Podcasts about Enablement

In dieser Folge sprechen wir offen darüber, warum in PreSales-Teams oft wenig Lust auf Weiterentwicklung herrscht – und was du als Führungskraft wirklich tun kannst, um das zu ändern. Wir teilen persönliche Erfahrungen aus aktuellen Kundengesprächen, analysieren typische Widerstände und zeigen, wie fehlende Kommunikation und falsches Framing die Motivation im Keim ersticken. Gemeinsam diskutieren wir, wie du Enablement-Maßnahmen wirksam begründest, individuelle Entwicklungsziele setzt und echtes Team-Engagement schaffst. Dabei nehmen wir auch die Führungsebene kritisch unter die Lupe: Wie viel Verantwortung trägst du selbst für fehlende Motivation? Hör rein und erfahre, wie du dein PreSales-Team aus der Demo-Comfort-Zone holst und zum strategischen Partner entwickelst. ----------

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If you gave your life to Christ today, contact us at thecityofthelordzambia@gmail.comIf you would like to join the COL Church, you may use the link below to register.https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1WvKlPpoqe5DuZJmcx2Qg7hLyN9gz2EsFeG0JBqMf1Os/edit Be Blessed

In a podcast recorded at ITEXPO / MSP EXPO, Doug Green, Publisher of Technology Reseller News, spoke with Federico De Faveri, founder of De Faveri Consulting, about the growing demand for highly technical, hands-on consulting that bridges gaps between business needs and complex software systems. De Faveri Consulting focuses on what Federico describes as “tech enablement consulting”—hands-on work that includes software development, system integrations, automation, and custom tooling. Rather than operating through large consulting layers, De Faveri works directly with clients to design and implement solutions that remove bottlenecks, reduce manual processes, and create more auditable, data-driven workflows. “I like going into a company with a real problem and building something that saves time, improves visibility, and just works,” De Faveri said. During the discussion, De Faveri explained that clients engage him both reactively and proactively—either to fix broken or inefficient systems or to bring new ideas to life. His interest in attending MSP Expo centered on identifying emerging challenges faced by MSPs, enterprises, and channel partners, particularly as AI-driven tools and integrations reshape operations. While based in South Florida, De Faveri emphasized that most projects are delivered remotely, allowing him to support clients nationwide while still prioritizing trust-building and occasional in-person collaboration. As a newer independent consultant, De Faveri highlighted the freedom and focus that come with running his own firm, along with a core piece of advice for organizations evaluating technology solutions. “Always get multiple technical opinions,” he noted. “Sometimes the best solution isn't another platform—it's a smart integration or a custom script that connects what you already have.” Visit https://df.consulting/

According to research on organizational alignment led by LSA Global highly aligned companies grow revenue 58% faster and are 72% more profitable than misaligned companies. So how can you cultivate an aligned culture ready to drive improved outcomes? Riley Rogers: Hi, and welcome to the Win/Win Podcast. I’m your host, Riley Rogers. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Julia Juliano, manager of sales enablement at Cencora. Thank you so much for joining us, Julia! I’d love it if you could kick us off by telling us a little bit about yourself, your background, and your role. Julia Juliano: Yeah, of course. Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here today. My name is Julia Juliano. I live in the Philadelphia area with my husband, daughter, and two dogs. I’m actually coming up on my seventh year with Cencora. I'm now a sales enablement manager, and I started with the company in generic sales within the New York Metro Territory, where I was a top performing rep. That experience really ignited my passion for empowering sales teams to succeed, which ultimately led me to transition into sales enablement. I entered the enablement world as a specialist about four years ago, and worked my way into my current role as a manager. Over the years, I’ve had the privilege of supporting both community retail pharmacies and more recently our specialty distribution business. These experiences have given me a comprehensive understanding of the challenges our teams face and the tools and strategies they need to excel in such a competitive and highly regulated environment. RR: Well, we’re super excited to have you here and to dig into a couple of those things you’ve mentioned—transitioning into that sales enablement role from your desire to help sales teams win, navigating competition. So excited to dig into all of that. I want to start with one of the first things you mentioned, which is that you’ve run the gamut from sales to sales enablement. So, can you take us back to your time as a pharmaceutical sales rep at Cencora? What challenges did you experience that shaped how you enable today? JJ: Yeah, you know, it’s a really unique experience to be able to go from sales to sales enablement. As a pharmaceutical sales rep, I experienced firsthand the challenges of accessing the right resources at the right time. Whether that was finding compliant marketing materials, navigating product specific information, or understanding how to position solutions for different customer needs, there was often a disconnect between the tools available and the realities of working in the field and the conversations that I was having with those customers. That experience really allows me to approach enablement from the rep perspective, knowing that every minute they spend searching for content or trying to interpret complex messaging is a minute that they’re not spending with their customers. My goal is to streamline their workflows, ensure they have what they need at their fingertips, and create alignment between the tools we provide and the outcomes that they’re driving in the field. RR: I think that’s such an important call out: Every minute that you’re distracted with non-essential tasks takes you away from the work that really matters both to you and to our business. I think bringing that kind of lived experience and empathy that comes with it to the table is so huge and helps you kind of build the programs and support arms that you’re like: “I wish I’d had that.” And I know it probably can’t be easy to build those programs because Cencora unites six distinct business units under a single brand. So, from an enablement perspective, what kind of complexity does that create for you? JJ: Yeah, so the complexity really lies in balancing the enterprise wide alignment with the unique needs of each of those six business units. So, the six business units are specialty, GPO, community, retail health systems, animal health, and corporate partnerships. They each serve distinct segments of the healthcare ecosystem; their customers, products, and sales strategies vary significantly, which means that their enablement needs are equally diverse. At the same time as one unified brand, we have to maintain consistency and messaging, compliance and governance across the organization. So from an enablement perspective, this requires a strategic and thoughtful approach to content structure, governance, and collaboration to ensure that we’re effectively addressing both the enterprise and each individual business unit’s priorities. RR: When you’re looking across these priorities and trying to stitch everything together into a clear strategy and message, it's obvious that alignment doesn’t happen by accident. It's a very intentional, thoughtful thing that you have to cultivate. So how do you use Highspot to break down those silos that could potentially appear, and then make sure that everybody’s running to the same drum beat at the same pace? JJ: We’ve accomplished this by building a centralized Spot architecture that balances enterprise-level consistency with business unit-specific relevance. So at the enterprise level, we house shared resources like compliance guides, org charts, corporate initiatives—things like that. At the business unit level, we provide more tailored content and tools designed to meet those unique needs of each team for their specific solutions. Highspot Analytics further enables us to identify content gaps and redundancies, which allows us to continuously refine and optimize our approach By centralizing any efforts on Highspot, we’ve established a single source of truth that fosters alignment while maintaining the flexibility needed to meet those diverse needs across our customer segments. RR: There’s so much in what you said that I really want to dig into in just a second. You know, about how you structured those Spots, how you determine what gets a Spot, what doesn’t, alongside the kind of specific, tailored tools that you’re building for solutions. But I want to start with the foundation, the baseline for all of this, which is that as part of your work, you led the creation of a formal structured governance plan. Why did you see governance as foundational for driving alignment and helping Cencora drive a shared strategy? JJ: Governance is truly the backbone of any successful enablement strategy, especially in a complex organization like Cencora. Without it, you risk content duplication, outdated materials, and a lack of visibility into what’s working and what isn’t. When I joined the team, we had a ton of great content, but it wasn’t always easy for reps to find or trust that they were using the most current and up-to-date version. By implementing a formal governance plan, we established a clear process for content creation, approval, and maintenance. And this not only improved findability and adoption, but also ensured that everything we provide to our teams is compliant, up to date, and aligned with our strategic goals, RR: So, you knew what it could achieve for you, and you’re starting to see those outcomes. Specifically you’re seeing that in the data. You know, as a result of this governance strategy, you’ve seen meaningful improvements in content views, downloads, findability, and even platform adoption. So, what actions or parts of this strategy do you think made the biggest difference in achieving the results that you’ve named? JJ: We implemented a consistent taxonomy or naming convention across all the different business units, which made it easier for reps to navigate and find what they need. We also introduced regular content audits on a quarterly basis to ensure that everything in Highspot is relevant and up to date. Another key action was also leveraging Highspot analytics to identify gaps in content or areas where reps were struggling to find resources. And by addressing those gaps and continuously refining our approach, we saw significant improvements in engagement metrics, like you mentioned, the content views, downloads, and overall adoption of the tool. RR: How did you identify those gaps in content that reps couldn’t find? JJ: So, we created sales surveys and worked with our marketing partners and our solution owners to identify which solutions were being most searched for by reps, what materials they needed to aid in the customer conversations that they were having. Then, you know, in the surveys we addressed: “What would you like to learn more about? What type of content are you unable to find that would be helpful in your day-to-day role?” And so we took those surveys, partnered with marketing and those solution owners, like I mentioned, and were able to create those resources to better drive, you know, adoption and findability within the platform. RR: Okay, amazing. I think that’s such an important approach where you’re building from the perspective of your users. It’s not just: “Here’s what we think works.” It’s: “Okay, what does this actually look like in your day to day and how can we make it better?” And actually that kind of leads me to that Spot architecture that you touched on, which includes enterprise-level and then business-unit specific spots. So, how did you create this structure and then how does it help you create consistency like we talked about, but also keep things relevant to reps' day to day? JJ: Yeah, so we started by clearly defining what belongs at the enterprise level versus the business unit level. Enterprise level Spots include resources that apply across the entire organization—this is our compliance guidelines, corporate initiatives, any distribution information, org charts, and training materials. The business unit specific Spots are tailored to the needs of each team—this is your product specific collateral solution, information, sales playbooks, and any sales execution materials that we have for the teams to ensure consistency. We developed a standardized template for all Spots so that reps know where to find what they need, no matter which business unit they’re in. The structure ensures that the reps have access to both the big picture, along with the details that matter most to their customers. Additionally, each business unit only has access to the enterprise level Spots, plus the materials that are relevant to their team. For example, a rep in health systems won’t be able to see community retail content if it isn’t applicable to their role. So the targeted access keeps search results cleaner and more accurate, reducing noise and helping reps to get to the right asset faster. It also supports a smart marketing model. We may have one enterprise solution, but the go to market strategy, messaging, and customer facing materials can vary by customer profile and their buying environment. So structuring the access this way allows marketing and enablement to maintain the consistent approach for enterprise positioning while still delivering the right version of the story and tailored assets for each individual audience. RR: It feels like there was so much intention and thought put into this. You’ve kind of checked the box for everybody in the org. You know, sales is getting specifically what they need. They don’t have to filter through the noise and the chaos of five other business units. Marketing ensures that their strategy is being executed to its fullest and that the materials they’re producing and investing in are seeing the usage they’d like. Then you as an enablement team have a much easier time governing and maintaining your strict policies because you don’t have that same sprawl, so I love to hear that; it’s a fantastic structure. Not to get too in the weeds, but I’ve heard that as part of this Spot structure, you’re also empowering reps to land the value of Cencora's different product lines by creating Richardson Methodology-inspired Plays for each solution. What do those Plays look like in practice and how are they supporting reps? JJ: Our Richardson-inspired Plays are thoughtfully designed to guide reps through the entire sales process, all the way from discovery to close in a way that’s tailored to each specific solution. Each Play for every individual solution that we offer is structured into three sections:Learn, prepare, and engage. The “Learn” section provides internal facing materials to educate the reps on the solution, ensuring that they have a deep understanding of its value and its applications. The “Prepare” section offers guidance on how to plan and strategize for customer conversations, so this includes tools like questioning frameworks and call planners. And then finally, the “Engage” section houses our customer facing materials. So these are typically created by marketing, and they support reps in effectively communicating the solutions value to customers to support them in those conversations. And these Plays really act as a clear and actionable roadmap, equipping reps with the knowledge, preparation, and resources they need to have more meaningful, productive, and impactful conversations with our customers. RR: So we’ve dug into the details. We talked about thoughtful governance, strategic Spot architecture, and solution-specific plays. When we look at all of this more broadly, how has this approach improved or changed how reps take Cencora solutions to market? JJ: This approach has really transformed how our reps take solutions to market by making it easier for them to find trust and use the resources that they need. With the governance in place, reps know that they’re always accessing the most current and compliant materials, and then the Spot architecture ensures they can quickly find content that’s relevant to their specific customers and sales strategies. The solution-specific Plays also provide a clear roadmap for engaging customers and addressing their individual needs. Together, all of these elements have really improved their efficiency, confidence, and effectiveness, which ultimately has led to better customer outcomes and stronger business results. RR: It really seems like you and the team have built an environment that you as a rep would’ve been like: “This is fantastic. I can go run and do my job and not spend time on the things that take me away from it.” I’d be curious to add onto that impact piece: What key results have you achieved beyond everything that we just covered off on (which was a lot!). What particular wins are you especially proud of? JJ: Yeah, so since we implemented Highspot in 2021—coming up on five years at this point—we’ve seen clear improvements in how our teams find, trust, and use the enablement resources that we’re able to provide for them. Like I’ve mentioned, the content is much easier to locate, adoption is stronger, and engagement is more consistent because reps know that they’re working from a single current source of truth. We’ve talked about most of them today, but the wins I’m especially proud of are the governance foundation we’ve put in place, the Spot architecture that balances the enterprise consistency with the business unit relevance, and then those solution-specific plays that help reps move from learning to preparing to engaging with their customers. Together, those changes have reduced friction for sellers, improved onboarding and readiness for new team members, and strengthened alignment across the organization. The most important thing with having Highspot as our sales enablement platform is that, before we adopted this tool, different versions of materials were just kind of floating around on people’s desktops and an old platform that we used to utilize in Teams channels and through inboxes. You never knew which one was the one that was most recently updated. “What should I be using? Has any of this messaging changed?” Now, there’s one place; I always pitch it to our reps as Cencora's Google. You just search in the search bar, whatever you’re looking for, and the first result that comes up is what you’re looking for. RR: I think it’s really important, that kind of domino effect that you touched on: “We did the work at the very beginning to make sure everything is accessible, to make sure it’s updated and to make sure it’s valuable to our reps and that they know it.” And now you’re seeing the entire progression from finding content to engaging buyers in a more meaningful, trusted way and creating more trusted relationships. So you’ve kind of built that flywheel. Now it’s just kind of spinning and maintaining, which is fantastic to hear. Last question for you: For leaders building similar enterprise-level enablement strategies in a similarly complex competitive environment, what hard-earned advice would you leave them with? JJ: My advice would be to start with the governance and the structure. Without a clear plan for how the content is created, organized, and maintained, it’s really easy for things to become chaotic, especially in a complex environment where multiple teams are involved. There’s lots of hands in the pot. Things get lost in translation. So governance and structure would be the starting point. Additionally, it is so important to always keep the end user in mind. Enablement is all about making the lives of your reps easier. Take the time to understand their needs and challenges so that you can create solutions for them. And finally, don’t underestimate the importance of analytics. Use the data to continuously refine your approach and demonstrate the impact of your efforts. Enablement is truly a journey. It’s not a destination, and the key is to stay agile and focused on delivering value both to the reps that you support and their customers. RR: That phrase there: Enablement is a journey is so important to hear because, to our audience who are all at different stages in the process, maybe you’re building, you’re just writing that enablement charter or maybe you’re just trying to run and optimize. Either way, I feel like you need to hear that because everything is constantly changing and you are constantly adapting. I think that’s a reassuring spot to end on, and I really appreciate you saying that. Beyond that, I really appreciate you joining us and sharing all of this wonderful experience. It’s been so amazing to step into the work that you’re doing and the impact that you’re driving for Cencora. JJ: Absolutely. I’m honored to be invited. I’m so grateful to be here. Thank you for the time and asking all these thoughtful questions. I hope that can help many other organizations out there.RR: To our listeners, thank you for listening to this episode of the Win/Win Podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

