Podcasts about Enablement

In this episode, Marcus speaks with Avner Baruch about the invisible costs of misalignment in go-to-market functions and why focusing on traditional sales metrics like ARR and conversion rates often misses the point. Avner shares his journey into sales enablement and how it led him to develop a methodology called Project Moneyball, which digs beneath surface metrics to uncover the real issues. By factoring in soft skills, time management, and process adoption, this approach helps teams identify problems much earlier, often during onboarding, rather than waiting months for reports to catch up. Key Themes Explored:

David Knight is the founder and CEO of Avarra.ai, an AI company that's arming sales teams with the kind of intelligence that turns potential into performance and guesswork into game plans. David has a 30+ year track record leading GTM teams and building revenue engines that don't just grow—they dominate. He's been instrumental in scaling MULTIPLE Billion Dollar recurring revenue machines at Market leaders like WebEx and Proofpoint. He's been in the trenches, in the boardrooms, and on the front lines of tech revolutions. In his leadership journey, David has learned the importance of creating teams that are “Customer Ready.” How elite leaders need to help create intentional improvement…not just incremental effort. Today David shares how elite leaders treat creating readiness in ways very similar to how elite golfers treat their driving range in an episode that will change how you think about “readiness.” You can connect with David on LinkedIn here. (https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidrknight/) You can check out Avarra.ai here (https://www.avarra.ai/). For video excerpts of this and other episodes of the Sales Leadership Podcast, check out Sales Leadership United Here. (https://www.patreon.com/c/SalesLeadershipUnited) Be sure to check out the full video of this episode on our YouTube channel here.

On this episode of RevOps Unboxed, Sandy sits down with Keenan, CEO of A Sales Growth Company & Bestselling Author of Gap Selling. They discuss the ASG Revenue Speed model, the role frontline sales managers need to play in an organization, the keys to a good relationship between Ops and Enablement, and more.

Cyber threats are estimated to have cost New Zealanders $1.6 billion last year. New data from the National Cyber Security Centre has revealed half the country has been the target of online scam in the last six months. Up to 830,000 experienced some financial loss. Director of Mission Enablement Michael Jagusch says good cyber security practises can reduce harm. He says it includes using two-factor authentication and having long, unique passwords on main accounts. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mit 250 PreSales-Kollegen weltweit und über 17 Produktmodulen steht Qlik vor der Herausforderung, Komplexität skalierbar zu machen. Matthias Anders (Director PreSales Center of Excellence) teilt, wie interne Strukturen, spezialisierte Teams und ein wachsendes Enablement-Konzept dazu beitragen, Orientierung zu schaffen, sogar über Länder- und Funktionsgrenzen hinweg. Besonders spannend: Wie GenAI bereits heute im Teamalltag eingesetzt wird, um Buyer Personas besser zu verstehen und Gespräche gezielter vorzubereiten. Eine Folge für alle, die PreSales als lernende Organisation denken. Matthias Anders bei LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthias-anders-229b4844/ ----------

The world of work has changed hugely in the last few years but the way we enable employees to do it has barely shifted this century. In this episode Paul and Matt discuss what's wrong with employee enablement today and how to fix it.Humanity Working is brought to you by BillionMinds - the company that makes employees ready for the Future of Work.BillionMinds helps companies be ready for the future of work by developing adaptable, resilient employees. You can learn more about them on LinkedIn or by visiting billionminds.com.

It's a bonus episode this week, taken from Lunch with Haley.   Can you create demand for temporary staffing? Today, around 2% of non-farm employment are temporary jobs. With 25,000 staffing companies competing for that business, winning clients has become exceptionally hard. But what if you could create demand for staffing? What if you could help employers to fill a larger percentage of job openings with contingent workers? Some studies have projected that as much as 10% of non-farm jobs could be temporary jobs. That's 5x more staffing. Think about the impact that would have for your business! In this Lunch with Haley webinar, we're bringing together some of the top sales minds in the industry to talk about demand generation. We're going to look at the ways staffing can be used strategically to help companies to control labor costs, improve productivity, manage risk, and capitalize on new business opportunities. And we'll discuss how staffing sales professionals can use topics like these to sell more strategically and differentiate their sales process and messaging from their competitors. About the Speakers David Searns, Co-CEO, Haley Marketing When it comes to marketing a staffing firm, few people know the industry like David. He literally grew up in the business. He has been helping staffing companies create innovative marketing strategies and award-winning websites for more than 25 years. Tom Erb, President, Tallann Resources With a career spanning nearly 20 years, Tom Erb has established himself as one of the staffing and recruiting industry's top subject matter experts. As an executive for two of the largest staffing and recruiting companies in the world, Tom worked with some of the most recognizable and well-respected companies in the United States to help optimize their workforce strategy. As a consultant, trainer, and speaker to the staffing and recruiting industry, Tom has helped hundreds of firms create and execute sales and recruiting strategies to grow their business. In 2010 Tom formed Tallann Resources, a consulting firm specializing in the Staffing and Recruiting Industry. Tom has helped staffing and recruiting companies of all sizes and verticals transform their sales structure, create and implement their strategic plans, and optimize their recruiting process. Mark Winter, CEO, WinSource Group Mark is an expert at driving sales performance, keeping focus on customers, and keeping things simple. For 20 years, Mark has held every sales role out there- from Branch Manager to Vice President of Sales and Enablement for a $2.5B publicly traded staffing company. During that time, he has spent countless hours figuring out what works and of course, what doesn't. This enables Mark to sniff out things that are blocking performance, remove the barrier, and get people to act. He is a Six Sigma Black Belt and holds master certifications from some of the top sales training organizations in the world. Whether its strategic planning, sales process development, sales training, customer acquisition & engagement, sales team performance, or system and tool adoption- Mark can help get your team on track. Mark is the CEO of WinSource Group, a consulting company that specializes in the staffing industry. By providing training, coaching, and solid process WinSource help staffing companies get the best possible performance from their sales team. Dan Mori, Founder of Staffing Mastery & President of Employment Solutions Dan Mori is a seasoned staffing industry executive, sales strategist, and leadership coach with over two decades of experience driving business transformation in the employment space. As President of Employment Solutions, he helped engineer one of the most successful regional staffing expansions in the country, growing the firm from a single location in upstate New York to a multi-state powerhouse operating in 28 states. As founder as well of Staffing Mastery, Dan brings a no-nonsense, high-impact approach to helping staffing firm leaders grow their teams, scale revenue, and systematize success. His passion lies in training salespeople to think strategically, lead with insight, and win market share—even in the most competitive or frozen economies. Dan also created the Staffing Dashboard, a powerful tool that provides staffing leaders with real-time business performance insights to make informed, data-driven decisions that drive growth and success. A recognized voice in the industry, Dan has coached hundreds of staffing professionals through workshops, playbooks, and performance coaching rooted in real-world results. He's known for breaking down complex sales challenges into repeatable, scalable strategies—empowering firms to shift from reactive selling to proactive demand creation.  

