0:00

If you can't forecast accurately, either you

0:02

don't truly understand your business, you

0:04

aren't truly doing the amount of diligence with

0:07

customers and opportunities. You don't have enough opportunities

0:09

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0:11

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0:13

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0:15

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0:17

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0:20

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0:22

Sales is a show where we sit down

0:24

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0:26

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0:28

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0:31

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0:34

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0:37

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0:39

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0:41

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0:43

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4:05

Larry, listen, I've heard so many good things

4:07

from the main man, Mr. Frank Philman. So

4:09

thank you so much for joining me today

4:12

first. Larry, it's great to see you. Thank

4:14

you. This should be a ton

4:16

of fun. So thanks for having me on.

4:18

Not at all. But listen, I want to

4:20

start with some context. Sales is often something

4:22

that sales leaders love. I want to dive

4:24

into when did you first discover your love

4:26

of sales? Was there a critical inflection point?

4:28

Yeah, well, so a little bit of background.

4:30

When I graduated from high school, I

4:32

went into college. I want to be

4:34

an electrical engineer. More specifically, actually most

4:37

specifically, I wanted to build robots. I

4:39

went in, took my first electrical engineering

4:41

courses, obviously heavy math, some things that

4:43

I had not really been prepared for

4:45

and realized that that was probably not

4:47

the best spot for me. I quickly

4:49

exited and got into marketing. I did

4:51

a lot of even back then a

4:53

little bit of kind of just soul

4:55

searching. That's a pretty dramatic miss of

4:58

what I wanted. And I

5:00

realized I actually didn't want to like build the

5:02

robots. I wanted to sell the robots. My love

5:04

of sales really just came from my first job

5:06

out of school. I graduated with

5:09

a marketing and finance degree and

5:11

two companies came onto my campus.

5:13

One was Eli Lilly pharmaceutical company and

5:16

the other was EJ Gallo, the wine

5:18

company. So these are tough choices as

5:20

a college graduate. I went Eli Lilly.

5:22

I was at Eli Lilly for two

5:25

years. That's where I kind of got

5:27

hooked. I mean, there's an, I love that in terms of

5:29

an origin story. Sadly, the robot career didn't happen.

5:31

I'm sorry for that, but I think it's turned

5:33

out pretty well. There's so many

5:35

great companies though that you've bluntly been an

5:37

instrumental part of. I wanted to start on

5:40

actually the decade at Salesforce. I mean, when

5:42

I looked at the numbers leading a 1300

5:44

person team to 2.1 billion in revenue. I

5:49

mean, these are insane numbers, Larry. What

5:51

are one or two of your biggest

5:54

takeaways from a decade at Salesforce in

5:56

that trajectory? For me, it was a

5:58

couple of things. And number one. from

6:00

a learning perspective is prioritization. What are

6:02

the biggest things that sales leaders do

6:04

wrong today when it comes to prioritization?

6:07

I would try and do too much. We really try

6:09

and do it all. I would look at that from

6:11

one, from the personal leader perspective, the impact that has

6:13

on the leader and then the impact that has on

6:16

your team. So I'll kind of unpack that. On

6:18

the leader side, if you're personally trying to

6:20

do too much, this is where you really

6:22

get into what I know are

6:24

mindset challenges. These end up in health challenges.

6:26

You really get spread way too thin when

6:28

you're trying to do too much. And we

6:30

can kind of talk about my perspective on

6:32

how you solve that piece of the puzzle.

6:34

But I think that's number one. Number two,

6:37

the impact that actually has on your team

6:39

is pretty detrimental. It all ends up flowing

6:41

down. It's a very diminishing trait when you

6:43

try and do too much because you flow

6:45

it down and you keep adding things on.

6:47

You never take anything off. Like the list

6:49

just kind of keeps growing. And when the list

6:51

grows, your teams aren't able to do it either.

6:54

In the bag, it's fuller and fuller and fuller

6:56

and fuller. And for me, it's a little bit

6:58

like a balloon. Eventually when there's

7:00

so much air in there, it breaks. How do we solve

7:02

that? If I'm a sales leader today and you're advising me,

7:04

which is kind of the role play that I'd love to

7:06

have today. Yeah. Do you have

7:08

a framework for like only focus on the

7:10

top accounts, everything else doesn't matter. Only focus

7:12

on spending time with your top reps. They're

7:14

the ones who are gonna close the business.

7:16

My framework is I think about it from

7:19

a leadership perspective. There's nothing more important than

7:21

people. There's just not. Some people call it

7:23

talent. Whatever you wanna frame it in, your

7:25

human capital is the most important thing. And

7:27

then in the job that I've chosen and

7:30

that my teams have chosen, which is deliver

7:32

the number, there's no plan B. There's no

7:34

like other team that if we don't get

7:36

it done, somebody else is going to it.

7:38

So it doesn't exist. So for me, it's

7:41

people, it's executing on the number. This is

7:43

ruthless prioritization because I could argue this third

7:45

one should be first. It's customer success. And

7:47

I think if you're nailing those three things,

7:49

you're probably doing a pretty good job. You

7:51

know, we've had frameworks before this question. And

7:54

then we hear about kind of the blurring

7:56

lines. And one thing that always strikes

7:58

me really to stay in sales is like, To

8:00

what extent is it an art versus a

8:02

science? And I spoke to your

8:04

coach before the show who said that

8:06

you're one of very few people who can blend

8:09

the two. If I push you, is

8:11

it more an art or a science, Larry? And how

8:14

do you think about that? I have

8:16

historically thought that it was probably 70%

8:18

art and 30% science. And

8:22

then I challenged myself on that because then I

8:24

think, okay, well, if it's art, then, like, can

8:26

you learn art? Is art

8:28

more talent and is science more

8:30

skills? How do you balance those?

8:32

How do you recruit for those?

8:34

How do you organizationally model for

8:36

those? I today am probably

8:38

in the

8:41

60, 40, if you press me, I still think it's a

8:44

lot of art. I still think it's

8:46

a lot of talent. And when I

8:48

say talent, I'm talking things that you

8:50

and I, like, that it's hard wiring.

8:52

That hard wiring was when we would

8:54

turn 13, man, it's in us. You

8:56

can pivot, you can adjust, you can

8:58

learn new things, but all the skills-based

9:00

things that happen after that, I would

9:02

put into the science bucket, right or

9:04

wrong. What do you think is the

9:06

art of sales? Is that the EQ

9:08

of reading customers? Because respectfully, to me,

9:10

looking in from the outside, it's just

9:12

more and more science-based. And I put

9:14

structure, frameworks, analytics, gone

9:17

recordings, outbound sales tools.