"You know, at the core of Working Genius, what it does is it allows us to avoid guilt and judgment—guilt about ourselves and judgment of others." That's Patrick Lencioni, bestselling author and organizational health expert, talking about his breakthrough Working Genius productivity framework on the Sales Gravy podcast. If you're leading a sales team, this explains why high performers thrive in some roles and burn out in others. Right now, you probably have high performers who are miserable, rockstars who've lost their spark, and top reps who suddenly can't hit quota. And you're wondering—did you hire wrong, did someone lose their edge, or do you need to have “the conversation”? What if the problem isn't the person at all?  The Real Reason Your Best People Are Struggling Not all work is created equal, and your sales reps aren't wired to do all of it. Lencioni stumbled on this insight while reflecting on himself. He'd show up to work loving his job and the people he worked with, yet swing from energized to frustrated without understanding why.  His colleague asked, “Why are you like that?” Over a few hours, Lencioni and his team pinpointed six distinct types of work. Depending on which type you're doing, you're either energized or drained. Five years later, over 1.5 million people have taken the Working Genius assessment. Why? Most organizations force talented people into work that drains them, then blame them when they struggle. Most sales leaders hire a closer for their ability to seal deals, then wonder why they can't prospect. They promote a quota-crusher into management, then watch them implode under administrative responsibilities. Or move an account manager into new business development and act shocked when performance tanks. The talent was there all along, but their positioning was wrong. Six Types of Work—and Why Most People Only Excel at Two Patrick Lencioni identified six distinct types of work that exist in every organization: Wonder (W): Spotting opportunities, asking big-picture questions Invention (I): Creating new solutions, processes, or systems Discernment (D): Evaluating ideas, figuring out what will work Galvanizing (G): Rallying the team, getting people moving Enablement (E): Supporting others, clearing obstacles, making things happen Tenacity (T): Following through, finishing tasks, closing deals Here's what matters: most people are strong in two, competent in two, and are drained by the remaining two. And there are no good or bad geniuses. Your closer with natural Tenacity isn't more valuable than your strategic thinker with Wonder and Discernment. Your rep who rallies the team (Galvanizing) isn't better than the one who quietly enables everyone behind the scenes. Different geniuses are valuable in different ways. The goal is to build a team where all six are represented, and people work in their areas of strength. Force someone into work that drains them, and sales team performance tanks. Leave them in their genius zones, and energy and results skyrocket. Stop Judging Your People (And Yourself) You've probably got a rep right now who frustrates you. Maybe they're brilliant in client meetings but terrible at following up. Maybe they generate incredible account strategies, but can't stand the daily grind of outbound prospecting. Maybe they close deals but never update the CRM. Your first instinct is to judge them. "They're not coachable." "They don't care about the details." "They're lazy." Working Genius removes that judgment. It shows you that their struggle isn't about character—it's about wiring. A rep isn't bad at follow-up because they don't care. They're bad at it because Tenacity isn't their genius. A rep isn't a bad team player because they don't remove obstacles for others. Enablement isn't their strength. And here's the part most sales leaders miss: you need to stop judging yourself, too. You feel guilty that you hate certain parts of your job. You think you should be better at forecasting, or administrative work, or whatever drains you. But guilt about your own limitations makes you harder on your team. When you accept that you're not built to excel at everything, you can extend that same grace to others. You stop punishing people for being human and start positioning them for success. Start With Self-Reflection Which activities give you energy? Which leave you drained? I'll be honest about my own wake-up call. I travel over 300 nights a year, giving keynotes and working with clients. Last summer, I got to the point where I thought I was going to have a mental breakdown. Days stacked with short calls, client check-ins, alignment meetings, and podcasts. I was furious when I got to the office, and furious when I left because those days completely destroy my brain. I'm a wonderer and a thinker. I need space to ideate. Without that time, I can't function. So I implemented a new rule: no more than two meetings per day. I understood my working genius and restructured my time. Once you see your own patterns, look at your team. Track what lights people up and what slows them down. Patterns emerge quickly. How to Apply Working Genius to Your Sales Team We had a team member at Sales Gravy who was noticeably unhappy. Not complaining out loud, just clearly not thriving. When we looked at what the job required versus their working genius profile, the answer was obvious. We had them doing work completely opposite of their natural abilities. Once we restructured their role to align with their strengths, everything changed. Here's how you can apply it: Pair complementary geniuses. Big-picture thinkers need execution-focused partners. Strategic planners need implementers. Someone strong in Wonder and Invention but weak in Tenacity needs to work with someone who loves finishing and closing. Restructure roles around natural strengths. Don't force people into weaknesses. Reassign or support tasks that drain them.  Be intentional with promotions. Top performers don't automatically make good managers. Your best individual contributor may hate administrative work. Your best manager may dislike strategic planning. Know what fits before making moves. Have your team take the assessment. Get everyone's working genius profile. Put it at their workstation. Use it in real-time during team meetings when you're trying to figure out why something isn't working. We do this at Sales Gravy, and it's transformed how we work together.  The Bottom Line Your sales team isn't broken, but your understanding of how they work might be. When you force talented people into roles that clash with their natural strengths, you get frustration, underperformance, and attrition. Then you blame the person and start hiring again.  Everyone has areas of frustration. Everyone faces work they aren't naturally good at. Working Genius doesn't let people avoid the draining tasks—but it helps you understand why some work feels impossible, build teams that complement each other, and stop punishing your people for being human. Stop judging that rep who struggles with CRM updates. Stop feeling guilty that you hate certain parts of your job. Start positioning people where their natural abilities can shine. Over 1.5 million people have discovered their working genius. Most of them wish they'd found it sooner. Visit workinggenius.com and take the assessment. Use coupon code GRAVY for 20% off. 

“You know, at the core of Working Genius, what it does is it allows us to avoid guilt and judgment—guilt about ourselves and judgment of others.” That's Patrick Lencioni, bestselling author and organizational health expert, talking about his breakthrough Working Genius productivity framework on the Sales Gravy podcast. If you're leading a sales team, this explains why high performers thrive in some roles and burn out in others. Right now, you probably have high performers who are miserable, rockstars who've lost their spark, and top reps who suddenly can't hit quota. And you're wondering—did you hire wrong, did someone lose their edge, or do you need to have “the conversation”? What if the problem isn't the person at all?  The Real Reason Your Best People Are Struggling Not all work is created equal, and your sales reps aren't wired to do all of it. Lencioni stumbled on this insight while reflecting on himself. He'd show up to work loving his job and the people he worked with, yet swing from energized to frustrated without understanding why.  His colleague asked, “Why are you like that?” Over a few hours, Lencioni and his team pinpointed six distinct types of work. Depending on which type you're doing, you're either energized or drained. Five years later, over 1.5 million people have taken the Working Genius assessment. Why? Most organizations force talented people into work that drains them, then blame them when they struggle. Most sales leaders hire a closer for their ability to seal deals, then wonder why they can't prospect. They promote a quota-crusher into management, then watch them implode under administrative responsibilities. Or move an account manager into new business development and act shocked when performance tanks. The talent was there all along, but their positioning was wrong. Six Types of Work—and Why Most People Only Excel at Two Patrick Lencioni identified six distinct types of work that exist in every organization: Wonder (W): Spotting opportunities, asking big-picture questions Invention (I): Creating new solutions, processes, or systems Discernment (D): Evaluating ideas, figuring out what will work Galvanizing (G): Rallying the team, getting people moving Enablement (E): Supporting others, clearing obstacles, making things happen Tenacity (T): Following through, finishing tasks, closing deals Here’s what matters: most people are strong in two, competent in two, and are drained by the remaining two. And there are no good or bad geniuses. Your closer with natural Tenacity isn’t more valuable than your strategic thinker with Wonder and Discernment. Your rep who rallies the team (Galvanizing) isn’t better than the one who quietly enables everyone behind the scenes. Different geniuses are valuable in different ways. The goal is to build a team where all six are represented, and people work in their areas of strength. Force someone into work that drains them, and sales team performance tanks. Leave them in their genius zones, and energy and results skyrocket. Stop Judging Your People (And Yourself) You’ve probably got a rep right now who frustrates you. Maybe they’re brilliant in client meetings but terrible at following up. Maybe they generate incredible account strategies, but can’t stand the daily grind of outbound prospecting. Maybe they close deals but never update the CRM. Your first instinct is to judge them. “They’re not coachable.” “They don’t care about the details.” “They’re lazy.” Working Genius removes that judgment. It shows you that their struggle isn’t about character—it’s about wiring. A rep isn't bad at follow-up because they don’t care. They’re bad at it because Tenacity isn’t their genius. A rep isn't a bad team player because they don't remove obstacles for others. Enablement isn't their strength. And here’s the part most sales leaders miss: you need to stop judging yourself, too. You feel guilty that you hate certain parts of your job. You think you should be better at forecasting, or administrative work, or whatever drains you. But guilt about your own limitations makes you harder on your team. When you accept that you’re not built to excel at everything, you can extend that same grace to others. You stop punishing people for being human and start positioning them for success. Start With Self-Reflection Which activities give you energy? Which leave you drained? I’ll be honest about my own wake-up call. I travel over 300 nights a year, giving keynotes and working with clients. Last summer, I got to the point where I thought I was going to have a mental breakdown. Days stacked with short calls, client check-ins, alignment meetings, and podcasts. I was furious when I got to the office, and furious when I left because those days completely destroy my brain. I’m a wonderer and a thinker. I need space to ideate. Without that time, I can’t function. So I implemented a new rule: no more than two meetings per day. I understood my working genius and restructured my time. Once you see your own patterns, look at your team. Track what lights people up and what slows them down. Patterns emerge quickly. How to Apply Working Genius to Your Sales Team We had a team member at Sales Gravy who was noticeably unhappy. Not complaining out loud, just clearly not thriving. When we looked at what the job required versus their working genius profile, the answer was obvious. We had them doing work completely opposite of their natural abilities. Once we restructured their role to align with their strengths, everything changed. Here's how you can apply it: Pair complementary geniuses. Big-picture thinkers need execution-focused partners. Strategic planners need implementers. Someone strong in Wonder and Invention but weak in Tenacity needs to work with someone who loves finishing and closing. Restructure roles around natural strengths. Don't force people into weaknesses. Reassign or support tasks that drain them.  Be intentional with promotions. Top performers don’t automatically make good managers. Your best individual contributor may hate administrative work. Your best manager may dislike strategic planning. Know what fits before making moves. Have your team take the assessment. Get everyone’s working genius profile. Put it at their workstation. Use it in real-time during team meetings when you’re trying to figure out why something isn’t working. We do this at Sales Gravy, and it’s transformed how we work together.  The Bottom Line Your sales team isn't broken, but your understanding of how they work might be. When you force talented people into roles that clash with their natural strengths, you get frustration, underperformance, and attrition. Then you blame the person and start hiring again.  Everyone has areas of frustration. Everyone faces work they aren't naturally good at. Working Genius doesn't let people avoid the draining tasks—but it helps you understand why some work feels impossible, build teams that complement each other, and stop punishing your people for being human. Stop judging that rep who struggles with CRM updates. Stop feeling guilty that you hate certain parts of your job. Start positioning people where their natural abilities can shine. Over 1.5 million people have discovered their working genius. Most of them wish they’d found it sooner. Visit workinggenius.com and take the assessment. Use coupon code GRAVY for 20% off. 

Pastor Wayne Van Gelderen shares biblical truth that will bring hope and comfort in these uncertain days. May we draw closer to God through this time and impact those around us for eternity. https://fallsbaptist.org https://baptistcollege.org https://www.theegeneration.org https://ontovictorypress.com If you'd like to support this ministry - https://fallsbaptist.org/give/

In this installment of the Expert Viewpoint video series, Pragatee Dhakal, Director of Product Strategy and Enablement at CLARA Analytics, explains how nuclear verdicts are becoming more frequent—and … Read More » The post Expert Shares How Nuclear Verdicts Are Impacting Insurers appeared first on Insurance Journal TV.

Jason Beal, President, Americas, and Danielle Skipper, HR Business Partner at Exclusive Networks, joined Doug Green, Publisher of Technology Reseller News, to discuss one of the most pressing challenges facing MSPs and VARs today: the shortage of qualified cybersecurity talent and the need for practical, scalable solutions. Beal opened the conversation by describing Exclusive Networks as a global go-to-market specialist and value-added distributor focused on cybersecurity and security-adjacent technologies. As the company worked closely with vendors and channel partners worldwide, a consistent theme emerged—partners were struggling not only to attract skilled cybersecurity professionals but also to retain them. “We heard over and over from our partners and vendors that they were really struggling with attracting the right talent and retaining that talent,” Beal said, noting that this feedback prompted Exclusive Networks to develop a structured response. That response is CyberFarm, a university-based workforce development program launched at Cal Poly that combines hands-on experience with real-world channel exposure. Skipper explained that the program began four years ago with just three students and has since grown to support more than two dozen at a time, with over 100 students having passed through the initiative overall. “Imagine having someone who's spent two years learning the channel, working with vendors, earning certifications, and supporting real partners—by the time they graduate, they're ready to hit the ground running,” Skipper said. Unlike traditional internships, CyberFarm students work for at least 12 months—often two years or more—supporting both Exclusive Networks and its ecosystem of partners and vendors. Participants gain experience across a wide range of functions, including SOC analysis, business development, marketing, content creation, and sales operations. For MSPs and VARs, this creates access to a proven talent pool with significantly reduced ramp-up time and risk compared to traditional hiring. The discussion also highlighted how CyberFarm enables partner growth. Skipper shared examples of MSPs using CyberFarm talent to scale operations rapidly, adding capacity in engineering, marketing, and renewal management at critical growth stages. “For some partners, CyberFarm has been the difference between staying flat and scaling their business two, three, or four times,” she said. Beyond talent development, Beal outlined Exclusive Networks' broader enablement strategy for the channel. This includes pre- and post-sales technical services, go-to-market support, authorized training and certification programs, and CloudRise, a security services organization acquired by Exclusive Networks to act as a virtual engineering bench for partners. “Enablement isn't just a buzzword for us,” Beal said. “It's about putting MSPs in a position to succeed—technically, operationally, and now from a talent perspective as well.” As the conversation wrapped up, both guests emphasized that while AI and automation are reshaping cybersecurity, human expertise remains essential. Exclusive Networks' approach blends “AI and AIR”—artificial intelligence alongside authentic human relationships—to help partners grow sustainably. More information about Exclusive Networks and its channel programs is available at https://www.exclusive-networks.com/.

In this episode of RevOps Champions, host Brendon Dennewill talks with Hayden Stafford, President and Chief Revenue Officer at Seismic. Drawing on 25+years leading go-to market teams at Microsoft, Salesforce, IBM, and Pegasystems, Hayden explains why modern growth depends on a "well-plumbed" revenue system, where sales, success, support, partners, and service operate as one connected engine. Hayden reframes enablement as the strategic translation layer that turns boardroom strategy into frontline execution with the right context, content, and coaching inside the flow of work. The conversation also tackles market downturn readiness, the CFO/CRO tension, and the importance of leading indicators, and a pragmatic view of AI adoption. What You'll LearnHow revenue strategy and revenue systems work together to drive resultsWhy enablement is a cross-functional translation layer, not just trainingWhat it means for RevOps to move from reporting outcomes to surfacing signalsWhere AI delivers the most value when embedded in daily workflowsThe first alignment levers CROs should focus onHow to recognize when AI adoption stalls before impact shows upResources MentionedSeismicSatya Nadella Microsoft Dynamics 365 Salesforce AgentforceMicrosoft CopilotIs your business ready to scale? Take the Growth Readiness Score to find out. In 5 minutes, you'll see: Benchmark data showing how you stack up to other organizations A clear view of your operational maturity Whether your business is ready to scale (and what to do next if it's not) Let's Connect Subscribe to the RevOps Champions Newsletter LinkedIn YouTube Explore the show at revopschampions.com. Ready to unite your teams with RevOps strategies that eliminate costly silos and drive growth? Let's talk!

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We analyzed 1,474 CSM conversations to uncover why they are leaving and what keeps them in 2026. Grab the Free Talent Report here: https://customer-success-career.captivate.fm/reportCSMs don't leave because they're bad at their jobs — they leave because no one can see the impact they're making. In Part 2 of this series, I'm breaking down the real reason high-performing CSMs feel invisible, even when they're driving renewals, expansion, and retention behind the scenes.We're unpacking what “impact” actually means when CSMs say they're missing it, why this isn't a motivation problem but a systems problem, and the three patterns I see over and over again in teams with high turnover. I'll walk you through where leaders unintentionally lose their best people, the gaps that prevent CSMs from articulating their value, and the exact operational, enablement, and management shifts that change everything without adding more work.By the end of this episode, you'll finally have language, structure, and a clear action plan to make impact visible and undeniable. If you're tired of feeling overlooked or watching top CSMs walk out the door, this is the missing piece you haven't addressed yet. Hit plat and let's dive in.1:07 – Why High-Performing CSMs Still Feel Invisible (and Leave Because of It)3:13 – The True Meaning Behind “I Want More Impact” (It's Not Just About Praise)4:42 – How Being Forced Into Reactive Work Stops CSMs from Contributing Strategically6:10 – The Real Cost of Not Having Access to Key Metrics and Business Data11:51 – 5 Root Causes Leadership Misses That Make CSMs Feel Disconnected15:29 – 3 Critical Fixes: Better Operations, Enablement, and Coaching (Not Just More Tools)19:16 – Why Advocating for Growth or Finding a Company That Invests in You Matters Now More Than EverOTHER EPISODES YOU'LL LOVE:

Everyone's chasing AI. Meanwhile, most organizations are wasting 25-30% of their software budget on tools nobody uses.In this episode, we meet James Malek, Senior VP of IT Infrastructure at Lexitas, who inherited chaos—45 acquisitions in five years, no structured IT department, and a hodgepodge of contracts everywhere. Instead of chasing the next shiny thing, James took a different approach: foundation first.What his team discovered when they finally got visibility into their software estate—including 300 employees using ChatGPT at a legal services company handling sensitive data—changed everything.In this episode, you'll learn:• Why software waste persists despite decades of awareness—and what actually fixes it• How one company consolidated seven separate ShareFile contracts into one• The shadow AI problem hiding in your organization right now• Why you can't do it all yourself—and what to do insteadFeaturing:• James Malek, Senior VP of IT Infrastructure, Lexitas• Elizabeth D'Amico, Manager, SAM Programs & Enablement, Softchoice• Josh Brewer, Account Executive, SoftchoiceThe Catalyst by Softchoice is the podcast dedicated to exploring the intersection of humans and technology.

