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one of the best things that happens with the sales team is when they say no to the customer and they realize that what your expertise is is not a fit it sounds so simple but that comes from the
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leadership on down I've been in so many pitches where it's like before we get to the demo we're gonna just go through a few slides and it's like 30 slides people on my team are like we get it can we get the demo absolutely we're going to get right to the demo after these three slides I have a theory about the
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future and it's a pessimistic one I think we're gonna keep asking people to join cyber join cyber they are going to get burnt out they're not going to be treated correctly they're just going to be tired of what they do [Music]
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[Music] thank you [Music]
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foreign I have to be honest I love business I've had a couple businesses you know when you start your first business you're all excited and you make a bunch of mistakes as you make more businesses you start to
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learn a thing or two get a little bit better when you look at a business you look at all the components that makes it up you look at marketing right how do you get the brand out to the world the lifeblood of business is sales because if you don't have Revenue then you're not able to pay your people you're not
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able to invest in the company and we have one of the best sales people in cyber security Jonathan and I want to ask you in the immortal words of Leonardo DiCaprio sell me this pen
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this is gonna be fun this is going to be fun so that's funny you start with this right because this is a common scenario that happened and we all know it's not about the pen it's not about me it's not about a company
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it's about the customer so it sounds like you're not selling me all right but we could be friends and we also brought in another friend as well we're talking about building relationships we brought in Samara Williams someone who I'm sure sales people all the time wants to build a relationship with as a purchaser of
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cyber security software right yes I bought a lot of things in the past couple years and that's kind of put me on this map but uh the sales person is everything my first big girl job I was a personal trainer so I was selling myself and that was easy to sell I knew myself best right but I quickly learned that it
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was about the customer as you said so now that's made me very biased especially when people don't do their homework on somebody like me before before pitching to me so doing the homework why is the homework so important I I would imagine the homework is important especially when I do
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something like when I step into the sales role is that you really really want to understand who they are if you come in blind I think you can sort of like start to pull it out during that conversation but I think there's something special about doing the work beforehand what would you say hey 100 I think it's one of the biggest areas that
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gets overlooked especially in sales you know they think it's a one and done sort of conversation it's not these Partnerships are stemmed way before the conversation happens practitioners doing research and checking out the companies and understanding things but then from
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like the sales side the time you get is incredibly valuable you know you take that measure of time and then you look at what the value of it is and you look at what you're bringing to it so the mindset coming in is very focused is this somebody that you can help and then
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more importantly what's going to be valuable for them so preparation is huge normally when something goes wrong it's a hundred percent in the sales side in their control and it normally begins without preparation right you know speaking of preparation when we met you
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were always prepared always prepared to show up have a great time and it never felt like you were ever selling anything right I haven't bought anything from you yet but I know that if I if I right if I were to I would call someone that I know and that I trust that can give me great feedback and opinion and
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you know a product that I could use for my team but what I see in my perspective is a lot of fluff on LinkedIn on email someone got my email or my phone number and it seems like in some ways there the hacker even maybe more so than I am
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because they're able to pull so much my personal information so like when y'all think about cyber security sales where are we at today it's a big discussion yeah it's a big discussion I mean the good I mean especially the scenario you're talking
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about LinkedIn and how powerful it is and all the benefits that we can all think about you know and then you think about your inbox Samara your inbox right now I can only even imagine what it is you gave me a little buffer there because I was really trying to think
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about like a one-word answer to talk about where we are in sales right now and from my perspective it's about quantity and not necessarily quality it feels like sales people are just throwing these these messages out there it's trying to get as many practitioners and many
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leaders many purchasers as possible and a little a little trick that I like to use okay so in in my LinkedIn name I either have an emoji in the front or I put like a middle initial that way I can tell if it's if it's automated right it's not going to say hi samara's gonna
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say hi Samara R and I'm gonna be like okay so this wasn't personalized I'm gonna sit on I'm going to sit on that one for a little bit so that's for the sales people and the practitioners right right yeah no that's awesome we do these polls on LinkedIn where we're trying to
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gauge how everyone feels because we can't just go off of our feeling alone we have to actually pull the data and the poll was like where are we at when it comes to selling in cyber security the poll was whether you think sales is fine as is like everything is good
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everything's perfect no improvements needed some good some bad on the next one the one after that is because I actually terrible it's actually really really bad and we need to change something needs to disrupt it and then the the last selection was I'm a
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salesperson I just want to know what everyone else is saying because I wanted to invite everybody to the party and it was funny 60 just about 60 percent said that there's some good and some bad and that's to be expected only three percent said that it was absolutely fine as is
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and there were some people in the comments really really passionate about like no it's fine I'm telling you it's so fine but I do think there is definitely some room to go uh the other 18 was of course the sales people that wanted to know the data and then the
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rest said it was absolutely terrible and then there is needs to be disruption where do you feel like we're going wrong when it comes to sales smart yeah throw that one over to me I think about when I think about our conversation you talked about how there
