The CRO Spotlight Podcast.
Hi, I'm Warren Zenna, founder and CEO of the CRO Collective, and
welcome to the CRO Spotlight Podcast.
This podcast is for Chief Revenue Officers, aspiring CROs and
CEOs who are looking to hire or support a CRO to succeed.
To join me in my expert guests as we debate, discuss and tackle today's
complex revenue growth challenges, and provide practical insights
to help CROs succeed in the role.
We're really excited to have you with us Now let's get to it.
Hi.
Hello.
Welcome to the uh, CRO Spotlight Podcast.
I'm your host, Warren Zenna.
Um, I'm doing solo today.
Uh, Lu pays out, but I'm excited because we have a great,
great conversation to have.
I wanna start out a bit first talk a little about the downturns
that we're seeing, cuz I'm getting a lot of input on this.
So a lot of my clients and other people are, as you all know,
are seeing a lot of layoffs.
So, uh, then what I'm noting here, and I've been talking about
this quite a bit, is the fact.
Most of the layoffs are in sales, some in marketing.
We're seeing a lot of salespeople get laid off, and I think that
it's a habit that a lot of these, um, kind of growth hack based
companies, they overhire salespeople.
They hire these, um, kind of SDR groups and they double up on their sales
forces, and then when the downturn comes, they don't need them anymore.
And something off with that.
Because I believe what's going on too often is they throw more salespeople
at a problem and then they don't need them anymore when the downturn comes.
And I see this as really a reflection of the focus that some
of these companies have is on their sales channel almost exclusively.
And so, you know, I've got a lot of friends who got hired
like a month, and then after the month was over, they got canned.
. So, you know, and I, I've been ranting about this a lot and a lot.
I don't think a lot of people are not happy about it.
But, you know, I think some of.
, well, we're gonna be talking about this today.
Some of the growth hacking and the, the growth at all costs.
Um, mentality of some of these companies has been so focused
heavily on driving pipeline growth.
And I'm not denouncing the idea of pipeline growth.
I think it's obviously critically important, but you know, it comes
sometimes the expense of other things.
And I think to some degree, I think even the SDR organizations are doing
the job that marketing should be doing.
We'll talk about that a bit.
But what I'm saying is I think that the key here is if you're from, from a
chief revenue officer perspective, you have to be looking at your organization
from um, am I bringing out the math?
If I'm, am I maximizing the utility of my Salesforce and are they efficient?
Are they sufficient for me?
Do I really need more?
You know, sometimes I think what drives hiring more
salespeople is cuz it looks good.
You know?
I mean, if you could tell you're bored, you hired more salespeople than the
natural, you know, reaction is gonna be, well then you're gonna get more pipeline.
Right.
You know, there's a quality versus quantity issue, which
we're dealing with right now.
The amount of spam that I get, I got a three cold calls on my cell phone,
uh, over the last week, and they were all pointless, not useful, and so, In
any event, I think that, uh, this is an important topic we'll get into, but I
wanna introduce, uh, our guest today.
I'm real excited about it.
Uh, his name is Mike Schumann.
Uh, Mike Schumann is currently the CRO at Revenue Base, which
is a Bessemer portfolio company.
Uh, they help organizations more efficiently create top line funnel.
That converts to higher rate to meet revenue goals.
Uh, Mike spent the last decade as a revenue leader for Rev Venture backed
companies like Sify, our work and Cloud Fast Path, which is now a box company.
Um, Mike and I talk a lot.
We have really interesting perspectives on things and we share them a lot.
And I thought it'd be a really good time to have a conversation with him
cuz he has a lot of thoughts on some of the shifts that are taking place.
So Mike, welcome.
Thank you.
It's great.
Uh, great to be here Warren.
Thanks for having me.
Sure thing.
So first, if you don't mind, um, we'd love to hear a little bit more about your
background and what you're doing right now and sort of like what got you here.
I think a lot of things, what our audience likes to hear is, so if you're
a C R O, like how'd you get there?
, right?
Because I work with a lot of people that are sort of trying to navigate that,
so that's always an interesting thing.
So if you don't mind, love to hear a bit more about that.
Sure.
So coming out of, um, out of college, I, I, I really came to sales in,
in business in general, very late.
in my academic career and I, I came out of college with a very rough plan,
um, after a couple of happenstances that I won't bore you with.
My plan was I was going to get my street education in business by being in sales.
For four, three to four years, and then going back for an MBA where
I was gonna focus on finance to get my formal business education.
These were like very broad, naive brushstrokes, but it was the only
plan that I had, but it was a plan.
And part of it really had me focusing on sales as an extension of my academic
work, where I took it seriously.
I was the guy reading the books, driving around, listening to tapes.
I watched other more successful salespeople, figured out what they
were doing and adopted those behaviors.
Uh, but really found myself getting very comfortable at operating.
With very little resources.
I didn't realize that when I was hired at this small company,
I was basically cannon fodder.
Nobody cared whether I was successful or not, and I, I wanted to be successful.
I didn't see myself as cannon fodder.
So every day I, I continued to learn and grow and I got very comfortable generating
and creating revenue streams from scratch.
So I, uh, threw some twists and turns after my M B A ended up at a
publicly traded company where I had launched a new product for them.