How can pairing geniuses enhance the customer service experience?In episode 105 of the Working Genius Podcast, Pat and Cody dive deep into the world of customer service roles and enablement. They explore how unique combinations of working geniuses, such as enablement paired with discernment or tenacity, can enhance customer interactions and improve service outcomes. By aligning strengths with job demands, being authentic about one's abilities, and providing tailored solutions to customers, individuals can excel in customer service roles and find satisfaction in their careers.Topics explored in this episode: 00:00:47 – Types of Customer Service* Great customer service depends on the right mix of working geniuses* Enablement shines when helping others feels energizing, not draining00:04:46 – Discernment and Enablement* Discernment helps decode what customers actually mean* Enablement turns confusion into clear, helpful solutions00:06:35 – Tenacity and Enablement* Tenacity makes sure no email or question gets left behind * Enablement brings the drive to serve fast, fully, and well00:11:09 – Types of Employee Geniuses* Different genius types shape how people show up at work* Customer service thrives when roles match natural strengths00:24:22 – Choosing the Right Job* The wrong role leads to burnout, even if you're good at it* The right fit makes work sustainable and satisfyingThis episode of The Working Genius Podcast with Patrick Lencioni is brought to you by The Table Group: https://www.tablegroup.com. We teach leaders how to make work more effective and less dysfunctional. We also help their employees be more fulfilled and less miserable. The Six Types of Working Genius model helps you discover your natural gifts and thrive in your work and life. When you're able to better understand the types of work that bring you more energy and fulfillment and avoid work that leads to frustration and failure, you can be more self-aware, more productive, and more successful. The Six Types of Working Genius assessment is the fastest and simplest way to discover your natural gifts and thrive at work: https://workinggenius.me/about Subscribe to The Working Genius Podcast on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/4iNz6Yn), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/3raC053GF5mtkq6Y1klpRU), and YouTube (https://bit.ly/Working-Genius-YouTube). Follow Pat Lencioni on https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-lencioni-orghealth, http://www.youtube.com/@PatrickLencioniOfficial, and https://x.com/patricklencioni. Be sure to check out our other podcast, At The Table with Patrick Lencioni, on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/4hJKKSL), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/6NWAZzkzl4ljxX7S2xkHvu), and YouTube (https://bit.ly/At-The-Table-YouTube). Let us know your feedback via podcast@tablegroup.com. This episode was produced by Story On Media: https://www.storyon.co.

Ever wonder why vision statements fall flat… or never stick at all?In this week's episode of the Only Constant, Eliza Fendell discusses with Nellie Wartoft how the “vision slide” can transform transformation initiatives from buzzword bingo into actionable, memorable narratives. She breaks down the art of making vision tangible, why simplicity and repetition matter, and how to personalize messaging in ways leaders and teams will actually remember.Connect with:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Nellie Wartoft⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠CEO of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Tigerhall⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Chair of the ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Executive Council for Leading Change (ECLC)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠nellie@tigerhall.com

With the Ralph loop going mainstream, how are engineering organizations utilizing it at scale? Andrew and Ben sit down with Angie Jones, VP of Engineering AI Tools and Enablement at Block, to pick her brain on how they are using the Ralph Wiggum technique to automate updates across 25,000 repos and how she is strategically preparing for Gas Town. The team also breaks down the launch of OpenAI's new GPT-5.2 Codex model before closing out the week with a look at the weirdest tech from CES, from hypersonic knives to music-playing lollipops.LinearB: Measure the impact of GitHub Copilot and CursorFollow the show:Subscribe to our Substack Follow us on LinkedInSubscribe to our YouTube ChannelLeave us a ReviewFollow the hosts:Follow AndrewFollow BenFollow DanFollow today's stories:Angie Jones: angiejones.tech | LinkedIn | X (Twitter)Goose (Block's AI Agent): github.com/block/gooseSteve Yegge's "Welcome to Gas Town": Read on MediumGeoffrey Huntley's Ralph Loop: ghuntley.com/ralphRyan Dahl on the End of Coding: @rough__seaThe Weirdest Tech of CES: Read the ArticleOFFERS Start Free Trial: Get started with LinearB's AI productivity platform for free. Book a Demo: Learn how you can ship faster, improve DevEx, and lead with confidence in the AI era. LEARN ABOUT LINEARB AI Code Reviews: Automate reviews to catch bugs, security risks, and performance issues before they hit production. AI & Productivity Insights: Go beyond DORA with AI-powered recommendations and dashboards to measure and improve performance. AI-Powered Workflow Automations: Use AI-generated PR descriptions, smart routing, and other automations to reduce developer toil. MCP Server: Interact with your engineering data using natural language to build custom reports and get answers on the fly.

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Guest: Samantha Phillips Guest Bio:  Samantha Phillips is the Sales Enablement Manager at SHI International, leading strategic initiatives across Commercial and Public Sector divisions. With over five years of enablement experience in high-volume IT sales, she builds scalable onboarding programs, develops impactful training, and drives process improvements that boost sales performance. Samantha partners with sales and technical leadership to coach enablement teams, ensuring sellers are equipped for success. Her programs have achieved high satisfaction scores and retention rates, reflecting her commitment to results and culture. Samantha is passionate about creating engaging learning experiences and fostering professional growth. She is recognized for her collaborative approach, problem-solving skills, and dedication to elevating sales teams. Connect with her on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/phillips-samantha   Key Points: Background & Career Path Samantha Phillips started her career in sales at SHI, not enablement. She transitioned into sales enablement after networking with the enablement team and being encouraged to apply. Her enablement experience includes Sales enablement trainer (onboarding & workshops), Program manager, and Sales enablement manager (for the past 3 years). She values continuous learning and has worked across nearly all aspects of sales enablement.   Why Sales? Samantha entered sales after moving to Austin and being drawn to the energy and culture of sales, the competitive environment, the ability to build her own book of business, the people and fast-paced atmosphere were the biggest drivers.   What Sales Enablement Is (and Is Not) Sales enablement has evolved beyond traditional L&D (Learning & Development). It is no longer just training or professional development. Modern sales enablement focuses on driving the sales process, helping sellers close deals faster, improving sales productivity and developing the right mindsets and behaviors. L&D serves the whole organization; sales enablement is specific to the sales org.   What Sellers Need to Be Equipped for Success The most critical focus is a customer-centric approach. Relationship-building is more important than just "getting the meeting." Sellers should aim to become a trusted resource, not just a vendor, build long-term customer relationships and short-term wins are easy; long-term relationships drive sustainable success.   Cold Calling & Prospecting Philosophy Samantha agrees that meetings matter—but they should be pursued with strategy and value, not just metrics. Effective prospecting requires researching what matters to the customer, understanding why it matters, and clearly articulating value. Cold calling without value is just "throwing things at the wall."   Role of Sales Enablement Tools Tools include CRM, internal systems, data resources, and content. Sellers must first be exposed to tools early (despite information overload). Enablement focuses on high-level understanding of frameworks and strategies and application, especially through role play. Role playing helps sellers sound natural and authentic, avoid reading scripts and build conversational confidence. AI is increasingly used to support practice and application. Skill retention requires ongoing practice—like muscle memory or sports.   Research & Preparation Sellers should deeply research their customer and the customer's customers. Understanding the full ecosystem helps sellers communicate broader value. This approach resembles a modern, automated version of a sales readiness checklist.   Driving Tool Adoption (Especially CRM) Tool adoption fails when middle managers aren't bought in. Success requires buy-in at all levels: Executives, Sales enablement, Middle managers and Sellers. Managers must reinforce tools during one-on-ones and team meetings. Enablement should test tools with pilot groups, gather feedback and adjust based on real usage. Sometimes tools don't fail—they're just being used differently than expected. "Fail forward" and pivot based on how sellers actually work.   CRM Challenges & the Future CRM resistance is common across sales organizations. Current problems include complexity, too many fields/tabs and poor usability. Samantha believes CRM is entering a new phase, driven by AI with more automation, less manual input and more "behind-the-scenes" functionality. The future of CRM should reduce friction for sellers.   What Samantha Loves About Sales Enablement Creativity in approaches and problem-solving Different strengths across sellers, managers, and trainers Freedom to experiment, test, and learn A "fail forward" mindset   What Drives Her Crazy People who don't try or limit themselves Sellers and leaders who stay stuck in their comfort zones Seeing people underestimate their potential Belief that even 1% improvement per day can be transformational   Final Takeaway Growth—in sales and enablement—comes from stepping outside your comfort zone, practicing consistently and being open to feedback and change. Sales enablement succeeds when it blends strategy, application, mindset, and leadership buy-in.   Guest Links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phillips-samantha/     About Salesology®: Conversations with Sales Leaders Download your free gift, The Salesology® Vault. The vault is packed full of free gifts from sales leaders, sales experts, marketing gurus, and revenue generation experts. Download your free gift, 81 Tools to Grow Your Sales & Your Business Faster, More Easily & More Profitably. Save hours of work tracking down the right prospecting and sales resources and/or digital tools that every business owner and salesperson needs. If you are a business owner or sales manager with an underperforming sales team, let's talk. Click here to schedule a time. Please subscribe to Salesology®: Conversations with Sales Leaders so that you don't miss a single episode, and while you're at it, won't you take a moment to write a short review and rate our show? It would be greatly appreciated! To learn more about our previous guests, listen to past episodes, and get to know your host, go to https://podcast.gosalesology.com/ and connect on LinkedIn and follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and check out our website at https://gosalesology.com/. 

Riley Rogers: Hi, and welcome to the Win/Win Podcast. I’m your host, Riley Rogers. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. According to the State of Sales Enablement 2025 Report, 20% of organizations see the sales process as a key strategic priority. So how can you optimize your sales process and drive higher win rates for your team? Here to discuss this topic is Aaliyah Patel, senior specialist, customer marketing at Ansell. Thank you so much for joining us. Aaliyah. I’d love if you could start by telling us a little bit about yourself, your background, and your role. Aaliyah Patel: Absolutely. Well, thank you for having me. My name is Aaliyah Patel. I’m a senior customer marketing specialist here at Ansell, where I’m a part of the customer marketing team. My role really centers on leading our sales enablement in digital MarTech operations, so ensuring that our systems, processes, and data flows that support our go-to market motion are aligned, connected, and easy for our teams to use. A large part of that includes overseeing the digital tools like Highspot in our tech stack, supporting content governance and building scalable frameworks that help reps access the right insights, messaging, and assets across the buyer journey. The goal is to ultimately empower sellers and partners with the clarity tools and visibility they need to drive growth and deliver consistent customer experiences. RR: Just from what you mentioned there, it sounds like we have quite a lot of ground cover in terms of your experience, your background, and then the work that you do with Highspot. Before we kind of jump too far into the deep end there, I always kinda like to start by getting a sense of the environment that you’re working in. So I know that Ansell manufactures and distributes a really wide range of products. What are some of the unique challenges that go-to-market teams face when selling in this environment? AP: Absolutely. So, Ansell serves an extremely diverse markets, so anything from industrial safety to scientific to healthcare. And each customer group has different expectations, buying cycles and safety requirements. Reps often need to shift between very different conversations throughout the day. And the challenge isn’t necessarily complexity, it’s clarity. Reps need to quickly position the right solution, especially when our portfolio is broad and customers span multiple industries with unique needs. There’s also the constant need to stay current on new product developments and differentiators across categories; our priority has been making sure that our teams have a unified way to access information, understand messaging, and communicate competently no matter what business they’re supporting. RR: I love the shift that you mentioned there: it’s not necessarily complex, instead the challenge is making things clear and easy to navigate because yes, there’s a lot going on. You can’t change that, but you can pull certain levers to make it a little bit easier for your teams. Knowing that’s kind of where you’re at, I’d like to turn towards some of the actions that you and the team are taking. So, what are some of the key go-to-market initiatives that you’re focused on? And then how are you enabling reps to find clarity in Ansell’s sales environment. AP: A major focus for us has been simplifying how our teams access and leverage content to drive more consistent, confident customer conversations. We’ve strengthened our content governance, we’ve centralized materials, and we’ve made it much easier to connect the right message to the right audience. We’re also aligning more closely with sales to ensure that our go-to market initiatives are really grounded in real customer challenges. Whether through targeted campaigns, sharper product positioning, or ongoing training and enablement, everything that we do is centered on helping our teams articulate our value across the diverse markets and products that we sell in. We’re seeing the impact of that work in real time: We’ve had over a hundred thousand content views with almost a 90% reoccurring usage rate, which tells us that the structure we’ve put into place is resonating and helping our teams move faster and stay aligned. RR: I love that you came in with the data to back it up—actually, not just the data to back it up but great data to back it up. That’s super impressive, especially knowing that you guys are a little bit early in your journey, that you’re already finding that significant success. One of the things that we’ve heard is that a key focus is the sales process. So in your experience, what are some of the essential building blocks for creating a sales process that’s driving these business results that you’re seeing? AP: For us, the foundation comes down to three things, so it’s simplicity, alignment, and insights. When you bring clarity, consistency, and real data together, you create a process that’s scalable, repeatable, and tied to business outcomes, and it allows teams to adapt their approach, depending on the customer segment that they’re working with that day. RR: I think you touched on some really compelling aspects there, and I think I’d be curious to double click into a little bit more of what you said and about how you’re bringing some of those building blocks to life, especially with a platform like Highspot. So, can you talk about the role that an enablement platform plays in helping you streamline that sales process? AP: So the value is truly structure and connection. An enablement platform brings content, people, and insights together, and it gives everyone one place to operate from. It reduces the time the seller spends searching for materials; it makes sure that our messaging is aligned across our campaigns and launches, and it also creates visibility into what resonates in the field. So, it’s truly become the backbone of how we support consistent execution across the buyer journey. RR: I always love to hear that consistency is kind of what’s coming out of your usage of an enablement platform. I think that’s really the goal, right, to help standardize your messaging and bring consistency to your teams. I would love to dig a little bit deeper into that and kind of the benefit that you see of partnering with Highspot. How does this partnership help you drive some of those core initiatives? You touched on this a little bit already. AP: Partnering with Highspot has been incredibly valuable because it gives us a partner who truly understands the complexity of a modern go-to market environment that helps us operationalize our strategy in a really scalable way. For us, the benefit is twofold. First, Highspot provides the structure we need to centralize our content, our launches, our campaigns, and our customer facing materials, so our field teams can execute with confidence. It creates alignment across marketing and sales, which is essential when you’re supporting multiple markets and product categories. Second, the partnership helps us accelerate our core initiatives. Whether we’re rolling out new product messaging or enabling our teams on evolving customer needs or programs, Highspot gives us the platform, analytics, and support to execute and quickly measure the impact. We’re not just using the platform, but we’re truly maximizing it, and the collaboration has helped us build stronger governance, improve adoption, and really tie our go-to market strategy back to real behavior and engagement. It allows us to deliver a more consistent story, support our reps with clarity, and really create a unified experience across every touchpoint. RR: That certainly makes me, and I think all of our teams happy to hear. One of the things that’s really interesting about what you said is that earlier you gave us the data to kind of back it up and say that yes, we’re seeing these things anecdotally, but we’re also seeing them empirically. Thinking of that data, I know that it kind of speaks for itself when it comes to the work that you and the team are doing, but we’ve heard that Digital Rooms have been a key driver in your enablement strategy and in your strategy with Highspot. In just 90 days you’ve generated like 3,000 views with your Rooms. How have you and your teams been leveraging Digital Rooms? Can you talk to us about what impact you’ve been seeing so far? AP: Digital Rooms have become a core part of how we help our teams go to market. We use them to create curated experiences that package our messaging assets and resources into a structured, easy-to-navigate format that aligns with the story we want to deliver so reps can use them to deliver a clear and consistent narrative and everything they need is in one place. This helps our teams guide customers and partners through a cohesive experience. That visibility supports stronger account planning, more intentional communication, and better alignment with customer needs. The engagement has been strong. We’ve created over 500 Digital Rooms with an average of 30 minutes of viewing time per Room. Some have accumulated between 20–60 total hours of engagement, and several have been shared externally more than 40 times, which shows us that our customers and partners are engaging with the content in meaningful ways. RR: I love to hear how you’re using that Digital Room scorecard to keep a pulse on how they’re performing out in the wild. When you are supplying go-to-market teams with these Digital Rooms, is it the marketing team that’s building them? And if so, what kind of use cases are you building for? AP: It’s in partnership with both marketing and sales, so we can help them create them if they’d like, but then they also have full autonomy to go and create them themselves for their specific customers. Use cases can include any specific interactions, follow-ups, trade shows, anytime that they’re meeting, any one-to-one interactions that they’re having, and any time that we want to consolidate a bunch of product brand information all into one curated microsite. RR: Okay, fantastic. I’m always a little bit curious about who owns those things, how you’re kind of building templates, and what you’re building for. I’d like to maybe switch gears from the digital rooms arena, knowing that you have the fun but kind of challenging job of being Highspot's solution owner for Ansell. In that role, your major job is to drive adoption and effective usage of the platform. Just a few months after launch, you’ve already reached a really astounding 85% adoption rate in Highspot, which—when you think about the breadth of behavior change that needs to be done—is super impressive. What are some of the best practices, if you have any that you could share, that helped you drive that adoption right off the bat? AP: I love change management and it makes it super fun. Our approach has been focusing on education consistency and advocacy, so we spent a lot of time with each of the different teams, showing them how to use the platform and how it connects to their daily workflows. We essentially made it the single source of truth for our campaigns, launches, and content. So it became more of a habit and not an extra step. Our marketing team members and super users have also played a pivotal role in reinforcing usage, sharing wins, and hosting their own one-to-one training sessions with different groups. Today we have an 85% recurring usage rate and strongly weekly recurring engagement from all of the different teams across the organization. RR: Well, that’s fantastic to hear. I mean, clearly you guys are doing all of the right things, and I know you're—like you’ve kind of alluded to here—keeping a really close pulse on those outcomes with weekly check-ins and things like that. I also know that each quarter you’re putting together a presentation highlighting major wins and how things are going. Since implementing Highspot, what key results have you achieved and are there any particular wins or achievements you’re particularly proud of that you could share with us? AP: We’ve seen strong engagement and alignment across the organization. We have over a hundred thousand content views and over 3000 external shares. 47% of our viewed content has been tied to opportunities. So truly, the materials that we’re producing fit into the real conversations that are happening. Our top 10 assets have also shown strong engagement, with some assets exceeding a hundred shares or downloads, and our Digital Rooms remain a major win with consistent interactions and hundreds of curated experiences that support our ongoing conversations. These results reflect the impact of a structured, aligned enablement approach that supports the way that our teams already work. RR: As a fellow marketer, I think hearing some of those numbers and some of the things that you’re thinking about, I am feeling the impact of that, and I’m like: “Oh, you guys are definitely doing the right things. I’m so glad that you’re seeing the impact and the usage of the content. I know that’s always so exciting and always makes the work feel a little bit more meaningful. Bravo, and thank you so much for sharing that with us. They’re, I think, again, really inspiring results, especially as I said so early in the journey. To close us out, one last wrap up question for you: If you could summarize one crucial lesson, one key point from your experience with Highspot and using it to improve your sales process, what would it be? AP: So the biggest lesson is that clarity fuels confidence. When our teams know where to go, what to use, and how to apply it, everything improves. The conversations, execution, and outcomes all become streamlined. Enablement is truly about connecting people, content, and insights in a way that supports repeatable, scalable execution. When you build that structure and provide visibility, the results will follow. RR: I think that’s a perfect way to wrap us up. Build your foundation and everything kind of comes from that. I think that’s fantastic to close on, but before we do, I do want to say thank you again for joining us. I’m so glad we had the opportunity to learn from all of the impact you and the team are driving. AP: Thank you for having me. RR: To our audience, thank you for listening to this episode of the Win/Win Podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

Wondering what SIs care about and how they approach implementing ISVs for the first (or hundredth) time? This episode if for you!In the latest episode of How We Got There, I speak with Steve Simpson, VP of Global Enablement & Learning at Copado, Co-Founder of Catcusforce and Certified Architect Instructor. Steve and I dive deep on the reality of the complex deal cycles that Salesforce ISVs experience and how best to posture in them, especially with new to you SIs. It's a timely episode as Cactusforce and Architect Dreamin' are coming up in Phoenix in late January and it's not too late to sponsor to fill the funnel for the new year….and get some warm weather in the winter! Go to the websites to learn more and find the prospectus.The customer, Salesforce AEs/SEs/RVPs, SIs can all be involved in a deal. Steve explains the personas in a deal and how it can/should change based on how you came to the deal. Did Salesforce or an SI bring you to the deal? Then they are the dominant person in the deal and you need to adjust your posture but one thing is a common through line is to make sure you continue to do right by the customer “with honesty and delivery”. Obviously you can ignore all of this complexity, but it introduces risk in your deals!Steve has wonderful detailed suggestions on how you position your experience in a specific scenario, even if you don't have any, that he borrows from a friend who trains physicians. He then relates it to how an SI can communicate their experience on your app. We talk about learning strategies that is tailored for customers and partners, the latter covering both sales and delivery. Steve is a wealth of knowledge and I am grateful for his sharing so freely.This episode is brought to you by Tequity Advisors . Tequity Advisors is a global sell-side M&A advisory firm with core expertise in SaaS and ISVs, Salesforce, ServiceNow, SAP, Microsoft, all things Data and AI, and the hyper scaler MSP cloud ecosystems with a focus on the Salesforce ecosystem and beyond! 