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are now cyber security degrees and how there are now programs where you can get into for sales when before there wasn't so I think change is inevitable I would never answer that it's just fine as is right because I think it's going to continue to grow I think it has a lot of growing to do as well but then I think
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about us as as practitioners as well and relying on our vendors so much you know you have you're either a build or a buy organization and if you're a buy organization how many vendors are you working with and are you making your own life harder just the Dynamics of how
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many companies how many options how many different programs how many different items you're dealing and then you subdivide that by the groups that you are and then as opposed to you know the move to consolidate in the move to kind of streamline the delivery of Enterprise sales right now there's incredible
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world-class Talent that's out there and then especially when you look at like the product sets and the relationship and the depth and the trust it's at a tier that's eons compared to when I first got into it and then as we were talking about most people in sales today
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they kind of got into it they didn't have a degree for it and that wasn't something now the program so where are we going with it as well I think the world-class experts the ones who really take it as a trade craft to improve they're sharing knowledge you can follow
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them all on LinkedIn or their blogs or they have their own side hustle knowledge is it the way they're spreading is really strong and I think when I look at the Next Generation they're coming in way more conscientious about what Excellence looks like they're
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coming in with a degree in intentionality right and they're really good and I think there's way more perspective to get because of discussions like this to learn how do people think so I'm excited about it yeah I would imagine that part of it is
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reaching more people reaching more people faster more aggressively I guess what are your thoughts there like when you think about like the ecosystem that we live in as practitioners it sounds like you take a different approach but I'm sure that you've worked with organizations or peers heard stories
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that where you know sales people are taking like more so these tactics well I mean first thought right it's all about the customer and then you back into it well who's going to benefit the most from what you offer and if you have the intention and you're like very specific on who you reach out to that alone
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absolutely just stands out compared to like spray away or you know here's you know Jonathan the human bot sending a note all the time on things and there's so many more ways to do social selling and come in with trusted relationships there's ways to come in and actually
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participate listening into podcasts uh commenting being a part of communities there's way more ways to authentically engage than the old uh show up at a doorstep or or just again send a lot of notes with no response right yeah if
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I've seen your name on LinkedIn here and there I think I'd be more likely to click on that message and be like oh I didn't know this person was a Salesman would you click online [Laughter]
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we talked about having a sales program or degree that people can come in we know that some cyber folks tend to get a little arrogant or act a little exclusive to those who don't have cyber security degrees can come up in so are we going to continue are we going to see
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a rise in sales arrogance as a result no interesting what do you think I've never even thought about it as well I mean because of the degree and because of the specialization is that
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what you're asking about will there be yeah I mean you still have to do your homework right there's still soft skill aspects to a cyber security degree there's it's going to be the same for sales I think the element that besides like tactics and like you know understanding which script to use or like which kind of approach I think it's
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going to be more of like the humanistic element of it too as well more of like the EQ stuff that I think that's going to really understand like I see specialization coming in and like you know I see the future of being like besides sales and methodology and the EQ
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stuff you could sub-specialize in cyber security and get really into like understanding the personas and different tools and focus maybe cross almost like cross-pollination between different programs within a university I think there's incredible amount to like bring
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in those elements to it and I think that's where it's going to go well to your point I've had sales meetings where people are just writing down everything that I'm saying because they don't necessarily comprehend but they want to take it back to their you know Engineers but I have a conversation with you or other sales folks that I really enjoy
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but it's a conversation it's not smart preaching about her problems to you know to Jonathan how important is that really understanding the terminology the plight of the practitioner is that super super important or can you still do business
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with a salesperson that has no idea what they're even really selling depends on what they're selling if it speaks for itself you know what I'm saying so person is everything because we talked about functionality we've talked about use cases that we need to fulfill right with a tool but if the sales person
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doesn't get me support faster and that that changes that changes renewal that changes you know expanding the portfolio and what you purchase so I think it does in the maintenance aspect aspect of the relationship maybe not so much the
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initial interesting for what would you say what is your response to that as well I really think it depends I think it depends because I have seen tag team Duos where you have like a really good sales person and then a really good sales engineer right and they work together like seamlessly because then I
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think you can kind of divide and conquer I mean it's very similar to when we look at csos whether they're like really focused on business or they have a little bit of hacking ability I think it's all about balance so if you have something to offset the other I think that works but if you have someone that's really just kind of doing
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everything themselves they're they're the only sales person they're only one having the conversation I think you really have to have that technical component really understand the plight of the practitioner the leader whoever you're selling to so I think that's really really important what was it like for you coming into the space of cyber
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like did you find it was difficult to wrap your mind around everything that you were selling or what was that Journey like for you it certainly was and I mean I kind of got into it really by happenstance I happened to find a company it seemed like a really interesting fit I understood what they
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did and it made sense and it ended up it was an organization that did multi-factor authentication and we had a successful exit and ended up joining Microsoft back in 2012 and but the biggest thing about it was it was a really elegant and really clean product
