Pluspunten
**Big investment in skill progression (prospecting and selling to customers)
The team is not shy when it comes to dishing out training opportunities. Both leadership and internal teams are all about mastering the skill of sales.
4+ years in, I'm having a very difficult time slowing down the learning curve. It's continuous skill progression, for those who actually want to be great at sales, and take the sales career seriously.
** Tribal knowledge that is actually implemented
Tribal knowledge is usually a trope, limited to a lonely Slack channel somewhere, that people sometimes use. In FastSpring, not hoarding information but instead sharing and training the rest of the team on it, is more of an underlining personality trait of the folks who get hired, rather than a mandate.
I've seen BDRs run a workshop to AEs on new video prospecting strategies, and AEs teach the rest of the team on deeper market insights to advance prospecting efforts.
** A mature leadership team to turn things around when we hit a slump
Up until late 2020, we were still feeling the after effects of a turbulent time back in 2019. The first attempt to hire a sales leader for the Amsterdam team led to the development of a toxic environment and a regression in what we built in terms of culture. We ended up with a young leader, who was a totally wrong cultural fit to manage a highly international melting pot of expats.
Phasing this person out by end of 2019 was important. Once the dust settled, the leadership team in the US took on accountability and used this moment to not dwell, but recalibrate and focus. One bad hire, and the waterfall of negativity surrounding that, didn't change the DNA of the organization.
In a way, I'm glad we went through a manager so toxic he could glow in the dark. Growth isn't butterflies and rainbows. It taught us what we really need it. The manager issue was resolved in early 2020, the right leader and team are here, and we're on the heels of a killer 2021 for Amsterdam - off to a promising 2022.
Minpunten
** Prospecting demands for AEs
There are moments when a bigger load is placed on the AEs' shoulders when it comes to generating opportunities than normal. Any additional load of having to prospect more than normal just distracts from advancing pure sales and closing skills. Luckily, this is very much on everyone's radar, and immense resources are placed into working on working on improving the prospecting vs selling balance for AEs.