They, they desperately needed to show that they could take their technology and
put it into a new vertical and create a stream of revenue to try to get the, the.
The share price up and I went into my first day, I was working directly for the,
the VP responsible for the product and pulled together a little team internally.
And, uh, nine months later, I walked into her office and I said,
congratulations, you just generated a million dollars of incremental revenue.
The sales channels are built and we're meeting our sell through rates.
And when you do that, you tend to get people's attention, especially in a big
company that's sort of been lagging.
So I ended up working very closely with the president and the C E O.
Launching new products or testing products from outside the US into the us um, market
and creating more streams of revenue.
And my, my wife and I at the time, were living at where we live now,
which is equally distant between Harvard and m i t and Cambridge.
Mm-hmm.
. Um, and there were all these early stage companies and at the
publicly traded company I was.
It used to be a startup and there were still people in the
halls that had taken that ride.
And I thought, man, I wonder if I could ever do this.
Like, how good am I really?
Like, can I, could I actually generate a revenue stream from
scratch in one of these scenarios where there's no brand equity?
You know, there's a really compelling solution, but it's causing, people
need to think about the problem differently and the solution differently.
And I threw myself into the early stage community where I knew absolutely no one.
I had absolutely no credibility and I just focused on helping other people accomplish
the things they needed to achieve.
And I really looked at these entrepreneurs as people that could really do it all.
And what I didn't realize is a lot of 'em are, while they're extremely
bright in areas that I, I don't necessarily count as my strengths.
Really selling and understanding how to build a sales process, sales structure,
and a sales organization to drive, uh, repeatable revenue that's predictable is
something I'm actually really good at.
Um, and doing that without very little guidelines.
And then I, you know, SIFY, I was the first sales hire there, took
them from zero to a million in like 18 months that they're now, you
know, valued at over $2 billion.
, uh, they have a great leadership team.
Much of the credit goes to them and the terrific people they hired.
Um, I worked myself out of a job very quickly, um, but was smart
enough to stick around to learn from a very skilled sales leader.
That took over for me, and I just kept building and building
and building my knowledge, base, my skillset, demonstrating my
abilities, until really I earned the.
To take over the, the broad responsibilities that I have now.
So the way I approached my career in general was, um, both
my parents were in the Navy.
Mm-hmm.
and, um, I all, I always believe that if I was going to have the privilege of
captaining a ship, that I wanted to be the captain, the kind of captain that not only
knew how to do every job on the ship, but I also know how to work as an effective.
Of a fleet.
So if the build pump on the ship broke and, and my, uh, you know,
maintenance person was down, I wanted to be able to repair that build pump.
And I treated sales and revenue generation that same way all the
way through, up to very complex, uh, go-to-market strategies and, and
metrics, which is where I am today.
Got it, got it, got it.
Great.
Thanks.
That's really cool.
So thanks.
I wanna talk a bit about some of that stuff cuz you mentioned some
things in there that I'm interested.
I, the first thing I'd like to know, , like when you think of the
role of a chief revenue officer, cuz you mentioned you came up through the
sales channel, which most, most CROs do.
Mm-hmm.
and we can, we can talk about that too.
There's an interesting kind of perspective on that.
But would what, how do you describe the role?
What's your perspective on the role?
, you know, if you were, let's say, advising a C E O right, and hiring
a chief revenue officer, how would you advise them to appoint one and
deploy one to the, to their business?
Yeah.
I think you really want someone who's gonna be a, a steward, a, a steward
of, of revenue and, and, and a steward of the, the different functions.
that participate in revenue generation from marketing, sales, customer success.
Mm-hmm.
really a steward to the ceo.
You know, they need someone who's gonna be watching out for them.
They spend so much time looking out for everybody else, well,
who's looking out for them, right?
Right.
And by being the machine that can drive revenue, that enables that c e o to
make the really fun decisions, like how do we grow, how do we expand, what
new products could we be offering?
Versus like, oh my God, how are we gonna meet budget this month?
How are we gonna meet payroll?
Like, we're, we're, we're like dying over here, right?
Mm-hmm.
. So I, I would say it's that mentality of.
Of a steward who, who really does need to possess not only a strong business
acumen, but they have to have a high level of technical skills as it relates
to reporting and metrics and other performance capabilities and, and how
to influence, um, The improvement of those KPIs, but they also have to have
a high degree of professional skills.
I'm, I'm told that now, soft skills.
Mm-hmm.
, uh, credit, my friend are now, uh, I should call 'em professional skills.
They have to be a steward of people.
They have to be someone who is of service who can set a tone for a team.
They're the, they're, they're, they're not necessarily on the field
as the quarterback of the team.
They're more.
, you know, the, the, the coach or the GM level mm-hmm.
, you know, they're particularly effective with it when they can really get down
to that grassroots up, grassroots level on the ground with the team
in the trench and be effective there as well, because sometimes people
just need a good example to follow.
Right, right.
And, and I think a successful c R O.
, I think you wanna see that person that's going to bring energy to the team.
They're gonna, they're gonna help the people around them really level up their
games in a way where people may leave.
, you know, revenue base.
Like, look, we, we operate from a revenue team that we are of service
to everybody else in the company.
Mm-hmm.
, like, let's face it.
Right?
Most people in an organization are scared to death of salespeople, . They
don't know how we do what we do.
