00:03 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Revenue Career Ladder podcast, where we dive deep into the career journeys of revenue focused professionals to give you real insights, actionable tips and maybe even a little reassurance that the journey is yours to define. In this episode, I'm joined by David Wilkins and we're going to be chatting about his journey from bookseller to founder, which is a slightly different or it's a departure from the previous conversations I've had because

00:28 The majority of people I've spoken to seem to start in fast food restaurants. So it's a, I think you're winning so far bookseller, uh, to founder. Um, but without further ado, how are you David? Yeah, good. Thanks. Yeah. I, I was very lucky and started in a bookshop. This is a McDonald's or anything else like that. So, uh, less greasy. Yeah. It was less who knows. Well, yeah, it depends. I guess it's depends who you're selling books to. Really? Yeah, there you go. Yeah.

00:59 All right, so tell us tell us a little bit about that, that first ever job, the bookseller, I know it's a pretty simple concept, but, you know, how old were you, how long did you do it? Why did you do why did you choose to be a bookseller? Yeah, so I did my my work experience there when I was 15 and it's the shop in the in the middle of the city, the bookshop in the middle of the city and yeah, they.

01:27 They offered me a job after I turned 16. And so the week after my 16th birthday, I was working there every, every Saturday. And, um, it was, it was, it was quite a, a eye-opening experience because where I'm from in Leicestershire, it's a village and the countryside, um, very closeted environment, and then you come into the city and

01:56 in Leicester and then working there and it's like, oh, okay, this is how people really, this is how people really are. And it was, it was fascinating. There were so many characters, the people that came in that had just published their own book and were very angry that it wasn't on the bookshelves, but because it was really bad. And yeah, we just, learning what human

02:25 16. So thankfully though you were learning about human behaviour in a bookshop rather than a fast food restaurant. I can imagine they're wildly different experiences of human behaviour. Yeah it was it got a little bit uh it got a little bit tense sometimes when the same woman came into the bookshop every week asking about why. She wasn't she wasn't called Karen was she? No she's very she's very posh like stood out in Leicester like what's what's she doing coming here?

02:54 And I think in the end, one of the more senior people had to say to her like, we're not gonna sell your book. It's not very good. And so that was, yeah, that went down well. Yeah, I can imagine. I'm a fan of, I'm allowed to say it's Waterstones, but I'm a fan of the Waterstones. They, you know, good cafe, good vibes. Yeah, it was good. And then, but they've shut the one down now in Leicester. There used to be this really nice one, massive, free story.

03:24 building and then they just they shut it down. You know why it was because that posh lady ended up burning the place down because you wouldn't publish a book and put it on the shelves. It was it was like some real pretentious name as well. It was hilarious. And it's just how Patricia or something. I don't know. Yeah. It was like, how do you how do you even spell the name of what you're trying to? Ophelia. I don't know. Yeah. Oh, you mean the name of the book rather than the name of the name as well. It was all it was all very long. All very double barreled. Yeah.

03:54 Double barreled, lots of syllables for an inslexic guy, not a good thing to try and find. I can imagine. Right, enough about Ophelia, Patricia, Karen, whatever she's called. And so that was your first ever job, like you said, whilst you were at university. What was your first sort of highlight role that you thought back to when you were, when you were running through this form that we get people to complete? What was the first sort of

04:22 I guess you would call it like milestone role that you had in your career that you want to talk about. Yeah. So I, my, I've got a very strange background where I worked in a bookshop when I was a school, played quite a good level of rugby when I was at school. My degree was in politics. And then I left university in 2009, graduated and moved to the Netherlands.

04:51 to coach kids rugby, just because that's what I love to do. I played rugby over here in the Netherlands as well. And then in 2011, I moved back to the UK. I thought I should get a real job, become a teacher. And so 2013, I moved to a kind of milestone role was working at a private school as a rugby coach and a PE teacher. Just this, this place that was like Hogwarts, but

05:19 it was full of monks and sort of wizards. And yeah, just having being in that environment. That was a real, a real big milestone for me. Now you mentioned there that it was you played up to a relatively high standard and it was a passion of yours. But is that the main reason for picking that? Like what, why did you decide to go from selling books, a degree in politics? And then you know what?

05:49 I'm going to ignore the degree or not necessarily ignore, but you're going to, you're going to pursue the passion rather than the education. What, what was the decision? Well, it was no, no jobs. It was, yeah, it was just in the financial crisis in a way. So I'd, um, I'd, when I, uh, I was at university, I did my Erasmus, which was the kind of six month, um, you can do a six month stint at a European university. So I did it in Amsterdam and

06:18 I played rugby over here in Amsterdam as well. So yeah, when my coach moved clubs after I graduated, I moved with him and played rugby there. And then I've always loved coaching. I've always loved helping develop people. That's always been a huge thing for me and what I get my energy from. And I just was like, well, what better place than just being able to coach rugby all day.

06:48 And it just do have been that environment. And it was, it was a really, it was just something that I felt like, okay, this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my career. Uh, really liked it. So I just thought, well, just go to that environment. Yeah. It's interesting actually, cause we, um, we often talk, well, in the, in the episodes that we've done so far, we've spoken about, um, moving for money. We've spoken with people who move for just pure career development for a challenge, but we've not had.

07:18 Um, someone mentioned economic climate, which is, you know, it, again, like we've come off the back of COVID and it's been particularly challenging, uh, especially for SAS, but sometimes you have to make decisions, um, perhaps that you wouldn't have made in more optimal economic situations. Um, but yeah, it's, it's an interesting motivation for, for a career choice. Yeah. I mean, there was, there was, there was no jobs when I graduated in, in 2009. And luckily.

07:48 I'd gone to the Netherlands year before and met moved and then be able to find a job in the Netherlands coaching and living a good standard of living, having a good standard of living over here. It was, uh, I just never moved back really. What were the, um, so how long did you do that? Uh, well, how long were you at that school? How long were you a rugby coach? It was 12 months. I was there.