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and that was one thing I didn't realize at the time like how clean how smooth and also how important that was it solved the direct need it was super easy for the customer low drama and just delivered and that was something that always stuck with me because it helped
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the learning curve and it helped the confidence right with it and there's a lot of complexity between a lot of solutions that are out there as well right now so for somebody coming in new it's all about the leadership team that's there what sort of enablement program they have as you said the typical tag team Duo between the
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technical is an incredible approach to help out to help for the customer as well because the technical folks they don't really want to follow up on all the business side or own all that because they want to really own and establish the trust I see the trend
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going where you're going to have more of the hybrid technical slash business going into it a little bit more that's what we're seeing a little bit more in the industry too right you mentioned acquisition so it sounds like you were you started in cyber security working at a startup just would you agree with that
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correct okay 100 and that's what I feel like a lot of the companies are at the you know when they're selling a lot of cyber security software they're trying to like make a name for themselves they'll spray and pray you know that's what you'll have to do or feel like you have to do but what about that new sales
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engineer or that new sales rep that comes into a company they don't know about the space they don't have the contacts yet what tactics are they going to take what tactics would you recommend that they take I would be maniacal on your learning and
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you can break it down into like passive learning which is as we were talking about earlier consuming podcasts reading blogs I would just be a maniac on that and I would see what really sticks and like where do you get going I think from there you're going to organically kind
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of lean into whatever the interests are or the type of community as well LinkedIn there's incredible stuff to follow I feel like the industry itself is incredibly collaborative and if you're reaching out and you're genuinely curious or you want to engage you're going to end up getting that engagement
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so that's what I would recommend is just learn learn because the the space changes so much but I just think that's going to like dictate where you go next I would even say hang on to the hotels of a fantastic you know sales person as
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yourself or a practitioner that you may have met somewhere and having those introductions from them and growing that way can kind of come with the credibility there's like credibility inherently and then you could you build on it it's much easier than starting from the bottom yeah and trying to build
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that credibility going to conferences was one of the biggest things that helped me out as well on my end I know it's a little bit harder right now with people's travel budgets or situations but like being in the room and bringing a humanistic element and you see people and it's like you meet somebody in the
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shrimp scampi line and then like you know 36 hours later you're best friends with them again because you've seen them in the elevator going to like to work out so it's just funny things like that at the end of the day it's all humans trying to do good and I feel like that's a way to accelerate your learning too
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and your network I've been in sales my whole career so over 20 plus years I fell into sales I was doing Car Wash sales the number one pipeline for talent and so I was doing a job in college and I happened to get
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noticed and a Fortune 500 executive was going to get their car wash they gave me a card and next thing you know that was my first shot job wow so I really got fortunate my first opportunity over time I ended up finding my way into cyber security and I feel like it was a
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blessing when it happened where the space was it was 2009 I joined an early stage startup we had a successful outcome it was really exciting and I got hooked and so I've always been with startups and part of the growth Mission it's where I learned to partner with
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practitioners and to learn the space is constantly evolving you have to keep improving I think that's one of my favorite things about it you always got to be learning and growing let's talk a little bit about the the Badness that we're seeing in from a sales perspective
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because you were talking about the automation you're even starting to manipulate how your name shows up in order to say hey is this automated obviously I think to a degree I'm sure sales is a numbers game or we need to have as many interactions as possible but now people are looking at automation
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to enable that from your perspective would you ever look at an initial message and immediately be like you know what I'm going to enter into a sales cycle with somebody is there a message that would actually work yeah I'm not a huge fan of sales people assuming that I
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need their either for one and I'm not a huge fan of sales people hey how are you trying to act like you're not about to sell me something so I realize this is complex and I asked for it right right but I have found that middle ground where people are like this is where I'm
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from this is you know who I represent and I'd love to have this much time with you 15 minutes right and tell you what I have to offer I love messages like that I do I do and on a given day you talked
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about meetings and providing value on a busy week I will average 10 to 11 meetings a day so when a salesperson reaches out to me and they want my time it's good to have that background knowledge like okay I'm going to prioritize these eight different messages in my LinkedIn right who do I
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want to go after which one because I'm a gut person right so if I like the message I'm going to reply to it but it's generally in the middle of those two things when this errors are going to get a lot of messages I do reply to people so I'm gonna I'll say I will reply to all the sales
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messages that I get really every single one I do I do I reply to them I don't like to ignore people um sometimes I'm just like hey friend nah I'm good or I'm like you know you're gonna have to schedule something with me in November I'll push it out a few months and stuff but I reply to everybody wow yeah so if all of a sudden
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you were moved over let's say we did like a classic movie scene we switched roles and and then exactly you're on you're on the business side what would you do what would your approach be oh my gosh so I think I've I've said this to you before but I do feel like I'll end up on that side and I
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feel like I'm going to kill it because I love people breaking news because I love people you know what I mean and I will get to know the people and I like looking at people as individuals and understanding how they communicate and I will tailor my communication based on
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the person and I'll do my homework and I will find somebody that knows that person right I think it's a lot of preparation it's a long con right but a positive content like a good one so it is exactly you're gonna fit right