They don't wanna know what we do.
Like they see us coming and they're like, oh no, here they come again.
These people are crazy and it's our.
To be grateful to them for the work they're doing to appreciate what
our colleagues are doing, right?
Mm-hmm.
, you, you wanna have a leader that's gonna set the tone for the salespeople and
say, look, you're, you're not entitled to anything y you're actually responsible
for the wellbeing of these people and their families, and you better bring
that intensity every day to what you're.
. And I think when you do that, it does set a really healthy tone
for people and, and leads to some terrific, uh, not only professional
growth, but but personal growth.
Yeah.
So you brought a lot of things up there.
Um, I think it seemed like you emphasized a lot on the leadership and personal,
or I call them professional skills.
Um, so I'm gonna play a game with you.
Gonna have the conversation a lot with people.
If you're interviewing A A C O, a potential one, like you're your
CEO of a company and you're, you're interviewing a C R O and that particular
candidate, you can tell possesses incredible personal professional
skills, great leadership, right?
Really motivating great coach, great leader, great visionary.
You know, someone who, you know, would, like you said, be
that sort of like professional steward of the business, right?
But they're not as competent in the technical skills.
and then vice versa.
Right?
Vice versa.
You met someone who was incredible metrics driven, really data driven
person, really has strong acumen, but lacked some of those like per
professional leadership skills.
Which one do you think would make a better or suitable candidate for you?
Yeah, hands down.
The person that possesses those, those professional skills, because I think that
that in my mind is more about who you.
Versus what, you know, I can teach you technical skills.
Sure, sure.
I can surround you with enough people to help you become quite astute in a very
short period of time on some of the, the key metrics we're, we're looking for.
But if you're gonna walk around sucking the life out of people,
Yeah, making them uncomfortable.
And you can't preserve a team because nobody wants to work with you.
Right.
Uh, I can't teach that.
And that's a emotion.
You know, I, I had a really interesting conversation about this.
I, I bring this up for a reason.
I'm really glad you had this, this, you brought this up.
So I was at a dinner in Utah a couple weeks, uh, two, three weeks
ago, and we were having this big conversation about this very topic.
and uh, you know, one of the questions that come to me a lot are, wow,
this c o role is so complicated.
Somebody has to know sales.
They have to know marketing, and they need to know how to manage customer experience.
And they have to understand numbers and they have to be good in metrics.
They have tech abilities and, you know, who is this unicorn?
You know?
And it's a great question cuz I, I do know some people whom are really
amazing at all these things, but they, they get there over time.
It's not like you're not, you don't come out of the womb that way.
Sure.
So the point is like, if you don't possess.
You can't, you don't have some way to speed time up.
You have to learn those things along the way, but you still have that job.
So sort of the way that I navigate this particular conundrum is, Ask yourself
the question is, what are the sort of endemic, rela, um, skillsets that I
know somebody has to have to succeed?
Right?
What are those?
Right?
So I think the, the, the initial thought would be, well, I need
someone who's really amazingly good at, you know, managing business data.
Because ultimately that's their job, right?
They need to be able to manage business data and create more, you know, co
cohesion between different functions and develop, uh, an ability to read
the tea leaves and have strong business acumen that based on that, , but then,
you know, they think about it and they're like, well, you know, if I'm
gonna hire a CRO in the way that you and I are proposing, which I think we
obviously were in agreement that they have to be somewhat like a more of a
leader of a lot of different functions.
It's really critical that person understands how to manage people and
drive, you know, I mean there's a lot of problems associated with that.
Sure.
Definitely.
You gotta manage up, you gotta manage down.
So this is the sort of, I'm leading up to a bit of a punchline here.
So the way that I sort of described it is, um, uh, I could delegate technical.
I can hire a rev ops leader who's amazing at this, and that person reports
to me and I can give that person a really clear direction and over time
accumulates some knowledge about it.
I can find someone who's really good at marketing.
I can put somebody in in charge of marketing who's a genius at marketing,
and I can manage that person's outcomes based on them my direction.
I can't delegate leadership.
I can't have somebody else be the leader for me.
Right.
Absolutely.
You can't, you have to do that yourself.
Hundred percent.
So you think about the thing you can't delegate, that's the thing that you have
to do and give it, given its importance, you have to do really well at it.
So I'm, I'm in agreement with you, but I, the reason I bring this up is
because while I haven't had any, had anybody argue this point, the problem
I'm seeing in the marketplace is that when people go to interview for a
COO job, they're not looked at that.
That way they're actually looked at for the skillsets that they can.
So someone would say, for example, a great leader would walk in the office and they'd
go, yeah, yeah, he's an amazing person.
My God, he really would be great on the team, but eh, you know,
he really doesn't really have a strong sense of data management.
Let's find somebody else.
And so they end up sort of doing the thing, I think that they look
at as more, um, um, what's the word?
Maybe more of a.
, an immediate, superficial need in.
Um, and they, and they sort of do it at the expense of someone who can really
manage things really well, you know?
Mm-hmm.
and, and I think that that's why a lot of CROs have a hard time getting
the job for the first time is because they have to earn their stripes.
by doing certain things, and then they find out later on that it's
the way someone actually operates and it actually is, is, is gonna
ultimately be more important.