Matthew Widick, Director of Data Enablement at Compare the Market: How I landed a role in Data and AI

In this episode of the Revenue Builders Podcast, hosts John McMahon and John Kaplan are joined by Marcello Gallo, Chief Revenue Officer at Sigma Computing. The discussion dives into Marcello's extensive experience in enterprise sales leadership, including his non-traditional path, lessons from leading roles at various companies, and the importance of structure, mentorship, and continuous learning. Marcello shares valuable insights on transitioning from technical roles to sales, territory management, and the significance of aligning with customer needs to drive value. The conversation also emphasizes the importance of having a growth mindset, understanding customer environments, and leveraging product-market fit for sustained success.ADDITIONAL RESOURCESLearn more about Marcello Gallo:https://www.linkedin.com/in/gallomarcello/Download the CRO Strategy Checklist: https://hubs.li/Q03f8LmX0Read Force Management's Guide to Increasing Company Valuation: https://hubs.li/Q038n0jT0Enjoying the podcast? Sign up to receive new episodes straight to your inbox: https://hubs.li/Q02R10xN0HERE ARE SOME KEY SECTIONS TO CHECK OUT[00:01:53] Marcello's Journey into Enterprise Sales[00:08:13] The Importance of Structure in Sales[00:28:37] Navigating Major Accounts and Complex Sales[00:34:32] Understanding the Champion's Role in Sales[00:35:15] Building Strong Relationships with Champions[00:37:59] The Importance of Predicting and Preparing for Objections[00:39:14] Role-Playing and Preparation Techniques[00:40:05] Leadership and Helping Teams Get Unstuck[00:42:03] Lessons from Climbing the Corporate Ladder[00:43:21] The Value of Enablement and Territory Management[00:46:20] Adapting to Market Changes and Customer Feedback[00:53:59] Choosing the Right Opportunities and Taking Risks[01:04:50] Sigma Computing's Growth and OpportunitiesHIGHLIGHT QUOTES“If you can't bet on yourself, who can you bet on?"“Knowledge is courage.”“You get delegated to those that you sound like.”“Hire the people commensurate to the territory that you have open.”“Don't confuse position with opportunity.”

Join Preston Morrison for The Leader's Cut LIVE! We are breaking down and discussing questions from YOU from the latest episode “How To Access The Oil Of Heaven.”