9:20

To me, the only art left

9:22

in sales is actually the EQ

9:24

of reading people, relationships, the older

9:27

school, intangibles. What is the art

9:29

left in sales? So, yeah,

9:31

so I do share that opinion. I

9:33

would expand if I can. This is

9:35

more than like reading customers. You cannot

9:37

train EQ. Really, really

9:40

good high-end EQ. I firmly believe that

9:42

that's in you. And I think that

9:44

is the art. And I would

9:46

tell you, as it relates to things

9:48

like empathy, which is what we're all

9:50

looking for from customer interaction with our

9:52

coworkers and bosses, I think it's really

9:55

hard to train empathy. Trust me, I've

9:57

tried, right? And when it's not something

9:59

that is... core to people, you're asking

10:01

them to work out of their, what I

10:03

think is their DNA cycling. And it's really,

10:05

it's uncomfortable for them. It's not a great

10:07

spot for them to be working. And so

10:09

I do think it's a lot of art.

10:11

I think there is a beauty, a real

10:14

beauty in people that do it well. And

10:16

I think it separates the incredible from the

10:18

great. I totally get that. And I agree

10:20

you cannot train empathy, which is a pain

10:22

in the frickin' ass because I would love

10:24

to. And the other one that I always

10:26

find striking is like playbooks. Everyone says about

10:28

sales playbooks. How do you define a sales

10:31

playbook? First off, let's just start there.

10:33

I always start playbooks with outcome first

10:35

and work backwards. You can get super

10:37

playbook happy, super playbook heavy. Everybody's got

10:39

a playbook, playbooks end up conflicting with

10:41

each other. I always try and work

10:43

playbooks backwards. What is the outcome that

10:45

we're looking for? And depending upon the

10:47

playbook, I typically work it backwards into

10:50

if that needs to be true. By

10:52

when does that need to be true?

10:54

What are the critical things that need

10:56

to happen for that to be true?

10:58

And who are the people that

11:00

we're going to ask to go do that?

11:02

I like to keep it simple outcomes first,

11:04

work backwards, and then measurement and cadence. How

11:06

will we know if we're on target? How

11:08

we know if we're on track? If we're

11:11

not, what pivots do we think we're going

11:13

to make kind of play the chessboard out

11:15

a little bit? But man, I'm just a

11:17

fan of keeping it simple. Going back to

11:19

the analogy of me being the new sales

11:21

leader or CEO who needs your help, you

11:23

scale sales teams like no one else has

11:25

done. You mentioned that being an AE and

11:27

I see yourself help me understand how do

11:30

you structure a hiring process for a new

11:32

sales team addition for an AE today for

11:34

an SDR today? How should I do it?

11:36

So first, I think you gotta understand the

11:38

role, right? What are you hiring for? What

11:40

are the specifics of that role that matter

11:42

the most? A lot of people put this

11:45

in the job description, but I also think

11:47

a lot of companies aren't super clear about

11:49

what they're looking for. And I'll take you

11:51

through how I think about the process. But

11:53

I have a high confidence score that when

11:55

you aren't clear about what you want, that's

11:58

when you may end up missing. and

12:00

hiring the wrong person has very little to

12:02

do with whether that person was talented or

12:04

not. It has to do with have you

12:06

done a good job with the matching process.

12:09

I always like to start with what

12:11

is the role required and then I

12:13

kind of work to, okay, well, like,

12:16

where are we going to go source

12:18

those candidates? There's an incredibly, incredible availability

12:20

of diverse, wildly talented people for any

12:22

number of roles at any level today.

12:25

It's really pretty beautiful as

12:27

a hiring manager, the amount of access that

12:29

we have now. You need a good recruiting

12:31

team. That recruiting team has to be armed

12:33

with the value proposition of the company. So

12:35

if I was going to interview, if I

12:37

was you and you're working

12:40

for me at Genesis and you're hiring an

12:42

AE, I would want to make sure that

12:44

you're armed with your Genesis pitch. What is

12:46

your pitch about Genesis? Like, what's compelling about

12:49

Genesis, Harry? Like, why would I come and

12:51

work there if I was the candidate? You

12:53

got to be armed with the value proposition.

12:55

I like to keep interview teams small. This

12:58

is a whole separate thing that I'm sure

13:00

will rile some people up that may watch

13:02

this, but I'm not a fan of panel

13:04

interviews. I like doing interviews one-on-one. I strongly

13:07

advocate that for my leaders because the relationship

13:09

between the people that you work with

13:11

for and around really matters. And I

13:13

think that's difficult to get out of

13:15

a panel. I like to keep it

13:17

five folks at the most interviewing people

13:19

and then I think you got to

13:21

move quickly. The beauty of having this

13:24

wide availability of diverse talent at all

13:26

levels today is just that. The curse

13:28

is dragging people through long processes. Oh,

13:30

I want you to do one more

13:32

interview. Like, speed is kind of the

13:34

game and I think when you can

13:36

match speed with a defined process, you

13:38

can get incredibly valuable people. My

13:41

question there was actually, you know, if

13:43

you have an amazing candidate on the

13:45

second interview, which often happens, and

13:48

you're like, oh, I quite want to hire them. Do I

13:50

need to do 10? What can

13:52

I just hire the second? How long

13:54

have we worked together, you and I?

13:56

In this process, not long, three months.

13:58

Okay, no, you're going to... to need more

14:00

people to interview that person. How many

14:02

do I need? Listen, I think if you've got

14:05

a really hot candidate, and we hear this a

14:07

lot, we've got offers like I'm a candidate, I've

14:09

got three offers, you know, I'm kind of coming

14:11

to you guys, you're early in your process, I'm

14:14

late in three others, kind of need to make

14:16

a decision that amount of pressure, we get that

14:18

a lot. But would you move on

14:20

that? I don't like like hot candidates, to me

14:22

it's like hot deals. Bad decisions

14:24

are made when you compress timelines and

14:27

don't know people in my mind. I

14:29

think this is where a lot of

14:31

hiring mistakes are made, because you

14:33

do not do enough diligence. The challenge

14:35

is compounded globally, because in some markets,

14:38

you hire the wrong people, that could

14:40

be a year to an 18 month

14:43

process to get a new person back in

14:45

seed. And it's going to cost you a

14:47

lot of money. If you're going to spend

14:49

more time, my opinion, there's no more important

14:51

thing than getting the right talent on board.

14:54

It is a beautiful thing when you do,

14:56

and it is really, really problematic when you

14:58

don't. So I'd rather invest the

15:00

time, get a little couple interviews. I don't like

15:02

the hostage negotiation strategy of, hey, I got

15:04

a bunch of offers, you know, you need

15:07

to get me one in the next week,

15:09

especially if it's that language. That person doesn't

15:11

match our value statement anyway. Certainly not anyone

15:13

I want working for me or for you,

15:15

even though we just met. Completely

15:17

agree with you. Before we get to

15:20

that offer stage, you're interviewing me for a

15:22

role in your team. What are

15:24

the questions that you continuously go back to if

15:26

you're adding me to your sales team? And

15:29

there are certain few which you always like to

15:31

know and hear answers to. I always

15:33

get into track record, and I do it a

15:35

couple different ways. I want it a little by

15:38

the numbers. Tell me the story. Like, if I

15:40

was going to tell you the sales for a

15:42

story, which you told very quickly and probably better

15:44

than I do, I would lead with results, because

15:46

we're in a results driven business. And

15:48

that's not just sales, it's customer success, everything. So

15:50

I want to hear the track record. Where I

15:53

then go, I typically get into

15:55

cultures. You know, so if you

15:57

know that I've worked at PTC,

15:59

Hyperion, Oracle. Salesforce, Confluent, now Genesis.