So I I I, I don't wanna get into it too much, but I think it's a, it's an
interesting topic and it's one that I have a lot, so I, I'm glad you brought that up.
So another thing that you and I talked about as a topic here is,
and you mentioned already is.
You know, this shift that's taking place in the market right now.
Right.
This whole growth at all costs sort of mentality of the SAS-based or, you know,
subscription based businesses is really, was very successful for a long time.
That's how unicorns get created.
Yep.
You know, these companies, they just build multiples and multiples and multiples
and they're able to scale, scale, scale.
And um, this is the conundrum and I kind of wanna get into with you about
this because there's two reasons businesses are created, right?
One is to serve customer.
Yep.
And the other one is to make money.
Now everybody wants both, right?
Everybody wants ha, happy customers and a profitable business.
Of course they do, right?
And there, there are some.
But I think the thing is, is what is the context?
You know?
Is your business built because you want it to scale and grow and get
more like a higher valuation, right?
Or do you want it to be, you know, increase its stock price?
Or do you want to create an outcome for people that's really great and that
they love the product and those things.
Always easy.
You can't manage both of those things.
You know?
They, they don't always work together.
If I'm going for just making more money, I'm gonna sometimes have to do it at
the expense of the customer experience.
We all know this, right?
Yep.
And I, and I think what's happening, I do, I think that it's happening is a lot
of the tools in the marketplace, a lot of this automation now, The s d r sort
of wave that's going on, these, these new sort of organizational growth, um,
segment that's being built and all the subsequent industry that's being placed
around it, it seems to me that it's sort of hitting peak, you know, volume.
You know, I, I don't know about you cuz we're probably both around the
same, you know, age and whatnot, just how many inbound garbage messages
I get through every single channel.
, I am occupied right now.
As I told you, I had three spam calls from salespeople on my phone
yesterday, you know, and some very inconvenient places I have to tell you.
And um, so I just wanted to get into with you, you know, this idea of, of like, is
it really a shift or are people saying this, Because it sounds good to say, but
back in the back room people are still doing this stuff because they have to grow
cuz that's what everybody else is doing.
Like is it really changing or are people just kind of giving it
lip service that it's changing?
I don't, I'm not frankly sure.
Yeah.
So look, I think people are, you know, becoming more, uh,
acutely aware of the fact that.
You know, it's so valuable to keep really good customers, right?
We, we've sort of, we've known that people talk about, well, it's always easier to
keep a customer than it's cheaper to keep one, than to go out and get a new one.
And, and that's true.
And that's not necessarily, you know, a great scenario, but, okay.
So that, that is in fact the case.
And, you know, I think that, Like, let's, let's, let's talk about
like where that starts, right?
And, and I'm not, I'm not, this is not gonna be a commercial for revenue
based, but I, I think it's one of the reasons why we, you know, we
started the company is that this idea of really getting a sense of, does
this person have this problem or not?
Like, does this company have this issue potentially or not?
Are they sending out the signals that tell us.
and, and for us to help our customers do that is yielding dramatic impact
on their ability to drive not only the volume of the top of funnel,
but the amount that it's converting.
Why?
Because we're just talking to the right people about things they care about.
You know, this idea of the B to C sort of level of personalization
drifting into the B2B space, I think is really all about, like all the
noise and crap and poor execut.
That passes as, as, uh, work in some of these organizations.
And I maybe, I mean, I, I hear you.
I, I don't disagree in general, but I do think.
You know, I, I, cuz I'm pretty intimately close with a lot of the people that
are doing this sort of thing, and they have a lot of tools they're using, you
know, they have a lot of their, their, their sales stack and their, their
MarTech stack is pretty sophisticated.
You know, they're, they're doing a pretty good job of trying to scrape
the marketplace and identify their I C P and, you know, look, we're,
they're gonna get it wrong a lot.
There's no question about that.
We know that.
Um, but I don't think, I guess what I'm saying is I'm, I'm trying
to understand it to a bit like how much of, of it is laziness.
and how much of it is that?
In some respects, I think some businesses are cannibalizing their market, like
there's just not enough people to sell to.
Like they've already blown their opportunity with the people
that they do wanna sell to.
And without those people being in the funnel, they have to go reach others.
And so they're sort of like hoping that they can convert people to think
a certain way as opposed to going out for the people that they know they are.
I'm, I'm just trying to understand the, from your perspective.
Yeah.
What's, what, what's going on here?
Because there are some businesses that have pretty.
Tams, right?
They're, they're big and they have a lot of opportunities or a lot at
bats, but then there are a lot of companies who have a niche business
and they have a very small opportunity.
And you know, if you don't go about it right, you ruin the opportunity
you have with that small audience.
And I'm wondering like, how many of these calls are emails that I'm getting
are due to the fact that either a, just really bad targeting, like they're
just lazy and they've somehow made some assumptions that are wrong about me?
Or is it.
, they've actually already expunged all the people.
And now I'm like on the fringe and they're hoping that, eh,
maybe this guy will say yes to me.
Like what, what are your thoughts on that?
Cause I know you guys are doing this right now.
Yep.
What are the dynamics you think that affect this sort of thing that's going
on inside these companies right now?
So, not to be in bad form and contradict my, my host, but I'll give you, I
know you're, you're smart enough that.
It's okay.
I enough to know that's why we're here.
