A new year is a natural planning moment. Partners are navigating various pressures and opportunities, including fast-moving AI, shifting cloud workloads, rising security expectations, and data becoming a bigger part of every solution motion. In that environment, skilling can’t be treated as an optional add-on. It’s a core business priority that supports what partners care about most: winning work and delivering it with confidence.
That’s the lens I’d encourage you to bring into 2026 planning. Not what courses should we take, but what technical and sales capabilities do we need to build so we can execute more consistently across sales and delivery?
How data makes the case for readiness and enablement
In December 2025, Forrester Consulting conducted a Total Economic Impact™ study, commissioned by Microsoft, on the partner opportunity for the Microsoft skilling and enablement offerings.1 The study modeled a composite partner organization based on interviews with partners who experienced the offerings.
The study found the potential for a three-year 217% return on investment (ROI) with a payback period of less than six months and a net present value (NPV) of $67.9M over three years.2
What’s behind those numbers is even more relevant for how you plan. Forrester ties capability building to specific business outcomes, including:
- Win rate improvement of 10% per year, which the study values at $49 million over three years for the composite partner organization.
- An increase in average deal size by up to 6.1% per year, driven by upsell and cross-sell, valued at $9 million over three years.
- The ability to create new offerings and capabilities that add additional revenue of 5% per year, valued at $3.7 million over three years.
- Improvement in project delivery speed by up to 20% per year, which the study links to decreased project delivery costs and higher gross margins, valued at $37.6 million of increased gross profit over three years.
The practical takeaway is that readiness shows up in growth metrics like win rates, deal size, and new offerings, as well as in speed, efficiency, and other aspects of delivery performance. This work is not abstract. It’s tied to how partners compete and how teams execute.
How to get started: Focus on the Partner Skilling Hub
Most partners I talk to don’t need convincing that building capacity matters. The real challenge is where to begin, especially when roles, solution areas, and learning options can feel fragmented.
"One of the key strategic challenges we have is how to transform ourselves, our task force, and our employees. We leverage the Microsoft program to upskill our people and to facilitate our transformation. It’s totally different selling fixed-line than selling cloud services. So Microsoft is facilitating this upskilling and is part of an important program here with thousands of people who must be upskilled."
- VP, Ecosystem and Partnership, GSI
The Partner Skilling Hub is designed to be your unified starting point. The Skilling Hub brings together curated learning paths across Microsoft solution areas, with options that are self-paced or instructor-led and aligned to both technical and sales roles. Courses are designed to simplify discovery, reduce fragmentation, and make it easier to scale readiness across teams.
Looking ahead: Build the foundation early
If 2026 is going to be a year of faster execution, capability building is the foundation that will make it possible. The earlier you create focus, the sooner your team can translate training into real delivery and go-to-market impact.
If you want one event series to prioritize, I’d recommend Partner Project Ready workshops. These role-based sessions focus on real-world delivery scenarios so teams can implement with confidence across key areas:
Check out the full list of Skilling Hub resources and stay up to date by exploring Partner news on Partner Community for fresh insights on incentives, skilling, case studies, Microsoft Copilot, marketplace growth, and other developments and opportunities.
1 Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study conducted by Forrester Consulting, commissioned by Microsoft, “The Partner Opportunity For Microsoft’s Skilling And Enablement Program,” December 2025.
2 Throughout this document, $ refers to US dollar (USD).