Welcome back to Snafu with Robin Zander. In this episode, I'm joined by Jeff Jaworsky, who shares his journey from a global role at Google to running his own business while prioritizing time with his children. We talk about the pivotal life and career decisions that shaped this transition, focusing on the importance of setting boundaries—both personally and professionally. Jeff shares insights on leaving a structured corporate world for entrepreneurship and the lessons learned along the way. We also explore the evolving landscape of sales and entrepreneurship, highlighting how integrating human connection and coaching skills is more important than ever in a tech-driven world. The conversation touches on the role of AI and technology, emphasizing how they can support—but not replace—essential human relationships. Jeff offers practical advice for coaches and salespeople on leveraging their natural skills and hints at a potential future book exploring the intersection of leadership, coaching, and sales. If you're curious about what's next for thoughtful leadership, entrepreneurship, and balancing work with life, this episode is for you. And for more conversations like this, get your tickets for Snafu Conference 2026 on March 5th here, where we'll continue exploring human connection, business, and the evolving role of AI. Start (0:00) Early life and first real boundary Jeff grew up up in a structured, linear environment Decisions largely made for you Clear expectations, predictable paths Post–high school as the first inflection point College chosen because it's "what you're supposed to do" Dream: ESPN sports anchor (explicit role model: Stuart Scott) Reality check through research Job placement rate: ~3% First moment of asking: Is this the best use of my time? Is this fair to the people investing in me (parents)? Boundary lesson #1 Letting go of a dream doesn't mean failure Boundaries can be about honesty, not limitation Choosing logic over fantasy can unlock unexpected paths Dropping out of college → accidental entry into sales Working frontline sales at Best Buy while in school Selling computers, service plans, handling customers daily Decision to leave college opens capacity Manager notices and offers leadership opportunity Takes on home office department Largest sales category in the store Youngest supervisor in the company (globally) at 19 Early leadership challenges Managing people much older Navigating credibility, age bias, exclusion Learning influence without authority Boundary insight Temporary decisions can become formative Saying "yes" doesn't mean you're locked in forever Second boundary: success without sustainability Rapid growth at Best Buy Promotions Increasing responsibility Observing manager life up close 60-hour weeks No real breaks Lunch from vending machines Internal checkpoint Is this the life I want long-term? Distinguishing: Liking the work Disliking the cost Boundary lesson #2 You can love a craft and still reject the lifestyle around it Boundaries protect the future version of you Returning to school with intention Decision to go back to college This time with clarity Sales and marketing degree by design, not default Accelerated path Graduates in three years Clear goal: catch up, not start over Internship at J. Walter Thompson Entry into agency world Launch of long-term sales and marketing career Pattern recognition: how boundaries actually work Ongoing self-check at every stage Have I learned what I came here to learn? Am I still growing? Is this experience still stretching me? Boundaries as timing, not rejection Experiences "run their course" Leaving doesn't invalidate what came before Non-linear growth Sometimes stepping down is strategic Demotion → education Senior role → frontline role (later at Google) Downward moves that enable a bigger climb later Shared reflection with Robin Sales as a foundational skill Comparable to: Surfing (handling forces bigger than you) Early exposure to asking, pitching, rejection Best Buy reframed Customer service under pressure Handling frustrated, misinformed, emotional people Humility + persuasion + resilience Parallel experiences Robin selling a restaurant after learning everything she could Knowing the next step (expansion) and choosing not to take it Walking away without knowing what's next Core philosophy: learning vs. maintaining "If I'm not learning, I'm dying" Builder mindset, not maintainer Growth as a non-negotiable Career decisions guided by curiosity, not status Titles are temporary Skills compound Ladders vs. experience stacks Rejecting the myth of linear progression Valuing breadth, depth, and contrast The bridge metaphor Advice for people stuck between "not this" and "not sure what next" Don't leap blindly Build a bridge Bridge components Low-risk experiments Skill development Small tests in parallel with current work Benefits Reduces panic Increases clarity Turns uncertainty into movement Framing the modern career question Referencing the "jungle gym, not a ladder" idea Careers as lateral, diagonal, looping — not linear Growth through range, not just depth Connecting to Range and creative longevity Diverse experiences as a competitive advantage Late bloomers as evidence that exploration compounds Naming the real fear beneath the metaphor What if exploration turns into repeated failure? What if the next five moves don't work? Risk of confusing experimentation with instability Adding today's pressure cooker Economic uncertainty AI and automation reshaping work faster than previous generations experienced The tension between adaptability and survival The core dilemma How do you pursue a non-linear path without tumbling back to zero? How do you "build the bridge" instead of jumping blindly? How do you keep earning while evolving? The two-year rule Treating commitments like a contract with yourself Two years as a meaningful unit of time Long enough to: Learn deeply Be challenged Experience failure and recovery Short enough to avoid stagnation Boundaries around optional exits Emergency ripcord exists But default posture is commitment, not escape Psychological benefit Reduces panic during hard moments Prevents constant second-guessing Encourages depth over novelty chasing The 18-month check-in Using the final stretch strategically Asking: Am I still learning? Am I still challenged? Does this align with my principles? Shifting from execution to reflection Early exploration of "what's next" Identifying gaps: Skills to acquire Experiences to test Regaining control External forces aren't always controllable Internal planning always is Why most people get stuck Planning too late Waiting until: Layoffs Burnout Forced transitions Trying to design the future in crisis Limited creativity Fear-based decisions Contrast with proactive planning Calm thinking Optionality Leverage Extending the contract Recognizing unfinished business Loving the work Still growing Still contributing meaningfully One-year extensions as intentional choices Not inertia Not fear Conscious recommitment A long career, one organization at a time Example: nearly 13 years at Google Six different roles Multiple reinventions inside one company Pattern over prestige Frontline sales Sales leadership Enablement Roles as chapters, not identities Staying while growing Leaving only when growth plateaus Experience stacking over ladder climbing Rejecting linear advancement Titles matter less than skills Accumulating perspective Execution Leadership Systems Transferable insight What works with customers What works internally What scales Sales enablement as an example of bridge-building Transition motivated by impact Desire to help at scale Supporting many sellers, not just personal results A natural evolution, not a pivot Built on prior sales experience Expanded influence Bridge logic in action Skills reused Scope widened Risk managed Zooming out: sales, stigma, and parenting Introducing the next lens: children Three boys: 13, 10, 7 Confronting sales stereotypes Slimy Manipulative Self-serving Tension between reputation and reality Loving sales Building a career around it Teaching it without replicating the worst versions Redefining sales as a helping profession Sales as service Primary orientation: benefit to the other person Compensation as a byproduct, not the driver Ethical center Believe in what you're recommending Stand behind its value Sleep well regardless of outcome Losses reframed Most deals don't close Failure as feedback Integrity as the constant Selling to kids (and being sold by them) Acknowledging reality Everyone sells, constantly Titles don't matter Teaching ethos, not tactics How you persuade matters more than whether you win Kindness Thoughtfulness Awareness of the other side Everyday negotiations Bedtime extensions Appeals to age, fairness, peer behavior Sales wins without good reasoning Learning opportunity Success ≠ good process Boundaries still matter Why sales gets a bad reputation Root cause: selfishness Focus on "what I get" Language centered on personal gain Misaligned value exchange Overselling Underdelivering The alternative Lead with value for the other side Hold mutual benefit in the background Make the exchange explicit and fair Boundaries as protection for both sides Clear scope What's included What's not Saying no as a service Preventing resentment Preserving trust Entrepreneurial lens Boundaries become essential Scope creep erodes value Clarity sustains long-term relationships Value exchange, scope, and boundaries Every request starts with discernment, not enthusiasm What value am I actually providing? What problem am I solving? How much time, energy, and attention will this really take? The goal isn't just a "yes" Both sides need to feel good about: What's being given What's being received What's being expected What's realistically deliverable Sales as a two-sided coin Mutual benefit matters Overselling creates future resentment Promising "the moon and the stars" is how trust breaks later Boundaries as self-respect Clear limits protect delivery quality Good boundaries prevent repeating bad sales dynamics Saying less upfront often enables better outcomes long-term Transitioning into coaching and the SNAFU Conference Context for the work today Speaking at the inaugural SNAFU Conference Focused on reluctant salespeople and non-sales roles Why coaching became the next chapter Sales is everywhere, regardless of title Coaching emerged as a natural extension of sales leadership The origin story at Google Transition from sales leadership to enablement Core question: how do we help sellers have better conversations? Result: building Google's global sales coaching program Grounded in practice and feedback Designed to prepare for high-stakes conversations The hidden overlap between sales and coaching Coaching as an underutilized advantage Especially powerful for sales leaders Shared core skills Deep curiosity Active listening Presence in conversation Reflecting back what's heard, not what you assume The co-creation mindset Not leading someone to your solution Guiding toward their desired outcome Why this changes everything Coaching improves leadership effectiveness Coaching improves sales outcomes Coaching reshapes how decisions get made A personal inflection point: learning to listen Feedback that lingered "Jeff is often the first and last to speak in meetings" The realization Seniority amplified his voice Being directive wasn't the same as being effective The shift Stop being the first to speak Invite more voices Lead with curiosity, not certainty The result More evolved perspectives Better decisions Sometimes realizing he was simply wrong The parallel to sales Talking at customers limits discovery Pre-built pitch decks obscure real needs The "right widget" only emerges through listening What the work looks like today A synthesis of experiences Buyer Seller Sales leader Enablement leader Executive coach How that shows up in practice Executive coaching for sales and revenue leaders Supporting decision-making Developing more coach-like leadership styles Workshops and trainings Helping managers coach more effectively Building durable sales skills Advisory work Supporting sales and enablement organizations at scale The motivation behind the shift Returning to the core questions: Am I learning? Am I growing? Am I challenged? A pull toward broader impact A desire to test whether this work could scale beyond one company Why some practices thrive and others stall Observing the difference Similar credentials Similar training Radically different outcomes The uncomfortable truth The difference is sales Entrepreneurship without romance Businesses don't "arrive" on their own Clients don't magically appear Visibility, rejection, iteration are unavoidable Core requirements Clear brand Defined ICP Articulated value Credibility to support the claim Debunking "overnight success" Success is cumulative Built on years of unseen experience Agency life + Google made entrepreneurship possible Sales as a universal survival skill Especially now Crowded markets Economic uncertainty Increased competition Sales isn't manipulation It's how value moves through the world Avoiding the unpersuadable Find people who already want what you offer Make it easier for them to say yes For those who "don't want to sell" Either learn it Or intentionally outsource it But you can't pretend it doesn't exist The vision board and the decision to leap December 18, 2023 45th birthday Chosen as a forcing function Purpose of the date Accountability, not destiny A moment to decide: stay or go Milestones on the back Coaching certification Experience thresholds Personal readiness Listening to the inner signal The repeated message: "It's time" The bridge was already built Skills stacked Experience earned Risk understood Stepping forward without full certainty You never know what's on the other side You only learn once you cross and look around Decision-making and vision boards Avoid forcing yourself to meet arbitrary deadlines Even if a date is set for accountability (e.g., a 45th birthday milestone), the real question is: When am I ready to act? Sometimes waiting isn't necessary; acting sooner can make sense Boundaries tie directly into these decisions They help you align personal priorities with professional moves Recognizing what matters most guides the "when" and "how" of major transitions Boundaries in the leap from corporate to entrepreneurship Biggest boundary: family and presence with children Managing a global team meant constant connectivity and messages across time zones Transitioning to your own business allowed more control over work hours, clients, and priorities The pro/con framework reinforced the choice Written lists can clarify trade-offs For this example, the deciding factor was: "They get their dad back" Boundaries in entrepreneurship are intertwined with opportunity More freedom comes with more responsibility You can choose your hours, clients, and areas of focus—but still must deliver results Preparing children for a rapidly changing world Skill priorities extend beyond AI and automation Technology literacy is essential, but kids will likely adapt faster than adults Focus on human skills Building networks Establishing credibility Navigating relationships and complex decisions Sales-related skills apply Curiosity, empathy, observation, and problem-solving help them adapt to change These skills are timeless, even as roles and tools evolve Human skills in an AI-driven world AI is additive, not replacement Leverage AI to complement work, not fear it Understand what AI does well and where human judgment is irreplaceable Coaching and other human-centered skills remain critical Lived experience, storytelling, and nuanced judgment cannot be fully replaced by AI Technology enables scale but doesn't replace complex human insight The SNAFU Conference embodies this principle Brings humans together to share experiences and learn Demonstrates that face-to-face interaction, stories, and mutual learning remain valuable Advice for coaches learning to sell Coaches already possess critical sales skills Curiosity, active listening, presence, problem identification, co-creating solutions These skills, when applied to sales, still fall within a helping profession Key approach Use your coaching skills to generate business ethically Reframe sales as an extension of support, not self-interest For salespeople Learn coaching skills to improve customer conversations Coaching strengthens empathy, listening, and problem-solving abilities, all core to effective selling Book and resource recommendations Non-classical sales books Setting the Table by Danny Meyer → emphasizes culture and service as a form of sales Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara → creating value through care for people Coaching-focused books Self as Coach, Self as Leader by Pam McLean Resources from the Hudson Institute of Coaching Gap in sales literature Few resources fully integrate coaching with sales Potential upcoming book: The Power of Coaching and Sales  

