💡Something struck me while I was listening to this excellent 20VC podcast from Harry Stebbings with AJ Tennant (from Glean, ex-Slack, ex-Meta):
Their points on how and when to build different sales functions and verticals were right on, and I wish everyone I worked with in 2018-2019 knew then what AJ Tennant knows now.
(Everyone I worked with in 2018-2019 in sales should listen to that podcast. Or build a time machine. First one, then the other.)
But!
There was one (almost throwaway) binary argument they touched on and thankfully didn’t dwell on too much.
❓ Are great salespeople born or made ❓
Do you (really) have to be a natural, gregarious, extrovert to succeed in a sales role?
Reader, I know you know how question heds work, the answer is NO.
Here’s my take:
🍽️ If you ever worked in food service and used your innate charms to persuade a customer to spend slightly more money on a larger beverage, you might be a natural salesperson.
🍻 If you ever tended bar and suggested a named liquor in lieu of the well swig, or anticipated the moment when a customer would want another drink, you might make a very good account executive.
🏪 If you ever worked retail and had the word “manager” on your name tag, welcome to your new role as a sales manager. You are ready.
📝 If you ever spent any time in a role where asking questions, taking notes, and making sense of the answers was part of your job, then you’re ready to run a discovery call.
🗳️ If you ever ran for class president or any other role in elementary school (we had four officers for every class in mine), you already understand the basic premise of SaaS sales.
💰 If you were an officer in student government in high school or college, you’re probably already managing a sales team.
👂🏻 If your friends say you’re a good listener, hello Senior Director.
Look, I’m not saying there aren’t levels to this game.
I mean, if you want to succeed at *talking about sales* internally or with recruiters, you’ll need a point of view, and someday, someone, somewhere, is going to put you through one or two flavors of “sales training,” like Challenger or Sandler or MEDDIC/MEDDPICC.
That’s fine.
They’re all fine.
But fundamentally, if you have any experience talking with people, listening to their stories, reading between the lines, and repeating back to them what you heard, hopefully with some idea of how you can help, you’re going to do just fine at sales. Congrats!
Or maybe all of this is wrong, and I’m just a natural? 😅