16:01

And if I was you and

16:04

I was interviewing, I'd be like, what culture

16:06

did you really prefer and why? I've had,

16:08

you'd be shocked, the range of answers that

16:10

I've gotten to the culture question. What

16:13

range of answers have you had, Larry? It was

16:15

really fun. We had Fridays

16:17

off for three months. There was

16:19

always food in the office. I've

16:21

heard very culture-related answers that had

16:23

to do with amenities of the

16:25

company. I've heard culture-related answers that

16:27

if I took that to the

16:29

other end of the spectrum, you know

16:31

what, that was one of the hardest places

16:33

that I've had to work. It was the

16:36

most disciplined structures that I had to work.

16:38

I didn't like quite a few of the

16:40

conversations, but I grew and it was amazing.

16:42

You'll hear stories about bosses. You'll hear stories

16:44

about philanthropy. But I really, for me, the

16:47

reason I'm asking the question, because values matter

16:49

to me. They matter every

16:51

place that I've worked. And I think value

16:53

alignment is an important thing. I'm kind of

16:55

getting a little bit of value statement out

16:57

of the culture piece. And then the last

16:59

thing that I typically get to is

17:02

what drives people. Why are you still working? Is

17:04

that bad if it's money? If I say, listen,

17:06

dude, I'm here to make money. I'm a comp

17:08

machine and I wanna make revenue for the company

17:11

and comp for me. Yeah, why? It

17:13

really matters to be able to give my family a great life. I

17:16

wanna get a bigger house. You know, obviously wanna send my

17:18

kids to great schools and wanna

17:20

have a great life with my wife. What

17:22

I just got from you is it's actually

17:24

not about money. It's money so that you

17:27

can deliver outcomes for your wife and your

17:29

family and getting a bigger house that probably

17:31

is for your family. I will always double click

17:33

on things to the point where people get super

17:35

annoyed. This may be a terrible habit, but I

17:37

ask why a lot. Because

17:41

I think the nuance is in the why for

17:43

people. I totally agree with you. The Toyota is

17:45

just five whys. One aspect that a

17:47

lot of people do is case studies. They love

17:49

a case study. Do you do case studies with

17:51

me? Are we gonna have to do that as

17:53

part of the process? I don't. I have folks

17:55

on my team that do and like that. This

17:57

is where I go to being open. into

18:00

different parts of processes. There is a

18:02

lot of value sometimes out of the

18:04

case study, but for me the case

18:06

study gets to what is your mindset

18:08

and your thought process. It gets

18:10

to the what and the how. I feel like I

18:12

can get that out of talking to you for 45

18:14

minutes. You know what I always do, I say, huh,

18:17

we're hiring the team around you too, Larry, and we

18:19

need more great people. Who are

18:21

the two or three people that you'd bring with

18:23

you on day one? Yes, it's a huge sign.

18:25

And I would say that imperative

18:28

grows the higher you

18:30

go in your role and responsibility. So

18:32

like, take Frank, right? Frank went from

18:34

running a team to running a country.

18:36

That imperative and your network, your brand

18:38

is critical. You have to have it.

18:40

And again, there's so many talented people.

18:42

If you're competing on that basis, and

18:44

by the way, it doesn't matter if

18:46

the people that you're gonna bring with

18:49

you are terrible, the double click on,

18:51

yeah, I can bring a team of

18:53

people. It's like, well, tell me about

18:55

those people. Who are they? What have

18:57

they done? Like, you gotta go unpack

18:59

that. It doesn't help if

19:01

you hire an average person that then brings people

19:03

that aren't the best people for your company and

19:05

your customers. Doesn't help at all. I totally agree.

19:07

It's probably the worst thing. Well, this has gone

19:09

incredibly well, and you wanna hire me in this

19:11

process. What are some of

19:14

your biggest lessons in terms of getting

19:16

the offer done right, the comp setting,

19:18

and how to get the right deal

19:20

structure for the new sales edition? I

19:22

think you gotta do that early. I'll

19:24

give you an example. We're in a

19:26

hiring process right now for a super

19:28

senior leader in our company. We

19:30

have a certain comp structure that we think

19:32

is aggressive. Some people are addicted to a

19:34

different comp structure, and the intersection of how

19:36

valuable those people would be for us and

19:39

what we would need to pay them doesn't

19:41

make sense for us. Like, that equation doesn't

19:43

pencil for us. It's really, really

19:45

challenging when you discover that after

19:47

two months of interviewing. That's a

19:49

prop. I like to know that

19:51

we can afford someone and get

19:53

to a comp structure before

19:56

it's time to have a comp discussion. I

19:58

think you need to do that. sooner

20:00

rather than later. I don't know, it's not

20:02

the first conversation. It's not the last conversation.

20:04

And this is the unpacking of the interview

20:06

process for me. You got to understand what

20:08

matters. And by the way, what matters most

20:10

around comp? Does your on-target earnings matter more?

20:12

Like are you a commission person? Does equity

20:15

matter more? How do you think about the

20:17

two? What do most people care about from

20:19

your experience? At a leadership role,

20:21

equity. At a normal role, like I

20:23

see it role. I see role like,

20:25

give me my on-target earnings. Like give

20:28

me the ability to crush my accelerators.

20:30

Have sales team expectations changed over the

20:32

years? I just saw a tweet from

20:34

Jason Lamkin today that said in one

20:36

of his portfolio companies, the top performing

20:38

sales rep just quit because she didn't

20:40

like her VP sales. Next line, she

20:43

made $800,000 last year. Have

20:46

people got more demanding in what they want?

20:49

Yes, I will say the

20:51

most important for me, the reason she left

20:53

is not comp. It's because she didn't like

20:55

her VP. Yeah, she made $800,000 dude. At

20:59

what price though? So this is where I

21:02

think it has changed. And I will say

21:04

this from some of the early companies that

21:06

I worked for, Supercoin operated. Give me my

21:08

on-target earnings, kill or be killed mentality. Let's

21:11

see how long you can make it. And if

21:13

you don't make it, then in six months you're

21:15

gone. And it doesn't matter if you like your

21:17

boss or not. That has changed the impetus on

21:19

leadership these days and the impetus on what

21:22

I think is like true servant leadership.

