Cross-Border Partnerships: Trust, AI, and Cultural Insights with Patricia Maia
Welcome to the IAMCP Profiles and Partnership, the podcast that showcases how Microsoft partners and IAMCP members boost their business by collaborating with other members and partners. I'm your co host Anthony Carrano, and in each episode I'll be talking to some of the most innovative and successful partners in the Microsoft ecosystem. In this episode, we reconnect with Patricia Maia, Director at Arquiconsult, the 2025 EMEA finalist for P2P Solution Partner Awards, and an expert in forging international partnerships and transforming challenges into opportunities with the help of technology, culture, and integrity. Whether you're a seasoned business leader or just beginning your partnership journey, this show delivers insights you won't want to miss. Before we jump into today's episode, I want to set the stage with a couple of questions for you to consider.
Anthony Carrano:What does it take to build real trust across borders and culture in business partnerships? And are you leveraging the full potential of AI in your collaborations, or could you be missing out on hidden risk and opportunities? As you listen, think of how these questions apply to your own experiences and what you can learn from Patricia's journey navigating the complexities of international business, technology adoption, and honest leadership. Let's hear what she has to say. Well, Patricia, welcome back to the podcast. It's so great to see you again.
Patricia Maia:Hi, Anthony. How are you?
Anthony Carrano:Doing great. Doing great. Well, really appreciate you, being on with us here at profiles and partnership. Now, I know, you know, it's, it's been a little over a year, but for those who don't know you, tell us a little bit about yourself and your role in the company.
Patricia Maia:So I'm Patricia Maia. I'm from Portugal, and I work for a company called Arquiconsult. We are a global dynamics partner. So we do focus on Microsoft Dynamics solutions from Business Central, F&O, and customer engagements and everything that goes around ERP. So PowerPoint from AI now, Copilot, Fabric, everything that our customers need.
Patricia Maia:My particular role is I work for the international business. Most of my work are with partners or through partners that need some support in different geographies or they are local partners and they have a international opportunity. And I try to engage with other partners or with us.
Anthony Carrano:Excellent. Well, I know before, I know Rudy's gonna get into some questions about like your story and different things like that. Before I do, give us a I know like I said, it's been about a little over a year. What's happened? What's been going on?
Patricia Maia:One year goes like this, right? Very, So very I would say most mostly the same. I think, connections and business is growing. So if I compare myself of Patricia last last year, I would say connecting with much more people and, well, trying to learn and grow.
Anthony Carrano:Excellent. Excellent. Rudy?
Rudy Rodriguez:So, Patricia, in the story that that you're about to tell us about this partner showcase, can you tell us a little bit about the client? You don't have to give us a name, but if you could share a little bit about the size of the company, the industry, and the technology that was implemented and what challenges they were facing.
Patricia Maia:So we had a very good case that we did with a partner to several customers, but one case in particular, it was a big customer that had the need of having support in different countries. And that partner only had offices in one geography. And what we did, we partnered with them in order to being able to help their own customer in several countries. So instead of the customer have to go one by one trying to get different partners in different geographies, we centralized everything on us and then when needed we were the ones that subcontracted a partner.
Rudy Rodriguez:So what business was the company in and the solution?
Patricia Maia:The company was an accessibility company, so elevators and things like that. And they are present in many countries. And what we helped was in the Dynamics Business Central Solution. So the ERP solution they had, so they would have to have their accounting team needing support on fiscal requirements, different requirements in different geographies, and that's where we help them.
Rudy Rodriguez:And what was the solution that you implemented with your partner?
Patricia Maia:Well, the solution we implemented was already Dynamics Business Central. So, they already had it. Their struggle was how to have support in these different areas. And in the past they were engaging with different partners. So every time they need something or they would go to a different country, they would have to engage again with another company and have again a new contract, new trying to choose another company. And the way we helped was they don't have to worry about that. They just have to work with us, and we are the ones that subcontract if needed.
Rudy Rodriguez:So what was the initial spark that led you to and your partner organization to collaborate, and how did you recognize it as an opportunity worth pursuing?
Patricia Maia:Yeah. The reason was the this partner that we collaborate with, they only have presence in in one country. So they could only support in this case in Germany. And they were looking for a solution to their own customer. And they already knew us because we've done business in different ways.