08:17 And in those 12 months then, what would you say were your sort of key learnings from that period? Given that this was your first, potentially your first, let's do the inverted con, first proper role. About the real world and being part of a group of people who were,

08:47 ego, ego driven, and how to navigate that and, and learning about the politics of the real world as well. That's what it taught me. So degree in politics, bookseller and then coach, would you say at that? How old were you at that point? First off? 24. 24. Okay. Yeah, because I think back to when I was that age and I there was certainly a degree of

09:17 naivety that I had at that age of, you know, perhaps it's going through the school system, university and what they almost instilling you in terms of what you can expect after going through a degree because obviously they're there to say that the degree is the best thing that you can do for your potential career. So would you say that you had naivety in terms of how the world's professional world should work? No, it was more so naivety to human behaviour.

09:48 thinking that you can trust everybody. People are nicer than people. Yeah, okay. Yeah, interesting. And I think I suffer quite badly from dyslexia. So it's always been a struggle for me in my studies. I had to repeat a year at sixth form because I just failed my first year at sixth form. I had to move schools, I had worked really hard to-

10:14 get A levels, work really hard to get the degree that I got. So that piece, I knew the hard work. I knew it was hard work, but I suppose it's that more of that trusting of humans and human behaviors and what are they trying to get out of a situation. That's what it really taught me. You've kind of alluded to the fact that it was a private school.

10:39 like Hogwarts, so I've got a certain image in my head, but I've got the notes up here as well. So it was also a Catholic school. So the reason I want to talk about this is because my mum works in a Catholic school, so I know a certain degree of how different a Catholic school is in terms of mass and the religious side of things. So what was it? What did you learn being in that sort of environment?

11:08 I love that, that was great. That was, so I was working in a house, one of the boys houses. I ended up being an assistant house master for a little bit as well. And that piece, that pastoral piece, I really liked and I think it gave a lot of purpose to people, especially as if you've got a group of 120 boys.

11:38 in a house, they're away from their families, just giving them something like a normal life or having given the ability for people to give them a compass to their life as well. I think it was really good and yeah I enjoyed that bit. I could imagine if I'd stayed I would have ended up getting confirmed.

12:08 think that was going to happen, but I just decided to move over, move over here and move on. Yeah. And you said that was 12 months. Was it that it was a 12 month placement or was it that you felt after 12 months you wanted to, wanted a change? Yeah. I'd spent, so I'd spent two years, I had another role before, before this role we're discussing two years back in the UK. And I just realized that now

12:37 I don't like it here. I prefer living in the Netherlands. So I just moved. I was just like, right, I'm going to go. And you're still in the Netherlands, right? You live in Amsterdam. Yeah, I just live outside of Amsterdam. So 2013 I moved back. And yeah, haven't moved away since. How's the foreign language?

13:07 I mean it sounds pretty authentic. I don't know what you said but... I could have absolutely said anything there and that's fine as much as I could say as well. So yeah, I'm typical Brit and I live in a foreign country and I can barely speak the language. My wife's Dutch, she is not happy. In our defence, when we say that...

13:36 pretty much everyone speaks English. We're not wrong. Pretty much everyone speaks English. It's not our fault that we happen to be born in the country of a language where, you know, that people have adopted globally, right? It's not our fault. No, and I've tried to say this before to people and I don't get the best of reactions to it. And especially in the Netherlands right now, there's a real right wing further building up.

14:06 And so it's, yeah, I think I'm trying, I'm trying to learn Dutch now. So I don't get, keeping your head down here. Yeah. Don't get kicked out. So that's my, that's my goal. So when you decided to move back to the Netherlands, uh, you obviously had to change roles. So what, what was the next role? What's the next role that you wanted to talk about in that career journey? Yeah. So when, uh, fortunate or unfortunate, um,

14:33 When I decided I was going to move back to the Netherlands, I ended up riding off my car because I was driving down the moors and I forgot about deer and deer and headlights and thinking that if I flashed my headlights, they would move and they didn't. So I took out four deer running across the road. Not just one, then, of four. It was horrendous. Like it was.

15:01 Luckily there was somebody driving past who could trust me, like believe the story. It was a, it was a really bad middle of nowhere. Well, it's cause yeah, try, try telling the police that it was deer that you hit when your car looks like you've plowed through a crowd of people. Yeah. And yeah, it was, uh, yeah, I just remember it now. It was just like, bad. Anyway. Um, so I had, I wrote off my car, took that money with me, uh, to the Netherlands. Um, I crashed it.

15:29 friend's place, Remy's house for a few months and then just tried to figure out what to do with my life and so I ended up working at a mayonnaise factory here in actually not that far from where I live now, just working eight-hour shifts just trying to make ends meet and that was yeah I was just trying to do anything just to try and survive.

15:59 worked at a clothes picking factory for a bit. It was just all that kind of heavy labor, labor kind of stuff. And about started trying to apply for roles, just I had no idea, just get my CV out there to recruiters. It's, yeah, it was just really interesting about who responded or who didn't respond.

16:25 So I don't know, I don't hold that many grudges, but there's one recruiting company in the Netherlands that I'll never do any work with ever because I gave them my CV and they just never responded to me. And, but there was one that did, and they said, we have this role. It's called a business development representative. Do you know what that is? I was like, no. And then that is for this company called Palo Alto Networks. Have you ever heard of them? No, no idea. They just, they IPO'd the year before.

16:54 They were like the hottest company in the world and yeah, just they took a chance on me they said like you've got no sales experience, but you've got all these intangibles of coaching and communicating and My phone voice was also a positive so they they managed to get me an interview with this company and Started out my my proper professional real-world jobs. Yeah, I can imagine it was I don't know what the

17:23 Job was in between the others, but in terms of a recruiter looking at your CV there, okay, right. Bookseller, rugby coach, Catholic school. And now he, he's looking for roles. I can imagine that they're looking at that going, right, where can we place this chap? But when you think about the actual, you know, assistant house, whatever 120 kids, kind of like a unruly sales team. Yeah.

17:53 trying to convince kids to do things that they don't want to do like sales, right? So there are there are actually quite a few, um, like you said, tangibles in there that would work well for sales. Yeah, exactly. And that's and I'd, I'd had, I'd had a really bad experience of being a telly salesperson years before. But it's something I don't really talk about because I, what were you selling? That's the only question I'll ask. Uh, events, event spaces for C level people.

18:22 And I lasted a week and I don't know how I managed to last a week until I quit. And so I thought all sales jobs were going to be like that. So I just was like, Oh, business development rep. That sounds like it's the same thing. But yeah. And then just started out there. That was, it was hilarious. So you, obviously I'll take it. You took that job. You thought that sounds pretty good. I can, I can see myself being a business development representative.