21:24

I think that is driving more loyalty. I

21:27

think those are for most people. I think

21:29

that is a bigger driver than compensation. If

21:31

that gets too out of whack, you're gonna

21:33

have a problem. You will get sideways if,

21:35

hey, I love my boss. I love the

21:37

company. I love our journey. I love our

21:39

customers. And by the way, you're paying me

21:41

30% of what I

21:43

could be making somewhere else. Clearly you're gonna

21:46

have a problem. If we're into small gaps,

21:48

I believe leaders make a difference. Okay, so

21:51

I'm, thank you. I would like to accept

21:53

your offer, Larry. I'm excited to join. No

21:56

one does onboarding well. Like universally

21:58

sucks. What've been your biggest... lessons

22:00

in scaling sales teams on how

22:02

to do onboarding well. It's gotten

22:05

harder too, right? I mean, insert

22:07

COVID in the pandemic when everybody

22:09

shut down what we all considered

22:11

normal onboarding, it's gotten harder

22:14

and I will argue we will never rotate

22:16

all the way back to the way it

22:18

was. And I'm talking a little bit about

22:20

like in-person versus digital or remote. My

22:22

first training, as I mentioned to

22:24

you, Lillie, I was exported, I'm an

22:27

Arizona guy. I was exported to Indianapolis

22:29

in the winter for six weeks. And

22:31

that was the way you trained and

22:34

you did role-based training and there

22:36

was curriculums and structure and everything else.

22:38

I think that has shifted certainly from

22:40

the remote aspect and the in-person aspect

22:43

that has completely shifted today. Along

22:45

that journey, you're getting bite-sized pieces of

22:47

the prioritized, what do you need to

22:49

know in order to be successful starts

22:52

with basic things. And then

22:54

you're on your enablement journey that

22:56

lasts a year. Do we spend

22:59

any time in support? People a lot of

23:01

times they support an amazing place to start.

23:03

When do we get in front of customers

23:05

first? Do we listen to prior sales calls?

23:07

Do we tag along with sales leaders? How

23:09

do we think about ramping in that first

23:11

30 to 60 days? The

23:13

support one's interesting. I haven't heard that. That's

23:15

an interesting thought. I think

23:18

you can get real perspective there.

23:20

I'm going to consider that stolen.

23:22

Honestly, it is the most effective

23:24

thing that I urge all founders for sales

23:26

teams to do. You hear the pains of

23:28

customers. You speak about training and empathy. It's

23:30

probably the closest way to train empathy just

23:33

to listen to the customer's portals. Yeah, that's

23:35

a great tip. We like to pair up

23:37

in teams. We do like the buddy system.

23:40

We like the mentorship system. Your

23:42

question on customers like day one, how many chances do

23:44

you get to be new? You don't give many. Do

23:46

you know why that you put them in front of

23:48

a big customer and they're like, I

23:51

don't really know the sales cycle here.

23:53

I don't know in the next step

23:55

on the contract. I'm not really sure

23:57

how we close deals. You can't just.

24:00

putting in front of big customers on day one.

24:02

How beautiful is that? Not beautiful at all. If

24:04

I'm paying $500,000 to a company

24:06

and you put a rep in front of me, who

24:08

doesn't know the process? I wouldn't send you a loan

24:10

as a new AE. I would

24:12

send you with either your boss or

24:14

someone else. And the problem is the

24:17

gift. Something has happened with a, you're

24:19

talking about a good sized customer. If

24:21

it's a 500 grand is the metric.

24:23

You clearly should know a lot when

24:25

you walk into that customer. So you

24:27

aren't blind to what's going on. Like

24:30

I've been at Genesis for a year. I

24:32

still sometimes will be with customers. I got,

24:34

I'm still learning. Like I'm still new. Like

24:36

help me understand. I think it is a

24:38

beautiful learning experience. Now what's valuable for the

24:40

customer in that you got to bring something

24:42

to the table. You got to, you got

24:44

to do your homework and your background. You

24:46

got to know your meeting. I'm not parking

24:48

any of the discipline part of that meeting

24:50

and the preparation part of that meeting. But

24:52

if I could be new forever, I would

24:54

do it. How quickly did you know

24:56

if a new rep or a new sales are

24:58

as bad? I, you know, for me, that's based

25:01

on the number of interactions you have with them.

25:03

There are some warning signs early. Well, let's use

25:05

your example. We're going in to meet an important

25:07

customer. I've given you all of

25:10

the background data on the account. I've

25:12

given you what they use of our

25:14

products. I've given you their use cases.

25:16

And if we're in prep for this

25:18

meeting and you haven't been through that,

25:20

or you don't have a command of

25:22

that information red flag right off the

25:24

bat, if you're in that meeting

25:27

and you aren't accurately

25:29

representing the story of

25:32

Genesis, and if you don't know about

25:34

our company, it's got a red flag.

25:36

And then by the way, the, just

25:38

the customer interaction pieces, you can kind

25:40

of draw conclusions on how people interact

25:43

in those situations. So how soon do

25:45

I know that they're bad? I would

25:47

say it's the combination of several red

25:49

flags. You got to really double click

25:51

and this goes back to our hiring

25:53

conversation. And I've made a lot

25:55

of hiring mistakes. Normally there is something

25:57

that ends up showing. up that when

25:59

I was in the interview process, assuming

26:01

I was perfectly diligent, which I never

26:04

am, there's always something it's like, you

26:06

know, like my gut was a little

26:08

bit like my gut, I hear that

26:10

a lot with people and I my

26:12

advocacy is trust your gut. Normally, those

26:14

things will show up later and without

26:16

fault, the hiring mistakes that I've made

26:18

end up showing up in our example

26:21

right now, that were things that I

26:23

didn't feel 100% comfortable with.

26:25

And for whatever reason, at that time, I

26:28

gave a pass on or I didn't do enough homework on

26:30

or I didn't poke on enough, you got to be

26:32

able to unpack it, you got to be able to

26:34

embrace that mistake. And you got to make sure that

26:36

you're doing everything you can to not do it again.

26:38

So that is the sum of a lot of red

26:40

flags and a lack of improvement with coaching. Do you

26:42

think that's the first 30 days? Oh, yeah. So

26:45

first 30 days, you just said that about the gut, and

26:47

I'm totally with you. Max Levchin

26:49

from Affirm said on the show when there's

26:51

doubt, there's no doubt. Do you agree? And

26:53

should you just move really fast in those

26:55

first 30 days said, Larry, I want to

26:57

get ahead of this clearly not working. Sorry,

26:59

what do you go? It takes

27:02

time. It's a complex sale. It's an

27:04

enterprise sales cycle. They're young, you know,

27:06

give them a bit of time. I

27:08

would say nature nature of the flag,

27:10

like what is the flag? What's the

27:12

foul? And I think he really got unpack

27:14

it. This goes back to hiring mistakes cost a

27:16

lot of money and a lot of time.

27:18

I think you need to have pretty candid

27:20

conversations with people. This goes into the whole

27:22

post call recap and, and feedback and coaching.

27:24

If you aren't doing that coaching, I think

27:26

you're going to be in a different bucket.