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and my plan my plan is to get to where I am as a you know practitioner Build That Base and then potentially you know switch sides maybe go to the dark side oh we talked about the dark side yeah you hear that a lot right on there and
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so it's really fun to see folks with backgrounds that are grounded and they're cemented in like real truth and they do move over on there so it's always fun to hear somebody say they're going to the dark side but the truth is that's where the industry is going to be more specific for the customer right
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flip the question you're in smart seat you're back to back in meetings you know that you have a little bit of Hands-On work to do as well and you have about 30 minutes to talk to someone that might have a product that you're interested in but you have no idea you never met this
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person what do you want to see if you were the practitioner what kind of things you know strike you as a customer when you put yourself in that seat I'd want some sort of framework to like lay out the state of my program before heading in I feel like a lot of time it gets wasted around that as well like if
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I was a practitioner right I would just want to either like have prepared these are my top three to five things this is the only area our team's focusing on with time and resources or like these are kind of like my big bets if you're looking out over x amount of time frame I think I would put that out earlier and
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I put that out often and then also if there is absolutely no need be upfront about it from the jump yeah speaking of efficiency I've been in so many pitches where it's like all right before we get to the demo we're gonna just go through a few slides and it's like 30 slides and
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then I've even been I've been in scenarios where people on my team are like hey we get it great company love it can we get to the demo like absolutely we're going to get right to the demo after these three slides and then I'll like go right back through them when you're looking at the actual like Sales
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Event when you're in there in person how important is it to really understand like what do people want to see do they want to understand more about the company or do they want to really get right to the tech huge huge you know I think the biggest thing is to ask up front like a level setting you know
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what's your engagement with us before this call why did you take this meeting um you know a simple little like self hack is like if you can't write in the invite the purpose of the meeting is and fill it in with one sentence then you're probably walking into a meeting that's going to head head into that or it
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shouldn't be happening and it shouldn't be the duration that it is so I think that's another biggest thing as well because in our space you know we've seen so many folks it's everyone's moving and progressing and and taking on new roles it's incredible amount of times we'll go into a meeting we'll just ask what's
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your engagement been with us before and our team will find out they've used our product at the last two or three shops and they've got a really strong Baseline it's like okay great let's skip that stuff we'll get you up to speed on what's new you tell me why are we here I mean so there's little things like that
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right but if you just show up and you just you know hit the play button and roll into the script yeah that's no good I've asked for the slides ahead of time before oh y'all hate that because hey hey I'm like hey you know I can read so I'm gonna do that and I'll ask you
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any questions I'm confused about otherwise oh tool it's a good approach that's a serious approach yeah I'll let you underneath the hood of at least how Chris and I used to work together when we would look at new Solutions we would have a thread and we would just like say name a solution with a little thread
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emoji and start chatting there and talking about the ideas that we want to see out of this organization out of this vendor or this product and then also jump back in there after the the conversation or the call and then you know take that and put it into notes
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ultimately and documentation so that's how we you know often look at it I would imagine someone similar for you but I want to know what what happens for sales people you're talking about all this preparation in the front and I'm sure at the end what goes on in like you know
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the mind or the calls of the sales organizations so I'll skip to the end the punch line on there it's all when it's done well remarkably boring yeah yeah that's the truth right it's natural it's very organic behind the scenes though there's a lot of rigor there's
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different organizations have different processes or methodology because they want a consistent unified customer experience and when we were talking about organizations have multiple Investments and multiple Partnerships across the org just within single companies they might be talking with
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multiple streams of folks so the biggest thing is like staying true to the process and making sure that it follows and you don't just wildly skip over because you're excited you know in the words of Samara why are we here what does she need what's she building and then you should have clear reasons of
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why you're moving from that process onto the the next and that's really kind of how it goes but it's always following a process and there's no surprises when it's done right let's talk about the the process because I think it's changed I became a student of sales I'd say right
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around 2012 and it was very much that old school pressure sales like hey close have that conversation make sure you're closing business like if you're not closing business you're not a good salesperson but then I would say right around the social media eras where things started to change and I have
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things like social selling like building a relationship I know you said you don't like when people just reach out like hey I just wanted to get to know you thanks all right see you later I actually I appreciate it I I like it when people come to me and they don't immediately ask me of something they'd say hey I
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love what you're doing with XYZ the podcast or business whatever it is and then kind of leave it like that I say cool appreciate it thanks and then maybe they'll come back and say something else that isn't necessarily tied to sales I'm like okay cool and then eventually whether I put something out as opposed post or they see an opportunity to be
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like oh you're an XYZ company and I just heard that they're looking for XYZ solution then it's almost like okay they've already built Rapport ready to rock and roll I've always wholeheartedly believed that you really do business with people that you like I like you so much like even if I didn't necessarily
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need the solution you were selling I'd be like okay how can I use this how can I use this solution I I can't really I'm so sorry man I can't use it right now but I think that really having that relationship is super super important I'm a little different I I'm I'm very technical in nature I