18:53 Yeah. The only other question that's floating around my head is, did you get free mayonnaise? No, it was horrendous. That is horrendous. They just like it had, it was mayonnaise, ketchup, any sauce that you want that if any sauce in the Netherlands is most basically made there and packaged there margarine. No, no freebies horrendous. That's tragic.

19:20 Cause that, that, that, that this is just recurring thought of things that I would put mayonnaise on going through my head. But anyway, back to the, back to the career journey conversation. So you were presented this BDR role, um, at Palo Alto, uh, you took the role. Talk to us about, um, talk to us a bit about the role. Yeah. So as I said, I, I took having, uh, the consequence of things that happened in the past, I'd started having a bit of trust issues with people and, um,

19:50 And they, it told me the interview process, oh, you go to San Francisco for training. And I was like, yeah, sure. Okay. Yeah. I'll just, yeah, better do. And then I started working and they're like, Dave, why have you not booked your flight and your health hotels? You're leaving in two weeks. And I was like, oh, you actually were being serious. So that made me realize, okay, this is actually a different, I'm in a different world now where they'll just splash out.

20:18 however many thousands of dollars to do that. And so it was opening my eyes to this kind of tech world about how it works, about the processes. It was in office five days a week, old pre-2019 kind of environment. Yeah, it was incredible, incredible to be a part of.

20:47 In terms of like how long were you there like to talk to us about at least at that company was it were you in the same role the entire time did you progress what what's talk to us about that? Yeah so um I was I was in the same role for the whole time I was there and one thing that didn't that happened uh was that I got really badly concussed uh playing rugby um about three or four months in so that really affected my work.

21:17 my behaviour. So I basically retired from playing rugby after that, when that happened. So I wasn't the nicest of people because my brain was just not working properly. And so I decided to, yeah, after about nine months, I decided to move to a different role. Another company approached me, offered me double my salary. So I was like...

21:47 Sure. I think it was time for me to move on. So, so in that period with Palo Alto, despite the fact you had the concussion, what nine months from, from my experience in working in, uh, recruiting companies, sales companies, nine ish months, right? If you haven't billed in the first six, in six to nine months, that sort of realm, that's generally the point at which they expect people to start billing, like between six and nine months. If you haven't before that.

22:16 So, you know, the concussion use of his four months in. So the symptoms of the I've unfortunately I've not experienced concussion before. So in terms of how that impacted you, you said your mood changed. What how did how else did it impact you in terms of like the day to day of a PDR role? Yes. So my my my quota was I was doing very I was. My mood was bad, but my I was still performing very well. I was overachieving month over month.

22:47 it got to a point where my quota was being increased month over month and I was still beating it. Uh, but, uh, just my, so that kind of professional piece was fine. It was just more of my me in general, just very, uh, just, just a bit abrupt. Not. Yeah. So you, you were a business orientated, very direct, straight to the point in, but in terms of empathy and emotion.

23:14 It was, uh, yeah, I mean, I can relate to that. Um, but, uh, okay. So what did you, aside from the, the concussion impacting things, what did you learn in that nine months? Cause that was your first foray into SAS and tech. And you mentioned about the money and things of that. What else did you learn in that nine months? Um, yeah, really learned about how, how a deal that started to learn about how a deal is constructed and about what's involved.

23:43 And it's not just David going to Jamie and saying, buy my thing. And Jamie saying, yes. And Jamie giving me a check and that's it. And really starting to learn, okay, what's needed, how, how many people we need to talk to, how we, how we do negotiation, how we do objection handling. It was, it was really learning those kind of basic skills. And also it was a time when

24:13 phone was still the only thing we used. We didn't use email or anything like that. So it was just calling. And yeah, Palo Alto is a very sexy brand. So that helped, but we were just making dials all day and just really getting in, building that muscle. I gotta say, I think, do you think it was better before all of the email and LinkedIn came into play when it was just the simplicity of

24:42 the even playing field of cold calling. Yeah. Cause it's, um, it's like, uh, I always use to say it's like an onion. Like even so when, when I started 10 years ago, 11 years ago, it was, there was only one layer. It was calling some email, but it was mostly calling, but now there's just these, all these other layers built up for it as an SDR and so you're getting your, it's taking you harder to get to the

25:10 core of what you're trying to do, which is book a meeting because of all these other layers that are over over you getting to that meeting. Yeah, that's a whole, that's a whole other podcast. Yeah, I'm just, yeah, I'm kind of thinking when you've only really got the choice of one core channel, yeah, the it then comes more down to the skill and the development of the individual cold calling, which in a way is

25:38 probably bear, not easier, but it's more clear in terms of how you hone your skills. It's right. I need to get better at cold calling, not, Oh God, right. I'm not very good at cold calling. Maybe I should try LinkedIn or maybe I should try email. And then what you end up getting is a one dimensional rep who's brilliant at LinkedIn, but can't call call for the life of them. That I think the big, the big thing that people are going to realize when it's too laggy is those that are great at book meetings on LinkedIn and email. Fantastic.

26:08 Good for you. You hit your number. But when you're selling something, you have to be able to respond to people in real time. And if somebody asks you an objection and you go, oh, let me email you. Like, it doesn't, no, you lose trust, you don't build rapport, you're not gonna win the deal. And I think there's gonna be this huge, there's gonna be this reckoning, I think, with a lot of reps that are.

26:37 championing, I don't have to do many cold calls, blah, blah, blah. They want to progress to an AE. They'll hit become an AE because they hit their number, but they will get found out and chewed out because they just can't speak to a human. Hmm. Which, uh, as we all know is a skill that seems to be deteriorating, uh, with each new generation. Oh, this is the youth. Hmm. I mean, I'm 32, but even now I find myself saying.

27:06 back in my day. Yeah. The youth don't know how easy they've got it. Um, so I can't imagine how bitter and resentful I'll be at age 60, but there we go. Well, yeah, look forward to that. So just out of curiosity, actually, what, what were you selling? At Palo Alto. It was a next generation firewalls. Firewalls. Right. Yeah. Fine. I knew the company name. I just didn't know what they did. Okay. So you were offered, um,

27:33 Well, you said you were offered, was it that you were, you didn't think you were open? And then when they approached you and said, well, double your salary, you were like, brilliant. Yeah, exactly. And so I think all my NDAs are on out. I was on like 27 grand a year OTE in 2013. So when I first got the role, I was like, oh, this is brilliant. But then I realized, hold on, this isn't a lot of money.