27:28

But let's assume for a minute, you go

27:30

in, we have a terrible sales call. I'm

27:32

like, Oh my God, Harry, like, that was

27:34

a mess, which I would never say. But

27:36

I would normally start off with, Harry, how

27:38

do you think that went? If it was

27:40

terrible, and you thought it went great, then

27:42

I'd throw another flag, I can really be

27:44

curious what you thought was great. So I

27:47

think you really need to unpack that. So

27:49

it depends on the nature of the flag.

27:51

If it's a coaching item, and a skills

27:53

related item, and it's not improving, like I

27:55

feel as an employer, you have a responsibility

27:57

to employees. You really do. It's hard onboard.

27:59

You mentioned it. It's hard to onboard and

28:02

I would break it into mental errors and

28:04

physical errors I played sports growing up So

28:06

my coach has always said that you can

28:08

make all the physical errors. You cannot make

28:10

mental errors What's the difference in sales? Not

28:13

a lot this goes back to I think

28:15

there are things that there are flags That

28:17

would be real issues if and this goes

28:19

to interpersonal skills That is something

28:21

you should be sniffing out of any of

28:24

your process preparation and diligence Those are things

28:26

that are they're kind of non-negotiables for the

28:28

job that we've chosen to do So I

28:30

think you need to be candid with your

28:33

communication We have a responsibility as leaders to

28:35

communicate and coach if that

28:37

coaching is not working Then

28:39

I think you need to move quickly You're just

28:41

delaying an outcome that you have already pretty much

28:43

decided on here's what also happens by the time

28:46

the leader knows it Everyone else on the team

28:48

knows it they know it before you do. Do

28:50

you ever keep someone you don't like? I'm an

28:52

investor too for my sins. You know, I'm Mad

28:55

a founder yesterday enterprise sauce business and I

28:57

was talking about one of those people I

29:00

said Total dick, but I mean he

29:02

brought in two and a half million dollars in

29:04

revenue last year So, you know I can put

29:06

up with it Do I ever hire people that

29:09

I don't like room like oh my god, like

29:11

I just don't like that person. They're offensive They're

29:13

abrasive. No, I just don't even hire them if

29:15

they're that way to me. They're gonna be that

29:17

way with our customers But I

29:19

know they're not they can be arrogant

29:22

and douchey especially in sales like I

29:24

Can be arrogant douchey, but you put me in

29:27

front of a client. I'm gonna charm the shit

29:29

out of them I'm gonna close the million dollar

29:31

contract I'm gonna be your number one rap and

29:33

I'm the best so I deserve the most money

29:35

and everyone else They're not as good as me.

29:37

Well, Harry, I would I would tell you

29:40

there's probably five of you You just

29:42

aren't self-aware enough to know that by

29:44

the way, this is not actually me

29:46

So, I know this is why everyone

29:48

is saying you're like what a dick

29:51

Legitimately that would be pretty much

29:53

what I would say there are

29:56

so many talented people out there

29:58

the separation the

30:00

highest echelon, they're more

30:02

and more, in my opinion, wildly

30:05

talented people out there. I

30:08

think it's all about building confidence in the

30:10

early days with sales teams, with sales people.

30:12

Do you think that you should go for

30:14

the logos or do you think

30:16

that you should go for just quantity? Like

30:19

just get as many clients or like go

30:21

for that Stella logo? It

30:23

depends on where you are as a business.

30:27

Your early stage, your zero is 10 million an hour.

30:30

And I think you got to go

30:32

get category killer brands. Why

30:34

in the early stage you went for category

30:36

killer brands? References. If

30:39

you can be successful with the category killers,

30:41

and they didn't become category killers because they're

30:43

easy to work with, and if you can

30:45

do it with the best, and I have

30:47

a huge caveat after I finish this sentence,

30:49

if you can do it with the best,

30:52

it's a heck of a place to start.

30:54

A caveat is closing the deal, it's like

30:56

the easy part. You have to be successful.

30:58

Like for them to be referenceable, they have

31:00

to be successful. You know, Coca-Cola is not

31:02

going to go on record and say, we

31:04

just closed an amazing deal with Harry and

31:06

we have no idea whether it's going to

31:08

be successful. It's not going to happen. They're

31:11

probably going to be a reference once

31:13

they're successful. So for me, the entire

31:15

orientation of an organization in the early

31:17

stages, I'm talking like sub What

31:20

everything needs to be, figure out the industries

31:23

and the verticals you could be successful in,

31:25

go get brand names, category killers, and

31:27

rotate hard on customer success. Because if

31:29

you can't get customer success, you're dead

31:31

in the water anyway. Okay, so I

31:33

had Chris Dagen on the show, the

31:35

CRR at Snowflake, and he was like,

31:38

why do we still have CS? We

31:41

should have professional services, and then

31:43

there's like support, but like CS,

31:46

not a fan. I heard Slootman

31:48

say the same thing, and you should

31:50

really go like unpack the titles versus

31:53

the roles, because that matters. And

31:55

By the way, they are in a pure

31:57

consumption model business, which is very different. Then

32:00

a fucking so it's a booking is

32:02

hers. revenue kind of business or hybrid

32:04

businesses. Snowflakes success is a hundred percent

32:07

built on customers being successful and usage.

32:09

Now if you're hiring a bunch of

32:11

salespeople and then you're going ask your

32:14

salespeople a I just want you to

32:16

go make sure they're successful they make

32:18

hold on and I'm in south like

32:21

Lan I need is find more use

32:23

cases. I need to find more applications

32:25

to move on to Snowflakes platform that

32:27

selling who is actually managing the technical.

32:30

Architecture The foundations of that customer

32:32

being successful. You can a need

32:34

to go unpack titles, verse roles

32:36

and similar companies and say we

32:38

don't need customers success. Someone is

32:40

playing that role in common every

32:42

want. You can put him in

32:44

finance for all I care, but

32:46

someone is responsible for the correct

32:49

architecture aligned to the right use

32:51

case, and then someone is responsible

32:53

for growing and expanding that business.

32:55

How do you think about the

32:57

interplay between Cs and sales? I

32:59

have Dave. Kellogg on the show and

33:01

he said i'm never want your farm

33:03

and going against someone elses hunter which

33:05

I always remembers the statement of the

33:08

your farm as you'll see ass rap

33:10

going against someone else is hunter which

33:12

is someone else is trained killer A

33:14

who's ready to take your customer how

33:16

does things that inspire between the sales

33:18

and see ass and know having your

33:21

form of us someone's on them. For.

33:23

Me: that's the segmentation strategy. That's the

33:25

difference between how my going up against

33:27

competition based on the accounts that are

33:29

in their patch and do we car

33:31

about Unter Farmer patches. You know this

33:33

could be a whole other five effort

33:36

by such as for you and I.