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like to get to the details and let you know if that's what works for me like yeah let me see the technical details of your product like how does it work not from a high level but at least like the like what are the features that I can use and I don't necessarily need a
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direct conversation I need a a tour and I think that's where I really live when it comes to the the relationship of sales people is whoever provides me the easiest path to take a tour taking a tour of the slides then jumping into the product but I need
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to I need to be the one driving like I need to be able to see this product work intuitively for me and then continue the conversation so I would say like there's rooms that we go into like this is the room for the slides this is the room for me driving the product and this is the room for me really bringing the team
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together in front of the salesperson so they understand like what it is that we're trying to do but I would say I'm a little different for that reason well we talked about homework right and getting to know people if you look on anything on the internet with Samar in it I like
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to have fun I think that's pretty up in the front right if I get into a meeting and I am just bored out of my mind we talked about value we talked about averaging 10 meetings a day I might not want to talk to you again you know like I want to have fun I want to be able to
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talk about all kinds of things I don't want to get straight to business often either you know like learn about me and my team and my Dynamic right because we all like to have fun I built a team we're gonna have fun yeah you know what I mean so it's an aspect of doing your homework to maintain that relationship
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as well so that is very rare and it's also very refreshing and I think like Ron on your point I think like for organizations that don't have a community or a free model or some sort of freemium way to get the like hands in the product I think that's one of my favorite things but I love what the
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industry has been doing is they've been doing that because it's a reality it's like give me the documentation give me access to the solution give me me some self-guided tours and then you want more right you want to keep going depth but it's like I really like what's happening on that piece yeah there's a lot of like
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automation that I see now oh boy once you hit the demo and you wait 30 days you'll start getting emails little little trinkets little messages Hey Ron thinking of you need any help with the product saw that you were using this feature to me that's somewhat surprising
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like oh how did you know that but it's also very welcoming because like I have hit a problem within this product and I don't necessarily want to be sold again I just want to know how I could solve it and I think sometimes when you get into the call with sales people they want to resell it like almost like the feature
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didn't happen like all right this is on the road map don't worry about it look over here we're gonna package this up let's go to dinner and then by the time dinner's over I forgot so I try to like really be laser focused on like really what works and what doesn't and then reach back out to the salesperson so you
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appreciate it like if someone immediately reached out to you and was like do you want a demo for XYZ product do you often jump into the demo do you first do some research like what does that look like for you I do some very light research so one the the need has
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to be there I think as the cyber security practitioners the first problem that we run into is not knowing what we should be doing we're just taking the information from our last job and trying to do it at our new job and that never works out so one understanding like the need that I have but then understanding
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the problem space that the organization really wants to solve for I've worked with many startups and worked at many startups to where why I originally bought the product isn't what they were intending to do in the grander scale like maybe the whole vulnerability management uh product turns into EDR
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like they're actually trying to do something very big and Grand but I really wanted vulnerability management so I like to look at the mission the vision and then the person who I'm speaking to where else have you worked I think sales reps especially people like yourself you you can predict lightning
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lightning strikes and similar you know patterns in cyber security the very successful cyber security companies and products I think that there's patterns that sales people see the best yeah I mean that's a good point I mean that's what's fun about seeing the industry
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mature you know they evolve you know their team the system and all that one of the best things that happens with a sales team is when they say no to the customer and they realize that like what your expertise is is not a fit for what
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the customer's asking and can verbalize it it sounds so simple but that comes from the leadership on down when that gets celebrated and recognized because again it's customer focused right and you can look and just say that's not what we do our games not about this I
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think that's powerful that's when you know you have a team of Pros right have you ever done that and someone been like what the heck are you doing jaywood why are you why are you turning down this deal they under they understand like right of why and then everybody respects it too myself and my team we've never
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sold somebody that didn't have a problem that didn't have a need it's not like on TV where you kind of like got all smooth and like super like charming and then all of a sudden a Fortune 100 company makes a purchase through a complex purchasing decision with procurement and
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it just doesn't happen like that right buying is not like that anymore yeah so no no I I no one's ever pushed back and then also no one's ever bought that like didn't have a concrete problem [Music]
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know that I was going to be born with a birth defect it used to bother me quite a bit she is just like you guys the message of control and complexity doesn't just apply to one subject in
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life universal truth when a challenge feels too big break it down to the parts that you can control when we think about the great resignation it didn't just happen to practitioners it happened to to sales
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people sales industry as well maybe not at the scale that happened to practitioners but it still happened our people in cyber security cyber security sales shift and change all the time every 18 months to two years essentially so you never know when that next when
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that salesperson you're talking to is just going to work for a tool you might actually need later down the road or if that person that customer that you're dealing with is going to work for a company that you're going to be going after in the future so it's important to keep those relationships strong and healthy open and honest one thing that's
34:25
been interesting in sales too is like especially with covid it really like shifted and changed the game because like all of us were locked at home right way back and you still think about the way we're operating and a lot of the Norms the way sales professionals had made a living or they engage with