28:01 And, um, and then when somebody offered me like 50 K OTE, I was just like, yeah, let's go. So what was, what was that next role? What, what job title? I was just BDR. I have another company was at some, uh, startup in, uh, uh, the U S startup that had a lot of funding and it's really funny speaking to people now. It's quite a famous startup in the Bay area. Um, it's

28:29 It got quiet a few years ago, but people knew about it. So it was quite funny to, again, not really knowing about the world. I was in the tech world, how this was actually quite a, a big, important startup. Now I know I noticed you didn't include this in your highlight role. So was it that it was just, um, good or bad? Let's just summarize it. Good or bad? That's good. It was nice.

28:58 Okay, so after that stint at the San Francisco Bay based startup that was good, good stint. What was the next step that you want to talk about? Yeah, so it was a company called Infoblox. So I joined Infoblox 2016 as a BDR, left 2021 as a director of BDRs and loads of other jobs as well.

29:28 So that was the, that was like the one that, the role that really made my career. And, um, we, we, the whole point, obviously the conversation is we tried to piece together, um, the journey in which you've taken during your career. So you were at Palo Alto, um, as a BDR, uh, earning 27, 27 and a half, whatever it was, you decided to move to, um, another company, um, uh, for double the salary. How long was that Stint? About 18 months.

29:57 18 months and it went well. Um, and then what was your rationale for leaving after 18 months? Um, the burn rate of the business was quite high and it was, I could see that the, the fun startup vibe was going. And you knew what you knew enough about SAS to realize that at that current burn rate, the things were just going to go.

30:24 Well, get more challenging. Yeah. And the people with the leadership who are in place were when things were good and they were getting a lot of funding. We're all happy, cheery, but when the pressure got put on them, they couldn't handle it and what, um, we don't have to talk about the company, but what was the, what was the tool? Well, what was the product? Uh, mobile event apps. So have a conference, have an event app on your phone. Uh, so it.

30:52 Like it didn't work at the time because people didn't really have internet when they went into like Earl's Court or Summit and like or Olympia and their event venues in London and the internet was pretty bad like now everybody has internet. They're known for having shockingly bad internet unless you pay for it. Yes. Crafty. Yeah funny that. Yeah that was like now it would be a lot more.

31:21 It'd been a lot more popular, I think, just not at the time. Okay. So 18 months doing that went pretty well. Um, and in circa 50 K, um, you decided to move to info blocks, um, as a BDR, just for, I guess, stability in terms of you wanted a, a role that you could foresee a future out basically, um, strong leadership. Like it was my manager, Lawrence Morrison was a good leader. Wanted to be with him.

31:50 and the environment that he was building. And how long were you there? Five and a half years. Good. All right. Okay. So five and a half years, like for obviously those listening will probably be largely in a sales role will know that five and a half years is a good stint in a, in a sales role. So you moved from BDR to SDR SDR director in that time. Yeah. Um, how many steps were there in between? Uh, five, six, every year.

32:18 Roughly speaking, you got promoted every year. Yeah. So I went from BDR to being a AE, to being a manager, to being a senior manager, to being a director, to running Asia as well as EMEA. I was in charge of new logo, go to market strategy for EMEA. I was responsible for a global pilot of a commercial sales team.

32:47 things that needed to get done were given to me to do. We'll probably spend a good amount of time on this one because I think there's a lot to be taken from that five and a half year stint because I would say it's probably quite rare. I mean, you probably know better than I, but I'd say it's fairly rare to find someone who stays in a role for five and a half years, especially in sales, well, especially in sales, but let alone...

33:14 marketing or any other sort of SaaS profession, uh, because people tend to get the grasses greener, things don't go well, things go too well, and then they get, they leave for better opportunities. So to be enrolled for five and a half years, it would be good to talk about. Um, I guess what, why you were happy there, why, why you felt that you found your stride and you really, like, I think you said you made a name for yourself into, in that sort of field.

33:44 because I think a lot can be learned from actually sticking with things and progressing through a company and developing rather than just going, right, I've hit 12 months, I want more money or I've hit 18 months, time to move on. Yeah, I think you get to a certain point where money is just money is just money is going to get taxed. So you're not going to see more of it. I think I don't live a crazy lifestyle.

34:13 So it was more for me about feeling like I was progressing in what my roles and responsibilities were. So the funny thing is, was that my friends were telling me a few years ago how they wanted Infoblox to get rid of me few months in, because I wasn't really doing much, they said. And...

34:40 how my boss Lawrence just said like, we need to give him some more time. So it was a slow burn, but then yeah, just started hitting my stride, started feeling valued. People started.

34:58 given me more things to do because I was hitting my numbers. And so, yeah, just became this integral part of the company in Europe. And when you say the initial perception of you was that you were not doing much, what did they mean by that? I wasn't dialing enough, was the thing. I was on LinkedIn. And it was more so because I was just going to have key calling times, calling people at certain times. But

35:28 Um, I was still, uh, I was still just, uh, figuring out my life at the time. And I just met my now wife. So things were starting to settle down a little bit more for me. Um, so yeah, it was just, uh, needing to, yeah, just settle down. And this is probably a, uh, quite a big question. I don't know how you'll break it down into little chunks of what you learned, but

35:56 What did you learn in that five and a half years with respect to sales? Uh, that I was actually good at something. Uh, so my, my whole.

36:11 My whole career, I've always struggled to find something that I thought I was good at. So rugby I was okay at, I wasn't ever going to be a professional. I was never going to work in a bookshop, never going to do, you know, just, I thought I was going to be a teacher, just didn't want to then, just didn't. And it was actually good to know that I was good at something.

36:40 and that I had passion for it. And so, yeah, that was kind of the big thing for me. And that's why I stayed for so long, was I was in an environment where I was good at it, people recognized that I was good at it, and it was a meritocracy. So I got rewarded more for being good at something, which was just what I wanted. No, I can relate to that, Jay. I've always said that I'm good.