A little bit of a different approach, right?
Yeah.
So fundamentally, I don't agree with the fact that, you know,
that getting it wrong is o it.
I know you didn't say it's okay, but like, eh, you kind of just, ah, they're gonna
get it wrong some of the time and ah, they don't really know that ta It's like,
well, I think it's just like anything, you know, things go wrong sometimes.
I, I, I think when you're dealing with a large sets of opportunities
in repetition, you know you're gonna have, like anything, there's gonna.
Some misses.
Right.
I'm not saying it's a good thing.
I agree with you.
I don't, I'm not saying that you should allow it.
I'm simply saying it's a fact.
It's like physics, you know?
Like you, you're not gonna get it right all the time, but Okay, go ahead.
I'll So, so, so part of our mission is to eliminate that whole assumption and
that whole level of like, it's okay.
Right.
People do need to know exactly how big their TAM is.
Where are those people?
Where are those companies?
Where are those personas that we want to meet?
Right.
And like the acceptance of things like bounce rates in the 20 to 40%
we're like, that is not acceptable.
Okay.
That's, that's not, that's an assumption.
, uh, or a, a, a conclusion that we just simply don't agree is okay,
like that doesn't get it done.
Sure.
For us and for our customers.
And then, and then I would also, yeah.
Yeah.
I would, I would also add, you know, gr I, and I think people did the best they
could with what they knew was mm-hmm.
available, but like the world and the availability of information
and the technology around.
Uh, when applied in a more effective way, can yield dramatically improved outcomes.
. Which is, which is what we are doing.
Oh, your supposition here is this, your supposition here is that, is that because
of the way that we are today and the world today, the sophistication that we
have available today, there's no excuse.
Like you should be able to get it right.
Right.
That's basically what I'm hearing you say.
Right.
It's start to get it right.
Okay, I got it.
Right, right.
So then my question to you is this, cuz I, I, I'd rather avoid getting
into a conversation about your company, but more about your philosophy,
which is then why is it not right?
In other words, . Everyone has the same availability, the same technologies and
everything, and everybody wants that.
I mean, I don't think I'd sit down with any c e O right now
that would say, oh yeah, sure.
I want to get crap in my system.
They don't.
They all want it to work, right.
So what I'm saying is, why is it not?
Is it because they don't know what they're doing?
Is it like financial pressure?
Is it culture?
Is it technology?
Is it skill?
Is it knowledge?
Like, what do you think it is given the cause?
I agree with you.
There shouldn't be any reason why anybody gets this wrong
anymore, but so many people do.
What's happening?
Yeah.
In your view, that's going on out there, that it's going on,
what's the, what's the reason?
So sometimes I think it's, it's a little bit of a, Of a, of a mindset around like
cast that wide net, get every deal we can.
Even the ones out on the fringe, even if they're not a great fit,
like, like let's just like get it in.
Right.
This is the vanity metric sort of thing.
Well, I don't know that it's vanity.
I think these are, look, these are all very bright people.
They're not unintelligent.
They know exactly.
They, I mean these people are, and excuse me, but many of them.
Much more skilled than I am.
Sure, sure.
Right.
I get it.
Are are making some very good decisions with, with what they know, but there is
this like risk of like, well, should we just cast the net a little bit wider?
A little bit wider?
Then you're doing that with some people that you know, these young professionals
that maybe not have been as well trained, so you're maybe starting sales cycles.
People on the fringe versus like those people at the core that you really meet.
You know, they have an intense level of challenges that you solve.
Sure.
With your solution.
That's like your ideal customer profile.
Yeah.
I would say if you can put more energy into that, i C P, not only are you
gonna close deals at a higher rate, but you're gonna retain them all Right.
You're gonna have a chance to expand them.
Yep.
The, this idea of like, we don't know.
Now, I'm not saying that you sort of put your blinders on and focus.
If you wanna see what's out in the fringe, then go run some experiments
that you can actually measure and execute against to, to run a test.
Right?
You want to go to a new vertical?
Absolutely.
Go there.
I love that.
Sure.
Actually, but do it in a very structured way with a degree of knowledge and don't,
don't rely on maybe your existing team.
To execute that experimentation.
It's, it's gonna debilitate them.
It's gonna demoralize them if it's not successful.
But if they go into it saying, Hey gang, we're gonna go out
and we're gonna like, go test.
We're gonna go, we're gonna dive into the jungle and we're gonna
see if there's a path here.
Got it.
Right.
So then you're, you're, you're, let's say, because I, I hear you.
Let's say you're a chief revenue officer at a company.
, get your job to, as you say, steward, make all these things that are going on.
Yeah.
And you know, you're getting a directive, um, that might sound,
I, I'm sure it happens a lot.
Something like pipeline's just not big enough.
I'm looking at the system.
I, I did a run at readout of our Salesforce and we're just seeing, it just
seems light to me, you know, given the, the metrics that you've provided us in
terms of our close rates and our time to close and whatever the case may be.
Um, the sales cycle.
We're concerned that, you know, we're not gonna have enough opportunities in
the, in the pipe in another three or four months, and I need you to get it up there.
Now you know that you've been following the philosophy that you've just laid
out, which you, you've been really targeted and really focused on having
the right conversations, and you and I know that those take a little bit longer.
You nurture people, et cetera, et cetera.