34:42
practitioners they built trust it got shut down and so that's been a very very interesting thing to see the way that sales itself has shifted more to a hybrid model now where it is highly digital highly remote I read emails right it just like two sentences and so send me
34:58
good content I'll read it and I think when people can put more into the content and the delivery as opposed to always having to do the face-to-face too um I can I can wait on the face to face so we got to go deeper into the subject
35:13
we just spoke about saying hey you it's me again I work at a new organization now and you know covet as well like covet really forced many of us to think differently about work some of us had to leave our job opportunities to work remote to be you know keep our families
35:30
healthy and safe and others lost their jobs maybe they went to a similar organization where are the lines of Ethics when it comes to sales like in recruiting the gold standard is don't poach right I would imagine in sales
35:45
maybe that isn't an ethical line a hundred percent need to be ethical I mean on there with everything I mean number one it is the foundation it's just trust and ethics especially in our industry it's a really tight well-connected group and it's just the
36:00
right thing to do so if you leave your like let's say you're working in the source space you're working for one soar provider or a product and then you go to another one like how do you address your Rolodex or contacts your LinkedIn strategy like how do you reassess even
36:16
though you work at a company doing the same thing well normally it's called a non-compete that's probably in place so you don't off of there I've seen it though yeah I mean it's it happens right well the way I try to approach most
36:33
things whether it's talking to sales individuals evaluating tools or recruiting hiring people that try to remove as much bias as possible right so I'm not going to look at the name or I'm going to look at the functionality and what it gives to me so that I can say which one is best for me not which one you know and is the sales person good
36:49
but which one do I like which one has the bigger name which one you know what I mean right so I think that kind of goes into it as well I've lost people to a vendor before right um and I just I try to assume that they take a similar approach you don't want to violate your non-compete that's not a good idea but
37:05
there's other ethics that I see when it comes to sales and it's the dinners it's the gifts it's all of all of the Extravaganza I think that has a very valuable tool as a salesperson but there's probably got to be a line of when this is not a gift and it really
37:22
feels like a bribe I'm sure you've been in this situation where someone's like hey Chris come to this baseball game and then let's go to dinner I've had some nice experience oh yeah definitely I've had some nice experiences unfortunately I don't think any of those have resulted in a sale
37:38
maybe I'm a I'm a bad customer but uh yeah I'd be curious about that too like where is your thought process when it comes to the dinners the events low-key normally is higher returns because you're going to give folks that are there for that purpose you see a lot of
37:53
groups that do rent out XYZ or do an event and it's all on LinkedIn and from there I'm sure they're fun but at least what I've seen on over the years is just doing something that's a little bit under the radar is normally a little more intentional let's tumble even
38:10
further into ethics a little bit when I was in college I was a broke college kid trying to figure it out and my best friend came and visited me and he was like hey do you want to get into technology I'm like yo I would love to get into technology that would be great he's like cool I got this guy above me
38:26
he showed me the ropes we're selling telecommunication stuff phones landlines internet I'm like oh that sounds really cool he's like it only costs 800 to get in and I'm like oh 800 is this is this really something that that I should do
38:42
he's like absolutely I'm like okay never made a single dime I gave my 800 bucks I was struggling for months and I come to find out it was one of those like pyramid type mid-level marketing whatever you want to call it from then I
38:57
was like you know what I really need to believe in what I'm selling yeah so whenever I'm selling anything if I don't believe in it I won't sell it like can't do it but I think that might be a luxury especially when you're looking at the socioeconomic climate today because now your people need jobs and they're like
39:13
you know what I'll take a sales job they just want a job they want to survive so where does that balance come in when you're looking at the thing that you're selling and whether or not you believe that's going to give the value to the customer or not well I'll kind of jump in from the thought of like you know I'm
39:28
really putting a lot of thought around how to scale sales teams and build sales teams and how do you do that at like a more impactful level and seeing the way folks approach their craft is like the biggest thing that jumps out of if somebody's in there to try to chase a
39:44
dime or somebody really in there because they want to solve a problem they believe in the mission right the folks who want to learn or they're excited the folks who have gotten into the product and they're playing with the uh the community version and they're curious and they're wondering why you're like
39:59
that's somebody who I want so I think on that piece what you're saying of somebody coming in and entering there's a lot of ways to get into the field and there's a lot of ways to end up with money but if you're just chasing dollars
40:14
on there normally didn't see that play out well at the Enterprise space right on there there's one more thread that I'll pull through there's one more thread in cyber security we spent a lot of time implementing Solutions trying to architect Solutions make it all work together and sometimes we buy products
40:31
and we don't ever get around to using them the next year comes around we're like oh my gosh I haven't used this product at all but we still need it we're still going to need it next year and you have a decision to make you
40:48
could renew the products which is just as risky because you haven't used it yet or you could not renew it and then have to go through the pain of the sales cycle again how do you weigh out those options I think when you look at a situation like that who's the account manager on
41:04
that honestly yeah oh I forgot we had this it's been a year like oh hello renewal time right well I'm sure it's not always that simple leadership changes changes changes and directions there I feel like there's so many components that go into that decision can we form a formal project
41:21
around something like this to get implemented quickly with funding behind it do I have enough bodies on my team do I have enough resources do I have enough support can I augment my staff so I am not one to just say ah you know this didn't work so it didn't work I would
41:38
depending on if I did the evaluation to begin with or not and what is with the competitors right so it's just it defense kind of situation but knowing me I think I would renew yeah and I'm sure the salesperson
41:53
would want that as well like I I really want to see you use this product I know you probably don't have the time but just in case like you you still would want to sell I know I would but I'm gonna yield to you all as well well yeah so that's an
42:08
interesting scenario actually happening it's happening a lot I'm glad you brought that up because it's happening a lot because of that situation so let's say one or two people in the organization did a evaluation they purchased a solution those said one or two people move on all of a sudden
42:24
that's not a good situation for both parties so that's why I like going back to having like intentionality and you have a project and you have requirements and there's rigor towards it and typically rigor also includes like there's a team evaluation on the customer and the business side of things
42:39
as well because then if all of a sudden somebody leaves it's a bad feeling you know you've got a customer who paid meaningful money they haven't activated it maybe they haven't even got off the starting blocks right or they've barely moved that's that's not good especially on our side so there's like a pit of