33:39

Mean tasting question Let's say we

33:41

had a ease wraps individual contributors

33:43

the just had customers pay so

33:45

a varying sizes right? but they're

33:47

just customers are no or there's

33:49

no new customers are new loggers

33:51

in their patch? Their job. is

33:54

quote unquote farming i say can i

33:56

don't think that farming as a thing

33:58

and in the cloud world at I

34:00

mean, you're responsible for finding new use cases

34:02

across the entire bag that you have to

34:04

sell. So you're always

34:06

hunting and farming. You

34:09

have to have interlock, stacked hands

34:11

between CS and sales. I'll take

34:13

my team that's organized that way

34:15

up against anyone else's all

34:17

day. Chris Dagnons? I

34:20

don't know, Chris, but yeah. That would be a fun show. One

34:22

thing I want to discuss, you mentioned that use case is

34:24

there. I'm such a fan of vertical sales

34:26

playbooks. You've been a master of vertical sales playbooks. I think

34:29

it's so important to mean something to a specific set

34:31

of customers. Your messaging is tighter. Everything

34:34

is better in a vertical sales world, in my mind, really.

34:37

So many founders are like, too expensive.

34:40

It's too expensive to build that. I'm

34:42

too early and it's too expensive. How

34:44

do you answer that question? If I

34:46

rewound to when we started doing this

34:48

at Salesforce, it was really

34:50

born out of customer requirements. We got

34:53

feedback that we weren't showing up

34:55

understanding the customer. Really,

34:58

you said it, right? There's very few

35:00

things worse than that. So when we

35:02

started that business, we were just very

35:05

focused on enablement. Enablement and organizational alignment.

35:07

And there's depth that you can go

35:09

when you think about verticals. Some

35:12

companies start with industry. So

35:14

building out industry teams that can come

35:17

in and have that conversation, but your

35:19

AEs are still aligned. You

35:21

may have an AE that calls in healthcare in

35:23

the morning, financial services in the afternoon, and

35:26

is going to dinner with a three-letter agency

35:28

at night. Contents created for

35:30

them, they can kind of get a

35:32

couple steps down the road. Do you think

35:34

that's really as effective as someone who

35:36

just lives and breathes aviation or hospitality? Yes.

35:40

And it's expensive. Does it need

35:42

to be, though? You hire a junior rep and

35:44

you say, hey, you're in charge of

35:46

hospitality, which entails large hotel chains around

35:48

the world, become a fricking nerd on

35:50

it, and go sell. Why

35:53

does it have to be expensive in

35:55

that way? So it's a great question.

35:57

When that AE goes to their... SE

36:00

or SE, the technical person on their

36:02

team and says, I need to

36:04

come in and show an airplane demo and

36:07

I'm sticking with the metaphor. And that SE

36:10

is like, well, we've got a really generic

36:12

one. Like, what do you want? Then there's

36:14

a disconnect at the technical teams. Then

36:17

you're bringing in an AE that is super

36:19

smart, super knowledgeable, and the SE isn't. So

36:21

clearly a disconnect. And then by the way,

36:23

for our earlier conversation, you're going to bring

36:26

in a customer support person, probably professional services,

36:28

and you're going to bring them in early

36:30

in the sales campaign, the customer's going to

36:33

go, so tell me, like, how many aviation

36:35

implementations have you done? Tell me what you

36:37

know about the industry, and that person's going

36:39

to be light. So my point is to

36:42

truly verticalize and to truly deliver value for

36:44

customers, it can't just be the AE. It

36:46

has to be every single person that touches

36:48

the account. And then you end up in these

36:50

sub-verticals. Financial services is a lot of things. The

36:53

reason I think that it gets expensive, and again,

36:55

you can like be on this journey where you

36:57

don't have to eat all this cost up front,

36:59

and you can try things and fail quickly. If

37:02

you're truly going to deliver the benefit, what I

37:04

think is the benefit of a verticalized

37:06

sales team, it's every person that touches the

37:09

customer. Can we do one at a time?

37:11

Do we need to do three at

37:13

a time? Yes and

37:15

no. This

37:17

is another cost implication. This is another

37:19

like prioritization implication. This is like, how much

37:22

risk do you want to take on?

37:24

We started with financial services at Salesforce,

37:26

and it became so successful. They actually

37:28

developed a product for financial services. That became

37:30

more impetus. And now the industry products

37:32

team at Salesforce is just crushing it

37:34

because they've actually went out and built

37:36

products specific to the industry. If I was

37:38

advising you and you're thinking of building

37:40

out a vertical, I would pick

37:42

where you think the biggest bang for your dollars, and

37:45

I'd try. I wouldn't go to three. To

37:47

what extent is one customer enough to bet

37:49

on a vertical? And what I mean by

37:51

that is that I caught off with meat

37:53

founders and they're like, well, we got, I

37:56

don't chase. And we feel that

37:58

actually the social validity of getting chased. means

38:00

we'll be able to get X, Y and

38:02

Z bank also. Do you

38:05

really see it like, oh you got one

38:07

so you can get another and another? Do

38:09

the dominoes fall when you have a big

38:11

name or not? Don't say it depends. I

38:13

think you pick banks which are super difficult

38:15

as it is but I would not make

38:17

that step. I would not think that just

38:19

because you got one that you're gonna get

38:21

the rest because by the way you could

38:23

have gone by accident. I didn't mean to

38:26

be abrasive about it but there's a lot

38:28

of reasons you can win a customer. I

38:30

would be more focused on what is the

38:32

use case, what is the value statement, how

38:35

pervasive do we think that value statement could

38:37

be or that problem statement is for customers.

38:39

I think you got to look at a

38:41

lot of variables to and that all rolls

38:44

into how we should be thinking about TAM

38:46

or you know our total available market. Just

38:48

to say that you got one I don't

38:50

know like you kind of need to make

38:53

a line. What size customer does it make

38:55

sense to have a full lifecycle like a

38:57

CSM, the full management of the accounts. The

39:00

biggest problem I see in SAS

39:02

today is I see people doing

39:04

enterprise teams with 10k ACVs. There's

39:07

a big operational cost implication to

39:09

doing that. There's how many accounts

39:11

is an AEE going to be

39:14

covering? There's what's the ratio of

39:16

accounts for customer support and customer

39:18

success? There's you should consider appropriate

39:20

ratios for solution consultants, solution engineering.

39:22

So you can work into this

39:24

process. I think when you get

39:26

down into the maybe your question

39:28

of what size customer do I

39:30

have one AEE covering it that I have

39:32

one SC that that's all they do, that

39:35

I have one customer success person that's all

39:37

they do. Man it's got to be a

39:39

pretty big customer. Is that a hundred K?

39:41

Well it depends on your business. If I

39:43

thought about Genesis you'd probably need to be

39:46

close to a nine-digit customer. It's tough to

39:48

get on our top ten list which we're

39:50

blessed and grateful for. If I was starting

39:52

a business and that rotation made sense for

39:54

customer success and you're gonna place your bets

39:57

there, you know it's always a tough trade-off

39:59

like hey. How do you think a

40:01

scale across team's never perfect out either

40:03

by discounting I want to get some

40:06

logos I'm a new hire I hate?