According to research from Gartner, only 24% of workers have a high degree of readiness to adopt new technology. So how can you optimize your enablement tech stack to build excitement and drive adoption from the start? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Karen Gauthier, senior Manager of growth enablement at Bright Horizons. Thank you for joining us. Karen. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Karen Gauthier: Thank you for having me very much, Shawnna. I’ve been with Bright Horizons for about five years in sales enablement. Our role here is basically to support our sales and client relations teams and serve up the right content, messaging and procedures so that they can do their job as effectively and scalable wise as possible. Prior to that, I worked in a number of different organizations, most recently education related. And I started out doing technical and user documentation, writing, and then supporting the training of those documents with the user group. And it just kind of, you know, one thing led to another and I probably was doing enablement before they called it enablement, but here I am. So enjoy it very much. SS: Well, we’re glad you’re here, Karen. Thank you for joining us. And given your extensive experience in education management, what are some of the. Unique challenges that reps in the industry face. And how would you say enablement can help them navigate these challenges? KG: Yeah, well, specifically for Bright Horizons, we have a number of products and services that really run a span from onsite care through career development and college coach elder care, everything for the lifecycle of the workers of the employers that we support. And so needing to understand all of the needs and the different types of tools that help. Those employers retain and recruit employees and just make it a quality place to work. And a best in class place to work is a big ask. So our reps not only need to understand the broad strokes, but the details and our job. And I think that the job of enablement is to serve it up in bite-sized pieces, but not just content, but the context. So when given a specific. Situation, different client, different industry, all of the different regulations or legal or political things that are involved in, you know, care or working for a nonprofit, those types of things. I mean, a lot of that makes our content very dependent on a specific use, and so having a tool that is robust, scalable, and flexible for our users with a good interface is a game changer. SS: I love that. And your organization has evolved quite a bit. On the enablement front. You recently switched off a previous enablement platform and moved to Highspot. Can you tell us a little bit more about some of the challenges your team faced before and how you’ve been able to overcome those since implementing Highspot? KG: Sure. When I started with Bright Horizons, we were very new in the launch of that original tool, so we really did have it almost five years. I was there for kind of all of the growing pains, and I think that tool allowed us to understand what was available, what we could do. But I feel like at some point. It hit its limits of growth and scalability and you know, then there are always the little support issues, upgrades and things like that, that we just felt like we were needing a little bit more. So we went ahead and really took a good long look at our requirements matrix and what we needed and did our due diligence and came upon Highspot as the best in class for our needs. SS: I love that, and I think you made the right choice since you were a key advocate in the evaluation process. How did you build the business case for switching to a new enablement platform, and how did you go about securing stakeholder buy-in? KG: Yeah, I think that the first thing that we’ve tried to do that I think we learned using the original tool that we had was we had kind of sporadically throughout our user base, some key users that were early adopters and leaders on their teams, and we just kept them very closely in the loop as kind of team members. Tangentially so that they, they would be aware of what was going on. They could provide us feedback, what was working, what wasn’t, and using them as a sounding board, we were able to identify very quickly, not only what requirements we needed to kind of improve on with a new tool, but also prioritize them. And so being able to use that as our main business case. As our internal customers. Then when we went to the management, you know, ladder as we need to make a change and within our scope of budget, these are the priorities over the next three, six months and then a year and further, we were able to kind of take that scope of what we needed and the budget and the sale, and then having an internal coach and champion. Helped us navigate some of the internal procurement and technology things that needed to be tied together. So just kind of bringing everyone into the organization of understanding what needed to happen and prioritizing it was the most important thing for us. SS: Well, you must have done a phenomenal job on that front. The team did. Yeah. Team effort. Now, at your previous company, you participated in the implementation of Highspot. In your opinion, what are the key building blocks for a successful rollout of a new platform? KG: I mean, I think one of the biggest mistakes, and this goes back to my training and documentation days, is not stepping into the user’s day in the life. And, you know, there could be a hundred features in, in a particular tool, but they may use five of them 90% of the time. And so it, it’s a matter of really stepping into their shoes and understanding what needs to get done, what needs to get done at scale, what are some nuances. For the different ways their days could go and then incorporate that into the rollout prioritization plan. And, and that was something that part of the team I was on at a previous company did a really good job. And then, you know, kind of accepted all support from people that were willing to help in, in identifying little details of things that could go wrong down the road, not just the big picture, but. The little details, like there’s embedded links that are gonna go wrong in a script when that old tool goes away. And just identifying a lot of that stuff up front so you don’t have chaos day one. SS: Yeah. Well, I have to say your approach to stepping into their shoes must be working because you’ve already seen an impressive 85% recurring usage of Highspot. So I’d love to understand what are some of your best practices for driving adoption and really building excitement for your programs amongst the teams that you support? KG: Well, thank you for that. Our teams worked really hard, like I said, to have champions throughout the user base. We have users in the US separately in the UK, and then we have three different main lines of business. So it’s kind of spread out and all of them have unique needs, and so making sure that we bring them in so that not only do they feel part of the solution, but they can then go back and be champions and socialize it with their teams and, and we started that early on for this implementation. For a number of reasons. We had a very, very tight rollout. It was like five weeks, and so that was like all hands on deck. And the goal on the backend was just to kind of drill in, get as much done as we could, but outwardly we just kind of dripped out information, made it as positive as possible. And then I think the key to the adoption being successful was on day one, there were very few things that they used to do that they couldn’t still do. So that was priority one, was to kind of keep it. Status quo. And then once all the little bugs were worked out, then we started, you know, bringing out some of the features that we knew were very, very high on the priority list. And, the other thing we did was have a lot of opportunities for them to jump in as questions offered one-on-ones, jumped in on team calls, provided our own little videos and job aids for people, that kind of thing. Just so that there were a lot of communication tools out there so that they felt like they were always kind of having it in the forefront and, oh, I can do this, I can do that, and that seemed to just feed on itself and work well. SS: Amazing. Well, like I said, phenomenal job already. That is amazing. Now, as we head it into this year, I know one area that you plan on focusing on is enhancing buyer engagement. Can you share how you envision leveraging features like digital rooms to personalize and elevate the buyer journey? KG: That was one of the main tools, I think when we were out in the market looking for something to elevate our users into. That context was not just, you know, serving up the right brief at the right time because it’s the healthcare industry, but as part of a buyer journey. What pieces during an introductory BDR conversation would be more useful than like right before a finalist meeting. And so that was something that because we have a lot of deals going on concurrently, we wanted to be able to have something that we had a template for that could be reused, but also customizable with a pretty. Easy interface so that our users could make those changes. And it didn’t have to be gate kept by the admin group. So that was phase one was just kind of understanding that people were used to just dropping something in an email and sending it out, and we were losing not only the ability to repeat it, but we can track. Any of the information that was now available to us in engagements and we couldn’t relate it to opportunities, accounts, contacts in Salesforce and gain information that way. So we started out just really getting people used to the email pitches and link pitches so that they were getting a little more familiar with internally. In the tool, sending things out to prospects and clients, and that went really well. So then our new launch, which is something we’re working on now, we are, we have a few prototypes of some different digital sales rooms, and the initial feedback has been very positive. We’re hearing that they’re able to connect with people that had gone silent or share things and the response from their prospects has been that they like having one portal, that they know that information’s gonna get updated or the next time they go, if there’s an updated version, it’s gonna be there. And it’s been so far, very, very successful. We’re excited to expand it further, but I feel like just being three, four months into our launch of Highspot and being this far, being able to actually get this out there has been a big win. We’re excited about that. SS: Amazing. You touched on this a little bit, but I know you’re currently working on integrating Salesforce with Highspot. What value do you see in this integration and what outcomes are you hoping to achieve? KG: Well, I think because we don’t have one path to a sale or one path to a existing client, so I think right now we’re just kind of getting a feel for. What that data’s gonna look like when it comes in. I mean, we know theoretically what it’s gonna do, but right now we’re making sure that whenever somebody shares something externally or uses a digital sales room that they’re relating so that we can start gathering all of the engagement information, tie it back to Salesforce, and we’re hoping to see is which content is most useful, at which stages of the lifecycle of a deal, which pieces of content help push it? Further and are there gaps where there just wasn’t content at the right stage for the right type of deal so that we can be serving up the right content at the right time. So I think initially that’s, that’s what we hope to get is providing the right content and then later making sure that we can tighten up our sales playbook with what to use at the right time throughout the lifecycle. Some of our deals are very short, but you know, building a new center is months and months, so they’re very different. SS: It’s amazing though that you guys are using that integration and that data that you’re seeing to really understand the full buyer’s lifecycle, so that’s phenomenal. Since launching Highspot, I’d love to understand what results you’ve seen so far and are there any key wins or notable business outcomes you can share with us yet? KG: I don’t have anything very quantitative. I can just say that whatever we are receiving in terms of information about what people are viewing and which tools are which, which pieces of content are more receptive than others, that’s all a hundred percent in improvement over where we were before. Because some information’s better than no information. I think. The people that use it appreciate the ability to go in and make it theirs, but not have to start from scratch. I think they like the idea of being able to see the metrics of people’s use or lack of use, and then understanding there’s another way to go about reaching out to that person. People you know that have different comfort levels with technology. So, you know, some people are gonna be all in on just building this out internally in the tool. Some people are gonna wanna just grab a link and put it in an Outlook email, and their clients might be appreciative of one way and not another. So I think that was one of the big wins we found so far, is that the tool is flexible enough to give and take for what we need. SS: Amazing. Well, Karen, we’re excited that you’re on this journey with us. And now I will say, last question for you, if you don’t mind. For enablement leaders looking to effectively implement and drive adoption for their new enablement platform, what is maybe the biggest takeaway you’d leave them with? KG: I think you need to know your customer, which is the internal users, and I think that you just have to find the tool that matches as best you can, given your budget and then prioritize. You can’t boil the ocean, but you know, you can pick and choose and and get those wins and, and when you do get a good win at an early win, good news travels fast, and when the right people hear the right message, it just does build on the energy, which is. Very helpful for the new tools that we wanna bring out to them. Things like the AI, we’ve just started dipping our toe into what that can do for us, and being able to get those wins with your user base behind you allows you to have the flexibility to play with some of the new features and bring them more. SS: Amazing. Well, Karen, thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate it. KG: My pleasure. Thanks for having me. SS: 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.