42:56
panic where you're like we gotta figure out can we help them or not and sometimes you decide you know the climate it changed or it doesn't make sense or you know the reason why you bought isn't a fit and other times it's like we just got to lock in some people and let's make progress you know there's also that element at the end of the year
43:12
we all go into a frenzy and we have to sell our we have to use our money I'm sure like we all find ourselves in that situation right I never feel good about that though I never feel good going into a budget conversation knowing if I don't use all of this budget maybe I won't get
43:29
that budget again next year right for me in my experience it's been the money is not available until and I gotta I gotta go go we've had this what's the timeline and I'm like six weeks what can we do right this is what I have you come with
43:44
what you have and we'll put something together but I don't like the crunch time either yeah I don't like it so I I was curious to get your take on that of just getting access and the whole budget process and then even after that's happened just the role that procurement's playing now in today as well so you know I'd love to hear it
44:00
well there there is some finesse there are some finesse that's required in relationships that yeah need to be had prior to you have to say get your leadership behind you as well to say we actually we do need this tool we can spend the money here we can implement it in XYZ I need your support to get this
44:17
expedited because procurement is just as busy as we are they have the entire organization to think about right not just my little you know Cocoon of things so it's all so much about relationships and maintaining relationships yeah and that's a funny part right I think folks
44:33
think sales leaves the cave and then they come back in with the deal and there's so many parts of it even when you have a technical like proven technical validity you get the thumbs up and it's time to move on then it starts a whole other chapter of moving through an organization's buying cycle it's
44:49
wildly complex now way different than it was even 10 plus years ago yeah so that's also a very interesting evolving part yeah I got a two-part question the first part is for you two and then I'm going to Pivot over here to you Jonathan when we're in a pitch we're talking to a
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prospective vendor for our program and we don't see a feature that we really really need in our environment how often do you hear oh it's on the road map yeah how often have you heard it uh I can't
45:21
say when I haven't heard it I'm saying yeah I'm in the same boat yeah okay yeah part two how often is it really on the road map is it really always on the road knowing zero context of the conversation you have and speaking on behalf of the salesman I
45:38
don't know on that but most times it's on a road map now you asked for the deliverable in the date in the exact timing that's where there's some unknowns because things shift priority shift so that's the toughest part of like the product delivery on what's out there right it's on the road map
45:54
somewhere I imagine and again not knowing but that's that's the toughest thing is when will it be delivered right I want to know how is sales shaping up in cyber security we talked about degree programs more intentional training for sales leaders
46:10
but I would imagine it goes much Beyond sales people are thinking differently we talked about the procurement process is much different today what are we going to see in the future going forward well we talked about just like the next wave of like sales Talent that's going to
46:25
enter they're going to enter with a degree and the degree is going to show that they've had like intentionality of this wanting to be a profession not just kind of like plopping into it they're going to enter with a skill set that's like beyond anything that I ever would have thought of having but I think the biggest part is like the way sales is
46:42
going is there's so much information share and I think there's so many more examples of like what Excellence looks like I think there's so many sales leaders that have reputations and programs they're almost like coaches that have like a coaching tree where you know like hey this person who came out of this they run this sort of
46:59
methodology they have this sort of Ethics these are the people that Thrive and that's more going to be Amplified on our side about the future and it is not it's a pessimistic one
47:14
I don't think the constant shuffling of practitioners is going to change I think we're going to keep asking people to join cyber join cyber join cyber join cyber they are going to get burnt out they're not going to be treated correctly they're just going to be tired of what they do tired of what comes with
47:31
you know being a practitioner in a corporate environment and so uh unique solutions that vendors are going to have to come up with to make up for the gaps we've had folks who have come over from the practitioner side they got settled they really did well and you know what
47:47
they moved back to the practitioner side and I think that's really neat too kind of playing out because they've got a fresh perspective they want to be there they kind of moved over for other reasons they realize they want to be back so I think it's going to be very circular the way it's going to flow that would be nice it would
48:02
I really think that you are one of the better sales people in cyber security it is there a moment when you think back to your entire Journey was there a moment that really made like an impact on how you develop those relationships was it a mentor or a situation that is like you
48:19
know what that was really like an inflection point for me as a salesperson oh wow that's a big question I saw in an organization where it was modeled from the CEO on down and then I had a particular sales leader that just kind
48:34
of like embodied a very long game thinking and when the founder has that belief you know it's cliche to say that the organization will mirror and reflect what the founder does but it really a hundred percent happens and that's where it realized for me like it's okay to say
48:51
no it's okay to like tell a customer that's not at all what we do you know it's okay to say like that's not ethical in those sort of elements as well so I think it was that particular company that I was at I saw it and the team was built off of it and then you know you
49:07
kind of come into your own the older I get the busier I get the more I index on like how viable a minute it is or even seconds when we were having conversations about like sitting down with Samara and Jonathan we were talking about like our appetite for being sold
49:24
to I prefer to enter into those more meaningful sales relationships uh you said that you were like I love being sold to I honestly I don't have time to even read a lot of the messages if I can tell that it's an automated message I
49:40
won't even read it like no matter what the solution is I just I just don't it could be the perfect solution for me I just don't have the time to read it but what are some of your thresholds for whether you engage or not engage when it comes to being sold to when it comes to a phone call I think it's about the story I don't necessarily like to skip
49:56
the the slides part I think that's the most important part that's going to tell me the passion for you know that this person has as about this product or idea technology I'm going to see that and then I'm also going to hear a great story what is your big strategy what's your vision and what are the steps that
50:13
you're going to do to get there I think when you look at Founders histories if you look on crunchbase for example you could see where they've been and almost put together a nice story of the salesperson doesn't or the team doesn't but I love the story the way I look at
50:29
it is we interview people day in day out whether it's for our podcast that we do but even for jobs like we've interviewed so many people and we only have about 30 minutes so I'm making such a big decision on my team and hiring somebody
50:45