37:09 a lot of things. I'm not great. Well, I've got that sort of imposter syndrome. So I don't see myself as great at anything. Good, I can get along. I'm, you know, pretty decent a lot of things. But yeah, I get the same sense of when you find something that actually you get the feedback of, you know, that sort of haptic feedback, like you get from a phone of, you know, that you're you're good at something you're like, Okay, I may stick around here. Yeah.

37:39 Yeah, and I did. And, you know, there was lots of ups and downs. There was, there was, was it, the company got acquired. Uh, but, um, I was, uh, it was really nice to actually be recognized. Cause that was the thing I was, I was, it was a recognized and acknowledged that I had talent. And I was told that as well. It wasn't a secret. Um, and so, and then being given things, courses to go on, um, people, you know,

38:09 I was a manager, but I was in the CEO and CMO meetings with the directors and above. And the only reason I wasn't, it was still, you know, there were still processes. You couldn't just jump from being A to B in title. There had to be steps in between. But, you know, I was in the same room as these people, as a, just a manager. So it was, you know, it gave me those kind of badges.

38:39 batches of approval. Now, I think it's, um, there's something to be said, like we sort of touched on about the fact of the whole job hopping thing. Like it's very, very common, um, practice to job hop to get the salary increase. So, oh, you'll get a 20 average, 20% increase in salary if you move. So I think nowadays it's far more common for people to do one to two years, move one to two years, move rather than invest into a.

39:08 company. So what would you, I guess, what would you say to someone who is doing well a job and probably has built up the confidence and is umming and ah-ing of like, maybe I should do something with this confidence and fight for a better salary elsewhere. What would you say? Before you even do that, have you actually built what your career path is? So

39:37 Do you know what you want to do and what you want to be and when you want to do it? And then have you spoken to your manager about that? Do you have a mentor? Do you have allies in the business? And it's very easy for people just to live in a bubble in their own heads and say, oh, I want 10% more. And it's like, okay, great, but what's your boss's vision for you as well? What are they?

40:06 You know, they, what are their plans? Um, and also the other thing as well, we live in a very, uh, self-centered society where it's like that me, me, me. Most people work for thousand, 10,000, hundred thousand person companies. Your, you are sometimes like your pace that you want to move at is not going to be the pace the business wants to work at.

40:34 And so you need to make sure that you understand what that looks like as well before you make any kind of crazy decisions to move. That's actually, um, it's an interesting one because I think a lot of people, um, tend to think that you have to keep your aspirations a secret from your manager or from the business because

40:55 If your aspirations are that you want to be in a different role elsewhere, not that company, you feel like they're not going to want you anymore and they're going to find a way to get rid of you. Whereas if you actually are very open about your career aspirations, that's, I think that's why in a lot of interview processes, people will ask the question of where do you see yourself in five years? It's not a, for me, I, I, a hundred percent, I asked this in an interview I had two weeks ago for a, for a web manager we're hiring. And I don't ask it because, um,

41:25 I want them to say, I want to be in this company in five years. I want to make sure I'm in, I stay and I invest into the company. I want to understand how big they're thinking in terms of like how hungry they are, where if they've got an idea of where they want to go and if it's at the company, great, if it's not the company also great because you're using this as a stepping stone, which has to go well for you to get to the stepping stone after it. Yeah. I mean, I was looking around because in my, I used to have a paper diary.

41:53 that I used to put my meetings in and stuff. And in the front of it, I had what my goals were. So my five year goals and about when I'm gonna hit them. And I spoke to my boss, Frank, great guy. And I said, you know, do you believe that these are achievable? Or what in your eyes do I need to do to make sure that these are achievable?

42:20 And so then he understood from my side about what I wanted to do and what I wanted to achieve and he was able to tell me like, Hey, that's too soon or that's not fast enough. And so, you know, that was, that was good. And, um, you know, I haven't checked it for a while, but I was able to cross off a lot of the goals that I had because I was able, I was hitting them. And that's, uh, yeah, critical. Yeah. So, you know,

42:46 Definitely, definitely be open. Don't be afraid to be open with your manager or senior leaders in terms of where you see yourself going, because it might be that you could save yourself the job hopping and having to learn new roles and you might actually be able to stick where you are and get that, that progression that, um, that you wanted. So you were there five and a half years. Yeah. Why did you decide to leave? Um, so I really wanted a global role. Um, I wanted, I've been there five and a half years and I just felt

43:16 that I needed to move to a different company to achieve it, be a global leader for being an SDR global leader. There were a lot, the company had just been acquired by another private equity company. A lot of changes were happening and I thought this is the right time to move on. So how long were you at Solace? 18 months.

43:43 18 months and in that 18 months, were you, was it global SDR leader for the it's sort of the entirety of that 18 months? Yeah. And so we built the team from like two free SDRs to 20 free managers over, over the free GOs, produced more pipeline, more meetings than the company never seen. Uh, start producing a, a talent engine as well for people, uh, to move into new roles in the company.

44:12 So I achieved everything that I set out to achieve. So you, you certainly proved the point that you could do a global SDR executive role. Yeah. Yeah. And what, what else, uh, in terms of what you said that you, one of the main reasons where you wanted to prove that you could do that role. So what did you learn about yourself, uh, personally, but also what professionally, but also personally in terms of, cause it kind of sounds more of a personal, um,

44:41 goal rather than professional. So personally, in that I can do this rather than professional in that I want to reach a certain amount of money or I want to reach a certain title. Yeah, I always find that personal goals will achieve monetary goals as a consequence. And so yeah, we just had, we, I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. And I proved it.

45:10 It felt good to do it. And so then once I did prove it, it was like, okay, now it's time to look for, look for something else, um, and go and try and get more skips. Two things I want to touch on. You gave a very, very good piece of advice there, which is, um, the way in which you should think about the money. So you've got two ways. One is, uh, I want the money. That's the primary reason for a job or a career choice. Um,

45:40 Or you've got the other, which is what you're talking about, where it's like, I want the challenge. I want the reward of developing. I want the education, the upskilling, which as you said, money typically follows because once you get better at something, once you develop, you increase your level of knowledge, your level of skill, you tend to get promotions or you tend to get bigger roles that come with the money. So it's a really good piece of advice that of.