According to research from Gartner, only 24% of workers have a high degree of readiness to adopt new technology. So how can you optimize your enablement tech stack to build excitement and drive adoption from the start? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Karen Gauthier, senior Manager of growth enablement at Bright Horizons. Thank you for joining us. Karen. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Karen Gauthier: Thank you for having me very much, Shawnna. I’ve been with Bright Horizons for about five years in sales enablement. Our role here is basically to support our sales and client relations teams and serve up the right content, messaging and procedures so that they can do their job as effectively and scalable wise as possible. Prior to that, I worked in a number of different organizations, most recently education related. And I started out doing technical and user documentation, writing, and then supporting the training of those documents with the user group. And it just kind of, you know, one thing led to another and I probably was doing enablement before they called it enablement, but here I am. So enjoy it very much. SS: Well, we’re glad you’re here, Karen. Thank you for joining us. And given your extensive experience in education management, what are some of the. Unique challenges that reps in the industry face. And how would you say enablement can help them navigate these challenges? KG: Yeah, well, specifically for Bright Horizons, we have a number of products and services that really run a span from onsite care through career development and college coach elder care, everything for the lifecycle of the workers of the employers that we support. And so needing to understand all of the needs and the different types of tools that help. Those employers retain and recruit employees and just make it a quality place to work. And a best in class place to work is a big ask. So our reps not only need to understand the broad strokes, but the details and our job. And I think that the job of enablement is to serve it up in bite-sized pieces, but not just content, but the context. So when given a specific. Situation, different client, different industry, all of the different regulations or legal or political things that are involved in, you know, care or working for a nonprofit, those types of things. I mean, a lot of that makes our content very dependent on a specific use, and so having a tool that is robust, scalable, and flexible for our users with a good interface is a game changer. SS: I love that. And your organization has evolved quite a bit. On the enablement front. You recently switched off a previous enablement platform and moved to Highspot. Can you tell us a little bit more about some of the challenges your team faced before and how you’ve been able to overcome those since implementing Highspot? KG: Sure. When I started with Bright Horizons, we were very new in the launch of that original tool, so we really did have it almost five years. I was there for kind of all of the growing pains, and I think that tool allowed us to understand what was available, what we could do. But I feel like at some point. It hit its limits of growth and scalability and you know, then there are always the little support issues, upgrades and things like that, that we just felt like we were needing a little bit more. So we went ahead and really took a good long look at our requirements matrix and what we needed and did our due diligence and came upon Highspot as the best in class for our needs. SS: I love that, and I think you made the right choice since you were a key advocate in the evaluation process. How did you build the business case for switching to a new enablement platform, and how did you go about securing stakeholder buy-in? KG: Yeah, I think that the first thing that we’ve tried to do that I think we learned using the original tool that we had was we had kind of sporadically throughout our user base, some key users that were early adopters and leaders on their teams, and we just kept them very closely in the loop as kind of team members. Tangentially so that they, they would be aware of what was going on. They could provide us feedback, what was working, what wasn’t, and using them as a sounding board, we were able to identify very quickly, not only what requirements we needed to kind of improve on with a new tool, but also prioritize them. And so being able to use that as our main business case. As our internal customers. Then when we went to the management, you know, ladder as we need to make a change and within our scope of budget, these are the priorities over the next three, six months and then a year and further, we were able to kind of take that scope of what we needed and the budget and the sale, and then having an internal coach and champion. Helped us navigate some of the internal procurement and technology things that needed to be tied together. So just kind of bringing everyone into the organization of understanding what needed to happen and prioritizing it was the most important thing for us. SS: Well, you must have done a phenomenal job on that front. The team did. Yeah. Team effort. Now, at your previous company, you participated in the implementation of Highspot. In your opinion, what are the key building blocks for a successful rollout of a new platform? KG: I mean, I think one of the biggest mistakes, and this goes back to my training and documentation days, is not stepping into the user’s day in the life. And, you know, there could be a hundred features in, in a particular tool, but they may use five of them 90% of the time. And so it, it’s a matter of really stepping into their shoes and understanding what needs to get done, what needs to get done at scale, what are some nuances. For the different ways their days could go and then incorporate that into the rollout prioritization plan. And, and that was something that part of the team I was on at a previous company did a really good job. And then, you know, kind of accepted all support from people that were willing to help in, in identifying little details of things that could go wrong down the road, not just the big picture, but. The little details, like there’s embedded links that are gonna go wrong in a script when that old tool goes away. And just identifying a lot of that stuff up front so you don’t have chaos day one. SS: Yeah. Well, I have to say your approach to stepping into their shoes must be working because you’ve already seen an impressive 85% recurring usage of Highspot. So I’d love to understand what are some of your best practices for driving adoption and really building excitement for your programs amongst the teams that you support? KG: Well, thank you for that. Our teams worked really hard, like I said, to have champions throughout the user base. We have users in the US separately in the UK, and then we have three different main lines of business. So it’s kind of spread out and all of them have unique needs, and so making sure that we bring them in so that not only do they feel part of the solution, but they can then go back and be champions and socialize it with their teams and, and we started that early on for this implementation. For a number of reasons. We had a very, very tight rollout. It was like five weeks, and so that was like all hands on deck. And the goal on the backend was just to kind of drill in, get as much done as we could, but outwardly we just kind of dripped out information, made it as positive as possible. And then I think the key to the adoption being successful was on day one, there were very few things that they used to do that they couldn’t still do. So that was priority one, was to kind of keep it. Status quo. And then once all the little bugs were worked out, then we started, you know, bringing out some of the features that we knew were very, very high on the priority list. And, the other thing we did was have a lot of opportunities for them to jump in as questions offered one-on-ones, jumped in on team calls, provided our own little videos and job aids for people, that kind of thing. Just so that there were a lot of communication tools out there so that they felt like they were always kind of having it in the forefront and, oh, I can do this, I can do that, and that seemed to just feed on itself and work well. SS: Amazing. Well, like I said, phenomenal job already. That is amazing. Now, as we head it into this year, I know one area that you plan on focusing on is enhancing buyer engagement. Can you share how you envision leveraging features like digital rooms to personalize and elevate the buyer journey? KG: That was one of the main tools, I think when we were out in the market looking for something to elevate our users into. That context was not just, you know, serving up the right brief at the right time because it’s the healthcare industry, but as part of a buyer journey. What pieces during an introductory BDR conversation would be more useful than like right before a finalist meeting. And so that was something that because we have a lot of deals going on concurrently, we wanted to be able to have something that we had a template for that could be reused, but also customizable with a pretty. Easy interface so that our users could make those changes. And it didn’t have to be gate kept by the admin group. So that was phase one was just kind of understanding that people were used to just dropping something in an email and sending it out, and we were losing not only the ability to repeat it, but we can track. Any of the information that was now available to us in engagements and we couldn’t relate it to opportunities, accounts, contacts in Salesforce and gain information that way. So we started out just really getting people used to the email pitches and link pitches so that they were getting a little more familiar with internally. In the tool, sending things out to prospects and clients, and that went really well. So then our new launch, which is something we’re working on now, we are, we have a few prototypes of some different digital sales rooms, and the initial feedback has been very positive. We’re hearing that they’re able to connect with people that had gone silent or share things and the response from their prospects has been that they like having one portal, that they know that information’s gonna get updated or the next time they go, if there’s an updated version, it’s gonna be there. And it’s been so far, very, very successful. We’re excited to expand it further, but I feel like just being three, four months into our launch of Highspot and being this far, being able to actually get this out there has been a big win. We’re excited about that. SS: Amazing. You touched on this a little bit, but I know you’re currently working on integrating Salesforce with Highspot. What value do you see in this integration and what outcomes are you hoping to achieve? KG: Well, I think because we don’t have one path to a sale or one path to a existing client, so I think right now we’re just kind of getting a feel for. What that data’s gonna look like when it comes in. I mean, we know theoretically what it’s gonna do, but right now we’re making sure that whenever somebody shares something externally or uses a digital sales room that they’re relating so that we can start gathering all of the engagement information, tie it back to Salesforce, and we’re hoping to see is which content is most useful, at which stages of the lifecycle of a deal, which pieces of content help push it? Further and are there gaps where there just wasn’t content at the right stage for the right type of deal so that we can be serving up the right content at the right time. So I think initially that’s, that’s what we hope to get is providing the right content and then later making sure that we can tighten up our sales playbook with what to use at the right time throughout the lifecycle. Some of our deals are very short, but you know, building a new center is months and months, so they’re very different. SS: It’s amazing though that you guys are using that integration and that data that you’re seeing to really understand the full buyer’s lifecycle, so that’s phenomenal. Since launching Highspot, I’d love to understand what results you’ve seen so far and are there any key wins or notable business outcomes you can share with us yet? KG: I don’t have anything very quantitative. I can just say that whatever we are receiving in terms of information about what people are viewing and which tools are which, which pieces of content are more receptive than others, that’s all a hundred percent in improvement over where we were before. Because some information’s better than no information. I think. The people that use it appreciate the ability to go in and make it theirs, but not have to start from scratch. I think they like the idea of being able to see the metrics of people’s use or lack of use, and then understanding there’s another way to go about reaching out to that person. People you know that have different comfort levels with technology. So, you know, some people are gonna be all in on just building this out internally in the tool. Some people are gonna wanna just grab a link and put it in an Outlook email, and their clients might be appreciative of one way and not another. So I think that was one of the big wins we found so far, is that the tool is flexible enough to give and take for what we need. SS: Amazing. Well, Karen, we’re excited that you’re on this journey with us. And now I will say, last question for you, if you don’t mind. For enablement leaders looking to effectively implement and drive adoption for their new enablement platform, what is maybe the biggest takeaway you’d leave them with? KG: I think you need to know your customer, which is the internal users, and I think that you just have to find the tool that matches as best you can, given your budget and then prioritize. You can’t boil the ocean, but you know, you can pick and choose and and get those wins and, and when you do get a good win at an early win, good news travels fast, and when the right people hear the right message, it just does build on the energy, which is. Very helpful for the new tools that we wanna bring out to them. Things like the AI, we’ve just started dipping our toe into what that can do for us, and being able to get those wins with your user base behind you allows you to have the flexibility to play with some of the new features and bring them more. SS: Amazing. Well, Karen, thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate it. KG: My pleasure. Thanks for having me. SS: 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.