Yep.
And someone's basically saying to look, just increase it.
I.
My board is looking at this and they're really worried and they have a concern
now that, you know, the pipeline seems to reflect right, the opportunities we
have in the marketplace and that cascades towards, you know, some bad returns and
we need you to do something about it.
What's the CROs way to handle that in your context so that
they can deal with that reality?
That happens a lot, you know, what do you think?
Yeah.
Um, look, I think that there needs to be a, a level of understanding before.
, it gets to that point, right?
Once that horse has sort of left the barn, it's really hard to get it back in.
Like you don't have a time machine, so you can't go back and start looking at
like, why are we winning some deals?
Why are we losing some deals?
Where, where maybe does this same issue exist in maybe an
adjacent market like the job?
of the cro O is to be seeing around those corners.
Mm-hmm.
in advance.
Yep.
Right.
So yes, all of the metrics of what's happening today, but being fully
aware and, and in lockstep with the c e o and frankly the board to know,
like where, where we need to get to, they start seeing pipeline drying up
if their, if their metrics are being followed and they know their unit
economics and, and all the associated.
Measures around their business.
They should have seen this coming long before.
. Okay.
Recognizing like there, there's a challenge, like what do you do about it?
Now look, you're going to, you, you dig in with your teams and you start relying
on the people around you to see mm-hmm.
, if there's any other insight, is there anything we should be changing
about how we're going about it?
Has there been some shift, for example, externally in the market, like we
haven't seen with the competitor?
What, what is, what is it that's bringing about all of a sudden if
we were doing really well, well, what is it that's changed and
now as a group, what can we do?
Hmm.
. Yeah, I agree.
So I would, I would lean on the people around.
So you're, you're saying it really has to do really with the upfront work that you
do, not the tactical work that Absolutely.
Right.
And frankly, I agree with, and, and frankly, I would say it gets down to
the level, to some of your most junior people and how they're being supported
and nurtured and how they're, how they're being, uh, to level up their
professional and technical skills.
Yeah.
You know, I agree.
It's all much about the framework of setting things up.
And we'll get into this cuz I wanna just chat a bit about.
Some of the evidence of how this isn't happening.
And, you know, I see these, um, and again, I, I, I don't want sound like
I'm demeaning like this whole group of people because I, I talk a lot
about the SDR thing and you know, the pushback is, oh, come on, these are great
people and they're doing a hard job.
And, you know, it's a tough thing and I.
Totally agree with that.
Like, I don't have any issue at all with the people that
are making these phone calls.
I don't, they're just doing their job.
They're being told to do something and they're doing it and they're
doing difficult job, and they're, some of 'em are really good at it.
So it's not that it's the, it's the strategy I have a problem with.
It's the deployment that I have a problem with.
It's that some of these people are being asked to make a hundred calls
a day or whatever the metric is.
That maybe was fueling my earlier comment, which is if I'm gonna make a hundred
calls a day, I know that, you know, a good point of be people that I probably
shouldn't have called in the first place, but I have to make a hundred calls a day.
So it's sort of baked into the system to some degree that I'm gonna do a lot
of misses, but the volume gets the, the check mark at the end of the day, right?
Mm-hmm.
. And so, so the way that I would like to walk through something with you
is, so what I counsel my clients on getting a chief revenue officer job, I
tell 'em the same thing you just did.
I say, look, your job success is gonna be predicated on one thing,
and that is the agreement that you have with your C E O and how
you're gonna go to market together.
Because if you don't have that together, then you're sort of at the mercy
of every whim that comes up, right?
Yes.
How do you do that, right?
How do you establish it?
So I wanna ask you that question, so, so you're look at it from
both perspectives, right?
You're a C R O or a C E O.
What's the manner in which you'd suggest or advise counsel a new c
r o to establish that relationship so that that doesn't happen?
What's the.
to do that in your I see.
Any the, it's the key element that has to exist in any meaningful
relationship and its trust.
I think there's a level of credibility that has to come along with that.
I think there's a level of transparency and a personal accountability
goes an awful long way, you know?
. It's doing those little things in the beginning.
Those things that you really can do as you're trying to get your
feet underneath you as you're trying to understand the business.
It's overcommunicating and it, it's really helping that c e o understand,
like, wow, this person really like, knows what they're doing.
They're looking down the road.
They're buttoned up.
They're, they're giving me, I'm gonna say like giving me energy
because they're not making me really.
and like have to put in like a lot of extra work to understand what's going on.
They're, they're actually, they're, they're making me smarter.
Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
And I think that that goes a very long way into establishing that trusting
relationship and that healthy dynamic.
Of, Hey, we're not like looking across the, the room pointing
our fingers at each other.
We're actually sitting next to each other at a table looking at the same problem,
maybe from different angles, but really driving to that same ultimate conclusion
that we've all agreed is our objective.
Yeah, I got it.
And so, you know, my a hundred percent agree, it, it, it, I think
it starts to, the interview process.
, right?
I mean, so again, big conversation to have with my clients a lot is when you're
looking at a Chief Revenue officer role, like instead of being in a situation
where you're just trying to get the job, try and create the job right.
the job that's gonna work because this is a job that traditionally doesn't
last . Most CROs last about 17 months or 18 months or something like that.
And that's not good for either party, right?
