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Companies WILL restructure their Salesforce team in the age of AI. Over 55% of the average Salesforce team is Admins & Developers. And AI will most heavily impact these roles. To be very clear, I’m not suggesting AI will replace these jobs. Salesforce Admins & Developers will remain as critical as ever. But AI will undoubtedly make these roles more efficient. In the near future, we will see tools that significantly increase productivity. For example, Salesforce Ventures just invested in Autify. An AI-powered tool enabling users to automate tests without having to code. Automated testing exists but it’s about to get 100x better. There are hundreds of startups already going after that problem. And that’s a job Salesforce Engineers spend A LOT of hours on currently. Innovation in these areas will increase Admin / Developer productivity. And that leads to 3 outcomes: 1. It frees up time to focus on shipping more impactful features. 2. Increased productivity means companies can have smaller teams. 3. Companies hire fewer Admins/Developers but re-allocate that spend. We will certainly see a bit of Scenario 1 and this is the greatest benefit to AI. Many companies will lean into Scenario 2, taking the opportunity to shed costs. But the smartest move is to take advantage of Scenario 3. In this scenario, Salesforce teams would have very few Admins / Developers. Instead, that budget will be re-allocated toward more strategic functions. Business Analysts. Product Owners. Architects. Today, these roles account for less than 30% of the average Salesforce team. It’s the most common gap we see in org structures we analyze. But they determine success or failure with the platform. Defining what gets built, when it gets built, and exactly how to build it. We haven’t started to see the composition of Salesforce teams shift yet. But I expect that to change in the years ahead. __ #AI #Salesforce #Productivity

OpenAI is making serious investments in Rev Ops. It’s no surprise given the Sales team grew 300% YOY. But the 8 Rev Ops Leaders hired in 2024 are 🔥 For context, the Sales team at OpenAI is <200 people today. But growing. Fast. In most scenarios, companies are slow to invest in GTM Strategy. They hire a Rev Ops Leader and maybe some in-the-weeds ICs. OpenAI is taking the opposite approach. They are investing heavily at the top. A Timeline: In Nov 2023, they hire the former a Head of Rev Ops at MURAL. In Jan 2024, they hired: • A Revenue Enablement Leader from Webflow. • Head of Rev Ops & Biz Ops at Mutiny (now leading Rev Ops for API Biz) In Feb 2024, they hired: • Head of GTM Operations from Middesk • GTM Analytics Leader from Slack In March 2024, they hired the Deal Strategy Manager from FullStory. In April 2024, they hired: • A Sr. Manager of Revenue Strategy from Rippling • A GTM Analytics Manager from Snowflake In June 2024, they hired: • A Data Science Leader from Instacart. • Head of Global Enablement from New Relic. Oh, and they just hired Zapier's Chief Revenue Officer. Their approach isn’t unique simply because they are hiring a lot of people. They have resourced virtually every discipline needed within Rev Ops. And done so with a group of incredibly seasoned, specialized Leaders. ✅ GTM Operations ✅ Sales Strategy ✅ GTM Systems ✅ Sales Enablement ✅ Deal Strategy ✅ GTM Analytics ✅ GTM Product Enablement ✅ Partner Enablement This team is already a multi-million dollar line item in the annual budget. And yes, we all know they have deep pockets. It’s not a Rev Ops team your average startup can build for ~200 Reps. But plenty of companies have Rev Ops teams 3x bigger that look like a mess. This is a perfectly constructed, cross-disciplinary group. __ #RevOps #GTM #OpenAI

The “Salesforce vs. Hubspot” debate in CRM may become irrelevant. AI will fundamentally change HOW we interact with these tools. The future of CRM may be a Databricks vs. Snowflake debate … In today’s SaaS world, a ton of value comes from usability and UI. If AI delivers on the hype, user actions are secondary to AI Agent workflows. And if that's true, the market leaders will be platforms designed for AI. Data platforms would be in a unique position to take advantage. Platforms like Salesforce & Hubspot have prioritized the user experience. ❌ Enabling Reps, Sales Leaders, and GTM Strategy teams. Data platforms prioritize the underlying data structure and architecture. ✅ Ingesting data to transform, analyze, and take action on it. And that’s going to be an enormous challenge for the leading CRMs of today. Companies that never appeared to be your competition will take the market. Established players struggle to get ahead of a new paradigm shifts. They can’t just throw a multi-year roadmap out the window in an instant. So, they slowly deploy features that offer diminishing value to customers. Over time, they become a relic of the past. Salesforce just finished a refresh of their UI. It was likely a TON of time, planning, and resources. And while it positioned them better in the war with Hubspot… This may be a bet in the completely wrong direction. There’s a reason technology market leaders don't dominate forever. We may be seeing a wave of displacement like never before. __ #AI #CRM #Salesforce #Hubspot