Julia Hilger ist Chefin des Geschäftsbereichs CRM, Analytik und Digitales bei Edeka, Florian Wolfframm ist Vice President Retail Sales & Marketing bei PAYBACK.Mit Olli & Martin sprechen sie darüber, wie strategische Kooperation und datengetriebenes Enablement die digitale Transformation im Handel beschleunigen und lokale Relevanz als Wachstumsmotor stärken.Florian Wolfframm, bereits Gast in Folge #25, und Julia Hilger gewähren Einblicke in eine der aufsehenerregendsten Handelspartnerschaften der letzten Jahre. Julia gestaltet seit einem Jahrzehnt das digitale Marketing von Deutschlands größtem Lebensmittelhändler mit – von der Praktikantin zur Leiterin des zentralen Digitalbereichs einer 70-Milliarden-Euro-Genossenschaft mit über 3.500 selbstständigen Kaufleuten. Gemeinsam erläutern sie, wie die Symbiose aus Edekas einzigartiger lokaler Verankerung und Paybacks datengetriebener Plattform nicht nur ein technisches Meisterstück darstellt, sondern vor allem ein exemplarisches Vorgehen für kooperative Digitalisierung und kundenzentriertes Wachstum im europäischen Einzelhandel ist. Eine Folge voller strategischer Einsichten und operativer Lernkurven.Key Takeaways:Der Innovationsdruck steigt immens; Kooperation ist das Gebot der Stunde.Individuelle Stärken der Partner können in der Kooperation zur gemeinsamen Kraft werden.Digitale Transformation gelingt durch Enablement-Systeme, die Möglichkeiten schaffen und den Kundennutzen in den Mittelpunkt stellen.Themen unter anderem:(00:16:45) Learnings aus 10 Jahren datenbasiertem Marketing(00:27:53) Launch des Jahres: Edeka & Payback(00:39:55) Digitalisierung kooperativ gestalten(00:45:52) Höher, weiter, WachstumMit freundlicher Unterstützung von PAYBACKLinkedIn:→ Julia Hilger→ Florian Wolfframm→ Olli Busch→ Martin Boeing-MessingKeywords:Multipartner-Programm, Kundenbindung, CRM-Strategie, Einzelhandel, LEH, Genossenschaft, Datennutzung, Personalisierung, Lokales Marketing, Omnichannel, Kundenkarte, Loyalitätsprogramm, Retail Media, Handzettel, Kollaboration, Synergieeffekte, Datenvertrauen. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Why is it dangerous to "fake it till you make it" when it comes to your Working Genius?In episode 85 of the Working Genius Podcast, Pat and Cody explore the pitfalls of "faking it till you make it," particularly in the context of the six Working Geniuses. They discuss how pretending to possess certain geniuses—especially Galvanizing, Enabling, and Tenacity—can lead to burnout and dissatisfaction, even if it seems successful in the short term. They also emphasize the importance of aligning work with your natural geniuses for long-term fulfillment and success. Topics explored in this episode: (00:51) Faking It Undermines Team Trust* Faking a role outside your genius may temporarily fool others but drains energy and joy.(3:48) When Observation Misleads* People often mistake visible productivity for true capability and fulfillment.* Internal processes like Discerning or Inventing can't be copied just by watching someone do the work.(7:36) Success in the Wrong Game* Achieving mastery in an area outside your genius often leads to burnout, not true fulfillment.* Mimicking Tenacity or Enablement might bring professional praise but leaves people feeling empty.(11:24) Misalignment at Work* Many early career roles overvalue G.E.T. work, unintentionally alienating people with W.I.D. geniuses.* Discovering the Working Genius framework helps reframe these challenges as fixable, not personal flaws.(15:12) The Cost of Faking It* People often carry unnecessary guilt when they struggle in roles that don't match their genius.* Leaders can free people from burnout by helping them realign with their natural gifts.A note for new listeners/viewers: In this episode, Pat and Cody dive deep into the Six Types of Working Genius, a model that helps you discover your natural gifts and thrive in your work and life. If you're new to our framework, perhaps consider checking out some earlier episodes of The Working Genius Podcast. Or, if you're interested, you can take The Six Types of Working Genius assessment, which is the fastest and simplest way to discover your natural gifts and thrive at work: https://www.workinggenius.com/about/assessment Refresher: The initials discussed in this episode refer to: W = Wonder. I = Invention.D = Discernment.G = Galvanizing.E = Enablement.T = Tenacity.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. Subscribe to The Working Genius Podcast on Apple Podcasts (https://apple.co/4iNz6Yn), Spotify (https://spoti.fi/4iGGm8u), and YouTube (https://bit.ly/Working-Genius-YouTube). Follow Pat Lencioni on https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-lencioni-orghealth/ and http://www.youtube.com/@PatrickLencioniOfficial.Connect with Cody Thompson on

