot on this year’s CRN Women of the Channel list for leadership of the targeted growth channel team. This team saw tremendous success migrating customers from perpetual to subscription and on-premises solutions to cloud models, which earned one of the team members a Circle of Excellence award for the highest sales attainment of the year. 

“Our targeted growth partners create extraordinary value for their customers by assisting with their cloud transition and transformation,” said Keeney. “As a leader on the channel team, I take great pride in being intentional with my behavior and actions, and when coaching each individual Channel Manager I ensure the team is focused on enabling our partners to recognize the unique solutions Avaya provides.” 

Flo Sollo 

Flo’s background encompasses sales, marketing, and not only supporting the channel, but working for a channel partner. The learnings and skills she acquired as a channel partner enabled her to springboard into a channel leader role at Avaya where she’s forged meaningful partner relationships while developing a strong channel team.   

“Our goal is to help partners expand out of their comfort zone to a space where they are comfortable layering new capabilities like AI, workflow automation, and digital automation,” said Sollo. 

Committed, results-driven female leaders like Alison, Lisa, Deb, and Flo set the benchmark for their teams to enable their partners and customers for success and growth in the channel while they innovate without disruption. Congratulations to these women and the other honorees this year!