The “Salesforce vs. Hubspot” debate in CRM may become irrelevant. AI will fundamentally change HOW we interact with these tools. The future of CRM may be a Databricks vs. Snowflake debate … In today’s SaaS world, a ton of value comes from usability and UI. If AI delivers on the hype, user actions are secondary to AI Agent workflows. And if that's true, the market leaders will be platforms designed for AI. Data platforms would be in a unique position to take advantage. Platforms like Salesforce & Hubspot have prioritized the user experience. ❌ Enabling Reps, Sales Leaders, and GTM Strategy teams. Data platforms prioritize the underlying data structure and architecture. ✅ Ingesting data to transform, analyze, and take action on it. And that’s going to be an enormous challenge for the leading CRMs of today. Companies that never appeared to be your competition will take the market. Established players struggle to get ahead of a new paradigm shifts. They can’t just throw a multi-year roadmap out the window in an instant. So, they slowly deploy features that offer diminishing value to customers. Over time, they become a relic of the past. Salesforce just finished a refresh of their UI. It was likely a TON of time, planning, and resources. And while it positioned them better in the war with Hubspot… This may be a bet in the completely wrong direction. There’s a reason technology market leaders don't dominate forever. We may be seeing a wave of displacement like never before. __ #AI #CRM #Salesforce #Hubspot

In the past year, Seismic and Salesloft have DOUBLED the Rev Ops teams. Even an established team at Gong grew ~30%. And this is while many trimmed the Sales team. A LOT 👇 In Q1’23, we published analysis on GTM Systems to Rev Ops team ratios. The orgs featured all had Sales headcount around 450-500 Reps. At the time, it looked something like this: • Seismic: 9 in Rev Ops + 10 on Salesforce • Salesloft: 9 in Rev Ops + 8 on Salesforce • Gong: 27 in Rev Ops + 7 on Salesforce Since then, Sales headcount has gone way down in many cases. • Seismic: -20% • Salesloft: Down slightly despite acquiring Drift • Gong: Flat • Outreach: -20% But as Rep count goes down, the Rev Ops teams are growing: • Gong: +7 ppl • Seismic: +10 ppl • Salesloft: +9 ppl The Rev Ops & GTM Systems Orgs Today: • Gong: 34 in Rev Ops; 7 on GTM Systems • Seismic: 17 in Rev Ops; 10 on GTM Systems • Salesloft†: 18 in Rev Ops; 10 on GTM Systems • Outreach: 29 in Rev Ops; 12 on GTM Systems • Clari†: 12 in Rev Ops; 7 on GTM Systems †Teams in transition following big acquisitions in 2023. There seem to be a few conclusions to draw from the trend. 1. The push toward profitability is fully underway. In 2023, Sales was 35%-40% of total headcount at these companies. Today, it’s closer to 20%-25%. This is largely thanks to economic headwinds and the funding landscape. Frankly, it’s a great forcing function that should drive efficiency. 2. Profitability does, in fact, mean doing more with less. Companies are re-tooling to work smarter when deploying GTM teams. And during the boom times, there was little discipline in GTM execution. EVERYONE was buying. But the music stops, Reps start missing quota, and we need to be smart again. It’s crystal clear that the way to do it is by scaling up Rev Ops. 3. Most companies are still playing catch up when it comes to Ops & Systems. We’re talking about the MARKET LEADERS in Sales Enablement here. Even they don’t have it all figured out. In ‘23, Seismic & Salesloft had slightly inverted Systems:Ops ratios. (You don’t typically see a 1:1 ratio when dealing at this scale.) Much of their Rev Ops hiring is likely to fill in some gaps. In contrast, Outreach had a high-powered Rev Ops team but little on Systems. As their Sales org trimmed by 20%, they are beefing up in GTM Systems. Meanwhile, everyone is talking about Salesforce’s earnings miss last week. And yes, their revenue growth is slowing. But that is the wrong takeaway. It’s not really about Salesforce. Earnings from the SaaS Market Leader are the canary in the coal mine. Demand is softening. GTM Tech Stacks are consolidating. New purchases are heavily scrutinized. The days of a brute force Sales approach to capture market share are over. What do you make of the Sales ⬇️, Rev Ops ⬆️ trend? __ #RevOps #GTM #SaaS

