SaaStr

FEBRUARY 25, 2025

Finding and recruiting top talent is consistently ranked as one of the biggest challenges for growing SaaS companies. SaaStr Annual attracts thousands of high-quality SaaS professionals across functions like engineering, product, marketing, sales, and customer success. Meet and Find Your Next VP / CXO!

Sales Recruiting 195

Sales Recruiting Scale CTO Hire Sales Hiring 195

SaaStr

JANUARY 21, 2020

Justin Welsh, former SVP of Sales at PatientPop explains how he started in SaaS in 2009 as the second sales hire at Zocdoc. Justin used Sales Culture to grow a successful PatientPop team to 140 employees and 55 million in revenue. Justin Welsh | SVP Sales @ PatientPop. I was a local sales manager or regional manager.

Sales Recruiting 332

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 332

SaaStr

MAY 10, 2023

In this week’s episode of CRO Confidential, host Sam Blond, Partner at Founders Fund, continues a mini-series on founder-led sales with Colin Zima, founder and CEO of Omni. The post SaaStr CRO Confidential: Omni Founder Colin Zima on the Power of Leveraging Your Network for Sales and Recruiting (Pod 658 + Video) appeared first on SaaStr.

Sales Recruiting 246

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Social Media Sales 246

SaaStr

JANUARY 31, 2022

Having learned from thousands of customers and prospects, Sarah Lash, Envoy’s head of enterprise sales, will talk about what it takes to guide and scale enterprise sales programs during an uncertain future. In my first six months at Envoy , I grew the sales team from six to 17. Combine Strategies To Drive Sales.

Sales Recruiting 246

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Enterprise 246

SaaStr

APRIL 26, 2022

It’s the never-ending stereotype –– marketing and sales are eternal “frenemies.” However, this push-and-pull doesn’t have to be part of your organization as long as you hire and empower the right leadership. Tip Three: Better Recruiting. What I care much more about is growth rate –– that’s [sales and marketing leaders’] DNA.

Leadership 244

Leadership Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale 244

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 10, 2020

We’ve talked a lot over the years about how not to hire a wrong VP of Sales — 70%+ of the first VPs of Sales don’t make it even 10 months. And figure out if they really are great: For your prospective VP of Sales, did her top 2 hires at least crush it and blow out their quotas ? Recruiting.

Part-Time VPE 352

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring CTO Hire Sales Recruiting 352

SaaStr

JANUARY 27, 2021

We’ve talked a ton on SaaStr over the years on how to make sure your VP of Sales and top hires really work out. We can pretty much summarize a lot of it into the following: Your VP of Sales should have lots of experience selling at your average ACV. for that type of sale. That they are the right ones. Ask who they are.

Sales Recruiting 334

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Sales 334

FastSpring

SEPTEMBER 3, 2020

In this post, we’re featuring our Recruiting Manager, Elizabeth Faddis! Priority projects are focused on enhancing the company’s recruiting strategy, processes, and programs to deliver on current and future talent needs. You recently started your Recruiting Manager role at FastSpring, how are you liking it so far?

Sales Recruiting 128

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Management Technical Review 128

SaaStr

JANUARY 5, 2024

In the latest episode of CRO Confidential, host Sam Blond, partner at Founders Fund and former CRO at Brex, sits down with Ashley Kelly, VP of Global Sales Development at Rippling. For context – Ashley had previously helped Sam scale Brex’s outbound sales from $2M to over $300M in ARR as Senior Director of SDR.

Sales Hiring 316

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Outbound Sales Team 316

SaaStr

MARCH 14, 2022

We’ve talked a ton about How to Hire a Great VP of Sales on SaaStr, but I wanted to highlight a few VP of Sales “personas” that I rarely, if ever, see work out. Because again and again, many of your will hire this VP of Sales. Here are the types of VP of Sales that just never work out. Sales is hard.

Sales Recruiting 306

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Technical Review Scale 306

Tom Tunguz

SEPTEMBER 7, 2020

Whether you manage a team of engineers, a team of regional sales managers, or the company, your first responsibility is to hire and successfully manage the seven people who will form your leadership team. First, as a company grows, the most important thing is recruiting.

Sales Hiring 263

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Management Leadership 263

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 28, 2024

Kyle Norton CRO of Owner is kicking off a new podcast for Pavillion with revenue leaders, and we were lucky enough to be guest #001 here: It’s a great convo on many SaaStr themes — but from the perspective of a VP Sales / CRO. Never play the blame game As a revenue leader, it’s crucial we take accountability for sales performance.