46:06 it was the reason I wanted to touch on it was sort of similar for me. I sort of stayed on the same salary for what felt like five or six years. And I took a lot of sidesteps just to build out strings to my bow, whatever you want to call it. And then I got to a point where I had built up enough of that knowledge and I had quashed the imposter syndrome a little bit more. And then the money came. And I think that's I think people should think of money.

46:34 like that more than the other way around of just chasing the money. The money will come, but think of it of do you deserve the money? If you don't deserve the money from a skill, personable side of things, work on that first. And I think the piece that people don't talk about enough and because it's the ugly side of it is what we do in SaaS and tech, we're paid more than 95% of the population.

47:04 And so we believe, some people believe then like, oh, I just need to go for more and more money. No, no, you need to realize about how privileged you are in the position that you are in. You are earning most likely more than your parents ever earned, unless they were also executives at places. But you are earning more than your parents. You're earning more than your grandparents. You've moved up the...

47:33 Degeneration or wealth ladder. Um, and you're also going to be working for the next, like only some people are very lucky to retire in their thirties. If they get a go to a company, IPOs. Well, even, even forties or fifties to your point, because the retirement age is like 68 now, it's going to be, it's going to be 70 before you know it. So even if you retire at 40 or 50, that's still a, that's still a good innings. Yeah. And so it's like, you've got to just take it.

48:02 much you know how much do you really need every every month because the thing is you get used to it as well so if you earn 100k you're gonna your way of your living will go up to that point so if you're at 200k and so it always happens i'm i'm wisely so i save up stuff save up money so i'm always all right but for some people it's it's like yeah they just hope they spend to where they are and then okay but you're never happy

48:32 Some good advice there on, I guess, motivations associated with money. Life's not all about money. We have, that's actually been a topic that's come up in a few episodes. A lot of career journeys seem to be orientated around money in terms of why people leave and join certain companies. And I think you only now you can look back in retrospect or hindsight and go, probably shouldn't have done that. I was very unhappy at that role.

48:58 Um, okay. It was, they said it was more money. Didn't really turn out to be that much more. So just think twice that the little takeaway there before we, um, before we find out about your next role is, uh, vice and all about money. Um, the, you do some very good, um, sit down, look at your finances, watch some YouTube videos and actually think about how much you do need to live the lifestyle you want. I had a figure in my mind of for me to live X lifestyle. I need Y amount.

49:27 When I got to that amount, I went, you know, I'm happy. I don't need millions. I don't need millions of pounds. I've got everything that I've won. I'm able to, like you said, I'm able to put money away, be sensible things and still do the things I want. I'm very happy. Life's not all about money. And yes, we can sit here because we're later in life. I know I'm only 32, but it's still 10 years later in life than a lot of people probably listening. But yeah, life's not all about money. So.

49:57 You were there 18 months. Uh, why did you leave? I think, I mean, I, I, I've got it on my screen here. I recognize the company. Yeah. I can imagine one of the reasons why you left, you were like, blimey. That's a very good company. Yeah. So it was, um, so I ended up taking, uh, moving to snowflake, uh, to help lead their, the Amir sales development function there. Um, and so it was two, two points. It was working at snowflake.

50:27 Uh, but it was also working with, uh, under Lars Nielsen, who is kind of the, the, the, the man, the goat when it comes to sales development in, uh, in, in America and really wanted to get under his learning tree with Travis Henry, who, uh, who, who they worked together, um, building out sales development motions. So it's really about getting under that, getting under that kind of environment. Uh, was that something that you pursued?

50:55 As in you, because it sounds as when you describe Lars and the structure there that you, it was a structure that you wanted to be a part of. So was it that you actively pursued and applied for the job or was it a recruiter reaching out? Yeah, I applied for the role and then Lars was like, did we approach you? I was like, no, no, I applied. He's like, well, because this is your exactly the kind of profile we want for this.

51:22 So that was nice. But I'd also the, the funny story was I'd, I'd got approached by a recruiter to go and work at Snowflake years before. Um, when they just started out and I, I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm like, I'm okay. I've just got promoted to a manager at Infoblox. Um, I wanted just to stick at it and I kind of regret it now. I say it's not always about money, but I would have been a, it was pre IPO. So I would have been.

51:51 very comfortable afterwards if I'd taken the job and was there during the IPO. But yeah, I applied for the role and got it. Okay. So you applied for the role after 18 months, previous company. What was your title? What did you go in at? It was director sales development, Amina. Amina, cool. And we touched on the main reason for taking the job. Was that a...

52:21 in terms of like that application process or thinking about your next move, was that a, were you rock, you know, rock solid on that next move in terms of like knowing exactly what you wanted, the structure you wanted, the type of company going back into more SaaS environment? Yeah, so I, I'd proven that I could run a global team. And I felt that for me to move into more of a

52:50 SAS global role next would be to go to a snowflake of the world where like it's the premier league, it's everything you want is there. So we had an SDR ops person for Amir, we had somebody that did our training and enablement for our SDRs in Amir, we had all the tools, we had just everything

53:20 But then the expectations that came with it were huge. And so that was fun because it's like, okay, well, now you've actually got to deliver. So I thought doing, moving it into that environment would help me then for my next role, which whenever that would come to run that global organization. So for those that might be wondering what the premier league of SaaS companies does, what was it that you were selling? Data cloud storage, basically.

53:49 Super, super interesting stuff. Yeah. Just making sure. So all these kind of, uh, applications and databases, just having it in one place rather than loads of different places. It's mad what you end up selling. Isn't it like, I bet at age 21 or whatever it was, you didn't see yourself. Go in, you know, I'm going to sell cloud-based data storage. Yeah. I just, I was just like, right. Which what Wellington boots am I going to buy for when I coach rugby? That was something I was thinking about.

54:19 Yeah, mad, mad. But okay, right. So, um, Snowflake, how long were you there? Uh, I was there for less, less than a year. Less than a year. Okay. So what did you, in that rapids less than a year, what did you learn? Cause you've touched on the fact that they had a lot of structure and which is good and bad, but like what, what did you learn in that, um, circa nine ish months there? Yeah, really about, about enter, enter enterprise.