Cloud Connections 2025 Podcast Interview with Jon Arnold, Principal, J. Arnold & Associates ST. PETERSBURG, FL - Jon Arnold, Principal of J. Arnold & Associates, delivered a clear message to managed service providers (MSPs) at Cloud Connections 2025: it's time to evolve beyond UCaaS commoditization and begin leveraging AI not just as a buzzword, but as a strategic offering. In a podcast conversation with Technology Reseller News, Arnold reflected on insights shared during two panels at the conference—one on market outlook and another focused on UCaaS. “UCaaS, CCaaS, CPaaS—they're all mature, well-understood offerings,” said Arnold. “But AI is where the next frontier lies. Most customers know they need it, but they don't know how to use it—and that's where MSPs have a real opportunity.” Arnold emphasized that MSPs, trusted for their delivery of cloud and voice services, are in a prime position to elevate their value by integrating AI into business operations—both internally and in customer-facing applications. The key, he said, lies in viewing voice as data, a concept that aligns with AI's data-driven architecture. “If you're not capturing the data from voice, you're missing one of the most powerful communication channels businesses rely on,” Arnold explained. “MSPs already understand voice. That's their credibility. Now it's about helping customers harness that voice data to power AI.” On the second panel, Arnold addressed a recurring challenge: UCaaS as a commodity. As major players like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and RingCentral dominate the landscape, differentiation has become more difficult. “If all MSPs are selling the same thing, they risk becoming arms dealers—no value, no margin,” he said. Arnold encouraged MSPs to think beyond unified communications and adopt a more holistic, strategic view, where AI is integrated across workflows, departments, and functions—far beyond the contact center. “AI isn't waiting for you to catch up. It's creating new ways of working,” he said. “There's a real risk of being left behind if MSPs don't evolve. A new generation of AI-centric MSPs will emerge—those who know how to sell it, implement it, and build strategy around it.” Reflecting on his first time attending the CCA's Cloud Connections event, Arnold noted the strong value of its focused community. “It's big enough to meet new people, but small enough to build real relationships,” he said. “It's not a trade show—it's a learning and collaboration environment.” Learn more about Jon Arnold and J. Arnold & Associates at: www.jarnoldassociates.com

PreSales-Führung ist oft ein Drahtseilakt zwischen Skalierung, Talentmangel, Tool-Stack und der ewigen Frage: Wie beweist man eigentlich den Mehrwert des Teams? Tim und Jan sprechen über die größten Herausforderungen für PreSales-Leader in SaaS- und IT-Unternehmen, von strategischer Ausrichtung über operative Blockaden bis hin zu AI-Adoption und kulturellen Reibungspunkten im DACH-Raum. Wie viel Automation ist gesund? Wie gelingt echte Zusammenarbeit mit Sales und Produkt? Und warum ist Enablement oft der blinde Fleck vieler Teams? Das PDF zum kompletten Report gibts hier: https://m.serockstars.com/download ----------