40:08

So. If I'm a new team and Id discounting how

40:10

do you feel. While. Discounting as

40:12

kind of a part of life. I

40:15

think there's appropriate discounting based on scale.

40:17

What's appropriate and will scale. Here's the

40:19

thing, if you're playing any. he got

40:21

a fish soften. The customer says on

40:23

this to, let's say you're a small

40:25

company and you're going into Chase, your

40:27

kind of an unproven company. They're taken

40:29

a flyer on you. They love you,

40:31

They trust you. You're on the hook

40:33

for this thing to be successful. You're

40:36

going to pay a pretty place at

40:38

Chase to win that business. Here It's

40:40

pretty risky. Pentagon your value proposition. Of

40:42

them, but you're unproven. Quantity: I

40:44

think the higher just general industry

40:46

practice now being a victim here.

40:48

But just the way things have

40:50

been an enterprise technology. There's a

40:52

linear correlation between volume for the

40:54

size of the investment and the

40:56

discount, and that varies by whatever

40:59

you're selling. Others you know, if

41:01

you're in the experience orchestration business

41:03

or venus fighting business or E

41:05

R P companies are pretty adept

41:07

at these days, Like this country's

41:09

gotten really good at buying south,

41:11

so. They're doing their compares. Gardner

41:13

advises on pricing. There's plenty of

41:15

places you can go do benchmarking.

41:18

The. Difference for me when someone ask for a

41:20

discount if if it's my team that asking

41:22

me for a discount our see the value

41:24

proposition. I want to see the business case

41:26

if we don't have a business case of

41:28

we entered have an articulated when they're gonna

41:30

get their money back What those outcomes look

41:33

like. If we haven't done a good job

41:35

and value and were just looking for a

41:37

discount, that's the stuff right? You know I'm

41:39

not a fan of that. Does not mean

41:41

we haven't done our jobs. Laurie, I'm sorry.

41:43

I'm sorry. I'm on your team and I

41:45

know I said that the the deal Tom

41:47

in this corner. But it it just

41:49

slipped. Next Florida, I'm sorry, slept and

41:51

that sorta had enough sponsor me as

41:53

a sales leader. No problem. Or. Are

41:57

you sit Sales leader? or a D?

41:59

Who are you? I'm an AE

42:01

you're the sales leader. Help me understand,

42:03

Harry. Like what happened? This was a

42:05

committed deal, Harry. Like what happened? I

42:08

know honestly they just didn't have it as

42:10

a priority this quarter. And so they just

42:12

said, hey, you know, we're going to punt

42:14

it tonight this quarter. When

42:16

did it get deprioritized? They

42:19

went cold on me and they just got back

42:21

to me yesterday. Okay. Who are

42:23

you working with over there? Who's your

42:25

highest level contact at the account? I

42:27

don't fucking know because it's a hypothetical

42:29

situation. We've

42:33

got a break. It could be anyone in the company. I

42:36

am a huge fan of people doing what they

42:38

say they're going to do. I put an incredible

42:40

premium on it. Do you think you're good at

42:42

sales forecasting? Yes. Why? How

42:45

are you so good at sales forecasting? Teach

42:47

me. Ultimately, you have to balance risk with

42:49

commitment. Pipeline is everything. So

42:51

the more the more at bats you have,

42:53

the more likely you're going to get a

42:56

hit. It's the same thing in sales. And

42:58

forecasting accurately is, in the

43:00

job that we do, a critical part of

43:02

your brand. If you can't forecast

43:05

accurately, for me, it's one of a couple

43:07

of things. Either you don't truly understand your

43:09

business, you aren't truly doing the amount of

43:11

diligence with customers and opportunities. You don't have

43:14

enough opportunities to be able to balance out

43:16

some of the riskier things with some of

43:18

the things that look better. And

43:20

we might not even be asking the right questions

43:22

and we're likely not talking to the right people.

43:24

Let me say all of that. And

43:27

it's really hard to do well. I've

43:29

missed months. I've missed quarters. I've

43:31

missed quarters back to back. It's

43:34

a hard thing to do. But

43:36

there is a real premium in the world that

43:38

I've chosen to play in on

43:40

forecasting accurately. In particular,

43:42

I kind of own the number myself

43:45

and my peer in the CS, I'd own

43:47

the number for the company. How we think about

43:49

investment and strategic priorities kind of depends on us

43:51

doing what we say we're going to do.

43:54

My roll up is based upon my directs doing what they

43:56

say they're going to do that's dependent upon their directs doing

43:58

what they say they're going to do. do, which is

44:00

dependent upon their direction, depending on all the A's. And

44:03

managing that with agility and accuracy

44:05

is very difficult. And I think

44:07

it's incredibly important. Everyone says

44:10

today is so hard in sales, so

44:12

hard in sales, all budgets are centralized

44:14

back to CFOs. People aren't spending like

44:16

they used to, you know, Larry, they're

44:18

not. They're like, yeah, that's true. We

44:20

like that. Bullshit. The

44:22

latter. There isn't a company out there

44:24

today that doesn't have TAM data that

44:26

maybe there are, but like in the

44:29

companies that are really playing the game

44:31

today that are winning, they know the

44:33

TAM data they have. There's so much

44:35

information about accounts. There's so much information

44:37

on PTB or like propensity to buy.

44:40

That information is kind of the table

44:42

stakes. When AEs start, they're kind of

44:44

like given all of this info, like

44:46

here's your territory. Here's the opportunity inside

44:48

of your territory. Now you could be

44:51

in an industry that

44:53

gets hurt macroeconomically.

44:56

Perfect example. Travel and transportation

44:58

industry during COVID, tough spot.

45:01

That's a tough plot. You need to have

45:04

a little humility with the narrative and a

45:06

heavy dose of empathy that listen, some of

45:08

these are hard. If you've given a patches

45:10

of customers that are upset and you're working

45:12

through a bunch of issues, I think you

45:15

need to have some empathy with that situation

45:17

to understand that. But I

45:19

would really push back on a

45:21

leader or an AE that

45:23

barring force majeure, some macroeconomic

45:25

pandemic or a financial crisis,

45:27

if you're selling to the

45:29

banks, I would really push

45:31

back anytime today of someone saying,

45:33

you know, people just start spending the way they used

45:36

to. So I'm not able to sell anything. That's a

45:38

mindset thing too, by the way. Have

45:40

you ever had bad culture in one of your

45:42

sales teams? Why did that happen?

45:44

What did you do wrong? The biggest lesson

45:46

that I would say that I learned early

45:48

in my career was I didn't even use

45:50

the word then. The word to me a

45:52

long time ago was like a soft word,

45:54

was empathy. Like I completely lacked empathy. It

45:57

would be the narrative of an AE and a

46:00

in the financial crisis who only called on B

46:02

of A and Chase came to you and

46:04

said, Hey, like it's really tough sledding and

46:07

these opportunities are going to push for a

46:09

quarter. And if you just said, I don't

46:11

care, go figure it out. Like there was

46:13

a point in my career where that was,

46:16

that was okay. There was a point in

46:18

my, in my learning as a leader where

46:20

that was how I was responded. I, and

46:22

it was uneducated. It was very difficult to

46:25

maintain loyalty. And I think you learned, you

46:27

learned some very expensive lessons that

46:29

normally show up through attrition. When quality

46:31

people start leaving, this goes back to our

46:33

first conversation when quality people started leaving is

46:36

comp an issue. Sure. Yeah.