54:49 organizations and about how they fit into this bigger, multi-billion dollar engine of a revenue generation. That was a real, uh, that was a real, I said about Premier League. That's, that's as, as big as it will get unless you work for Nvidia or something like that or Google. It's that kind of level of, of how you're, you have to make an impact because the numbers are so, so big.

55:20 So describe the reporting structure in terms of who is your boss? How many people did you have in your team? So I had about 80 overall headcount in my team. Had about seven, eight managers that reported under me. And then my boss was the VP of sales development, whose boss was the VP of demand generation, who's the boss of the CMO.

55:45 So it was pretty, yeah, I was interested. You mentioned it in a previous role, actually, that you reported into CMO. So I'm interested that there were a sales function reporting into a demand gen and a marketing function. It's becoming more often. More. Yeah, certainly nowadays. You know, it's sales and marketing are one revenue engine. But back, you know, even a few years ago, it was very much marketing and sales separate. Yeah. Yeah, it's.

56:14 The SDR function was, uh, it's still it reports under marketing. Um, yeah, it's just the, it's the, the way, the motion of how they've built out the SDR function. Uh, interesting. I've not come across that. Um, interesting. Okay. So huge team eight, that gives you a, that gives you an idea of, or gives us an idea of the size of the business. If they had 80 and that team alone, you had anywhere from what? Eight to 10 reports, uh, direct reports. And then they would have had.

56:43 each of them sub reports. So roughly nine, 10 months, however long it was, why was it so short? I got laid off. There was a real good business. And so me and quite a few other people were affected. Yeah, it was a year ago now. Last in first out sort of thing. Yeah, yeah, it is what it is. It was just a lot of changes happened. So yeah.

57:13 But again, you know, this is an interesting thing to talk about because the career journey that we've discussed so far has been about, well, largely just good things, right? Good promotions and progressions and good performance and learning a lot. And the realities, unfortunately, of the sales function are that at some point in your career, you are almost certainly going to get laid off. Yeah. Yeah. And so I was very lucky. And, you know, I've been I've been doing other stuff over the last year.

57:43 that's been really successful. So it's not been a, you know, it was sad, but yeah, just gotta move on and keep going. And then, you know, in terms of what you do from, you've spoken today about proving to yourself that you could do something that you, you know, the imposter syndrome thing that I sort of touched on as well. Did that...

58:10 Did you take a step or two back initially, like mentally, how did you deal with that? Was that the first time you were laid off? Yeah, it was the first time and it was also during a period where there was just no jobs around. It was the end of the last year. Yeah, the COVID slump, post-COVID slump. It was really live, so I was like, yeah, I'll get a new job tomorrow, whatever, I'll be fine. And no, no, just...

58:39 And then also I was too, I was overqualified for roles that I was applying to. So people, I was speaking Latin to people that only spoke English and, and I was talking to execs as well and I just, I couldn't, there was just such a mismatch. Uh, so, uh, yeah, it was, uh, it was, it's fine. Like I'm not, I know my worth, I know my value and I'm not going to under.

59:07 Undersell myself to just because Yeah, that's I guess that's sort of why I was trying to get to of the because there's what you know, there's two ways you can sort of tackle that it's the defeatist and The the opposite of defeatist wherever there the word doesn't come to come to my mind but defeatist mentality of I got laid off because I wasn't good enough or I Got laid off because of the reality that is a real it happens. I'm still

59:36 bloody good at what I do and what am I going to do with that? But it sounds like you touched on the fact that you put money away every month. So it sounds like that that trait in your personality paid off. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So it was all fine. And so I do a lot of consulting stuff now and I run I run some very successful SDR leadership communities in America and Amir. So, you know, I've just I've just dust myself down.

01:00:05 myself off and just get cracking and do something else? No, that's the only reason I touch on putting money away is because I do think it's a... again, it's something that comes with age, but for those listening who are earlier on in their career, just because you're earning the money, don't spend it all. Put some of it away. I think the general rule 50-30-20, 50% on your fundamentals, 30% on...

01:00:32 flexible spend, that's the stuff you enjoy, and then 20% put it away. Because you don't know when reorgs are gonna happen. You don't know when the career that's going from strength to strength might have a stumbling block or an obstacle come around the corner. Yeah, I mean, I had somebody who reached out to me last week on Sunday saying, hey, I think, Sunday before Christmas, 23rd, and he went, yeah, I think there might be a reorg going on at the company.

01:01:01 So can I share my CV with you to help you to share it with people? Sure. Send it. It went, yep. I was and then literally two minutes later. Yep. I was right. I've just been laid off. 23rd of December. Merry Christmas. And it's like you never know when it's going to happen. And you never know when people are just going to be heartless like that and not wait a few extra days before laying you off. It might it might feel like it's a

01:01:30 grown up boring thing to do, just put money away every month. Yeah, you have absolutely no idea what's going to go on. And I'll tell you what, in terms of stress and anxiety, which are very, very high in sales anyway, knowing that you've got six months of fundamental expenses, your mortgage, your rent, your bills covered, that is a hell of a good thing to bring your anxiety levels down. Cause you go, I'll tell you what, if all goes tits up, I've got six months. Yeah. And that's, that's a good place to be. 100%. And, uh, you know,

01:02:00 being self-employed, what I'm doing right now, that's, you know, you've got to go and hunt for your own food every day. And then there's nothing better than looking now and saying, okay, right, I've actually, I've got, I've done quite well. And I can, I don't have to work as hard because I've got a buffer. It helps mentally so much. Okay, so that's, I think that feels like a good point.

01:02:28 do the roundup, the quick fire stuff. So what would be your top three tips for those listening in terms of their career growth? Yeah, so three things are go beyond your job description, treat people with respect always, and never be the smartest guy in the room. Okay, the two, the treat people with respect completely agree, but the other two I wanna touch on. So go beyond your job description, talk to me. Yeah, so.

01:02:58 You've been employed to do a role, great, awesome. Like, I don't think that sounds quite cold, but yeah, that was the reason why you were hired. And great, you're doing the job. But if you want to, if you want to progress in your career, you need to be finding other things that you can be doing, which you're not quote unquote being paid for. Because that's then when leadership sees if people have passion, commitment.

01:03:28 They do things that are not being monetarily paid for, but it's all about chipping in. And I get it, people say, well, no, that's not what I'm paid for, blah, blah, blah. But how do businesses realize that you have the ability to do the thing that you want to do if you don't do it first? They're not gonna take the risk in this financial climate.

