Salesforce, AWS, and Sand Hill Road created bad sales management. Wait - what? A buddy and I have been noodling on why modern sales management capability is so weak. Why "old school" orgs like Salesforce and PTC and ADP etc. (and their coaching trees) have strong managerial capacity - but otherwise it's much much more hit or miss. One insight is that in the past most sellers would come up through a substantial "sales system" (PTC, Oracle, Salesforce, ADP, Xerox, Ricoh, etc). It was the only place you could get a job out of school. These large sales organizations had the rigor (and size) to invest in substantial rep enablement, and further, manager enablement. You learned how to be a rep, what was expected of you, and how you would be held accountable, and managed. This was important because this isn't taught in school (like engineering is, as an example). Working at one of these pedigreed sales organizations is the closest thing to "sales school." This led to reps that know how to be a rep. And also managers who know how to manage reps (...who know how they should be managed). But things are different now. Thanks to the explosion of mid-market sales organizations without the critical mass to implement meaningful rep enablement, and, more importantly, manager enablement programs - you get a lot of "management by vibes." Where did this come from? The explosion of B2B SaaS organizations powered by the decline in the cost of starting a startup (AWS) crossed with capital availability (VC) crossed with the decline in cost of running a sales org (cloud CRM (and ecosystem) versus on prem CRM). This leads to an explosion of small (10-50 rep) sales organizations. Too small to implement muscular "rep academies" or "manager academies". As a result now see reps who haven't gone through a "this is what it actually means to be a sales rep". Their first five years of their career could be bouncing between Series A, B, C startups with wobbly managerial harnesses. And then they become managers themselves. 😬 You can "rent" sales rigor from Force Management, etc. But it's ephemeral. A few month engagement. And even worse, you now have a bunch of bullshit artists on LinkedIn and Twitter who are more than happy to fill the void with pleasing sounding lies. We used to get reps who came out of Oracle / ADP / Salesforce / Fisher Investments bootcamp. We now get reps and managers marinating in LinkedIn Tiktok. No wonder attainment is a disaster. I'm not sure how you solve it, but there are hundreds of thousands of sellers and managers who came of age in small, mid-market sales organizations who never came through a "system", and it really shows.
Nick Ruggieri
1mo
As someone who had to attend mandatory yearly training coming up through the ranks at Grainger, a lot of what you said resonates here. But part of this feeds into the same tired narrative of “this new generation doesn’t want to work hard” which I don’t buy. I think for those of us who did attend the school of hard knocks are job is to pay it forward. And realize these young sellers are incredibly resourceful, I certainly don’t know if I could have learned how to sell from TikTok. We have be patient and invest in these folks, knowing that results don’t come over night. I don’t have all the answers but I know when you start with giving a shit vs criticizing, you can start to understand people, and work towards building a culture of quality selling.
Amartyo Sen
1mo
A really strong, measured, and accurate take. Like a lot of folks on this post, I get a lot of questions on how to break into tech sales and I’ve found a mini-trend. Most people just want to say they work in tech sales and want a lot of the upside: working hours, benefits, (potential) comp etc. So now, you have a lot of SDRs/jr. AEs that made their way into the industry with very little foundation in the skill set that will either make or break their success. I tell anyone that’s looking to truly make it in tech sales to start with the right organization that can give you the right foundation: building blocks of your sales skillset, management that knows what they’re doing, and an environment that is forgiving yet corrective when it comes to mistakes. I found that at Gong with a lot of leadership and reps coming from LinkedIn, Salesforce, Glassdoor etc (e.g. coaching trees) I think there could be an entire series of posts on how the void is being filled. I’m just really glad someone is talking about this and has put it so eloquently.
Ellen Rataj
1mo
YES this is so well articulated. I haven’t thought about this angle you’re presenting like this, and I think you’re right. I got my start in B2B sales at AT&T in 2008 - they ran a 6 month in-person program in Atlanta. I literally moved to Atlanta and learned everything about sales, as well as how to sell AT&T B2B, and I couldn’t imagine where I would be without that foundational knowledge and experience. What’s the solution? I think Chris Orlob is forging a great path, but it requires a lot of self-motivation from his user base to stay consistent and learn ‘everything’ he is putting out there. B2B sales need a new feeder system.
Justin Lam
1mo
I don't disagree with anything you're saying. I also wonder what your thoughts are on the changes on the customer's side of the table? Some 'older school' enterprise tech vendors had severe information asymmetry in their favor and therefore controlled more of the pace and cadence of communications. To your point, the product-led-growth approach that many tech vendors have undertaken have also eschewed more rigorous sales-led-growth approaches you lament are missing. Perhaps focusing on the ways customers strategically invest and incorporating that into some of the great programs out there - SPIN, Sandler, Miller-Heiman, Challenger, etc., -- one small to mid-market sales org at a time -- might be the way forward. Lastly, one can't get mad at the sellers for their lack of sales rigor. You're aiming too low. It's all a by-product of the position they were not intended to succeed in.
Joe Breider, DBA
1mo
So True. All past sales waves had Sales Schools. Unfortunately today, you don't have the old-school legendary Sales "Teachers". Youngsters today confuse a great startup outcome with sales ability. Lots of today's new sales gurus came from PLG. That is not sales. That is an order taker.
Matt Buren
1mo
I think a lot of this is SaaS startups refusing to invest in sales enablement or leadership training. My first org invested in all of its people and spent money sending us to leadership courses, personal development conferences, etc. You have first time CEOs and CFOs who don’t care about anything outside of dictating a bottom line blaming the sales team they refuse to invest in that they’re at fault for not hitting a number. Not to mention constantly changing your ICP or positioning at the drop of a hat because someone on your board told you to. The only way to break the cycle of jr leaders and sellers failing this way is to invest in making them senior ones AND giving them the time in the seat to grow. Problem is, I just don’t see that happening with the direction this space is going.
Matt Larson
1mo
Interesting take. Do you think the “reps and managers marinating in LinkedIn TikTok” view the situation in any similar way, and just don’t know what to do about it, or would they simply think you’re a get off my lawn guy when they read this?
John Thackston
1mo
At IBM sales school in the 80s, you had to train for 1 YEAR before you could talk to a customer. Now for obvious reasons that isn’t realistic in most orgs today. But it makes you think - what if companies took the profession that seriously?
Daniel Zamudio
1mo
Peter Kazanjy. Thank you for raising this issue. Rampant inconsistent execution is the norm. Ebsta/Pavilion published their first half 2024 state of sales report this morning which showed worsening performance. This is an execution issue. Truth is that this has been an issue for ages but it has gotten worse for all the reasons you cite. I grew up at Xerox and Gartner so learned that sales process execution excellence is the key to driving repeatable and predictable sales success.
Business Builder
1moNot to knock anyone that came through one of those established enterprise sales programs, but I have found that experience may not be as helpful to younger, or more innovative companies. The sales leader that has done a tour of duty at SFDC or Oracle, and knows which frameworks are appropriate to apply in a new company, and which ones aren't, is a rarity. Too often, I have seen sales managers simply implement what they learned at prior companies, only to discover after a fiscal year(s) of missed targets and/or poor attainment that their approach was a mismatch for their company. I'll put my money on the sales leader that has taken a company from $10-100M, through intentional process design and regular GTM motion iteration, regardless of where they worked previously.