maybe in 30 minutes or maybe three 30 minute sessions if I'm lucky I almost wish that I was able to be equipped with that same level of information in 30 minutes spending time with the vendor how do you think you get to a place where you feel not only like you feel solid on the the products that they're
51:02
pitching but also also feel solid on the leadership the direction of the company like what are some of the the go-to questions that you might have for for that vendor Jonathan said it best to send them a message beforehand give them the context that they need to be successful you don't want to be on the
51:18
call with someone and hinder their success especially if you're using your time so I think giving them that bit of information is valuable I never really thought of doing that I've been asked for it but it's you know time's so precious I'm like I just don't have the time but if I really do want to pack it
51:35
all in in 30 minutes I think that's the only way both sides enter a meeting with a lot more information that is said or even acknowledged right because right there's I think the part that I think that's getting better in the industry is putting more of the information out there I personally like when vendors ask
51:51
questions first and leave their stuff and de-prioritize what they want it to pitch and they're like what do you want to know about the product or the company and those are the questions that I want to answer right like a genuine interest and what I need in my interest and what
52:08
how I want to move forward and get better before that I was in the service industry I was a server and man okay I worked at a breakfast place so I woke up early I knew I had a thing for people right I love people but I kept rebranding myself I turned into a
52:24
personal trainer and then I went into like QA software analysis right and I just like this I still love people but these aren't my things once I got to security which is what my mom told me to do so listen to your mamas right once I got into security I was home so
52:42
now you know I started in threat intelligence now I work in vulnerability management I have interest in risk and automation all these things I just want to make programs and people better naturally I became a People Eater that was always the goal right my first sort
52:59
of interaction with sales folks was when I was a subject matter expert for threat intelligence team and so I was the one Gathering all of the requirements all the details and talking with people people they always thought I was a manager because I was managing them and
53:15
everything there but once I actually became the manager I had the keys to the kingdom I had the money to spend things started to change now I was getting all the attention I was reaching out to them they were reaching out to me so just learning how to manage these relationships has always just been very
53:31
the psychology behind it is super interesting and the different people you get to meet so I love that aspect of it I've been really looking at the way that garyvee kind of talks about business the way that Christo talks about business and what Christo says is stop selling
53:46
start serving and that's always been on the Forefront of my mind when I go and put on my sales hat it's never like okay I got to get the sale got to get get closed my first question in one way or another is always how can we help you it's always the first case like really understanding The Plight that they're
54:03
going through where the the friction points where the pain points how can we help them to go to the next level and it goes back to really believing in what you're selling how important from your perspective is it to really understand who is on the other end of that table
54:19
and then de-prioritizing the the sales person I I really believe that we're just getting to the point where we're practicing that and where I see sales reps practicing it where I see CEOs practicing it like practicing the pause essentially right giving the space for
54:35
someone to tell you what it is that they're actually working on I think that's that's what it's all about is you know doing that pause and getting the feedback like Jonathan he's listening right now he's taking feedback from us a group of uh practitioners at a table and I could see you know just the
54:51
observation the the attention and I I see that you're very aware of the conversation which is great I think bringing that to the table is how I always get hooked curiosity is a really great trait and some of the best performers I've seen in
55:07
the space on both sides on both sides like I love a team that has high level of curiosity they're very authentic you know they're having fun as well but I think going back to that like the star of the show is not their said
55:22
salesperson the star that shows the customer right and so like that's a big mindset shift too for people new coming in they think they have to do so much they really don't it's all about the customer with the things and so I think curiosity I think leading in with the
55:38
intention to make sure they're on there and listening enlisting's very hard it is it's very hard to do I can I can dovetail off that one I do not enjoy repeating myself so at one point if I've told you and I know I seem like a hard ass I'm not a hard ass but I I take
55:55
these tallies in my brain when I have to con continuously like tell you what my issue is and if you you know aren't able to necessarily give me those solution and potential Solutions or you're asking me the same questions or that it's a completely different sales person now
56:12
and I have to retrain them like where did those notes go you know like just general sort of management in that way and managing my needs right so I've been on the other side of that and guilty of that too going back to preparation like things that are in your control that's a
56:28
perfect example of like when you just feel like oh man we weren't as buttoned up as we should they told us what their XYZ tools were they told us you know where their team's growing and you're like we should have known that so that's a I'm glad you brought that up yeah I see it it happens so it seems like there
56:45
is a bit of a spectrum on one end you have the sales folks that they're they're just trying to make a book and then on the other end we have folks like you that really care about the practitioner want to develop that relationship and really understand what's going on in the world and then
57:00
there's everything else that's in between how do we begin to move to a place where the sales and customer engagement becomes a much more healthy place I think this conversation is the starting point right I mean that's why that's why that's why I was excited to
57:16
be here right I mean I was just sit at the table and to learn I think the biggest thing is like practitioners sharing and learning and listening and then what's happening is like again the Excellence and the good example that's out there it's being Amplified way more
57:31
out there in the marketplace today and then also there's so many more sales Pros that are like taking it like a true craft and they're elevating their game so I'm excited where things are and I'm excited where they're going yeah well from my perspective I think sales people
57:47
take the time to evaluate take the time to say am I with the right company do I believe in this Mission am I going about this in the best way possible for my customer have I taken the time to do my homework and to
58:02
understand their needs and from a practitioner perspective instead of talking about how bad vendors can be tell tell them how bad they are make them better because we are all in it together it's not vendors versus practitioners at the end of the day
58:17
honestly I think it's all about empathy right you have to have empathy for those sales folks that are trying to do the numbers game like I understand what they're trying to do they're trying to do good work they're trying to do their business but I think just bringing in a little bit of that that social selling that empathy the soft skills and once
58:35
you meet in the middle I think that's a place that I think everybody can feel good in correction can't happen without connection yeah love it less cheers of that [Music]
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[Music] [Applause] thank you