B2B Sales Trends 2026 (auch: B2B Vertriebstrends 2026) sind kein „Nice-to-know", sondern sie entscheiden, ob dein Team schneller wird – oder ob ihr 2026 noch mehr arbeitet und trotzdem weniger gewinnt. Ich sehe im Markt gerade zwei Extreme: Die einen rennen noch immer auf Masse, und zwar mit mehr Leads, mehr Calls und mehr Angeboten. Gleichzeitig wundern sie sich, warum die Pipeline zwar voll aussieht, aber dennoch nichts durchgeht. Die anderen machen etwas Radikales: Sie bauen ein System, sie fokussieren, und sie nutzen KI im Vertrieb 2026 nicht als Spielzeug, sondern als Verstärker. Deshalb bekommst du in diesem Beitrag die 5 entscheidenden B2B Sales Trends 2026 – und zwar mit klaren Schritten, damit du sie sofort umsetzt. Außerdem bleiben wir dabei ohne Buzzwords, ohne Theater und mit Wirkung. Quick Takeaways zu den B2B Sales Trends 2026: Die 5 Trends in 60 Sekunden Trend 1 (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026): System statt Zufall – denn weniger „Bauchgefühl" bedeutet mehr klare Standards. Trend 2 (KI im Vertrieb 2026): Hyperpersonalisierung wird Pflicht, und KI macht sie gleichzeitig skalierbar. Trend 3 (B2B Sales Trends 2026): Challenger gewinnt – weil wer nur nett ist, oft Entscheidungen verliert. Trend 4 (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026): Enablement wird Chefsache – sodass Coaching Routine wird und nicht nur ein Event bleibt. Trend 5 (B2B Sales Trends 2026): Fokus statt Volumen – also Klasse statt Masse, gesteuert über die richtigen KPIs. Warum die B2B Sales Trends 2026 den Takt vorgeben Die meisten Teams spüren es längst: Käufer sind informierter und kritischer, und oft sind sie auch langsamer in der Entscheidung. Gleichzeitig wird der Wettbewerb härter, während die Tools besser werden – vor allem durch KI. Was viele übersehen: Technologie ist nicht der Hebel, sondern System ist der Hebel. Deshalb gilt: KI verstärkt nur, was schon da ist. Genau darum drehen sich die B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 im Kern um eine Frage: Wie wirst du systematisch besser? Wenn dein Prozess chaotisch ist, dann macht KI ihn nur schneller chaotisch. Wenn dein ICP unscharf ist, dann skaliert KI nur die falschen Kontakte. Wenn dein Team keine Challenger-Haltung hat, dann erzeugst du mit KI nur hübschere „Feature-Texte". Trend 1 der B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: Systematisierung – weniger Angebote, mehr Abschlüsse B2B Sales Trends 2026: Die harte Wahrheit hinter „zu vielen Angeboten" Wenn ein Team sehr viele Angebote schreibt, dann klingt das erstmal fleißig. In Wahrheit ist es jedoch oft ein Zeichen für zwei Probleme: schlechte Qualifikation und fehlende Klarheit im Zielkundenbild. 2026 gewinnt nicht, wer am meisten tippt, sondern wer am saubersten auswählt. Und genau das ist einer der wichtigsten B2B Sales Trends 2026: Standards schlagen Aktionismus, weil sie Entscheidungen vereinfachen. A/B/C-Kundenlogik: So wird systematischer B2B-Vertrieb wieder leicht Mach es dir einfach, und teile deine Welt in drei Kategorien. Dadurch weiß dein Team schneller, worauf es sich konzentrieren soll: A-Kunden: Perfekter Fit, hohe Marge und gute Umsetzung, sodass der Sales Cycle oft kürzer ist. B-Kunden: Fit grundsätzlich okay, aber mit Reibung, weshalb klare Spielregeln nötig sind. C-Kunden: Nervt, zieht Ressourcen und frisst Marge, während am Ende häufig schlechte Referenzen entstehen. Wenn dein Team 2026 ständig C-Kunden bedient, dann wird es euch zermürben. Nicht wegen Arbeit, sondern wegen Sinnlosigkeit. Deshalb gilt: Wer die B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 ernst nimmt, sortiert C konsequent aus – und schafft Platz für A. Mini-Checkliste: ICP in 30 Minuten schärfen (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026) Welche Kundengruppe bringt saubere Projekte und saubere Marge, und warum genau? Welche Deals liefen schnell durch – und welche Faktoren haben dabei geholfen? Welche Kunden würdest du niemals wieder nehmen, obwohl der Umsatz vielleicht gut aussah? Welche 3 Trigger signalisieren echten Bedarf, zum Beispiel Wachstum, Wechsel oder neue Strategie? Merksatz: Dein ICP ist kein Marketing-Dokument, sondern dein Schutzschild. Und sobald dein ICP klar ist, greifen die B2B Sales Trends 2026 deutlich leichter. Trend 2 der B2B Sales Trends 2026: Hyperpersonalisierung & KI im Vertrieb 2026 B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: „One-size-fits-all" ist tot Käufer sind genervt von generischen Nachrichten, und das gilt natürlich auch im B2B. Deshalb wird eine saubere, hochpersonalisierte Ansprache zum Standard – ansonsten wirst du schlicht übersehen. Die gute Nachricht: KI im B2B Vertrieb kann dir die Vorarbeit abnehmen, und zwar zuverlässig. Allerdings funktioniert das nur, wenn du vorher klar definierst, was du brauchst. KI im Vertrieb 2026: Was KI wirklich liefern soll (und was nicht) Ich will nicht, dass KI „deinen Stil" kopiert, sondern ich will, dass KI dir Zeit kauft. Damit du dich auf die Dinge konzentrierst, die wirklich abschließen helfen: Research: Branche, Situation, Trigger und Vermutungen, sodass du schneller ins Gespräch kommst. Hypothesen: Was könnte dem Kunden gerade wirklich wehtun, und welche Kosten entstehen dadurch? Erster Draft: Mail, LinkedIn-Message, Agenda oder Follow-up, damit du nicht bei null anfängst. Und dann kommt der Teil, der zählt: deine Haltung. Denn ohne Klarheit bleibt es Text, während mit Klarheit daraus Wirkung wird. Genau hier greifen die B2B Sales Trends 2026 ineinander: Personalisierung ohne Haltung ist nur hübsch. KI im B2B Vertrieb: 3 Use Cases, die sofort Umsatz bringen Account-Briefing in 5 Minuten: „Was sind die Top 3 strategischen Themen dieser Firma – und warum?" Dadurch startest du mit Substanz. Personalisierte Outreaches: Ein Satz, der zeigt: „Ich habe verstanden." Und genau deshalb steigt die Antwortquote. Einwand-Bibliothek: KI hilft dir, Einwände zu clustern, sodass du starke Antworten systematisch trainierst. Wichtig: KI ist kein Ersatz für Substanz, sondern ein Verstärker für Substanz. Deshalb ist KI im Vertrieb 2026 ein zentraler Baustein der B2B Vertriebstrends 2026, wenn du sie richtig einsetzt. Praxis-Tipp: Baue dir 3 Standard-Prompts: (1) Research, (2) Hypothese, (3) Follow-up. Danach trainierst du sie wie ein Muskel, und so wird es schnell besser. Trend 3 der B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: Challenger Selling – Kunden brauchen Führung B2B Sales Trends 2026: Der Kunde will Orientierung, nicht die nächste Feature-Show Im komplexen B2B-Deal geht es nicht darum, wer am besten präsentiert, sondern darum, wer den Kunden am besten durch die Entscheidung führt. Deshalb gewinnt der, der Klarheit schafft. Und genau hier liegt der Challenger-Vorteil: Du bringst neue Einsichten, und du setzt einen Reframe. Außerdem zeigst du: „So würde ich das betrachten." Das ist 2026 nicht Kür, sondern Standard der B2B Sales Trends 2026. Reframe statt Produkt-Feuerwerk (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026) Viele Verkäufer verwechseln „kompetent" mit „viel erzählen", obwohl 2026 genau das wie Lärm wirkt. Deshalb brauchst du weniger Folien, aber mehr Relevanz. Schwach: „Hier sind unsere Features." Stark: „Die meisten Unternehmen unterschätzen gerade X – und zahlen dafür Y." Der Unterschied ist brutal: Der eine ist Lieferant, der andere ist Partner. Und weil Entscheider Orientierung suchen, wollen die B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 von dir vor allem Führung. Buying Committee steuern: Multi-Threading wird Pflicht in den B2B Sales Trends 2026 Entscheidungen fallen selten in einem Kopf, deshalb brauchst du mehrere Kontakte. Gleichzeitig brauchst du Sponsoren, und du brauchst jemanden, der intern argumentiert. Dadurch sinkt das Risiko, dass der Deal einfach stehen bleibt. Wer ist fachlich betroffen, und wer hat den größten Schmerz? Wer hat Budget, und wer kontrolliert es? Wer blockt (Einkauf, IT, Compliance), und warum genau? Wer gewinnt persönlich, wenn das Projekt klappt, sodass er dich intern unterstützt? Challenger heißt 2026: Du verkaufst nicht „das Produkt", sondern du verkaufst den Weg. Deshalb ist das einer der klarsten B2B Sales Trends 2026. Trend 4 der B2B Sales Trends 2026: Sales Enablement wird Chefsache B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: Training als Event ist Zeitverschwendung Viele Organisationen machen Enablement wie Zahnarzt: nur wenn's weh tut. Einmal pro Jahr ein Training, und danach passiert wieder Alltag. Deshalb wundern sie sich, warum sich nichts verändert. 2026 zählt Routine, nicht Motivation. Und weil Routine planbar ist, gehört Enablement ganz klar in die Liste der B2B Sales Trends 2026. Coaching-Routine: 45 Minuten pro Woche (B2B Sales Trends 2026) Wenn du eine Führungskraft im Vertrieb bist, dann plane pro Woche pro Verkäufer eine feste Einheit. Kurz, klar und wiederholbar, sodass es wirklich stattfindet. 15 Min: Pipeline-Review (Qualität, nicht Menge), damit Fokus entsteht. 15 Min: Deal-Review (nächster sinnvoller Schritt), sodass Deals vorankommen. 15 Min: Skill-Training (Einwand, Pitch, Discovery), weil Skills Umsatz sind. Das ist nicht sexy, aber es ist effektiv. Außerdem bringt es die B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 direkt in den Alltag. Sales Playbook, das genutzt wird: Enablement nach B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 Ein gutes Playbook ist kein Buch, sondern eine Checkliste für Situationen. Dadurch wird es genutzt, statt im SharePoint zu verstauben: So qualifizieren wir, damit wir weniger C-Deals jagen. So führen wir Discovery, sodass wir echten Bedarf finden. So bauen wir Business Cases, weil Entscheider Zahlen brauchen. So verhandeln wir, ohne Marge zu verschenken. So holen wir interne Stakeholder rein, damit der Deal nicht kippt. Wenn dein Team das Playbook nicht nutzt, dann ist es zu kompliziert. Deshalb gilt: Die B2B Sales Trends 2026 lieben Einfachheit. Merksatz: Du skalierst Umsatz nicht über „bessere Closings", sondern über bessere Verkäufer, und zwar jeden Monat. Trend 5 der B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: Fokus statt Volumen – Klasse statt Masse B2B Sales Trends 2026: Warum Aktivitäts-KPIs dich in die Irre führen Viele Teams steuern immer noch über Aktivität: Calls, Mails, Termine. Allerdings ist Aktivität billig, während Wirkung teuer ist. Deshalb bringt dich mehr Aktivität selten ans Ziel, wenn die Auswahl falsch ist. 2026 brauchst du ein Setup, das Fokus belohnt – nicht Hektik. Und genau deshalb ist das einer der unterschätzten B2B Sales Trends 2026. KPIs, die in den B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 wirklich zählen Winrate (nach ICP-Klasse!), weil Fit über Abschluss entscheidet. Sales Cycle (Zeit bis Entscheidung), damit du Engpässe erkennst. Pipeline-Qualität (wie viele echte A-Deals?), sodass du nicht im Nebel steuerst. Quote pro Angebot (wie viele Angebote werden gewonnen?), weil das Quali sichtbar macht. Next Step Rate (wie oft wird ein sauberer nächster Schritt vereinbart?), damit Momentum entsteht. Wenn du diese Zahlen im Griff hast, dann brauchst du keine Motivationsrede. Stattdessen läuft das System, und genau das versprechen die B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: weniger Lärm, mehr Ergebnis. 30-Tage-Plan zu den B2B Sales Trends 2026: So setzt du die 5 Trends um Woche 1: Fokus festziehen (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026) ICP schärfen (A/B/C definieren), damit Klarheit entsteht. Top-10 Zielaccounts festlegen, und zwar mit einem echten Fit. 3 Trigger definieren, die Kaufabsicht signalisieren, sodass Outbound präziser wird. Woche 2: System bauen (B2B Sales Trends 2026) Quali-Checkliste für Erstgespräche einführen, damit weniger heiße Luft entsteht. „No Offer without Next Step"-Regel definieren, sodass Deals nicht auslaufen. Deal-Review-Format starten (kurz, wöchentlich), weil Rhythmus gewinnt. Woche 3: KI im Vertrieb 2026 sauber integrieren 3 Prompts standardisieren (Research, Hypothese, Follow-up), damit jeder gleich startet. Outreach-Templates auf Hyperpersonalisierung umstellen, sodass Antwortquoten steigen. Einwand-Bibliothek anlegen und trainieren, weil Einwände planbar sind. Woche 4: Challenger & Enablement routinisieren (B2B Vertriebstrends 2026) Pro Verkäufer 1 Coaching-Slot/Woche fix blocken, damit es nicht ausfällt. 2 Reframes entwickeln (für Top-Problemfelder), und sie dann im Team üben. Buying-Group-Mapping als Standard im Deal einführen, sodass Multi-Threading normal wird. So setzt du die 5 B2B Sales Trends 2026 in 30 Tagen um – Schritt für Schritt, ohne Overload, und trotzdem mit Tempo. ICP schärfen: A/B/C-Kunden definieren und Dealbreaker festlegen, damit Fokus entsteht. Fokus-Accounts wählen: 10 Zielaccounts mit Triggern bestimmen, sodass Outbound präzise wird. Quali-Standard einführen: Checkliste + „Next Step"-Regel verbindlich machen, weil Standards Deals retten. KI-Workflows bauen: Research, Outreaches und Follow-ups als Routine, damit Personalisierung skaliert. Challenger trainieren: 2 Reframes entwickeln und wöchentlich üben, sodass Führung spürbar wird. Enablement routinisieren: Coaching-Slots + Deal-Reviews jede Woche fix, weil Routine gewinnt. Steuerung anpassen: Von Aktivität zu Winrate, Sales Cycle und Pipeline-Qualität wechseln, damit du Wirkung misst. Die häufigsten Fehler bei den B2B Sales Trends 2026 (und wie du sie vermeidest) Fehler 1: KI draufkippen, ohne Prozess zu klären, denn KI im Vertrieb 2026 verstärkt Chaos. Fehler 2: „Mehr Aktivität" als Lösung für schlechte Auswahl, obwohl B2B Vertriebstrends 2026 Fokus verlangen. Fehler 3: Challenger spielen, ohne Vertrauen aufzubauen, sodass es wie Druck wirkt. Fehler 4: Enablement als Projekt statt als Routine, wodurch alles wieder verpufft. Fehler 5: KPIs messen, die nur Beschäftigung belohnen, und deshalb falsches Verhalten erzeugen. Fazit zu den B2B Vertriebstrends 2026: 2026 gewinnt der Vertrieb mit System Die B2B Sales Trends 2026 laufen am Ende auf einen Punkt hinaus: System schlägt Adrenalin. Und genau deshalb ist 2026 weniger „mehr machen", sondern „besser machen". Wenn du systematisierst, fokussierst und dein Team befähigst, dann wird 2026 leichter. Nicht, weil der Markt netter wird, sondern weil du klarer wirst. Außerdem ist genau das der Kern der B2B Vertriebstrends 2026. Und wenn du KI nutzt, dann bitte so: als Verstärker für Fokus, Struktur und Challenger-Qualität. Dadurch wird KI im Vertrieb 2026 zum echten Umsatzhebel – statt zum Pflaster für Chaos. Dein Feedback zu den B2B Sales Trends 2026 Welche dieser 5 Entwicklungen triffst du bei dir im Team am stärksten, und wo reibt es gerade am meisten? Außerdem interessiert mich: Was ist dein nächster Schritt, damit 2026 nicht „mehr Stress", sondern „mehr Wirkung" wird? Wenn dir der Beitrag geholfen hat, dann teile ihn gern mit einem Kollegen, der 2026 auch lieber systematisch gewinnt, statt einfach „noch mehr zu machen".

True power isn't about control; it's about divine ability. Discover why God's strength is essential for fulfilling your life's assignment and how righteous living unlocks it. Using the gripping story of Paul and Silas, Rev. Obeng reveals how praise in the darkest moments can break every chain holding you back. Are you ready to escape your spiritual prison?This message was aired on Radio HCI Today via the WeLove Radio App.

In a moment of cultural tension, Patrick Lencioni invites us to rethink our role—not as louder voices, but as faithful contributors. In this THINQ talk, he introduces Working Genius, the six ways God uniquely wires each of us to serve: Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, and Tenacity. No one has all six—and that's by design. When our gifts work together, wisdom becomes truth in action. This conversation reframes culture as a shared work to steward, showing how honoring our strengths and the strengths of others leads not only to better work, but real cultural change. Resources: You may also like Beyond Vanity by Tim Chaddick. Take the THINQ Asessment to help you understand how you naturally think, learn, and grow in your faith.  Take the Working Genius Assessment to discover your natural gifts. Dwell offers several Bible-in-a-Year plans to match how you want to journey through Scripture - whether by theme, by story, or by order of the books themselves. Head over to dwellbible.com/thinq and find your perfect plan! Create a free THINQ Account and download the THINQ Media app on your smart TV to access more trusted content like this on topics from all channels of culture at thinqmedia.com. Apply the THINQ Framework as you think through cultural topics. Attend THINQ events where you can gather with like-minded leaders, ask better questions and have conversations that lead to wisdom: Sign up for THINQ Summit 2026 October 1-2 in Nashville, TN. Host a THINQ Family conversation series in your home:  Let's Talk Civility Let's Talk Relationships Let's Talk Mental Health Let's Talk Tech Detox More from the THINQ Podcast Network: Rhythms for Life with Rebekah & Gabe Lyons The InFormed Parent with Suzanne Phillips NextUp with Grant Skeldon NeuroFaith with Curt Thompson UnderCurrent with Gabe Lyons Now on YouTube! Subscribe, Like, and Share:  THINQ Media UnderCurrent with Gabe Lyons NextUp with Grant Skeldon Rhythms for Life with Rebekah and Gabe Lyons  The InFormed Parent with Suzanne Phillips

Eku Malcolm on skucast: Stop tinkering with AI and start scaling it. Frameworks to move your team from experimentation to fluency in 2026.

