The Millennial Report Profiles: Nathan Teplow, Continuum Managed Services

This week we’re continuing our coverage of notable millennials in the IT industry with a closer look at Nathan Teplow, marketing programs manager at Continuum Managed Services, a channel-exclusive SaaS and managed service solution provider. Aside from being a chief example of the kind of millennials making waves in the channel, Teplow is also one of the five recipients of CompTIA’s ChannelChangers 2014 award, which recognizes young leaders for their hard work in the industry.

Teplow, 25, has been interested in marketing from an early age, and graduated from the University of Miami in 2012 with a bachelor’s degree in finance and marketing. During his senior year of college, Teplow completed an internship at BlueTrain Mobile, a Florida-based digital marketing startup, and was promptly hired by the company after graduation, where he eventually took on a sales and marketing role.

“I always knew I kinda wanted to get into marketing,” he said. “I like being able to be creative in the work that I do and also being strategic too, and I thought marketing was a nice combination of those.”

Teplow remained at the company until November 2013, when he was hired by Continuum as an Inbound Marketing manager. The position was his first real experience with the IT channel, yet he quickly realized that he could use his innate experience with technology to succeed as a professional.

“I kind of stumbled into a channel role,” he said. “I guess you could say I more or less fell into the channel from wanting to join a pretty advanced marketing team, but I’ve learned a ton in my year and a half [at the company]. It’s something I’ve grown passionate about.”

As a marketing programs manager, Teplow works to build campaigns and programs around new product offerings and help customers adopt new programs. He also works directly with the rest of the content team to drive awareness of new programs and spread the world about upcoming services. He is most well-known for hosting and producting MSPradio, Continuum’s weekly podcast, where he discusses channel issues with managed service providers and other industry experts. Teplow helped found MSPradio in 2014 and has currently produced 57 episodes of the show. His work in the industry and in running the podcast helped him secure the title as one of the inaugural CompTIA ChannelChangers last year.

Teplow is also a founding member of CompTIA’s Future Leaders Community, which encompasses young IT professionals from across the industry to help bring awareness to the challenges and success of millennials in the workforce. Teplow said one of the things that makes millennials particularly good at what they do is their unique view on the convergence between work and leisure time, and their ability to remain up to date via social media.

“I think it’s just in our nature to be connected at all times.” We’re not necessarily going to come in at 9 a.m. and leave at 5 p.m., but we definitely work hard,” he said. “I really don’t think there’s a work ethic issue with millennials. I think it’s more just that we like to spread out our connectivity throughout the day. … Productivity and connectivity have been ingrained in our generation.”

When asked how millennials differ from our peers, Teplow said he believes the birth of the Internet has helped create a generation that understands how each individual can succeed on a global scale.

“I think one thing that drives millennials is just a desire to make an impact,” he said. “I think when you grow up with social media and things like going viral or hearing about overnight success stories like Facebook or Instagram or Snapchat … those are our peers that are starting those companies. And I think that with the velocity that things are moving in this day and age there’s a strong desire and drive from millennials to make an impact.”