What your SE Wants to Tell You

For this installment, I wanted to address the sales reps on behalf of our SE community. As an SE leader, a good part of my job is to help out with being an ESM / SE 'marriage counselor' so I wanted to try and articulate a few things that for various reasons are difficult to communicate for a lot of SE's. I think everyone agrees that a trusting and productive relationship between ESM and SE is super critical, and maybe a few ideas here can just help bring voice to some things to help out - some of these may be a little controversial, so please feel free to chime in with disagreement in the comments.

  • "I don't really care if you know our technology in detail, as long as you trust that I do". In startup land, I have often worked with sales reps that have a technology background and may feel that it is important to be intimate with the actual details of the technology. That's totally OK, as long we stay in our lanes. Even if you know a technical answer, don't say it in front of the customer. The customer will hear the exact same words very differently out of your mouth vs. mine. It is important that we are able to communicate internally with technical details about how our product fits the customer need or not, but when it comes time to talk to the customer - we each have our role, and I will cover the tech stuff. So the other side of this coin is:

  • "I don't want your job." What we really need is for you to be able to do what you do well and focus on that. Keep the deal moving, build the trust and relationships, navigate to the right decision makers, work with the partners, etc. There is a huge amount of work that you need to do that doesn't involve the technology, and I recognize and appreciate that. I've certainly had young SE's that struggle with this one sometimes and can feel like the SE's do the "hard" work, and the ESM just sets up the meeting, does the legal paperwork, and takes home the big commission check. In these cases, as an SE leader, I try to really make sure there is more understanding about the ESM role and all the responsibilities and pressure it includes. On rare occasions an SE does really want an ESM job. That's a whole other topic I may write about one day, but if an SE thinks they want to make that move, they really need to get a lot of help to experience what that really means before they embark on that journey. Many ships have been lost on that journey, so it' very important to be prepared before shoving off.

  • "Do I really need to show you how to get your presentation on the projector - again ?" So as I mentioned above, we don't really think an ESM should be super technical and deep in the technology - however, the bread and butter of what we do involves some basic technology like PowerPoint, Zoom, email, calendars, etc. I can't tell you how frustrating it is when an ESM schedules a meeting without looking at my calendar to find a free spot. It's not that hard. I will help you figure it out, and you can learn it if you want to. I think that many ESM's feel it's perfectly it's almost a badge of honor to say "I'm just not that good with this stuff", but I'm telling you it's not OK. You don't have to be a wizard, but the little jokes we always say when you are struggling to get your laptop screen to display on the projector "Yeah, I need an SE to do this technical stuff" can wear thin. Spend the time to learn the tools you use every day. Practice doing a web based presentation with the tool your company uses, ask your SE to help you learn the tools early on but then commit to being proficient with these things.

  • "It's my quota also." This one obviously depends on the organization, but in most smaller companies where team based selling is important, this is literally and figuratively true. Great SE's care a lot about quota attainment. Not just financially (which is obviously important), but also for the sense of success and the competitive nature of sales motivate and inspire SE's just as it does for ESM's. When a sales team looks at their territory as a franchise that they are building together, great things happen. Bring your SE into the conversation about strategy, prospecting, partner development, etc. Have the conversations about how you will get to quota together, what the gaps are, what creative ideas can help, etc. Most great SE's are very comfortable that the ESM is the quarterback, but they still want to get up to the chalkboard and offer some input on the X's and O's.

  • "I appreciate the compliments, but I would prefer more actual respect." All successful ESM's know they need to recognize the work that their SE's do. It is pretty well rehearsed to give credit to the SE team upon success, which is important and great. However, if those compliments are not coupled with a partnership approach to account strategy, it feels very empty. This same idea goes all the way up the leadership ladder. Simply stating at a sales kick off that "The SE team is the most important in the company" is not enough, you have to live it. Give the SE team a seat at the table to shape and improve sales motion, market strategy, product strategy, etc. And a little hint for those at the top of the sales leadership chain - the entire SE team knows if they are actually at the table. So layers of leadership in the SE organization will filter messages in both directions, but I think the influence of that Director or VP leader of the SE organization is very apparent and important to the entire team. Many frustrated SE's feel like their leaders do not have a voice and the entire team is simply expected to show up and deliver the demo.

  • "I really want to receive and give feedback." For a team to be highly functional, there needs to be a comfortable and frequent amount of feedback between SE and ESM. It takes time and trust to get there, but teams that can get comfortable enough to be candid and open about what is working and what to improve will crush the numbers. Our business requires a very healthy amount of ego and confidence, but only those with the most open approach to feedback can reach the highest level of success in my experience. The teams that can look at each other and truly evaluate what is working well will find new ways to succeed.

There are certainly all sorts of sales models, all sorts of individual personalities, all sorts of formulas for success - but I think many of these things are rather universal from what I've seen. It is my firm belief that in any market, with any product, a solid ESM and SE team that works well together will have a much better chance at success. I have never seen a successful territory that only had a great ESM or only had a great SE. You have to have both. And, by the way, I feel the same about the leaders. Great regions have RVP's and SE Managers that have a similar dynamic. All these same ideas apply. They have to collaborate on territory design, team dynamics, hiring, sales motion, and they have to be open with feedback and input.

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Leadership and S’mores

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Scaling Up an SE Team