According to research from Gartner, channel partners are crucial levers of revenue generation, accounting for up to 75% of revenue income. So how can you build efficient and deeply engaged channel partner relationships to optimize channel sales? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Jason Singh, the head of global partner marketing at Meta. Thank you for joining us. Jason, I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Jason Singh: Thank you very much for having me. So I look after partner marketing for business messaging, specifically at Meta, which is our conversational platforms around Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger. Being in B2B, marketing, sales, and marketing my entire life. We started in Australia and then moved over to Singapore and then New York about five years ago. What we do is three main things. We focus on ensuring that our partners have all the information that they need to be able to run their programs that they want to around business messaging. The second thing that we do is ensure that they have the right tools and materials. They’re able to grow their business. So that’s partner enablement, whereas where a lot of the Highspot focuses is within. And then lastly, it’s partner demand generation. So making sure that partners have the right investment from us, whether it’s time, dollars, et cetera, to be able to add fuel to their demand generation five. So those are three different programs that we have and where we focus a lot of our attention. SS: I’m excited to have you here, Jason, as a fellow marketing leader, and as you mentioned in your introduction, you have extensive experience across multitudes of regions, including Australia and Asia, and you really have a global perspective on how to bring the channel partner ecosystem to life? How has this diverse background shaped your approach to channel enablement? JS: The role that I have now is my first full-time role where I focused purely on partners previously being in and out of partner marketing and partners as a key audience over the past 15 years. But I took on this partner marketing leadership role officially about 24 months ago. And one of the things that I found out in that, firstly in the first 90 days, I think I met our top 35, 40% of our partners because I didn’t want to assume what they needed to know and the information they need to have and the formats that they needed to have it in and read rates of emails and, and downloads of contents. And I didn’t wanna assume. And so I spoke to a lot of them and it was super, super interesting that there were hardly any patterns. If you spoke with APAC partners, you would think you’d be able to put them into a category if you spoke with India partners similarly versus Latam, Spanish speaking Latam versus Brazil, North America… There weren’t really any regional patterns or trends. It was only when you looked at all partners globally, were you able to look at how partners operate and start compartmentalizing them into different groups, which would then give you a cohort to then cater around in terms of enablement, content, information, demand generation, et cetera. So I think one of the things that, having a diverse background where I. Help me to figure out is don’t assume in the first place, don’t assume more partners are the same. When I, when I was based in APAC, you would think Southeast Asia would be compartmentalized North Asia, so Japan, Korea, China could be compartmentalized and there we have these sub regions within the APAC region where we say, oh, okay, they operate the same, but it’s actually quite different. And so I think that really helped me coming into this global role because I was able to remove that assumption that we have these groupings, these cohorts, that because they’re based in certain regions, because they’ve got certain demographic attributes which are similar, but they’ll work the same way. And so instead of relying on those assumptions, what we did was just net new partner discovery, speaking with partners, getting, building really strong relationships with a lot of our great partners, and then figuring out what those groups are outside of. Demographic regional assumptions. SS: I love that you went in there unassuming and just really kind of learned what the partner ecosystem needed in today’s fast pace evolving environment. What would you say you were hearing are maybe some of the top challenges in channel partner sales and how are you addressing some of these challenges? JS: There is so much opportunity for the channel that they often struggle with. Prioritizing opportunities. If you look at any one of our partners, they partner with us somewhat exclusive, but many partners, partner with a number of other technology providers, and then within each technology provider there are end number of products of go-to market motions of incentives of programs. That they could be a part of. And within each of these standard operating procedures, there are processes, there are portals, there are hubs to sign into, passwords, usernames to remember. And then you’ve got the teams within these organizations that they need to make sure that they’re building relationships with the incumbent partner teams, the the senior leadership marketing teams like myself, et cetera. So it’s no surprise that when you speak to a partner that they’re often doing this. Inner calculation in their head around how important is this? Is this opportunity right now? Is this new product that we’re launching, A new program that we have is our H two market development fund, which we’ll launch in June. How important is this to me right now in the near future and in the long term? And how do I figure out what level of resources to invest? And that could be turning up to a meeting, that could be turning up to a webinar, or that could be. Injecting a couple hundred thousand dollars. That is, I would say by far, the most top of mind thing right now with our channel partners is. What is the actual opportunity with this thing that we’re being positioned with right now, and what do we need to do around this? SS: Yeah, absolutely. Kind of building on that, what do you believe are the key building blocks then for being able to foster really strong and effective partnerships with those channel sales teams? JS: I mean, I think I touched on that first point a little bit, so I’ll expand. Not assuming firstly and not doing groupings or categorization by those assumptions is super important because all of our partners operate probably a little bit differently to how we expect them to operate. The second bit is, I’ll speak my partner marketers lens specifically is learning about how these partners operate. You’ve gotta know who these partners are. You have to build relationships with partner marketers, salespeople, alliance managers. Marketing operations people within the partners. I’m very fortunate to have built a pretty strong relationship with probably about 40 or 50 people within our top 40, 50 partners in different partner groupings for our strategic partners, our tech partners, our service partners, where I’m starting to build a little bit more relationships now with our agency partners as well. And so I’m starting to get a really strong idea about how these partners operate. When I say how they operate, I’m talking about what are their incentives, what are their KPIs? What are the needles that they’re trying to move? Number two is how they actually work internally. So what are the processes? What are the procedures? What are the operating models? What are the systems? What are the tools that they use internally to help them get their work done? And lastly, it’s what are their expectations and what are their needs from us? What do they actually need right now? And that could be something as simple as one of the biggest things that we did. I think last year we’ll start rolling out more decks in Google Docs because we found that a lot of our partners wanted Google Docs because that’s how they operate and wanted the option of Google Docs as well as PowerPoint. And that subtle shift made, I don’t know, 10 partners to be able to work with our content from. Four days, two instantly because from Highspot, they could download that and ship it straight away, or just share organically within Highspot as opposed to having to download it, manipulating it, and then distribute it. And so you’ve really gotta invest the time and the effort to intentionally want to learn about your partners. It’s not a tick in the box of, oh hey, I can show my leadership that I met with 10 partners in Q1. It’s you being able to represent the partner voice. Across all of the different touch points that you have within the organization, whether that’s building content, building plans, talking with leadership. I would say once you get them out of email into a WhatsApp group or a WhatsApp chat, that’s where the real sort of connection happens, and that’s when you can start, like what I do now is when we’ve got a new piece of content, a new program that we’re building, I will take a screenshot of that and I’ll send it to about 12 different people from a different partners on WhatsApp just to get their input and they’ll respond very quickly within a couple hours globally, and they’ll start tell me what they like, what they don’t like, how it’ll work, how it won’t work, and that sort of instant feedback loop that I get with the partners have been cultivated over six months of getting to know them. So I won’t provide like three things that you need to do. I’ll provide, I’ll make it super simple with. The P zero thing that you need to do is build a relationship with your partners, really intentional, meaningful relationships with your partners and get to know them. SS: I think that’s fantastic advice. Jason, to shift gears a little bit, you developed a