I mean, it's a very expensive failure, right?
For everyone.
Um, and so, you know, I'm, and I'm in the, I'm in the midst of this
discussion with a lot of my clients right now, which is what's the
right way to set the foundation up.
To that end, um, this kind of gets into the conversation about hiring, which
I know you and I have talked about a little bit too, and the way that CROs
need to start thinking differently about hiring and, you know, this is
a whole other like big disciplinary problem we're seeing in the marketplace.
I have more and more friends of mine or people that I know that are incredibly
skilled at something, but they can't get jobs because the hiring criteria.
is not looking for the skills that they have, it's looking for
other things that are different.
Right.
And so, you know, people are making the wrong very, I think sometimes superficial
hiring decisions and they're not predicating it on what people really need.
So I'm just curious, if you're a c o and you're in a situation where you're
building your team, what are some thoughts you have on the way hiring is changing
and the way you need to be looking?
Oof.
Um, you know, I don't know that it's really, that it's really changed.
, um, for me, so to, to call it, you know, how I see it changing.
I mean, look, there's definitely been this, this, um, this, this shift from
a, it being sort of a candidate market to a, to a company market, right?
It's right.
Um, you know, people that, that didn't want to talk to me, uh, two months ago
or now they're, now they're calling me, they want to talk again cuz
you know, we're hiring up the team.
Um, so I don't, I don't know that it's really changed for me.
Uh, I would say that one of the things that I struggle with and, and I hope
the recruiters out there, don't get angry at me because I know you're
doing what you've been asked, which is like, I feel like when you're working
with a client sometimes, , like you're looking for the client to describe the
ice cube tray, and then your job is to go out and find ice cubes that like
fit into it from a technical skill.
And given sort of my, my background and, and my mentality as it relates to
people and in general and professionals, I, I, I just like indications of
people being interested in what they're doing and committed to it.
Um, when I'm interviewing candidates, I'm frankly like, I, I've, I've interviewed
some great candidates and when I ask 'em, like, tell me about the latest
like sales book that you've read or tell me about like the things that you're
doing every day to improve your craft.
And I go, well, you know, I, I followed this person on LinkedIn and I've like
watched a couple of YouTube videos and I'm, to me, I'm alright, well, what
have you tell me about the latest one.
You saw it, what'd you get out of it?
How did you apply it?
You know, they're not invested in themselves.
Mm-hmm.
, and I thought, I think, you know, geez, I'm, I'm about to like, give
a significant amount of my time and energy to this individual.
I'd like to be met halfway.
I'd like to be working with someone who's as, who is as interested.
in themselves as I am mm-hmm.
in terms of their professional success.
Okay.
And it just sometimes you don't see, it sounds like that that's, uh,
you're speaking to candidates, right.
Whom are bringing themselves to the marketplace and how they
should be positioning themselves.
Well, I think it's, I think it's that, but also, you know, for.
For people that we're being, that we're asking to help us
find really good candidates, like we, we give them direction that
Oh, I see what you're saying.
It's not just about the technical Yeah.
Fitting, fitting a box.
You know, I, I talk to a lot of recruiters and, and the problem
that most of them have, as you probably know, is that they do bring.
Innovative people or different types of people to the table.
And their boss goes, what'd you bring me?
This person for this person isn't a fit.
Get 'em outta here.
You know?
Um, you don't know what you're doing.
You know?
Uh, I asked you to get me the square peg to go into the square peg,
and you brought me a round one.
Get outta my office.
This person is so good.
And I used to have this conversation.
I was working in a big, big company and they had this, you
know, recruiting department.
They'd say to me, you know, dude, they don't, they don't
want people that are innovative.
If I, if I bring somebody to the table that has this specific type
of you, Business skill or this specific type of personality trait
that I know would be good here.
They look at them and they say, this person never worked in an agency before.
I don't.
Why are you bringing this person to me?
I don't even wanna talk to this person.
So there's constraints, right?
Um, so I, I, I, it, it's broken.
I mean, there isn't any doubt about that.
I mean, the problem right now too is, you know, if you put your resume in any
one of these online systems right now, a bunch of AI bots look at a bunch of
keywords and that's how they get show.
So it's a, it's a robot that's making a decision.
So, you know, I think there's two sides of this, right?
One is you have a recruiting layer, right?
Who you've deployed into the marketplace did sift through the marketplace
for you and bring you back bodies.
I understand that and I know that, you know, if I'm a small company, you know
I have some degree of control over how I put those people to market and I can
say, you know, I want you to look for innovators or I want you to look for
people that can like address these things.
I don't think most people are that creative.
Most people say, I need a project manager and I need somebody who's been a project
manager at a company like this that's worked on projects like this successfully.
Cuz I need someone to do that for me tomorrow.
Right.
I can't afford to like build this person up over the next six months
cause I need this done tomorrow.
I want someone that can jump right in here and get into my system and start doing it.
And that's a real need.
I don't think that's a, there's anything to be said about that.
I think that we're working in an immediacy based society right now in our industries,
which are, you know, very fast moving.
and, you know, I'm, I'm guilty of this.
I mean, I look for people and I'm like, I need someone that can, I can
hire tomorrow and they can jump into my thing and fix it for me, you know?
Um, and I probably am overlooking people who might be better at it if,
you know, I gave 'em a little bit more time, but I don't have the time.