What does it actually take to move AI from experimentation to enterprise-wide impact? In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with Leigh-Ann Russell, Chief Information Officer and Global Head of Engineering at Bank of New York (BNY), about how one of the world's most systemically important financial institutions is operationalizing AI at scale. Leigh-Ann shares how BNY trained 99% of its 50,000-person workforce on AI, moved beyond pilots into deep enablement, and empowered employees across technical and non-technical roles to build AI agents that drive real productivity gains. Key topics discussed include: Training nearly the entire workforce to become AI-literate Moving from AI pilots to enterprise-wide enablement Empowering employees to build and deploy AI agents Reducing cognitive load while improving speed and resilience Leading AI adoption through hands-on executive behavior

The pandemic forced organizations to rethink how they engage their people, with many old rules torn up almost overnight. Five years on, AI has arrived and changed the game again.  Leaders are now facing a new set of questions. How do you design experiences that attract and retain talent while driving the performance your business needs? And how do you prepare for a future that's increasingly impossible to predict? So, how do you build a truly future-ready strategy for employee experience? My guest this week is Jacob Morgan, author of the upcoming book The Eight Laws of Employee Experience. In our conversation, Jacob shares insights from over 100 CHRO interviews that he has conducted around employee experience and reveals the principles that separate thriving organizations from those struggling to keep up. In the interview, we discuss: What's changed about the employee experience in the last five years? Proactively planning for the future The eight laws of employee experience Empathetic excellence Using AI to amplify humanity Enablement and augmentation Personalization at scale Run culture like an operating system TA & the employee experience What are the biggest changes going to be in the next two years? Follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts. Follow this podcast on Spotify.

A modern sales enablement strategy isn't about more activity - it's about better preparation. In this episode of B2B Sales Trends, we explore why preparation has become the true differentiator in B2B selling and enterprise sales strategy. In this conversation, host Harry Kendlbacher sits down with Gena Dakos, a seasoned sales enablement leader, to unpack how high-quality outreach, customer empathy, and thoughtful preparation help sellers stand out in a noisy, AI-driven market. From executive discovery to enterprise-scale deals, this episode reframes enablement as confidence, clarity, and credibility - not just training.

In this episode, Saurabh Bhansali, Partner at Health Velocity Capital shares how his firm identifies and scales market leading healthcare companies, highlights emerging investment themes like AI enabled services and revenue cycle management, and explains what he looks for in founders who thrive through disruption.

In this episode, Saurabh Bhansali, Partner at Health Velocity Capital shares how his firm identifies and scales market leading healthcare companies, highlights emerging investment themes like AI enabled services and revenue cycle management, and explains what he looks for in founders who thrive through disruption.

In this episode, Saurabh Bhansali, Partner at Health Velocity Capital shares how his firm identifies and scales market leading healthcare companies, highlights emerging investment themes like AI enabled services and revenue cycle management, and explains what he looks for in founders who thrive through disruption.

What if the key to success and happiness isn't working harder, but finally understanding how you're wired to thrive? Many people unknowingly work against their own strengths and personality, leading to stress, stalled career growth, and strained relationships. In this episode, you'll learn how to uncover obstacles, unlock your personal greatness, and start living in your type of working genius. Burnout doesn't always come from doing too much. Often, it comes from spending too much time doing the kind of work that drains you. Patrick Lencioni and I talk about why stress, frustration, and self-criticism are frequent signals of misalignment rather than failure, and how understanding your natural skills can change the way you work, lead, and relate to the people you love. Patrick is the creator of the Working Genius assessment and author of The Six Types of Working Genius. Together, we explore how the Working Genius framework helps people understand their strengths, release shame around what feels hard, and create healthier relationships at work and at home. We also talk about why rest alone doesn't resolve burnout, and why doing more of the right kind of work often restores energy, confidence, and momentum. As you listen, you may find yourself reconsidering long-held beliefs about success, productivity, and what you “should” be good at, and noticing where clarity could replace stress. Episode Breakdown: 00:00 Feeling Burned Out and Self-Critical at Work and Home 05:06 Burnout as Working Outside Your Strengths 06:56 The 6 Types of Working Genius Explained 11:45 How Working Genius Differences Affect Relationships 17:50 Enablement and Tenacity as Essential Strengths 21:08 Shame, Comparison, and Misunderstood Skills 32:41 Using Working Genius to Improve Couples and Team Communication 41:34 Why Doing Less Does Not Fix Burnout 55:35 Moving Toward Career Alignment Without Major Life Changes Are you feeling stretched thin while trying to crush it at work and keep up with everything at home? Burnout might be looming and that isn't just because you're doing too much. It's often about doing the wrong kind of work. Patrick created the Working Genius assessment to help you discover what kind of work gives you energy and what drains it. It's helped me find more balance, not by doing less, but by focusing on what I'm actually wired for. If you're a CEO, entrepreneur, or anyone trying to level up in business and life, take the Working Genius assessment today and get 20% off with code LHS at https://www.workinggenius.com/  xoxo, Dr. Lisa Marie BobbyGrowing Self

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report, 2025, 29% of companies still rely on multiple disconnected GTM tools. So how can organizations leverage a unified platform to scale sales readiness and achieve GTM success? Riley Rogers: Hi, and welcome to the Win/Win Podcast. I’m your host, Riley Rogers. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Heather Hubner, advisor distribution and agent relations at Priority Health. Thank you so much for joining us, Heather! I’d love it if you could just start by telling us a little bit about yourself, your background, and your role. Heather Hubner: Thanks for having me, Riley. Again, my name is Heather Hubner, and my role is a somewhat newer role in our company, but I came from the employee benefits side of the industry and then moved into sales. So I was a sales rep for several years for priority Health and that has evolved into the distribution side. Really my role is to ensure that our agent partners have a very aligned message as far as our products go, and just ensure that we are giving them the tools they need to represent our product in the field appropriately. RR: I kind of wanna double click into something you mentioned, which is that you started on the sales side of the house at Priority Health. So with that background in mind, can you walk us through some of the unique challenges that reps in the healthcare industry face, and then maybe a little bit about how enablement can help them overcome those things? HH: Yes, and I love this question. Being a sales rep in this industry—I think anyone who has worked in it understands the complexity—-is complex, it is fast paced, it’s somewhat seasonal, but we’re also learning that those seasons are no longer such. It’s just a high pace all year round. As a rep, one thing that I really learned was we have time wasters: we’re looking for a certain material that an agent wants, we’re reeducating ourselves on a product because maybe it’s something that we don’t delve into on a regular basis, we just need to reeducate ourselves as a rep. Before Highspot, so much time was spent digging around for that information and therefore less time was spent selling and building relationships and building trust with the agents. That was, that was very challenging. You know, I always thought: “Goodness, if I had everything at my fingertips, frankly, I could sell more for our company because I would be spending my time in a valuable way.” So I would say about four years ago, that’s when we first started using Highspot and it was an absolute game changer. I mean, it changed our world. We could get everything in one spot, and there was a lot of emphasis on making sure we had a source of truth. Reps know they know to go to Highspot, they can grab what they need when they need it, send it to an agent, reeducate themselves, and there isn’t any more guessing about where to look at our system, which drive, how do we find out who has the most up-to-date information. It really has been an amazing alignment tool. RR: I love that you’ve walked the walk so much so that you’re like: “I know what was hard, and I can now have the agency and also the tooling to go in and fix it.” I think that’s wonderful. And I think that’s always the goal of enablement, right? But when you have that background, you’re so much more in touch with what your reps need. So now that you’ve kind of made your way into this new role, I’d like to dig into what you’re working on now. So, what are some of those key initiatives that you’re focused on driving for the business this year? How are you hoping to decrease complexity like we just talked about for Priority Health's reps and agency partners? HH: To give you an idea of our journey so far, we started using Highspot for our reps and really went hard this year on ensuring that we had similar tools for our agents creating pages, specifically for our agents by market segment. We have created digital pages, so to speak. We call them engagement pages from an externally facing standpoint, and we have tailored the tools that those agents specifically need. This is important because, you know, if you are a small group agent, you generally don’t have all the complexities that large groups have, and therefore you don’t wanna weed through all those materials. So it really is the same principle applies, right? It’s giving them the tools they need when they need it, without having to sift through a lot of things that they don’t need. So creating very tailored pages for them has been really important. We’re going to take it a step further this year. So, to get to your actual question, we’re gonna focus on training. So when we get new agents in the field, they are the ones that we count on in order to sell our product, and oftentimes they are getting in the trenches, learning about all the carriers all at the same time. It’s a lot to digest. What we are gonna focus on is working on our training and our onboarding experience for our agent partners, and that way they can get in the field quicker with the right type of information, stay compliant with what our product actually is offering, and feel more comfortable. The hope there is truly we’re gonna sell more, more quickly, and they’re going to feel more comfortable repping our product. RR: I love the kind of internal enablement philosophies that are being extended out to the partner network—we know what you need and we want to give it to you in an easy, digestible way that is tailored to your workflow, because I’m not going to make you dig for something that you don’t even need. Keeping that in mind, I’d love to know what some of those other key building blocks for effectively equipping agents and building strong partner relationships are for you. HH: Gosh, the biggest piece is trust, right? They're building trust, um, spending time with them. Listening. Listening is the biggest piece. When agents are telling us things, we have to listen to them and act upon them. Otherwise what’s the point? The fact of the matter is in our industry—and anyone that works in health insurance knows our agent—partners are very direct. Sometimes too direct, but they’re very direct. So when they’re telling you something, they mean it and they are going to be truthful because their livelihood is also reliant upon the information we give. But I would say relationships are the strongest one. Trust, transparency. You know, being honest. If we are, you know, if an agent questions us on something, or frankly, sometimes they’ll compare us to other carriers: “Hey, this carrier does this. How come you guys can’t do that?” Be honest about it. But it really goes back to listening and forming those bonds to where they trust you. Because the more an agent trusts you, the more willing they are to say: “Hey, this group is a really good fit for your product. And I feel confident that you’re going to onboard them smoothly. I feel confident you’re going to take care of them from a customer service standpoint. And I feel confident that when there’s a problem, I’m going to call you, you’re gonna answer and you’re gonna help me solve it.” RR: So, you mentioned listening and building trust and transparency, and then using what agents are saying to kind of build your programs and how you support them. How are you kind of creating these channels to get in touch with your agents? Is it just getting on the phone and talking to people and then taking that information back to your strategy? How are you kind of creating that feedback loop? HH: So our team, I wanna give a little, um, shout out to the team a little bit. We are very unique, so we’re a newer team. There was not a distribution and training team before. We’re really working on the strategy for exactly what you said. How do we strategically get out? How do we make sure that our interactions are meaningful, and how do we enable our sales team to do the same? So what we have really come up with—and it seems to be quite successful—is we’ve created a premier partner program. What that means is we’ve got different levels, essentially of our partner groups: gold, silver, and bronze. For each one of them, we provide different levels of service, so to speak, but it’s really rewarding them for their business with us. With that, we’ve created a strategy on formal meetings. So formal meetings are when we actually go to the agency, we’re bringing our team of leaders and some of our reps, and we’re spending time with them in person and talking about our new products, some of the intricacies and nuances about what to expect, getting feedback about what they’re seeing in the industry and what they need in order to keep their clients in the space that they’re hoping to be for their employee benefits. We do that twice a year, and then we have kind of the other agency partners who we hit once a year. But on top of that, you’ve got kind of this less formal interaction, and that’s where we really come into play from an enablement standpoint. We want to make sure our sales reps have what they need when they need it. We help create some content for them so that when they are having more informal meetings—maybe they’re going to lunch, they’re going to breakfast, and they want to build a relationship, but they also want to bring some value and bring some meaningful messaging. That’s really where we’re focused. We understand that there’s different levels of that relationship building. You know, those individual reps, it’s so important that they have those relationships, but as an organization, as a whole, it’s important that we have those relationships and that vantage point in the market to where they’re saying, yeah, they have it together, they understand what we need. They are being formal when they need to be formal, but they’re being people when they need to be people. RR: That’s fantastic. I think one of my favorite things to hear about is programs that people are in the process of building and they’re so excited about. Thank you for sharing. We’ve talked a little bit about the strategy and kind of the philosophy. We’ve talked a little bit about how you’re creating feedback loops and embedding those relationships that you’re building with your partners into your programs. Could you talk to us a little bit about the role that a platform plays in kind of driving all of this for you? HH: I will be frank with you. Without the platform, this would be merely an impossible task. It is. I mean, it really would be. That was maybe the barrier in the past—having that source of truth for our materials, our education, and everything that our internal folks are using and our external folks in one place. On top of that, the tools that allow us to strategically tailor the messaging is amazing. You know, just sharing out links. The new digital pages, I’m telling you, these have been my favorite thing. We had a lot of feedback from our agency partners that it’s so hard to navigate where I get things. I mean, they were saying that to us for years and I couldn’t even disagree. I’m like: “It’s a hundred percent hard for us too, just so you know.” So this answer has been, you know, truly amazing. And then the Sales Plays: Our marketing team actually creates Sales Plays whenever we have a new product that’s going to market. Oftentimes, there are a lot of pieces of information that go along with that. We have member-facing materials, we have agent-facing materials, and then we also have things that are for our internal team only. But the Sales Plays really bring all those together so that when a salesperson is saying: “Hey, I need to learn about this product so I can go sell it right now,” it’s all in one spot for that product. Without it, I don’t know how we would do it. It feels as though our business would be so limited because the fast pace that we’re rolling out products and the fast pace of regulation changes would be very challenging to keep up with without having this platform. RR: That’s everything that we love to hear, is that the platform is helping you solve for those big problems. And it also kind of leads me to a question that I had for you, which is about how you’re driving alignment and consistency with Priority Health's strategy and message. You mentioned Sales Plays as kind of like an internal lever for keeping reps aligned, but what are your best practices for keeping agents and internal reps on message, on theme, and aligned to your strategy? HH: Really, that is our entire job as our team is to ensure what you’re saying is exactly what is happening. So we do it a few different ways as we are building what these for, what the formal agenda is going to be—which is what we formally take out to the market to each of our agency partners. At the same time we’re communicating internally to our sales reps what that’s gonna be and getting feedback from them about what it should be because they're the boots on the ground and they’re getting the calls from the agent saying: “Hey, you guys don’t have enough information on this. Tell me more about this.” That feedback loop coming to our team says: “Hey, we need to do more education in this area so that we’re aligned on the messaging.” Or if a rep says: “You know, we don’t know enough about this to go feel comfortable in the market with it,” we take that back and we know as our team, then we need to do better. And our marketing team, like I said, does a lot of that, but what we do is corral it together in a meaningful way for them. We need to do it better. I’ll be frank with you, you know, this past year has been a little bit of, you know, drinking out of a fire hose—creating new processes, creating new strategies. In terms of our communication to the market this upcoming year, we’re gonna spend a lot of time making sure that our reps have the same information as our agent partners in a more timely manner, so that there’s never a time where an agent is asking a rep something and the rep is saying “I didn’t know about that.” RR: I think it’s an endless task, right? Enablement. The business is constantly changing and so is your work too, but it does seem like, at least looking at the data that you guys are starting to drive, the impact that you’re really looking to. We’ve seen that you’ve achieved a really impressive 90% recurring usage rate in Highspot, which tells us that folks are in the platform, they’re using it regularly, and it’s part of their workflows. So what are some of your strategies for driving that adoption? How are you keeping people in the platform and excited to use it? HH: Being consistent with using this tool. So when we send out messages, we are very consistent in letting them know where they can find it, whether that’s providing the link or giving them teasers in the messaging to say learn more and then somewhat forcing them to the tool in order to learn everything they need to about it. This is a couple of things. One, you know, if they’re curious about the product, they’re gonna click in and then they’re going to potentially see what else is there, which is really great. But the fact that we’re using this really as our source of truth too for product information that’s been learned—because of the frustration of past years where they didn’t know where to go—it’s such a breath of fresh air that quite frankly, the user adoption, I don’t wanna say it’s easy, but it’s been easier because it’s been such a good problem solver. We didn’t know how we were going to solve for before we had this platform. RR: You know, you’re doing something right when just having folks land in the platform and realize “oh, this is so much better than what we had” is your main driver of adoption. That tells you you’ve built the right system, you’ve got the right structure, and you’ve built it exactly for them. So that’s fantastic. I always kind of love when I ask that adoption question, it’s like, I don’t know. They just like it and you’re like, you’ve done the right thing. That’s fantastic to hear. So, aside from that recurring usage rate that we just talked about, what other impact have you seen with the platform? HH: Yeah, I got chills when you just asked me that question actually, because there is a piece that I’m so excited about. We track the metrics, of course, of how much usage is being had on the agency side. So again, I keep speaking to this Digital Room, but that’s where we put all the large group information. And then we’ve also done the same for small groups. Seeing how much time has been spent there by our agent partners is a direct correlation of the time that doesn’t have to be spent by our reps. And in fact, I would argue even more when we first launched the pages, it was, we would look at the hours spent in there and we’re like, Ooh, three hours. Ooh, five hours. Ooh, 24 hours. And then we just started to get excited of: “man, people love this tool!” And then just getting the direct feedback from the agents too. They’re like: “This is a game changer. Heather.” I love not having to bother a rep with this information because that’s more time out of their day too, right? The agent then has to make a phone call. Or an email, which is more likely it’s adding to the multitude of emails that everybody’s getting every day. It takes that step out and creates a self-service environment that I think we all know and love. But I think that’s the most exciting piece RR: That’s so great to hear. I think that digital room example is such a masterclass in how you can bring the workflows of Highspot to an audience that maybe doesn’t live in your platform, but you can still create that consistency, that transparency, and I think definitely something to share with our audience. I’ve heard a couple of teams do that, and it always works out wonderfully, so thank you for sharing that. One last question for you: What advice would you offer to other health insurance organizations like yours that are hoping to build strong partnerships and drive consistent execution across their channels? HH: My advice would be to really listen to your agency partners. Don’t dismiss what they are saying. Also, listen to your reps. Relationships are everything—trust, transparency. When you give your agent partners or your customer, regardless of the industry, that, you build something really special. RR: Trust, transparency, good product. I think those are wonderful things to close on. Um, and I think it ties really nicely back to everything else that we’ve talked about. I do have to say before we close out completely, Heather, it has been so wonderful to chat with you. I really appreciate you taking the time to come and share a lot of really wonderful best practices, some tactical, some strategic of how to use the platform and how to run in this industry. HH: Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it too. Just the opportunity to really think about what this platform has done to us has brought some, a next level of appreciation from my end. RR: Amazing. To our audience, thank you for listening to this episode of the Win/Win podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

In this episode, Dr. Harbir Sian sits down with Nancy Dewald — renowned leadership consultant, owner of Lead Up Training & Consulting, consultant with Kleinman Performance Partners, and named one of Vision Monday's Most Influential Women in Optometry.Nancy brings her extensive experience in staff development, leadership, and organizational culture to break down two major topics every clinic owner should understand:The Working Genius framework — a simple, powerful way to understand team strengths and improve implementation.Blending generations in the workplace — strategies to reduce conflict, build empathy, and support a stronger, more connected team.⭐ Key Topics Discussed1. The Working Genius ModelWhy burnout is often not “too much work” but the wrong type of work.The six Working Geniuses — Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, Tenacity — and how every task or project requires all six.How identifying your team's geniuses prevents false starts, failed initiatives, and implementation bottlenecks.Using team maps to see missing strengths and make better hiring decisions.Real-world insights on how certain genius combinations drive momentum, while others can unintentionally stall progress.2. Avoiding Burnout Through AlignmentEnsuring team members are doing work that aligns with their strengths.Why tasks in your “frustration zone” drain your energy and how to rebalance your workload.When to delegate, outsource, or strategically schedule difficult tasks.3. Leadership EssentialsWhy clear expectations are the most commonly missed leadership skill.How leaders can build more effective teams by understanding roles, gaps, and what each person needs to succeed.Lessons from Patrick Lencioni's Five Behaviors of a Team: trust, healthy conflict, commitment, accountability, results.4. Blending Generations in the WorkplaceWhy “we are more alike than we are different” — and how focusing on differences harms teams.Understanding values and experiences that shape Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z.The importance of empathy, curiosity, and individualized support.Practical adjustments clinics can make to support different generations (communication styles, flexibility, additional benefits, etc.).