framework — Learn, Adopt, and Grow to keep channel partners engaged, kind of beyond the onboarding portion of coming on with Meta. Can you tell us more about this framework and what each of the phases entails? JS: Definitely. Before I took over partner marketing, we had a really strong content development arm, but we, we lacked a little bit in the structuring of our content and from a partner point of view. Some of the feedback that we had from our partners when I took on the role and start a meeting with them was, got too many assets on there. There’s there’s too much stuff. We don’t know where to start. One of the assumptions that we made internally actually right at the start was, oh, we need to split this by product type partners, want to know individually by products. And that’s when we sort of paused a little bit. ’cause that didn’t make a whole bunch of sense to me and a few of the other folks in my team. And we went to our partners and plus it didn’t specifically tell us this, it was very clear that partners had different levels of maturity. And within their teams there were different levels of maturity. So partner A may have a sales team that’s super advanced, but their marketing team hasn’t yet really been enabled on business messaging on WhatsApp Messenger or Instagram Direct. And so what we decided to test was how do we group our programs, our content, our materials that aligns with partner maturity. So we split these in, into three different cohorts of partners. Number one, they’re the partners that just kicked off, just finished onboarding, like you said, and, and they’re looking to learn. They’re looking to learn about the products, the platforms, the incentive, our programs, how we go to market. It’s a learn phase. And so we built this category of, of learn, and we started mapping almost, I think two years ago or 18 months ago, we started mapping all of our 101 content and then the second one is adopt. We notice that a lot of partners have at that stage now where they want to, they wanna kickstart some stuff. They wanna launch some programs. They wanna launch a sales program around WhatsApp. They wanna launch a campaign. They want to do internal education. I. Show globally around education, around meta business messaging, and this is all around how do they get from zero to one. And so that was around adoption or expansion where partners have finished that learn phase and they’ve decided they’ve onboarded and they’ve internally prioritized business messaging. Sort of the tier one things of the, what they wanna do. And so in here is a lot of sales materials, marketing materials, program materials to help them to get from zero to one and launching stuff. And so we do things like sales toolkits. We do things like partner ready campaigns, which are campaigns that marketing teams within our partners can give to their. Campaign team and you’ve got landing page designs. You’ve got social media kits, we provide Figma files, co-branded assets, everything that you need. Basically 80% of the stuff that you need to launch a marketing campaign or a sales campaign. And then lastly, we’ve got Grow. Grow is made up of a series of programs that have fairly high investment but are built purely to 10 XROI or ROI. And this is where we partner. We wanna make the programs available. All of our partners, but there’s pretty strict qualification, uh, or eligibility criteria to be part of one of these programs. But essentially these are programs where a partner’s already pretty successful. They know how to sell business mission. They know how to pick the concept and the product they’ve got runs on the board. They’ve got considerable pipeline or revenue already, and they’re looking at options for meta to help them grow this to 10 x, 50 x to a hundred x what they’re already doing. And so that’s grow. That’s when you’ve already mastered. The learn. You know all about the product, the platforms, the programs available to you. You’ve already started driving product adoption or portfolio adoption using our tools, and now you’ve got that. You’ve got a good run rate, but you’re wondering. How you can actually really blow this up. So that’s, that’s our growth phase. And we’ve probably got about 15 to 20% of our partners, I would say, are in there. I would say the lion’s share 50, 60%, 50% probably in that middle bucket. And we’ve got another maybe 15% right now in Learn. But as we expand our partner ecosystem and we open up our ecosystem to different types of partners. Marketplace partners, commerce partners, agencies, et cetera. We will see them starting at learn. We’ll see a lot more people or that waiting shift a little bit more to learn. And then over the course of six months to a year, we’ll see them starting through that process. SS: I love that framework because it really helps kind of guide them through their evolution and their journey with meta. So that’s amazing. And you know, on a similar note, you actually spoke at Highspot user conference last year and you had shared that relevance and timeliness are key to driving adoption with channel sales teams. How do you ensure these elements are really embedded into all of your programs? JS: It’s a hard one. Um, relevance for me focuses on, it’s a three-legged stool. Relevance is all about making sure that the CONT is, I would say firstly it’s format and it’s probably a little bit reversed from how. The majority. Think about it. I think about format, because again, knowing our partners, and this comes with knowing the partners, there are a hundred things that a partner could be doing in any given day. If they’ve decided in half an hour to focus on something related to partner enablement, what I look after and they open up a document and it’s not in the format that they need. So they’re expecting a one pager because I’ve called something intro to x. They’re expecting a one pager, but it’s an 80 page SOP that’s in Microsoft Word that, that they’ve gotta open up on their mobile device and look through it. They’re gonna close that window and they’re not gonna spend the time necessarily finding the thing that they want. They’re gonna shift their mind into focusing on something completely different. So format for me in terms of relevance is key. Making sure that when we launch something, it is in the format that it needs to be in. We have a really strong understanding about the length, the detail within that document. We have a really strong understanding in the time of the day and the mental mode that a part of the audience is gonna be. When they open up this document, are they looking for something really quick that they can share with something? Are they gonna be expecting something really detailed, which they can absorb and then distill for other teams? Are they gonna be looking for something on the go, on the way to a client meeting? And so format number one is, is big for me. And relevance the other legs, uh, of that stool would be. I would say I would include timeliness within that. It’s making sure that we are producing things within the right timeframe requirements of that audience. And so what I mean by that is often what you’ll see with teams is they launch things in phases. You’ll wanna enable a partner on a new product, and you’ll have this phased out over a 12 month period. Quite often that’s done based on the requirements of the internal team and not what the partner’s requirements actually are, and so you’ll almost enable them 20% to do what you want them to do because you’ve got other things coming in phase two, phase three, what we like to do is we like to build our phase one. We used to also launch in phases. We build our phase one point of view. But then we share that with the partners and say, hey, is this the MVP that you need? Like we think it’s these four materials. Do you actually need something else? And they’ll give us feedback. We do this formally, but we also do this informally through like our WhatsApp groups, as I mentioned before. And they’ll come back and say, hey, that ROI calculator that you’re building for phase three, we’d love that in phase one, which we’ve got some pipeline right now that we can accelerate to closure if we were have to show them a stronger ROI through some sort of tool. And what you’re building is perfect for us and so we will recalibrate internally to try and build an asset that’s in phase two, phase three into phase one. Or they’ll say, hey, we don’t actually need this narrative right now. We’ve built this PowerPoint deck already. We’ve got what we need. You can push that out for some other partners that may not be at the stage right now. So again, like having a good understanding of the partner, but also just sharing with the partner, having partners at the core of what you’re actually building in your development cycle is part important and part of and timeliness. And lastly, would be how you launch. So we talk about relevance in terms of making sure got the right format of the materials, the right details within each of the specific assets. We talk about timeliness. I’d say lastly, it’s how you actually launch something. We’ve had to get pretty creative about how we launch certain programs and just projects and and campaigns internally. The main reason being, as I mentioned before, partnered with a hundred things that they could be doing, and so you have to ask yourself, how do you cut through the noise? With those 101 things that partners have to think about every given day, and it could be soft launching, it could be launching with a smaller group of partners, building a case study around partner success, and then using that to launch to the other 80% of partners. But thinking a little bit more creatively around how you launch something so they can build internally. And understanding about how this particular thing is important to me right now is relevant to me right now. