OwnBackup. Area Vice President, Enterprise Sales. I lead a team of Sales leaders and their Account Executives across the Enterprise segment.

How big is it?

‍Right now we have  1 RVP, and 10 reps.  Growing to 4 RVPs and 23 reps this year. ‍

Where are your teammates located?‍

Atlanta, Indianapolis, Wisconsin, Charleston, Austin, Philadelphia, Boca Raton, Charlotte‍

What does your team do? What are you responsible for?‍

Our team is responsible for interfacing with Enterprise companies to understand how various cloud based applications fuel their business.  Our AE’s then need to understand what type of data resides in these applications and work with the business to uncover the potential impact of any data loss or data security event. This allows them to position solutions that safeguard customer data, amongst other things.

AEs are responsible for the end-to-end sales process:

Discovery / Demo / POC / InfoSec / Legal & Procurement / Closing Business

This is both hunting net new logos and upsell/crossells.

All of this is a team effort and AE’s orchestrate resources like partners, solutions engineers, SMEs etc. to strategize on the best play to formalize a partnership with prospects.

My role includes:

• Set and execute customer acquisition strategies to generate quarterly revenue and bookings for the region
• Maintain key customer relationships to expand the company’s footprint
• Provide detailed and accurate sales forecasting
• Manage company sales process, set appropriate metrics for sales funnel management
• Plan and manage at both the strategic and operational levels
• Position the region to growth by increasing the revenue and yield of each RVP and Account Executive
• Operate effectively in a high-growth fast paced environment

You have to get everyone together in person as often as possible so everyone can bond.

This trickles over into our day-to-day when we can’t be together.

While it probably seems pretty basic, I think the key is creating a culture built on collaboration.  We are a team.  While we have to meet regularly to cover the dry stuff like forecasting, we make a big effort to meet frequently as a team and participate in activities that continue to foster collaboration by doing things like: role plays, deal reviews, strategy sessions.

Another thing that I think is a big part of keeping us close is that we have a group text messaging chain. It helps us be a little more personal with one another.  We talk about anything from celebrating deals we win (and adding all the memes to go with it), to sharing photos of fun things we are doing, or sharing our favorite Corporate Bro videos, and recreating them.  Yes, some of the AEs recreate the videos from Corporate Bro - especially his EOQ video.

While we are all colleagues, we have also built friendships.  Many leaders out there probably think that blurs the lines, but I think the mutual respect we have for one another is an integral part to our success.  Because of the relationships we have built, my guys are always willing to step up to the plate for me, and they do what is required of them.

We have open communication. If something is going great, I am going to know about it. If there are challenges, the team knows my (virtual) door is always open. We talk about it and my job is to remove any blockers for them, if it is a possibility.

Not having enough time. You get spread thin. We are all in zoom hell right now and schedules get crazy very quick. I think the team is empathetic to that, but I do want to be in front of them as much as possible.

In-person QBRs with team dinners and happy hours

Rented a boat and cruised the lake

Deep Sea Fishing

VIP dinners with customers

Porsche Driving Experience in Atlanta

We don’t.  We do lots of role plays, which allows us to keep the collaborative culture alive - even when we are apart.

The company as a whole does a lot of remote games.  We did a trivia game last week to raise money for a charity that was important to one of our peers.

During trainings we use an app called Kahoot and we all race against each other to answer questions as fast as we can to win prizes.  It’s really fun. I highly recommend it.

Yes. We do “One Thing.” I prompt them with a question at the beginning of each of our team meetings. Keeps everyone on their toes and engaged.

We don’t but would love to learn more about what’s out there that we could leverage.

I just love learning from my peers. I spend a lot of time on LinkedIn following content of other leaders that I respect. I was a member of Pavillion and got a lot of useful ideas from the connections I made there. And, I read.