Technical Review 304

Technical Review Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Revenue 304

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 22, 2021

I've never seen a great VP of Sales hide from a miss. We’ve talked a lot on SaaStr over the years about how to hire a great VP of Sales — and how to course-correct if you’ve made a miss hire. Every great VP of Sales has 1 or 2 folks that wants to follow them from their last role. Nothing gets better in 1 sales cycle.

Sales Recruiting 306

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Sales Marketing 306

SaaStr

OCTOBER 28, 2022

Leadership must communicate this objective to the entire company and ensure everyone works toward improving efficiency instead of simply bringing in more dollars. However, don’t this doesn’t mean that your sales teams shouldn’t bring in more revenue –– quite the opposite. The 2022 Economic Climate, Barriers to Growth, and Recruitment.

Sales Recruiting 264

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Leadership Interviewing 264

SaaStr

DECEMBER 13, 2021

Either by yourself, or with a Sales Ops / Marketing Ops / Some Sort of Ops leader under you. Look for dashboards, strong project management, strong pipeline projection after $5m ARR. If you don’t see things getting more organized, that manager can’t scale. Inability to hire great Directors / managers under them.

Scale 354

Scale Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scaling 354

SaaStr

MARCH 25, 2023

So one recent survey we did really brought out a healthy debate: does your VP of Sales really need to be a product expert? Many of the comments said it was more important a VP of Sales understand process and leadership more than the product itself. They often melt. I say, you just gotta know the product. At least a little bit.

Scale 298

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Sales 298

SaaStr

JULY 30, 2020

I’ve been reminded of this question in several meetings lately where founders are doing pretty well, getting to and past Initial Traction, but with hindsight it’s interesting that the founder that took the CEO gig perhaps was better suited to a different role, say CTO or SVP of Sales or President or COO or SVP Product.

Sales Recruiting 329

Sales Recruiting Venture Capital CTO Hire CTO 329

SaaStr

AUGUST 7, 2020

A few factors that contribute to high-performing sales teams: High quota attainment. The best startups invest in their sales teams and work hard so most of the reps hit and exceed quota. Turning over a sales team is very hard on the organization. A great VP of Sales is worth her weight in gold. They have low attrition.

Sales Hiring 363

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting Compensation 363

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

For example, a great Stretch VP of Sales might get you to from $50k to $500k a month in new bookings. To recruit the team and resources it takes not just to meet the plan this quarter, but the next one and the following quarters as well. Many first-time VPs just can’t recruit great managers under them.

Sales Recruiting 316

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Metrics 316

SaaStr

AUGUST 30, 2022

This happens with some regularity in SaaS, I’ve learned (and to be clear: I’m not talking about any company I’ve invested in, am an advisor to, board member of, etc – Because when it’s still a very small team, with no true management team … co-founders can kind of hack it to $1m-$2m in ARR together.

Sales Recruiting 279

Sales Recruiting Technical Cofounder Scale Investment 279

SaaStr

APRIL 7, 2021

And that means your initial leadership team often takes you faster, and further, than you might ever think. There are roughly 2 types of start-up management teams. The first type is the kind of management team hired by second+ time founders. Often folks they convince to once again be a VP of Eng or VP of Sales.

Part-Time VPE 285

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting CTO Hire 285

SaaStr

JUNE 21, 2023

They hired their first VP of Sales with a wonderful pedigree and experience at some of the hottest startups. because they needed to rebuild the sales team. They rebuilt the sales team and closed some big deals. A good executive recruiter is like a real estate agent or matchmaker. A good recruiter is worth it.

Sales Recruiting 300

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Underperforming Technical Team Pricing 300

SaaStr

AUGUST 15, 2021

But one of you has to lead on Customers/Sales/Marketing and the other likely on Product/Engineering for it really to work. Better recruiter than you. If your co-founder is a better recruiter than you, this is an immediate upgrade. Ideally, you are both strong recruiters in different areas.

Sales Recruiting 291

Sales Recruiting Engineering Product Marketing Marketing 291

SaaStr

MAY 6, 2021

A CRO owns and directs the strategy over a company’s revenue cycle, but there’s not a set standard for operational or management decisions: in addition to sales and sales development, they might be responsible for customer success, lead generation and pipelines, and even marketing and brand development. Is a CRO right for you?