Send us a textSee our faces! Watch this episode on YouTube.In this episode of Cavell Cloud Conversations, Finbarr Begley and Patrick Watson break down the biggest insights from Cavell Enable which is Cavell's unique event that dives deep into how telephony is evolving inside Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and Cisco.They unpack why high-quality voice still matters for customer experience, even as collaboration platforms dominate the enterprise stack. The discussion covers fresh Cavell data, including the nearly 5 million users now active across telephony marketplaces, and why 73% of businesses say telephony still justifies its cost.Finbarr and Patrick explore what's holding adoption back from the shrinking need for external calling to the operational gaps in service provider support and shows where the real market opportunities still lie. They also discuss how better integration, smarter enablement, and richer usage data can finally unlock the next phase of telephony value.If you work in collaboration, CX, or the broader communications ecosystem, this episode gives a clear, pragmatic view of where telephony is heading and why it still matters.

Go to www.LearningLeader.com for full show notes The Learning Leader Show with Ryan Hawk This is brought to you by Insight Global. If you need to hire one person, hire a team of people, or transform your business through Talent or Technical Services, Insight Global's team of 30,000 people around the world has the hustle and grit to deliver. My Guest: Patrick Lencioni is the founder of The Table Group and a bestselling author of 14 books, including The Five Dysfunctions of a Team and The 6 Types of Working Genius. Behind his achievements (valedictorian, straight A's, business success) were childhood wounds that drove him to prove himself. Key Learnings "I think I'm really good at anticipating people's objections." I think about what they might be thinking and what I need to put out there. Whether talking interpersonally, giving a speech, writing a book, or on a podcast, I like to think about what the other person might be objecting to. Lean into empathy. I always felt like I needed to prove myself in order to be successful and to feel safe. That's not healthy.  "When people tell you they got straight A's and were the valedictorian, the student body president, and got accepted to all the schools they wanted to get into, there's a wound there." Based on my personality type, I shouldn't have done all those things, but it was out of the need to prove myself. Which wasn't healthy for me. My parents had a hard time being affirming because of their own lives. It wasn't until I was 55 years old that a friend who's a psychologist said, "You, my friend, have childhood wounds you've never dealt with." I got good Christian counseling and realized that the way I grew up, I wasn't supposed to grow up that way. It's common in athletes & CEOs to feel like they haven't done enough. They need to do more. "You're a noun, not a verb. You are enough, and you're not defined by what you do." Great achievements come out of fear, but "true greatness is best when it's only in the things that you're meant to be great at, and that you're doing it out of freedom and passion and love, not out of fear of failure." I remember seeing Tiger Woods on the Tonight Show when he was four years old. He was being groomed to be a golfer when he was four. It's best in life when we discover who God means us to be, then we do the things we're supposed to do and we're okay with not being good at the things we're not supposed to. Are we too affirming now as parents? People who are pretty darn good at everything it's usually because they're doing something out of fear. When I was a kid, my parents came from World War II and the Depression. It was like, hey, you got a roof over your head. There was a lot of suffering, and they weren't really attuned to that. Now we are hyper worried of our own kids suffering. No, suffering is actually good. They need to know they're loved and safe, but they're not gonna be protected from what is necessary for their development. The mistake I made was, oh no, I don't want them to feel like I did. Thankfully at my age, I'm now interacting with my mostly adult children and explaining to them what I did wrong. The Teammate Trifecta - How should we use it?: When I wrote The Five Dysfunctions of a Team right after 9/11, I thought, "That's the book on teamwork." Then we realized you need The Ideal Team Player (humble, hungry, and smart) to hire people that fit on teams. Years later, we came up with Working Genius: Are they in the right seat?  3 steps to building a team: Don't let people on the bus if they're not humble, hungry, and smart. Make sure you have them in the right chair based on their gifts. Then teach them the Five Dysfunctions. Pat's Two Working Geniuses: Invention and Discernment "Invention means I love to come up with ideas out of nothing. Discernment means I love evaluating things, curating things. God wired me to do that kind of thing." When people say, "Pat, we have five minutes, and we need a new idea," I just take a deep breath and smile. One man's trash is another man's treasure.  Every new idea I've come up with has been in the field, working with people. I asked Jim Collins, "Jim, you do all this research with data. I go into a room with leaders and just think, What's going on here?" He said, "Pat, that's just as valid as what I do. That's called field research and face validity."  What is Pat terrible at? Finishing things. People say, "Well you finished 14 books." And that's because I had the help of others to make me finish those.  I got a 4.0 in high school. That wasn't my personality. I went to every class in college, never blew off classes. My personality is the kind that should blow off classes that don't matter. But I was so afraid of failing and disappointing my parents and teachers that I did anything they asked. That was not natural; that was fear-based. Can we use fear as useful fuel? "You can use it in the short term, but if you're doing it in your life, no." "We should celebrate what other people are better than we are at things. We should literally celebrate what we suck at." If we have two kids and one's creative and the other's disciplined, we tell the creative one to be more disciplined and the disciplined one to be more creative. No. We have to say, understanding that you're not creative is good for you. That's not who you're meant to be. The hardest thing about being a parent is constantly asking yourself, "Am I pushing them too hard or not enough?" The hardest question you ask yourself as a parent is, "Am I pushing my kids too hard or not hard enough?" This question also applies to yourself.  In Working Genius, should I work on my working frustrations? The short answer is no.  Working Genius is all about knowing what you love to do. Enablement and Tenacity are my working frustrations, and so many of those things fall into parenting. I'd say to my wife, "Hey, Laura, let's outsource some of these things." Out of fear and guilt, she said no because she felt like she'd be a bad mother. Outsource the work you don't enjoy, and when you have to do it, try your best and don't feel guilty with the result. The electrical company turned off our power for not paying the bill. We need to accept our deficiencies and need to be able to laugh at the things we're not good at.  Ryan's Learning Leader Team: When your whole team has Tenacity as their working genius, your team loves to finish things. You will never be flaky. You might stick to something that needs to be changed way before it needs to be. In my company, we're always up for a change in plans, but not great at following through. If your team doesn't have Wonder and Invention, force yourself to borrow from others outside the organization to get new ideas. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team Vulnerability-based trust changes everything in teams. Eric Spoelstra uses Five Dysfunctions with the Miami Heat. He started when they acquired LeBron James. He said, "I don't know what offense we're gonna run this year, but I know we're gonna use the Five Dysfunctions." I love it in basketball, especially because you see them on the court. When people can be so vulnerable that they can say it was my fault, or I need help, or I'm sorry I was kind of a jerk yesterday at practice, it changes everything. But when you have a player who doesn't admit when they made a mistake or who blames everybody else, the ceiling of that team being great is so low. Humble, Hungry, Smart has been a great tool for athletic teams. I define it: no ego, it's about the team (humble). Hungry means I go above and beyond. Smart means I have emotional intelligence. I have the team members say, "Which of those three is your lowest?" It is crazy how people will call out. The goalie said, "I'm not smart. I yell at guys on the field, and I demean them. I gotta get better." Another kid said, "I need to be hungrier. I don't do the workouts at home." Pat phrases it this way when meeting with athletic teams. "Okay, everybody, look around at your teammates and think about the thing they want to get better at. If you want to be a good teammate, when you see your teammate doing the thing he just admitted he wants to get better at, you need to call him out on it." Once people start to have that language, it's amazing how they're coaching each other. And if as a coach yourself, I think you should tell people, "When I was a player, this was mine." They're gonna go, hey, if the coach admits that, I'll do it too. For leaders with Enablement & Tenacity as top geniuses, how do they avoid burnout? You have to be willing to start with "I am prone to burnout if you guys aren't aware of what's going on." The people with enablement and tenacity will say, "I'll just do it," and then they do. We had 12 employees and only one had Tenacity. We said we are going to kill her because every time we have to get something done, we're gonna say, "Jackie will finish." When people have enablement and tenacity, they and everybody else need to say, let's not abuse them. How do we assess a company in a short amount of time without focusing on their financials?  When I go into a company, I find out what their meetings are like. If there's no disagreement and they're not exhausted at the end of a meeting, that's a red flag. If good people are leaving an organization, that's a massive red flag. I like going around and checking interactions. Is there an intensity with people together? Or are they alone and quiet? Also, keep an eye on customer reviews. What are the customers saying? There are two extremes of humility problems: arrogance on one end, and lack of confidence on the other. I first identified humility as a problem when I saw a CEO who didn't care about his company's results, but if he went on TV and answered questions about why they didn't meet their numbers, he would make jokes and make others laugh. If he was happy from that versus getting the results they needed, that's an issue. What specific traits do leaders need to have to get hired? A leader has to simultaneously believe they are no more important than the people they lead. They also have to accept the fact that their behaviors and words ARE more important than others in the company. "The one thing the leader has to do is break the tie." This past Friday, I was in a meeting trying to deal with a strategic issue between two great people. I dropped a curse word and said, "Listen, I'm pulling the CEO card right now. I don't do it all that often, but since I am the CEO, this is where we're going." Because I don't pull it every time, people are glad to have a CEO that will do that. If you're doing it every time, you lose credibility. Advice for young professionals: I wrote a book called The Motive, and what I say to leaders when they're young is: make sure your motive for being a leader is about sacrificing and suffering for others. "I want to help this organization, or I want to be the kind of person that takes on more than others for their good." Leadership is a lonely and selfless thing. It's wonderful, but the personal economics of leadership are not good. If you don't sign up for that, don't be a leader. Too many people say, I want to be a leader. And if you really scratch below the surface, they'll say, I think it would make me feel important, I'd get attention, maybe I'd make money, I'd have power. When that's your motive for being a leader, you're not gonna be a great leader. Reflection Questions Pat says people who were perfect students (straight A's, valedictorian, student body president) often have childhood wounds driving them. What in your past might be driving your current achievements? Are you operating from freedom and passion, or from fear and the need to prove yourself? He teaches his kids' sports teams to identify which of Humble, Hungry, or Smart is their lowest, then hold each other accountable when they see teammates struggling with that area. What would you identify as your lowest, and who in your life could you invite to call you out when you're not living up to it? Pat says the motive for leadership should be "sacrificing and suffering for others," not feeling important or controlling what you work on. If you're honest about why you want to lead (or why you currently lead), what's really driving you? Would people who report to you say you're other-motivated or personally motivated?

In this episode of The Product Experience, host Randy Silver speaks with Teresa Huang — Head of Product for Enablement at global health‑insurer Bupa — about the often‑overlooked world of platform product management. They explore why building internal platforms is fundamentally different and often more challenging than building user‑facing products, how to measure the value of platform work, and practical strategies for gaining stakeholder alignment, driving platform adoption and demonstrating business impact.Chapters0:00 – Why “efficiency” alone no longer cuts it — measuring platform impact in business terms1:02 – Teresa's background: from business analyst to head of product in health insurance6:20 – What we mean by “platform product management” — internal tools vs marketplace vs public‑API platforms7:44 – Why you need to “hop two steps”: address developer needs and end-customer value10:24 – Types of platforms: internal APIs, marketplace ecosystems, public‑facing platforms (e.g. like Shopify)10:55 – Reframing platform work: building business cases instead of chasing “efficiency” metrics13:16 – Linking platform initiatives to core business goals and joint OKRs15:47 – The importance of visualisation — using prototypes and role‑plays to communicate platform value20:57 – Internal showcases: keeping stakeholders engaged with real‑world scenarios23:28 – Success metrics for platforms: adoption, usage, reliability, ecosystem growth26:00 – Retiring legacy services: deciding when low-use tools should be decommissioned28:55 – From cost centre to enabler: shifting the narrative to show value creationOur HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She's currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She's worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury's. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group's Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He's the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager's Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon's music stores in the US & UK.

The Future of Learning: Turning Training into Performance with Rob Rosenthal, President of Udemy BusinessThe ground is shifting under every team — and the biggest winners are the ones treating learning not as a checkbox, but as a performance system that fuels growth, agility, and innovation.In this in-depth episode of the HRchat Podcast, host Bill Banham sits down with Rob Rosenthal, President of Udemy Business, to explore how learning and development is being redefined in an era shaped by AI, hybrid work, and rapid skills transformation.Together, Bill and Rob unpack how AI, executive sponsorship, and measurable enablement can dramatically shorten ramp times, sharpen skills, and deliver business outcomes that leaders can trust. Rob shares what he's seeing across industries and regions: a growing expectation for L&D to partner directly with technical teams to lead AI readiness while also proving ROI to the C-suite.Listeners will discover a practical framework for building what Rob calls a “skills operating system” — one that starts with clear assessments and gap discovery, moves through curated learning paths, and lands on deliberate practice powered by AI. Rob explains how AI-based role play and virtual coaching can help new skills take hold faster, and how Udemy implemented this internally to reduce new-hire ramp time by 30% for account executives through structured enablement, not just new tools.The conversation also explores what skills truly outlast the hype. Rob highlights the continued importance of communication, change management, resilience, and leadership, especially as automation accelerates and teams face constant reinvention. Finally, Rob describes how private LLM integrations can deliver targeted, role-specific content at the exact moment of need — whether an engineer is debugging code or a manager is preparing for a tough conversation — turning learning from an occasional event into an everyday habit.Support the showFeature Your Brand on the HRchat PodcastThe HRchat show has had 100,000s of downloads and is frequently listed as one of the most popular global podcasts for HR pros, Talent execs and leaders. It is ranked in the top ten in the world based on traffic, social media followers, domain authority & freshness. The podcast is also ranked as the Best Canadian HR Podcast by FeedSpot and one of the top 10% most popular shows by Listen Score. Want to share the story of how your business is helping to shape the world of work? We offer sponsored episodes, audio adverts, email campaigns, and a host of other options. Check out packages here. Follow us on LinkedIn Subscribe to our newsletter Check out our in-person events

In this episode of The Product Experience, host Randy Silver speaks with Teresa Huang — Head of Product for Enablement at global health‑insurer Bupa — about the often‑overlooked world of platform product management. They explore why building internal platforms is fundamentally different and often more challenging than building user‑facing products, how to measure the value of platform work, and practical strategies for gaining stakeholder alignment, driving platform adoption and demonstrating business impact. Chapters0:00 – Why “efficiency” alone no longer cuts it — measuring platform impact in business terms1:02 – Teresa's background: from business analyst to head of product in health insurance6:20 – What we mean by “platform product management” — internal tools vs marketplace vs public‑API platforms7:44 – Why you need to “hop two steps”: address developer needs and end-customer value10:24 – Types of platforms: internal APIs, marketplace ecosystems, public‑facing platforms (e.g. like Shopify)10:55 – Reframing platform work: building business cases instead of chasing “efficiency” metrics13:16 – Linking platform initiatives to core business goals and joint OKRs15:47 – The importance of visualisation — using prototypes and role‑plays to communicate platform value20:57 – Internal showcases: keeping stakeholders engaged with real‑world scenarios23:28 – Success metrics for platforms: adoption, usage, reliability, ecosystem growth26:00 – Retiring legacy services: deciding when low-use tools should be decommissioned28:55 – From cost centre to enabler: shifting the narrative to show value creationOur HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She's currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She's worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury's. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group's Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He's the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager's Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon's music stores in the US & UK.

In this episode of The Future of Teamwork, host Dane Groeneveld talks with learning and development leader Greg Wilton about how generative AI is reshaping knowledge, skills, and talent pipelines. Greg shares how his career in corporate L&D and knowledge management led him to focus on “human enablement” rather than traditional training, emphasizing decision quality over content recall.They explore why so many AI pilots fail, what “ground truth” really means in a fast-changing business, and how leaders can use prompt engineering, critical thinking, and clear roles to get better outcomes from both humans and machines. Greg also highlights the impact of AI on entry-level roles and why reimagining early career work is now a strategic and moral imperative.

At the Cisco Partner Summit, Technology Reseller News' Moshe Beauford spoke with Jeff Drury, Director of Engineering at CVE Technologies Group, about how Cisco's expanding AI portfolio is reshaping partner enablement, education, and customer strategy across the channel. Based in Salt Lake City, Utah, with offices in Oregon and Hawaii, CVE Technologies Group has been a trusted Cisco partner since 2002. The company provides technology solutions, engineering support, and technical services to customers across the Intermountain West and beyond. Discussing the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence, Drury described AI as “the new buzzword — it's replaced ‘cloud' as the vaguest but most talked-about trend in technology.” He explained that customers are approaching AI adoption in three ways: by using built-in AI features within existing tools, leveraging large language models (LLMs) to improve workflows, and developing proprietary AI solutions — with the last category being the most complex and skill-intensive. Internally, CVE is also adopting AI to streamline operations. “We're looking at how to ‘dog food' our own AI initiatives, especially around LLM integration, to improve business processes and make us faster and more agile,” Drury noted. Education and enablement remain central to CVE's approach. “Cisco's been very good about providing enhanced and focused training once we show initiative and investment in a space,” said Drury. “Education is the key and the burden of being a successful channel partner — it's constant.” Looking ahead, Drury hopes for greater interoperability across AI-driven tools. “Standalone AI information for one product isn't beneficial if it can't talk to other systems. Interoperability between vendors' AI technologies will be key as the market matures,” he added. Learn more about CVE Technologies Group at https://www.cvetech.com/.

What happens when we misunderstand or mistype someone's Working Genius? Also, what changes when we finally understand the true genius behind someone's behavior?In episode 100 of the Working Genius Podcast, Pat and Cody explore why an incorrectly identified Working Genius can create frustration, friction, and confusion among teammates. They also dive into factors that often lead to mistyping, and how understanding true genius unlocks better collaboration and more joy. Topics explored in this episode: (03:00) When the Wrong Genius Causes Friction* How teams can inadvertently push people into the wrong types of work.* Metaphors—like ice cream and lactose intolerance—to illustrate the mismatch.(06:25) The Nuances Behind Misinterpreting Behaviors* Examples of people misinterpreting public speaking as galvanizing.* How different geniuses can look similar on the surface but feel different internally.(09:22) Why Some Geniuses Are Commonly Mistyped* Why Wonder and Enablement are often misunderstood.* How environment and personal bias influence self-typing.(13:39) Consequences of Selling the Wrong Genius* Why advertising a genius you don't have creates false expectations.* The importance of accurate self-awareness.This episode of The Working Genius Podcast with Patrick Lencioni is brought to you by The Table Group: https://www.tablegroup.com. We teach leaders how to make work more effective and less dysfunctional. We also help their employees be more fulfilled and less miserable. The Six Types of Working Genius model helps you discover your natural gifts and thrive in your work and life. When you're able to better understand the types of work that bring you more energy and fulfillment and avoid work that leads to frustration and failure, you can be more self-aware, more productive, and more successful. The Six Types of Working Genius assessment is the fastest and simplest way to discover your natural gifts and thrive at work: https://workinggenius.me/about Subscribe to The Working Genius Podcast on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/4iNz6Yn), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/3raC053GF5mtkq6Y1klpRU), and YouTube (https://bit.ly/Working-Genius-YouTube). Follow Pat Lencioni on https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-lencioni-orghealth, http://www.youtube.com/@PatrickLencioniOfficial, and https://x.com/patricklencioni. Be sure to check out our other podcast, At The Table with Patrick Lencioni, on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/4hJKKSL), Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/6NWAZzkzl4ljxX7S2xkHvu), and YouTube (https://bit.ly/At-The-Table-YouTube). Let us know your feedback via

Martin Frohock is Global Workplace Experience Director at AVEVA where he is passionate about delivering a strategy that aligns with his team's mission is to connect trusted information and insights that spark industrial ingenuity and help create a more sustainable future. Mike Petrusky asks Martin about how the role of corporate real estate and facility management professionals has evolved to focus on strategy enablement rather than just services and operational support. They explore the power of technology, such as AI and data analytics, and how it will shape the future of real estate and the workplace. Martin says that workplace innovators will need to be fluent in data, understand technologies impact while also speaking the language of the business. Collaboration, curiosity, and being attentive listeners are essential skills for workplace leaders as they care for the future of the built environment and the workforce. Our industry needs to move away from reactive execution and head towards more strategic partnerships, so Mike and Martin offer practical advice and the inspiration you will need to be a Workplace Innovator in your organization! Connect with Martin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-frohock-0001/ Learn more about AVEVA Group Limited: https://www.aveva.com/ Discover free resources and explore past interviews at: https://eptura.com/discover-more/podcasts/workplace-innovator/ Learn more about Eptura™: https://eptura.com/ Connect with Mike on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikepetrusky/  

Scaling SaaS in 2026: AI, Talent, and the Future of People Operations is becoming a core focus for growing B2B companies as AI reshapes how teams work, how customers buy, and how leaders build the next generation of SaaS organizations. In this episode of the Grow Your B2B SaaS podcast, recorded live at SaaS Summit Benelux in Amsterdam, host Joran speaks with Hotske Wesselius about how AI will reshape scaling in 2026. With a background in marketing and a career shift into people and talent acquisition, Hotske supports SaaS companies in hiring and retaining top talent. Their discussion explores how AI is changing the buyer journey, customer success, people management, culture, team structures, search behavior, partnerships, go to market strategies, efficiency, and the overall pace of competition. The theme is consistent. AI will not remove the need for people, but it will transform how teams work, what skills matter, and how leaders manage and support their organizations. The episode also offers advice for founders at various revenue stages and the mindset shifts needed to thrive in a fast changing environment.Key Timecodes(0:00) – AI Breakthrough Intro: B2B SaaS in 2026, Scaling, Buyer Journey, Customer Success, People Leadership(0:47) – Talent Secrets: Hotske Wesselius on Marketing, Recruiting, Hiring Top SaaS Talent(1:12) – Scaling Revolution: What Will Separate Winning B2B SaaS in 2026 (AI-Driven Orgs)(1:26) – Skill Upgrade: New Capabilities for the AI Era — Agents, Enablement, Leadership(2:13) – Buyer Shift: AI Search, Findability, and Customer Support Automation(3:11) – Data Reality Check: People Analytics Built on Engagement + Results(3:33) – Automation Wave: Headcount vs AI, Cognitive Tasks, Reporting, AI “Brain” Roles(4:31) – Human-in-the-Loop: Training, Building, and Governing AI Inside SaaS Companies(4:52) – Culture Reset: Designing Strong Company Culture in the Age of AI(5:29) – AI-First Shift: Changing Mindset at Scale (Miro Example)(5:56) – Leadership Hack: Using ChatGPT for Feedback, Tone, and Empathetic Communication(7:03) – Hyper-Personalization: Tailoring Communication via Personality Types (DISC)(7:44) – Empathy Engine: How AI Improves Manager Communication & Employee Experience(8:15) – Pro Tip: Use AI as Your Personal Empathy Coach(8:29) – Sponsor Spotlight: Reditus — B2B SaaS Affiliate & Referral Growth(9:25) – Efficiency Mode: Growing Fast in 2026 with AI Automation

What if consistency isn't about willpower but about design?  In this special crossover episode, Angela flips seats and becomes the guest. Interviewed by Kevin Joseph from the Lekker Network, I unpack how small, deliberate system changes can unlock unstoppable performance in individuals, teams, and entire organizations.  Angela shares her journey from health and neuroscience to behavioral science and leadership transformation, and the practical insights that help people stay on track long after motivation fades.  

According to research from Forrester, 70% of marketing content goes unused. So how can you effectively structure and govern your content to unlock its value and drive measurable business results? Riley Rogers: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Riley Rogers. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Chanique James, marketing lead generation and enablement specialist at MSCI. Thank you so much for joining us, Chanique. To kick us off, I’d love if you could just start by telling us a little bit about yourself, your background, and your role. Chanique James: Sure. Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here. I have several years of experience in brand and product marketing, focusing on promotions, trade marketing, and event management, as well as sales enablement. Over the years I’ve managed from product marketing initiatives across both B2B and B2C environments, developing integrated strategies that connect creativity, storytelling with measurable business outcomes. I’ve always been passionate about connecting strategy with people and finding the balance between creativity, data, and impact. That perspective has shaped how I approach marketing and enablement today. In my current role, I focus on marketing, lead generation and enablement. Ensuring or grow to market teams have access to the right content at the right time, along with insights and tools to engage clients effectively. I see my work as connecting digital strategy with operational excellence, bringing clarity, consistency and impact to how marketing and sales collaboration. RR: Amazing. Well, from that background, it seems like there’s a lot of ground we could cover here. A lot of experience across a lot of different arenas that I’d love to dig into. So let’s just start with maybe a bit of background on kind of the environment that you’re working in. So I know that MSCI provides a pretty broad range of services to the global investment community. So what are some of the unique challenges that your go-to market teams face when activating at scale across global regions? And then to your point, how does digital enablement help address them in global environment? CJ: I believe that scale introduces complexity from different regulatory environments to language nuances and varying buyer expectations. Go to market teams face similar challenges across regions. They have to balance consistency, compliance, and connectivity. Ensuring that messaging feels unified, yet relevant in diverse markets. Managing that balance requires both structure and flexibility, and that’s where digital enablement comes in. By centralizing content, data and workflows, digital enablement gives team visibility into what’s working and empowers them to adapt quickly. These tools make it possible to deliver localized content and timely materials to client facing teams around the world, helping them navigate campaigns efficiently as well as, I would say more confidently. RR: Amazing. It sounds like you’ve got a lot on your plate, so I’m excited to dig into kind of the strategies for approaching those obstacles and those challenges of scale beyond kind of some of the unique obstacles that you encounter as a global organization, as a financial services organization, I’d like to focus on some that pretty much every organization is gonna face, which is the disconnect across the go to market organization. So as a marketing leader. What go-to-market initiatives are you focused on to better align your marketing and your sales teams? CJ: For me, I would say alignment starts with visibility and connection. It’s really about making sure marketing and sales teams are working from the same playbook as well as working together so that content, messaging and data tell one cohesive story. That alignment creates focus and efficiency. It means simplifying access to marketing and enablement tools, making insights actionable, and keeping collaboration front and center with both sides. That is marketing and sales are connected around shared goals and clear communication. Everything else from productivity to performance naturally improves. RR: Absolutely. And I think one of those key levers that you can pull on is the content that you’re sharing across. When it’s well managed and well socialized, you unlock really strong cross-functional collaboration when it’s not, we know the consequences in your work. One of those key focuses is content management. So from your experience, what are some of the common pitfalls that financial services organizations like yours might face when developing and managing content, and then how can maybe they avoid them? CJ: I would say possibly a big, or the biggest challenge that we have is fragmentation content often live in silos owned by different teams, sometimes with different goals that can lead to duplication, outdated materials, or even inconsistencies in messaging and compliance. Key, however, is strong governance and collaboration, establishing clear processes around how content is created, reviewed, distributed, and even maintaining open feedback loop across marketing, compliance, and sales can actually help us ensure that every piece of content is purposeful, consistent, and UpToDate in addition. I believe that when organizations take that structured approach, they move from managing content reactively to managing more strategically, and this can actually turn into a real advantage for the business. RR: Can you talk to me a little bit about like the value of that strategic approach as opposed to a like reactive approach? CJ: So I ultimately believe that in terms of content management, you really need to think strategically, how are teams accessing it? How are they using it, and also is it relevant for your market? I believe that one of the key things that we can do is always leverage the data. Enablement tools allow us to get a lot of insights not just into client engagement with content, but also how our sales team are actually using it. When we actually leverage that data, that helps us to drive strategy and that strategy actually helps us improve over time. The content that we continuously create and the content that we also continuously share with our clients. And I think that’s a big portion. That’s a big part of actually making sure that we’re not just reacting to things, not be being used well, but also strategically ensuring that moving forward when we see certain metrics, we use that to create better content, to have better client relationships and conversations for our sales team. RR: Yeah, I think that’s such a great perspective. I think sometimes as marketers, you get really caught up in like what you’re excited to create, and sometimes you have to take that step back and go, what is actually useful? What are our reps like, what are our clients like? And how can I lean into that? So I, I love that you’re taking that approach. Um, and I know good governance and good content creation strategies can be really, really crucial, but they can also be really difficult to maintain. So I’d like to talk a little bit, maybe about. The impact of taking the time to focus in on that. So what do you see as the value of having compliant up-to-date content and how does that enable reps to succeed in the field? CJ: Sure. I believe that having quality and compliant content is very essential, and also having enablement platforms actually serve as a great deal in terms of ensuring that the content is easy for sales reps to access. Enablement platforms are transformative because they turn content from status assets into living resources. They centralized content distribution, enforce compliance, and provide clear insights into engagement and performance. For financial organizations where accuracy and timing are everything, this gives our sales team confidence that what they’re sharing with clients have been approved and is also relevant. So I would say that it’s not just about access, it’s really about assurance, agility, and trust. RR: I think that that last call out is so key because it’s ultimately just about trust, right? Your reps need to know that your content is reliable and aligned to their needs. Your business needs to know that you’re compliant and aren’t gonna create unnecessary risk that nobody wants to deal with. If you can prove that and build that brand of trust. You’re set. And maybe that’s kind of how you’ve achieved such a high recurring usage rate in Highspot. So can you walk me through, in addition to some of the governance pieces that we’ve been talking about, but what best practices have been effective in helping you drive strong adoption? CJ: Adoption thrives on relevance and experience. We treat our environment as more than a repository. It’s really a dynamic workspace that grows with our teams. We’re focused on building a clear content structure so users can easily find what they need, and we partner with champions who will help drive awareness, as well as share best practices. We also offer focus training and share success stories with our new users. That highlights real results. In addition, we integrate with platforms such as Salesforce so that the tool actually fits naturally into the workflows of our sales teams. I think that when people see genuine value in how it helps them, it actually allows them to work smarter and adoption really naturally flows from that. RR: I love touching on the ecosystem piece and creating an environment that works for people. ’cause a lot of the time when enablement feels like a mandate or it’s not built with workflows in mind. You don’t see that adoption, so love to hear the best practices that are working for you, but I know that it’s not just adoption that’s going well for you and the team. We’ve heard some really great things about the work that you’re doing, so I’d be really curious to know, since implementing Highspot, what key results have you achieved and are there any particular wins or achievements that you’re super proud of? CJ: I think one of the most exciting things have been our ability to see how our approach has truly transformed the way our team operates. One major impact and achievement has been turning the platform into, as I mentioned before, a strategic activation hub. We’ve streamlined how content is distributed, tracked, measured, which significantly, adoption reads and overall content utilization. So we’ve seen measurable improvements in both time savings as well as content engagement. Our sales teams now have easier access to tailored playbooks, helping them move faster and stay aligned across functions. What I’m most proud of, however, and honestly continuously working on, is how this has strengthened collaboration between our functions such as marketing, sales, and even our product teams. I believe that this has actually helped us to turn our content and digital strategy into a true connector across the business. RR: I think that’s a fantastic achievement to say that, you know, we’ve created a through line across the organization that is now our source of truth and our source of communication. That’s fantastic. So have to commend you and the team for that work. We’ve talked about what the challenges are, how you’re solving them, what you’ve achieved so far, but let’s maybe talk a little bit about the future. So I know that MSCIs tagline is Clarity drives action. Thinking about that philosophy, how does that guide your approach to strategy and your role? And then what outcomes are you looking to drive next? CJ: Clergy drives action resonates deeply with my approach to marketing, digital strategy, and enablement. For me, it’s about simplifying complexity and making information accessible, actionable, and meaningful so that insights can truly drive impact. Looking ahead, I’m focused on advancing data-driven personalization and using insights to deliver more connected high value experiences for both internal teams and clients. The goal is really to keep evolving how we connect strategy to execution, creating clarity, efficiency, and measurable outcomes that help marketing efforts drive stronger engagement and ultimately business growth. RR: Awesome. Can I ask, is there anything in particular with Highspot that you think is going to be helpful in helping you achieve those goals? CJ: Sure. Yeah. I think the data that we’re able to get from Highspot, again, not just the external information in terms of client engagement with our content, but also usage information in terms of how our sales team is actually leveraging the platform. I think that will give us a lot of insights into ensuring that what we’re putting forward on the platform in terms of content, as well as our enablement strategy, that will actually mirror into helping them go to market more efficiently and effectively. So moving forward, I think that. The tool actually plays a key role in how we’re doing that right now. It has helped us in gaining a lot of success, and I think moving forward all we can do is continue to leverage that data and insights to just make more improvements for the future. RR: Fantastic. I love that. It’s just an optimization approach if we’ve created the foundation and now we’re gonna hone in on what works and continue to scale it. I know we’re running a little bit low on the time we have with you, so I’d like to close out with maybe some advice for our audience who are likelier than not in similar shoes to you. So if you had to summarize one key lesson from your experience in content development and management, what would it be? CJ: I think one key thing is that simplicity drives scale. The more intuitive your systems and processes are, the more likely teams are to use them effectively. Great enablement isn’t just about technology. It’s about designing experiences that empower people to do their best work with confidence. At the same time, governance also enables growth. So when structure and simplicity work together, creativity can thrive, and that’s when organizations scale effectively as well as sustainably. At the end of the day, it’s not just about really the tools, it’s also about being able to empower our teams to do great work confidently and consistently. RR: I think that’s wonderful to close on, empowering our teams to do great work. That’s what we are all looking to do, so thank you for all of the best practices to help us get there. It has been a pleasure chatting with you, and I can’t wait to bring all of these insights to our listeners. CJ: Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoy the conversation. RR: To our listeners, thank you for listening to this episode of the Win-Win podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

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