46:38

I mean comp is likely always an issue. I

46:40

don't think comp is always the issue and I'm

46:42

prioritizing the issues and then it comes down to

46:45

your leader. And I, early in my career was

46:47

not a great, not that I'm great now. I'm

46:49

on the journey, just like the rest of us

46:51

that are in this, in this role. I

46:53

was pretty poor. Were there one or

46:55

two moments where you really thought you improved as a

46:57

leader, like the floor fell from beneath you and you

47:00

improved in that way? Yeah. So

47:02

this goes back to our, our deal conversation probably.

47:04

And it's very hard for me to do. Like

47:07

I would say that I've tried to

47:09

work my DNA to respond to things

47:11

a little more masterfully than, than

47:13

I used to. But generally

47:16

when things would come to me as

47:18

a problem, I would respond

47:20

with finger pointing. Somebody's doing something

47:22

wrong. Very little accountability

47:24

for myself in that equation. And

47:27

it was really how I responded to things.

47:29

I learned a lot. I talked about kind

47:31

of my career journey. Godfrey Sullivan

47:34

was the CEO at Hyperion and I

47:36

learned a ton from Godfrey. The

47:38

empathy score with Godfrey and customers I learned a

47:41

lot from. I'll never forget it was a meeting.

47:43

I'll leave the account name out of the picture,

47:45

but it was a, we were not

47:47

doing well with this account. Super senior

47:49

level C-suite meeting. The way

47:51

he handled that situation. Remarkable. What

47:53

did he do to handle that?

47:55

Just listen, listen. Empathy. I know

47:57

you're using that word a lot.

48:00

He listened, he was prepared, he showed incredible

48:02

empathy, he knew the details of what was

48:04

going on and he had a plan. You

48:06

can tell when someone's genuinely listening or when

48:08

someone is sitting there with a prepared answer

48:10

hoping that you ask the right question. That

48:12

was a great example for me as a leader. I

48:15

was blessed to have the same boss for a period

48:17

of time when I came into Oracle

48:20

all the way into Salesforce

48:22

who had a remarkable ability to

48:24

hear things that weren't going the

48:26

way the teams anticipated and

48:28

you'd leave that meeting and you're like, we got

48:30

this, no problem. It really comes

48:33

with listening and empathy. Those are probably my two

48:35

biggest career journeys I think, personally and professionally. Now

48:37

I could talk to you all day. I am

48:39

cognizant that you do also have a job. Listen,

48:41

I want to do a quick fight. So I

48:43

say a short statement, you give me your immediate

48:45

thoughts. Does that sound okay? Yeah, careful what you

48:47

ask for, but yes. What would

48:49

you most like to change about the world of

48:52

sales? I think value creation. The

48:54

ability pretty universally for teams to be

48:56

able to convey value to customers. I

48:58

think that pretty dramatically changes things.

49:00

I think that changes the optics of selling

49:02

completely. It's like it's not a sales game

49:04

then. Tell me, is Outbound dead

49:06

in 2024? No, no,

49:09

no, no, no, not at all. Outbound

49:12

done well, what an instrument, what

49:14

an incredible instrument. So no. Do

49:17

you not worry that with AI, the

49:19

Outbound supply will be infinite in the

49:21

way that everyone will be able to

49:23

create so many personalized emails, messages. There's

49:25

going to be automation gains from AI.

49:27

So efficiency gains that were largely, by

49:30

the way, things people didn't want to

49:32

do anyway, they hated doing anyway. And

49:34

then there's going to be augmentation benefits

49:36

from AI. So helping people do their

49:38

jobs better. The way I see this

49:40

going, that's going to be like 30, 70. I

49:42

think 70% of the benefit of AI

49:44

is going to be for people to do their jobs

49:47

better. So no, I don't think

49:49

Outbound is better. I think or anything outbound

49:51

is gone. I think AI will help enable

49:53

the right outbound teams to do it better.

49:55

What sales strategy do you think is dead?

49:58

That was prominent and now it's dead. It's

50:00

like, nah, we don't do that anymore. Uh,

50:02

you know, fab selling is pretty dead. FAB,

50:04

do you remember this one? Feeding feature advantage

50:06

benefit. This is a big deal. This is

50:09

actually how I learned. And this was when

50:11

I said Eli Lilly, that was the training.

50:13

So you were trained feature advantage benefit. That

50:15

was how we learned. So I think

50:18

that one is dead and gone. It goes

50:20

back to, you know, there's so many value

50:22

selling frameworks. Now I grew up at, at

50:25

my tech job at PTC, which was medic

50:27

at the time or med pick. So there's

50:29

an unlimited choice of them,

50:31

but I think I'm pretty sure fab

50:34

selling. Nobody's writing a book on fab

50:36

selling these days. What are the most

50:38

common ways that fast scaling sales teams

50:40

break? Paradiseation for me is

50:42

the most common. Then I would

50:45

think generally speaking, it's waiting. Even

50:47

though you're fast scaling, uh, what are

50:50

the things that you're waiting for something to

50:52

be different on before you go and try

50:54

that could create a different outcome? I think

50:56

waiting is a, is just a really dangerous

50:58

way to go. I'm a founder considering a

51:00

vertical sales playbook approach. What's your number one

51:02

piece of advice for me? Focus.

51:05

Pick your spot on where, where you're going

51:07

to go to the vertical on the playbook.

51:09

Work outcomes backward. Final

51:11

one. What recent company sales

51:13

strategy have you been most impressed

51:16

by? None. I'm

51:18

not a sales star. Ironically, given

51:20

the job that I have, I'm

51:22

not a sales strategy, like entrepreneur.

51:25

Or wizard. So I

51:28

probably don't see as many

51:30

or enough in the cloud

51:32

world. You have to be in a land

51:34

and expand and retain sales strategy.

51:36

And that's not just sales. It's customer life

51:39

cycle. If you're not in that business, I

51:41

think you're going to lose. Listen, Larry, I can

51:44

clearly speak to you all day. I can't thank you

51:46

enough for doing this. And this has been so much

51:48

fun. And it's been a blast. It's great to, uh,

51:50

great to meet you. Thank you for everything you're doing.

51:54

I just love shows like this. For me,

51:56

I started these vertical shows because I wanted

51:59

really actionable takeaways. for founders to learn from

52:01

and implement in their businesses today. Larry was

52:03

incredible there and if you want to watch

52:05

the full episode you can see it on

52:07

YouTube by searching for 20 VC that's 20

52:09

VC. But

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before we leave you today,

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