Patricia Maia:And well, why to pursue this is a little bit our focus. So that was what we engage or why we engage with them. Saying, okay, we might have a solution to the customer. So, in the end, the three parties are winning, meaning the customer does not have to choose different partners. Our partner does not have to take care of, engaging with several partners for the different countries.
Patricia Maia:And we would gain a new partner and a new customer in the end, because we believe that we are giving value added to everyone. Now, the question about why to pursue them. Usually I say I'm very patient in this kind of business. We are in the business of people and people in the end, or they trust or they do not trust. So this sometimes have, they need to have time to gain some, some trust on us.
Patricia Maia:So this, this German partner, they already worked with us for several small cases. And, well, they decided to go in a higher level and challenging us to one of their own customers. And I think we are working with them for for several years. So we succeed on that.
Rudy Rodriguez:Very good. Anthony?
Anthony Carrano:Yeah, no, that's excellent. So just to kind of piggyback on that you mentioned about, you know, that you're patient.
Patricia Maia:Yes.
Anthony Carrano:And you're in the business of people and earning and gaining trust. And you've been doing this for, for you know, quite some time. Can you share a time when a partnership maybe just didn't go as planned? And what you learned about resilience or leadership from that experience.
Patricia Maia:I think didn't go as planned several times it happens because expectations sometimes are different. And the other thing is in the beginning of any every partnership we have to learn with each other. We have different ways of working. We have different sometimes even if we are working exactly in the same system we have and we say we use the same methodology in the end we are different people working in different ways. So we always have a learning process that we need to adapt.
Patricia Maia:So I think things does not succeed when we do not we are not there to share our profits and our goals. So if we don't see it as something that everyone will win in the end, a partnership will not succeed. So some cases that happened was when people are not being transparent and they are not sharing everything that will happen in that deal is when it does not succeed. When we trust each other and we are transparent saying, okay, this is our goal. What we want to achieve is this.
Patricia Maia:And if we share that with all the parties that are involved, I think we can have a we always have a successful case. Even sometimes it's not immediate. Sometimes it's we start with small things and in a year or two we become or the challenge comes or a new customer comes that we suddenly have that big big profit or big opportunity. But sometimes it starts with small small things that we are learning from each other and growing together. I think in the end, it has to be like that. We need to have trust, and we have all to win in the end of the game.
Rudy Rodriguez:Well, Patricia, I've I've got a question for you because one of the things that we're seeing these days, we're entering a new frontier with AI and automation. And so that's reshaping the whole partner landscape. What's the one area where you see partners both leveraging and possibly even underestimating the opportunity or the risk?
Patricia Maia:Well, that's a very, very big and interesting question. Because we used to say AI is there, it's not the future, it's here already, right? So there are lots of things that for instance in our case that we as a company already have taking advantages of AI. We can accelerate our work. So things that we used to do in two or three days now we can do in one or even less.
Patricia Maia:So, and starting with development where we when we are developing a tool or developing something to our customers. Now we can do it much much faster. This is one way. The other thing is even in our productivity tools. So small details like finding an email.
Patricia Maia:So we use Copilot. With Copilot it's easier. We just have to ask him, can you find this for me? And he does it. And in the past we had to look who in our archives or even use the search tool, but it's not as quickly as we get.
Patricia Maia:So this is, I think we have lots of opportunities there. Of course, there are some risks sometimes we cannot have or sometimes no, we we really have to confirm everything that we we have from AI when we are searching for something. It's not replacing the way we think. So it's just just take that as suggestions and not it's the same that we say to our kids in school. So ChatGPT will not replace the work that you have to do.
Patricia Maia:It can suggest you some things, but do it by yourself. Otherwise, you don't learn. So you can do the same in your day to day. You cannot trust everything. You have to think after you get it.
Patricia Maia:And but there is lots of opportunities. It's a new world that we need to adapt. It's a it's a we had the industrial revolution some years ago, and now we have AI. And we need to to think in a completely different way and see it as something that we will help or that will help us in the end.
Anthony Carrano:That's excellent. You know, one of the things too, if I can, know, maybe go back a little bit just, you know, about your story and you know, the where you know as is the end specifically the, you know, the story in which you know, as the may have, you know, finalist, you know, for the solution partner. You were working with a Danish, I mean, you're in Portugal, you're working with a Danish ISV and you got a customer in France and a customer in Lithuania, which you know, I find just, know, fascinating all that, know, like the cross cultural and the borders and, and I know, you know, you've been, you know, working in that, you know, in that type of arena for a while. What's the biggest cultural lesson you've learned from working with partners and customers in different regions like that? I mean, and I can if you could really unpack that, I think you've got some unique insight there.
Patricia Maia:Now one of the cases that I gave, with a German partner was, when we won the P2P final, award from IAMCP. That case we were finalists. This was a Danish company and ISP. So they are on the graphic and packaging solutions. They have a solution to this industry. And we help them in different ways. And one of those was this project that we did in France and in and we it was also Lithuanian sorry. I think it was not Lithuanian. It's Polish Polish company. So they were in Poland.
Patricia Maia:They were in France, and we were with a team from Portugal. So and the Danish team also. So culturally, lots of different ways of of approaching it. And in fact, there are differences. One of the things we learn is that sometimes the countries that are smaller, like Portugal, we are a smaller country and we really have to adapt to the other countries to grow.
Patricia Maia:So that is one of the characteristics that we have is that we are able to adapt to the way the others work and the others are. So we are, for instance, in this case you could see different types of Nenish people are more pragmatic. Usually we are we are more diplomatic. So this kind of cultural things we see that and sometimes it's difficult at the beginning because they do not understand why we are not being so straightforward. And we do not understand why they are so We feel it like no, they are too direct for us.
Patricia Maia:And these are the kind of things that in the multicultural environment you face and even other things. Now I got an example of a different company for instance in Spain, in Spain they do not work on Friday afternoons. So, kind of small details of course we have to take that in consideration when we are booking a meeting because if we are booking on Friday afternoon, they will not be able to attend and they feel like why are they booking in a it's like for us booking on a Saturday, why are they booking something on a Saturday Or so these small details we need to take in consideration these cultural details when we try to work in different with different geographies.
Anthony Carrano:If I can ask a kind of a follow-up is, I'd like you just to share like, what was one of your biggest cultural hurdles that you've encountered and you don't have to give partner name, customer name or anything like that. But because you know, obviously, you've had a lot of success, right? And, and just, know, in the story, which you were the finalists for this year, you know, the winner, you know, in previous years, you've obviously, you've got a lot of success, you know, navigating, navigating all that, I want to hear where you have one of like the biggest cultural challenges. Like what's the story you can share with our audience? And then, you know, what did you learn from that?
Patricia Maia:Suddenly, don't know why the story that comes to my mind was, well, it was many years ago. And it was with a Spanish partner. And in fact, it was a customer. He was so rude the way he wrote. And I think it was a personal thing, but also a cultural thing because he was really rude, even in the wording.
Patricia Maia:Some words that we do not use, And I don't use them, you know, in front of my parents. And he was using it. And at the beginning I thought, wow, this is not the way that we talk with people. And then I understood it was not it's really some words that for us translate into Portuguese. It's really bad word. In Spanish, it's not that bad. And it was a way of the way he he acted under pressure because every time I called him about something, it was completely different. So it was not that he was being rude. It's just the way he was. So one of the things I start doing was, okay, let's not exchange emails about certain topics, let's do a meeting, because sometimes it's better and then we can write it down.
Patricia Maia:So that was, I don't know why it's the first thing I because it was a cultural shock at the beginning, I can say we are still, we still work together after fifteen years or something. Wow. And we learned also to work with each other because I also, he also understood that was some things that I said, cannot write this like that. I feel a little bit offended when you say that. I think one of the things that sometimes I say is when you write I don't know if you made this this exercise.
Patricia Maia:If you write an email and two weeks later you read it, Sometimes the way you read it, the sound that you put in the way you are reading it, it can be different. And if you do it just between your colleagues or just giving in your own country two weeks time to between those emails and you do it in different cultures. It's even exponential the way you can be perceived. So it's something that I think we have to take in consideration. We were talking about AI but we had this revolution with emails also.
Patricia Maia:That people tend to write an email for everything and sometimes it's just a phone call or a meeting that the email does not replace a meeting and the meeting is not replaced does not replace several emails.
Rudy Rodriguez:Well, I find that to be a really interesting story because I can relate to it. In in the company that I sold. We used to have a class for our employees, and it was based on email tone. And to always we had to train our our our whole staff.
Rudy Rodriguez:Be very careful how you write because we did international business as well. And and you have to be very careful because different countries interpret it very differently. So I really appreciate where you're coming from. So this leads to the next question. When building a partnership, how do you intentionally balance the technical capabilities, the people side of collaboration, and deliver the right customer value, and what frameworks or practices, help you keep those things in alignment?
Patricia Maia:Well, that's, I thought, a big question.
Rudy Rodriguez:That's two in a row now.
Patricia Maia:Yeah. The partnerships that I deal with and here in Arquiconsult that we do, most of our partners we do more or less the same. Meaning, we are implementers or ISV is in the Microsoft Dynamics world. So that allows us to kind of speak the same language when we are talking technically speaking. Okay?
Patricia Maia:And that allows us to align a little bit better. Of course, are things that when we start a partnership, first thing is we need to learn from each other and we need to understand not only what we can sell or what we can give to the other, but we have to be open to understand what we have to receive from the other partner. Because this has to be balanced. It has to be a win win situation. So usually, we start us showing how we can help, how what we can deliver, but also trying to understand what they what are the needs and also what they can deliver to us.
Patricia Maia:And after that, of course, we need that boring part, which is the contracts and the the way we we have to have some rules behind everything. To be honest, it's the part that I hate. It's the administrative thing, but it's needed because we need to have some understanding on the on the rules also. And and then, again, it's finding the the opportunity, finding the what our end customer could need or even these partners, what are the things that they they need and we can help.
Anthony Carrano:That's great. Now what about, you've talked about, like, when you're building and, you know, and and intentionally, like, balancing all that. Are there things that and so if I'm a if I'm a company that's, you know, starting out and wanting to do partnerships. Right? What type of maybe frameworks or signals could you say, hey. This these are some things that you need to kinda keep in mind when evaluating, you know, another, you know, you know, tech company, you know, as a potential partner? Are there any kind of I mean, is that possible? Like, are there any like signals, things that that you want to look out for? Let's say, I'm kind of getting new to this game of partnership.
Patricia Maia:Well, first I would say what is a partnership, right? What's the essence of a partnership? And the partnership is something that we do and can be business or can be whatever we do together with another entity or another person. When we go and start working together with another partner, as I mentioned, is we have to evaluate if there is any value added between both parties. If we are both going to win something in the end of the game.
Patricia Maia:And winning can be revenue and profits but can be much more. It could be knowledge. I can know, I can be an expert on again dynamics area and I could not know anything about let's say cyber security for instance. And it can be also knowledge sharing or as the case as we were the finalists. I was working with an ISV, they had a great product.
Patricia Maia:They have a go to market product, but they did not have the skills to implement in this case in a French company because they did not know the fiscal requirements for that French company. So that was for the for France. So we need to take in consideration what is the the games? How are we going to to collaborate? Usually, I compare this with the marriage.
Patricia Maia:So when we get married, you have to balance things in a way that we both are comfortable and in in the end we both win something. And when you start a partnership, you also need to understand if it's something that is just opportunistic. You're just engaging because we have a small case that is going to be a short term thing. And that I will not say it's really a partnership, it was a case that we companies work together. But if it's a long term relationship that you start building something together and you want to achieve and continue working for a long period of time.
Patricia Maia:And it was not just because you had this particular issue or problem or challenge or deal that you have to solve. So another thing that usually I think we should take into consideration is what are the goals and if it's a long term thing so that we will work together like a marriage. I married for thirty years so.
Anthony Carrano:Yeah, well congratulations.
Patricia Maia:I have experience on that so no, but that we have to build. We have to- Another thing is during the process of and when we are engaging with other partners, even in the same country, companies have their own culture. And things will go well and things will go wrong also. We are not going to do everything right at the first time. And sometimes during a project things go wrong.
Patricia Maia:And one of the things is do not point fingers. Do not start blaming each other. It's trying to see how we can help each other instead of pointing fingers. That's another and act like a unique team. It's not their team, our team, the other part team is we are one team with different expertise and different knowledge that we work together and we will succeed achieving something.
Anthony Carrano:Well, as always, you give a lot of really great advice, a lot of great steps and things to keep in mind. I want to I want to hone in though, if you know if another partner listening today want to replicate your success, what's one principle or mindset? Because you provided a lot of great things, frameworks and signals and things just to kind of keep in steps just to just to keep in mind, really appreciate that. But what would one principle or mindset shift that you tell them that you if before you do anything, you need to adopt this first. What would that be?
Patricia Maia:Be honest.
Anthony Carrano:Okay.
Patricia Maia:If you're honest, everything then will will succeed because again, we are people and trust and trust is built based on honesty. Right? So if I had to say one thing is be honest.
Anthony Carrano:That's great. That's great. Well, that this was excellent. Before we wrap up, know as I was thinking about our our last episode, are you still involved with REFOOD?
Patricia Maia:Well, I made a pause. I'm still involved. I'm in the SOS team. The thing is I start traveling so much that I was being absent so much time saying I cannot this Monday, I cannot go there. I thought this is not on again, it's not honest saying that. So I'm still engaging with them as a SOS.
Anthony Carrano:And what's an SOS?
Patricia Maia:They need help. I I try to help. I still contribute. You know, we need the boxes to put the food in. So I still save them when I have the takeaways. It seems like food. I still save them, But I had to pause a little bit.
Anthony Carrano:Remember, I remember when we were talking about it was just a great organization just helping with, redistributing food to those that are in need. So I wanted to, you know, make a point to bring that up. And you know, for those that are listening, if you want to, you know, either get involved or really help support, it's at www.refood.org and we'll have, you know, the links in the show notes for those that are listening. But I just remember that was something that, that you had brought up that I thought was really, really, really cool.
Patricia Maia:And they still, go to help lots of people. And as I said, I had to pause due to personal things, but it's still something that I really believe on is the this kind of associations and them in particular. Because it's not profitable. They do not ask for much money, just volunteer people to help them with the waste.
Anthony Carrano:That's great.
Patricia Maia:And there is so many waste in food and so many people that need it.
Anthony Carrano:Well, this has been fantastic. We really appreciate you. What's, for those listening, what's the best way that they can reach out and connect with you?
Patricia Maia:K. They can find me on LinkedIn. You can also have my email patricia.maia@arquiconsult.com and reach out and I'm available to talk and ask questions and answer to questions and also ask some questions.
Anthony Carrano:Excellent, excellent. Well, thank you. This was fantastic. Patricia, enjoy the rest of your day.
Patricia Maia:Thank you for inviting me.
Anthony Carrano:Absolutely.
Anthony Carrano:Well, wow, that was a great episode. I always really appreciate Patricia and just perspective that, that she tends to bring, you know, to these interviews. Rudy, what really stood out to you?
Rudy Rodriguez:Well, one of the things I appreciated about, Patricia's the conversation with Patricia today was how partnerships can work on an inter international level and the challenges that you face. She brought an interesting story about the directness of working with a Danish partner and, or and also with a Spanish partner, challenges that you face. So there's always challenges that you face in when collaborating with people, and it could be language. It could be culture. And one of the things that it does require is patience and honesty in your dealings with with everyone.
Rudy Rodriguez:I thought that was really insightful from her. Those are the challenges that she faces, every day working in in especially in the European market where there's many different languages. So I really appreciated that from her.
Anthony Carrano:Yeah. No. That that was that was really insightful. And the thing that really stood out to me was just like towards the end where, you know, she started talking about like, is what is a partnership, you know, and just, you know, taking the time to really define that, you know, is this is this something that, is it just opportunistic, for the short term, or is going into it like it's truly a long term, like relationship as you're going to build your businesses, you know, and providing these these, you know, joint solutions for for customers, just the importance of defining what does actually winning mean for, you know, you know, each partner as well as for the customer, how are you going to play the game together. But also understanding that look going into that during the process, things are going to go well, but sometimes things are not going to go well, and you know, just not not pointing fingers, but how are we going to, you know, help each other, you know, to best serve the customer. So I just really appreciate she's got a just an incredible blend of something that's both diplomatic as well as, know, pragmatic. So I just really appreciate what you brought there.
Rudy Rodriguez:Absolutely. Well, want to thank all of you listening today for joining us on this episode of IAMCP Profiles in Partnership powered by Dunamis Marketing. We hope you enjoyed this podcast and find it useful and inspiring. If you did, please subscribe, rate, and review us on your favorite podcast platform. One of the best ways to partner for success is to join IAMCP, a community of Microsoft partners who help each other grow and thrive.
Rudy Rodriguez:IAMCP members can find and connect with other partners locally and globally and access exclusive resources and opportunities. Whether you're looking for new customers, new markets or new solutions, IAMCP can help you achieve your goals. To learn more, the website at www.iamcp.org.