OpenAI is about to find out how hard Enterprise SaaS can be. They announced PwC will be the first Partner to sell & implement the product. Building an ecosystem of "OpenAI Consultants" will cost a TON. Gaining Enterprise adoption in SaaS requires specialized Consultants. It’s an enormous investment for companies to adopt a new Enterprise platform. 👉 Not just the cost of licenses. 👉 The cost to implement it properly. 👉 The time spent managing setup, integration, security etc. 👉 And the ongoing investment to constantly optimize, leverage new features. NO Enterprise SaaS vendor relies exclusively on external Partners to implement. Every platform has to deliver Professional Services to new customers. And they all lose money in the process. • Salesforce loses $35m-$50m PER QUARTER on Pro Serv • Hubspot, Zuora, and Workday lose $5m-$10m per Quarter • ServiceNow lost $32m in their last fiscal year Typically, these Professional Services teams are viewed as a ‘loss leader’. Subsidize the cost of implementing the platform. Capture new license revenue. Assuming you retain these customers, it’s a profitable tradeoff. But OpenAI has a long road ahead to gain widespread Enterprise adoption. A partnership with PwC helps but 1 Consulting Firm barely moves the needle. ❗ Salesforce has 2,000+ Partners globally. They still deliver $2B+ worth of services annually. And there is a far greater shortage of AI talent than Salesforce talent. So, all roads will inevitably lead to OpenAI delivering Professional Services. An offering they will likely need to do at a steep loss. The real problem is that they already lose a TON of money. Sure, revenue has grown at an insane rate ($2B+ runrate for 2024). But they also lost nearly $600m in 2022. AI Talent is expensive. R&D is expensive. Sales is expensive. Professional Services is … expensive. OpenAI’s partnership with PwC is an exciting step forward. But it’s the 1st pitch in the 1st inning. This will be a long, expensive game to play. And it's even harder for a company already burning cash. __ #AI #OpenAI #PWC

This is the best line I’ve seen in a Biz Tech Leadership job description: “The urgent cannot starve the important.” Sums up the mindset and approach at Cloudflare 👇 The Salesforce team at Cloudflare is in TRANSFORMATION mode. This line comes from their JD for a new Director of Quote-to-Cash Applications. “The urgent cannot starve the important.” Your approach needs to be about building for the future. And you need to invest the team that will get you there. Over the past 12 months, Cloudflare added 12 people to the Salesforce team. Bringing the current Salesforce team to 35 people. In the last 3 months, they hired a new CIO and VP of Enterprise Apps. Meanwhile, their customer base grew 17% YOY. And customers with ACV over $100K increased 33% YOY. It takes real discipline to focus on building scalable infrastructure. Instead of cutting corners with good enough solutions to fix the “urgent”. Cloudflare has a diverse, layered Salesforce group in-house: Sitting within the new Chief Information Officer’s org: • VP of Enterprise Applications • Director, GTM Systems • Sr. Manager, CPQ Applications • (11) Salesforce Business Analysts • (7) Salesforce Administrators • (8) Salesforce Engineers • (5) Salesforce Product Owners It’s a well structured, cross-disciplinary team by any standard. This is an essential starting point but only works when properly allocated. The philosophy that the urgent won’t starve the important is what it takes. This team exists to drive internal product innovation. And that takes time across every phase of planning and execution. This mindset sets the tone. Both within the team and to stakeholders across the organization. __ #Salesforce #SaaS #GTM