So, you know, I'm looking at this, again, I, I don't wanna give this
new recruiting conversation as much as, as a chief Revenue Officer, and
I'm saying this again, from that perspective, you have a lot of people.
Bring together.
You've got marketing people, you've got sales people, you've got customer success
people, you've got technical people.
So, you know, what's the sort of, I don't know if there is an answer to this
question, but you know, what's the Cro o's sort of perspective that needs to
be brought to that conversation when the CRO wants to build the right team?
Cuz this team is gonna be the way that that steward is gonna fulfill
on the obligations that you have.
Right?
So I think one of the first things that you want to do is,
you know, rely on the structure.
That any structure that you have in place, you wanna leverage, right?
Whether it's your head of customer success, focusing
on their, on their people.
Um, and you're also supporting them, right?
That first team mentality of really helping out your teammates internally.
So I think in a way you've gotta have them sort of shoulder.
some of the, the load in terms of hiring and you really owe it to them to
give them a structure in which to have candidates participate in an interview
process that's really well thought out.
Right?
It has to be detailed and it's less about maybe the titles they've had
or the companies they've been in and necessarily maybe the industries,
but there are other elements.
that you will also want to have on that scorecard for a particular role.
Mm-hmm.
, but you've gotta do that homework upfront.
Mm-hmm.
in terms of defin.
, like what is a good fit for this position?
Yeah, yeah.
But then also rely on the structure that you have in place.
Other, other managers or teammates.
I mean, shoot, I've got AEs on our team now doing role play
interviews with candidates.
Yeah.
It sounds like it's more like, um, a competency based
approach as opposed to a job.
Approach, which I agree with, and you have to assess those competencies.
So we're getting close to end here cause we, you and I can talk for another hour.
I can tell.
Sure.
But, um, I wanna give you a minute to just expound on one thing before I close out.
And that is, is this, um, if you could give a, I'm trying to think
how to do this the best way.
If you could, if you were speaking to a chief executive officer of a company
that you like kinda look at in the space that we are in, like a revenue,
uh, like a subscription based or a SaaS based company right now, and they
were looking to hire their first c R O.
In a, in a minute, what would be some of the things that you'd say
they need to be thinking about to appoint their first chief revenue
officer and the approach they should take before they make that decision?
So I would, I would have them do some introspection on themselves, maybe where
they see some of their, their gaps.
Um, working closer to strengths, some areas where they would really
be looking for a partner in crime to.
To collaborate with and then, um, you know, maybe look at areas where they're,
they have strengths that maybe they don't necessarily need this person to possess.
Sort of a nice to have, need to have.
Um, I would also say that spends get plan on spending some time with this person.
, um, maybe consider some type of arrangement where you're able to
work with them on a contract basis for a period of time leading up to
the hire, if they're open to that.
It kind of gives both parties the chance to get to know each other date
before you get married, so to speak.
Yep.
Okay.
Um, and, uh, uh, I would say that, um, you know, understand the technical
skills that you want this person to.
and just ensure that they can either like, lock that down or have resources
to, to quickly get schooled up on the areas where they may not have
as strong a, a visibility of, you know, the technical side of things.
Um, we talked about our, talked about it earlier, Warren, is this idea of,
I would put a high emphasis on the professional skills, the leadership
skills, times where they failed.
Mm-hmm.
, where they speak freely about.
. Mm-hmm.
, are they gonna withhold that?
Do they have the confidence to, to speak to that and articulate like where
they've, where they've won mm-hmm.
despite those, those losses, like what are they made of?
Mm-hmm.
. Right.
Um, spend some time doing that.
Because it is a very important hire.
Yep.
It's, it's the, the most important hire.
So all, we're running out of time, but this was great.
Like I really had really some great, I hope people find it helpful.
I appreciate you.
Yeah, no, no problem.
I mean, it's a good topic cuz I think the CROs are being hired wrong,
you know, to be honest with you.
They're not being hired properly.
Um, and your perspective is really valuable, so thank you for that.
So how can people reach you and, and what's the best way they can get in
touch with you and what are you up to?
Yeah, so, uh, uh, the best way is, uh, Mike revenue base.ai, um, is my email.
I, I will just say I look, I've been where people are when they've struggled,
and one of the things I'd always hoped is that somebody would just take a
minute and listen to me and maybe help me out a little bit and not just,
you know, dismiss me out of hand.
So I promised myself that if I was ever in a position to help somebody, I was gonna.
and, um, so I'm, I'm all ears to anybody that, you know, may want to
chat and, uh, maybe have a, have a, a, a method of sort of, you know, safe
place to talk and some place to provide 'em with a little bit of support.
Who isn't gonna go around gossiping about the challenges, who's gonna
more revel in their successes?
So, um, that's probably the best way of getting ahold of me.
I'm on linked.
, um, it's, uh, Michael j Schumann is, is the handle.
And, um, you know, I'm, like I said, I'm just thrilled to have been
here and thanks Warren, and keep up the good work on your end too.
Well, thank you.
I, there's great conversation and you brought a lot of really
good things to talk about here.
So thank you very much for your perspective and your experience.
So, uh, we're signing off Mike Schumann.
Thank you very much and, uh, looking forward to talk to you more.
Pleasure.