01:03:56 to give you something that you've not proven at all that you can do? Yeah, I've never understood the mentality of it's not in my job description because I'm like, look, life isn't that black and white of if it's not explicitly written in my job description, I'm not doing it. That's not the reality of the world we live in. And that wouldn't have been the reality of any job in the history of careers. It's probably got better in terms of that. I don't know.

01:04:24 might offend some people here in terms of the woke society we live in, in terms of sticking to the exact verbiage in a job description, but it's probably a lot better than it, a lot better now than it was, but why come on, have some flex. And it's for people that are like that and say, I'm going to stick to my guns. Your bosses are going to talk to other people within the business. When they ask about you, you're going to get the comment.

01:04:54 It won't be it won't be explicit, but it's like don't really doesn't really do beyond what their job description is and for And actually when you want a reference for another job Yeah, that reference is gonna be the most textbook Google off-the-shelf reference So yeah, they were a very astute. They were always on time. They were polite. That's your references Oh, yeah, yeah, Jamie Jamie worked at the forefront from so-and-so to so-and-so That was it

01:05:22 Like, that'll be it. That'll be the only thing you get. And then that says a lot. And then what you put in is what you get out. Yeah. Karma goes, what goes around comes around, you know, whatever phrase you want to use. 100%. Uh, and then the last one, what we were in terms of, um, never being the smartest guy in the room, what do you mean by that? I find that if I'm the, if I know all the answers to everything in a space that I'm in.

01:05:51 that's a bit worrying for me because I should always be learning and being challenged and improving. And I've been in roles before in the last few years where I was the smartest guy in the room and I didn't feel like I was progressing, I didn't feel like I was going to get better, felt like I was getting stale, so I needed to be in environments where I was challenged and my and not in a not in an unprofessional way but have my opinions

01:06:20 and my ideas like talked through to make sure that we all have the right, the best solution for the business. So I think that's you want to be in those kind of real tough environments, challenging environments. It really helps you. That's interesting actually because it reminds me of a role that I was in. I was doing affiliate marketing, did it for about two years, just over two years and you in that particular role in that particular company in a particular function.

01:06:48 I could not step outside of the four walls of that role and that role's job description and any creative ideas I had, it was like, that's just not how we do things. Yeah. And I was, I mean, that role was probably only five years ago, four or five years ago, and it was probably the most junior the role could have been. And what I've managed to do in the role after that and the role that's followed, which is the role I'm in now.

01:07:15 It was, I just felt completely caged. Like I couldn't, I couldn't use the creativity or the, the energy that I had. And I think, um, it's one of the most important things is that you are stretched. You are challenged. You are, you are able to challenge the narrative. Exactly. And it's like, and it's how you get the best out of people. That's the big thing. And, um, yeah, I just think.

01:07:45 You have to have that environment. You have to be in it. There's probably some sort of like saying, I think there is, it's like, if you're not learning your this, and I can't remember what the saying is, but yeah, always be learning, always be challenging. And I think that'll put you in pretty good stead in terms of that career development. Okay then, so any, I think I know what the regret's gonna be because you mentioned earlier in our conversation, but what would be your, any regrets? Yeah, I wish I'd been at Snowflake pre-IPO.

01:08:12 because I've met enough of those people now who are there pre-IPO. And there was one guy who I met who is early 30s that's retired because he never has to work another day in his life. So, I mean, I would never be, I would always have to work, but I think it would have been nice to have the house paid for and yeah, just be able to live carefree in that respect.

01:08:42 But if we think to the infamous story of lottery winners and what happened to them, you could have got that nice lump sum and something could have happened and your life could have taken a more negative downturn than you sitting here, you're looking back going, oh, that money would have been brilliant. I could have paid this, this and this. You don't know what happened. No, it could be like that. The, what's his name, the chav who wastes all his money on.

01:09:11 Snorted it all. Yeah. Yeah. Basically. Yeah. Back being a bin man. Yeah, it could have been him. Yeah. Look, that's my point is like we've sort of touched on it Money isn't everything and you never know what could happen like To be blunt, you could have got a nice 500k payout across the road and got hit by bus Yeah, exactly. You just don't know. Um, okay then so what's next for you then? What's the next step on the ladder? Yeah, so i'm i'm very happy doing the the entrepreneur

01:09:40 life that I'm doing running communities for SDR leaders currently. My thing will be my next operator role will be as a global SDR leader but I'm not really in really a rush to find it because things are going well. I'm building this thing currently. Ecosystem. Yeah ecosystem and you know

01:10:09 Something will come from it. Maybe great. If not, no problem in no. My parents did ask me, I'm only 38, but my parents asked me over Christmas, like, yeah, but can you retire on this? Can you do this at 60? I was like, mom, dad, come on. Let me just, let me just enjoy this for now. What I'm doing and the challenge. Let's not think about that just yet. And that's a wild, how generational.

01:10:35 perceptions of careers and jobs and pensions and retirement. It's different, isn't it? Um, and then what, what, what's the, I think everyone, um, has this. What's like your end goal? Like what, when you sit here now, what, where would you like to get to before you stop working? Yeah, it will be to be a CRO chief revenue officer at a SaaS company. Um,

01:11:04 I think it goes back to that piece of when, if and when I'm ready to go back into the full-time world of work, then I'll build out my career plan about how I want to get to it. But that, you know, really making an impact to the bottom line, that's what I love to do. So yeah, that'd be the thing that I would aim to be before I turn 17. Hey, you've got a while. You've got plenty of time. Plenty of time.

01:11:32 Exactly. No rush. Right. Well, that brings us to the end of conversation. Thank you for joining me for an episode. I hope that those listening have taken something from it. I think there's tons of information, insights, stories, actionable things that people can actually take away from that episode. A lot of them probably quite philosophical, actually, in terms of how you should approach things and the sensibilities of money and things like that. So.

01:12:01 Hopefully those listening have enjoyed the episode. We'll be back either next week or next season. I don't know when this episode will fall in the seasons that we've got planned, but we'll be either be back next week or in the next season. But thank you, David, for joining me. Hopefully it wasn't too laborious for you. No, it was good fun. Thank you very much. Good. Right, we will catch you in the next episode.