Biz Tech teams need a Product Owner over every application. It’s the only way for them to be a real driver of Product innovation. And it’s exactly how Asana does it 👇 This is the biggest difference in core Product vs. Internal Tools teams: • 100% of Product teams are cross-disciplinary. • They account for every phase of planning, design, and build. • Every single feature has Product Managers, Engineers, and Designers. The Product Manager (i.e. Owner) provides you with FOCUS. A single point of failure for the squad they represent. And these roles are in addition to Leadership and various others on the team. But this is not the case on Internal Tools / Biz Tech teams. You often see a group spread thin, skewing heavily towards DOERS. A team managing 10+ standalone applications typically only has: • A couple Leaders to set the product roadmap • An Architect to work on complex systems design (if you're lucky) • A couple Business Analysts and Product Owners with a broad mandate • And a team mostly comprised of Admins & Developers This causes an inevitable lack of focus and accountability. Instead, every single application should have a Product Owner. They drive strategy, set priorities, manage stakeholders, and more. Asana gets it: (5) GTM Systems Product Owners | Sales (3) CPQ & Quote to Cash Product Owners | Sales, Finance (1) Financial Systems Product Owner | Finance (2) Zuora Product Owners | Finance (1) Anaplan Product Owner | Finance (1) CDP Product Owner | Organization Wide (1) Marketo Product Owner | Marketing (1) Governance Product Owner |  Organization Wide I don't know many Biz Tech Leaders that wouldn't do it this way. But few have the option. They can't get budget like Asana to properly invest in the team. It's because many Execs are still confused about the role of Biz Tech. The fact that it can (and should be) a driver of real innovation. And what it takes to get there. __ #Salesforce #BizTech #GTM

800 Salesforce users and only 3 Salesforce Admins should be chaos. At BlackLine, it’s not. This is why 👇 A lean Salesforce team can produce a variety of outcomes. 1. A complete lack of prioritization and purely reactive build 2. The most efficient way to scale Systems infrastructure It all comes down to HOW you build that team. The Sales & Support orgs at BlackLine combine for ~525 users. But research suggests the total Salesforce user base is closer to 850. And this includes responsibility for peripheral tools. Not just the low-maintenance kind either (Outreach, Clari). Platforms needing real attention on top of Salesforce (Gainsight, Zuora CPQ). As we’ve said so many times before, it comes down to team composition. The Salesforce Team at BlackLine: • 2 Biz Tech Leaders to set the broad product vision • 1 Salesforce Architect to engage on complex design problems • 3 Salesforce Administrators delivering support and build capacity • 3 Salesforce Engineers dedicated to building and deploying • 3 Salesforce BSAs + Product Owner as liaisons to stakeholders • 1 Manager of Program Delivery to keep the trains on the track • †Hiring for a Director, Business Systems Analysis Less than 40% of this team is focused on actually shipping features. The majority focus on strategy, planning, prioritization, and relationship building. We see too many teams with this structure inverted. Too much building. Not enough planning. __ #Salesforce #SaaS #Teams

I’m starting to see a trend on internal Salesforce teams. More orgs are moving towards a centralized ownership model, which is great! But many of them are UNWILLING to do it the right way 👇 This is what we see playing out across the landscape. 1. Companies reach the stage when Rev Ops can’t own GTM Systems 2. They make the smart decision to centralize all Biz Tech teams 3. Rev Ops worries about their needs being met in this structure Result: A portion of the Salesforce team remains within Rev Ops And this end result is even more disjointed than when you started. Now, some top-down decisions are made from the Technology team. While other bottom-up decisions are made from Rev Ops and the Admins, Business Analysts, or Product Owners that remain there. The point of centralization is to create a unified governing body. This ‘partial’ centralization model is a disaster. And I say companies are “unwilling” to get it right because it’s a choice. It’s conceding to one team, rather than prioritizing organizational needs overall. We see this playing out all over the place. An example you can see based purely on open jobs is at Dialpad. • 300+ Sales Reps • 100+ Support Reps • 8-person Salesforce team 👉 Sr. Director, Enterprise Apps & Integrations 👉 4 Salesforce Administrators 👉 3 Salesforce Engineers 👉 And 2 Open Biz Tech Positions: 1. Sr. Director, Enterprise Applications Reporting into the CIO Ownership of Salesforce, Finance Systems, HRIS, and more. 2. Salesforce Administrator Reporting into the Director, Sales Ops & Strategy I understand the desire for Rev Ops to retain some control. Yes, there are benefits to them having Salesforce SMEs on the team. But ultimately, Salesforce needs to live on a single team. Otherwise, the CIO org lays plans for the long-term roadmap. Meanwhile, initiatives are occurring without their full knowledge. • An Admin working directly with Finance on changes to CPQ • Random deployments trickling into the org along the way And this slowly turns into complete fragmentation. The Salesforce team needs to be centralized. And there’s a right way to do it. __ #Salesforce #BizTech #GTM