Sales Hiring 306

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Interviewing Revenue 306

SaaStr

JULY 21, 2020

Your investors and others will learn a lot more hearing about sales from your VP of Sales, your CTO co-founder … and not you. This also will make you appear to be a much stronger manager. Especially, don’t try to talk over your weakest VPs and managers. All-hands meetings, board meetings, whenever.

Sales Recruiting 363

Sales Recruiting New CTO Scale CTO 363

Tom Tunguz

NOVEMBER 16, 2015

As he told me a few days ago, he has observed the lack of sales management and sales execution skills as one of the most consistent deficiencies limiting the potential of early stage SaaS companies. Sales execution deficiency manifests itself at roughly the same time as product market fit.

Sales Hiring 184

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Startup Compensation 184

SaaStr

JUNE 27, 2024

At the same time, you want to give trust and power to people who recruit, and you do that by ensuring they understand what the culture is. The Difference Between Kind and Nice Hannah asks how you balance a culture of hiring for kindness with the leadership team’s intensity for hard work, ambition, and getting things done.

Scale 264

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales Recruiting 264

SaaStr

MARCH 3, 2022

With over 70 million users worldwide, Zoho’s 50+ products aid your sales and marketing, support and collaboration, finance and recruitment needs—letting you focus only on your business. Outreach is the only solution provider to integrate sales engagement, conversation intelligence, and revenue intelligence into one platform.

Payments 49

Payments Payment Solutions Sales Recruiting Onboarding 49

SaaStr

JUNE 24, 2022

Your best sales reps can close so much more than your average rep. Move the bottom 10% out and give the best leads to your top performer, and watch sales go up 20%. The best VPs of Sales design comp plans so the team never wants to leave. You should be striving for zero voluntary attrition on your sales team.

Sales Recruiting 288

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale Customer Success 288

SaaStr

OCTOBER 27, 2022

You need engineering, product in all start-ups — but in SaaS, even in the very early days, you also need sales, client success, true support, demand gen marketing, etc. Routine Sales. You gotta hire 2 great sales reps as soon as you can. This didn’t work well until I had a Great VP of Sales. That was me.

Sales Hiring 300

Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Scale Scaling 300

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

I thought it would be worth drilling down deeper into each of them, and sharing the learnings and mistakes: 1/ Spending less time fixing things, more time recruiting senior folks to own them. No one spends enough time recruiting as it is, after $1m ARR or so. Yes, you can manage the sales team yourself. You can do this.

Part-Time VPE 300

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 300

SaaStr

JULY 18, 2023

Some engineers by training, others in sales or product originally. But a few uniting characteristics of the very best: Relentless Recruiters. You have to be constantly recruiting the best. The best founders usually spend at least 20% of their time recruiting. Some ruthless with competition, some more zen about it.

Sales Recruiting 246

Sales Recruiting Scale Scaling Engineering 246

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 27, 2023

From $1m in ARR, and Then Forever After: Recruiting Great VPs. You need to learn to become great at recruiting. Why is my sales team less efficient at $20m ARR than at $2m in ARR? Many functions simply need more bodies to keep up with larger bookings goals, and inefficiencies come from that, especially in sales-driven models.

Sales Recruiting 291

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Startup Scale 291

SaaStr

JULY 9, 2022

The role of a VP is to own everything required to hit the goals for a functional area – Sales, Marketing, Product, Engineering, Finance, or Customer Success. This includes: Recruiting the team. While the answer may sound obvious, I’m not sure it always is in early-ish stage start-ups. This can be hard. Hitting the number.

Sales Recruiting 300

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Finance Engineering 300

SaaStr

JULY 25, 2021

They talked about product adoption, sales alignment, freemium models and lessons they have learned throughout their successful SaaS careers. As two CEO who love the art of sales and scaling, this one really was special. Recruiting is easier, but the things that don’t change are customers don’t care.

Sales Recruiting 265

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale VP of Engineering 265

SaaStr

MARCH 19, 2021

A head of sales that doesn’t recruit at least one strong rep in the first 90 days. A VP of Sales that has never done outbound, if they don’t take it on fairly early — they never really will. But the top VPs of Sales know you have to get it going soon. Never will. That hits quota or better. Never will.

Sales Recruiting 349

Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring SMB Engineering 349

Sales Hacker

NOVEMBER 8, 2024

Examples include: Thought Leadership : Actively source and share opportunities for customers to showcase their expertise. GTM 120: Avoid the AI Sales Skills Atrophy Trap with Peter Kazanjy Pete Kazanjy is a serial founder, and seasoned early stage Saas executive, advisor, and investor.

Scale 113

Scale Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring AI Search 113