The Playbook to Building a Thriving Sales Culture with Fmr. PatientPop SVP of Sales Justin Welsh
1.
2. Who am I and why am I
talking about sales
culture?
3. About Justin Welsh
• 2009: 10th employee at Zocdoc
• 2015: Hired as the VP of Sales at
PatientPop
• 2015 - 2019: $0 to $55M in ARR
• 2015 - 2019: 140+ sales employees
• 2019: eNPS Sales score: 54
That’s considered a WORLD CLASS
sales culture
9. What culture IS
Culture is the attitude and behavior
that your team exudes each day in
pursuit of your company objectives.
10. Creating Culture
You create your culture by investing
in your sales team with targeted,
specific plans to improve their life &
career.
11. The Agenda
Step 1: Hire correctly
Step 2: Cover goals & expectations
Step 3: Provide learning & development
Step 4: Build out a great career path
Step 5: Get compensation right
Step 6: Recognize often
Step 7: Surprise & delight “generously”
Step 8: Have a feedback loop
12. Step 1: Hire correctly
• Aligned with your mission, vision & values - tie values to
interview questions
• Comes from the right velocity - hire in your "velocity lane”
• Curious - look for good questions, layers, and relevance
• Coachable - role play with every new hire 2x
13. Step 2: Cover Goals & Expectations
• What EXACTLY are my goals and expectations? What are the behaviors
you’ll be monitoring to achieve those goals?
• Should begin during the interview process
• Documented & shared the first day of training
• Signed off on upon graduation
14. Step 3: Provide Learning &
Development
• The three keys: Provide the “how", the “well”, and the “why”
• Onboarding coach - manager for first 90 days
• Onboarding buddy - peer mentor for first 90 days
• VP Engagement - Connect the dots to the company why
15. Step 4: Build out a
great career path
MDR
SDR
Sr.
SDR
AE
AEII
SAE
SD
16. Step 5: Get the comp plan right
• Pay back your base salary first
• Pay 20%-25% of ACV after that
• Paid when cash comes in
17. Step 6: Recognize Often
• Daily mantra goals - daily team KPIs
• Weekly & monthly leaderboards - emailed out and on monitors
• Monthly Contests - incentivize great behaviors
• Quarterly awards - take the time to promote
22. Step 7: Surprise & Delight
“Generously”
• My story
• Collect hobbies - always have your ears open
• Office hours - make yourself available
• Reward “generously” - find personal gifts, not costly ones.
23. Step 8: Have a Feedback Loop
• Anonymous Suggestion Box - solutions-oriented
• Quarterly eNPS surveys - Look for consistent themes
• Senate Team - An elected group of salespeople that aggregate feedback
and present to leadership.
Tell your story
End with, “That’s considered a world class sales culture!” So that’s what we’re going to talk about…
BUT….
To start today, I want to remind everyone what culture ISN’T.
Dogs! I love dogs, but I also like clean carpets and quiet client calls.
Ping pong! Nothing like knocking my computer off of my desk with a return serve.
Booze! Liquor + young people + work. Not always a great combination.
Dress code! Lululemon and mesh tank tops don’t translate well on Zoom calls.
In all seriousness, that’s not culture. Here’s MY definition of culture:
Culture is the attitude and behavior that your team exudes each day in pursuit of your company objectives.
So here’s today’s agenda.
(Go through it)
Let’s dive in.
It’s nearly impossible to build a great sales culture, without great people.
Aligned: Talk about importance of mission, vision, values - tie those to interview questions
Velocity: Stay in the velocity lane - talk about mistakes people make
Curious: How deep do they go in interview? Are questions relevant by role?
Coachable: Simple, easy role play. Imagine how much better people can get in 90 days vs. 10 minutes
Talk about the importance of communication.
Communication can’t be vague, must be clear.
Must start from the beginning and be continuous
The How: How do I do my job? What are fundamental skills necessary to do it? ONBOARDING COACH - one of the only companies that has dedicated managers for the first 90 days of people’s careers.
The Well: How do I do it well? What does it look like to do my job at a high-level? Who is doing it that way? ONBOARDING BUDDY
The why: Why does what I do matter? Who benefits? How? How does my role impact the larger company vision? VP OF SALES
Specialize and deliver on the job training.
Cover your costs first.
Pay the maximum commission past that
Make sales reps focus on customer loyalty by paying them when cash is collected.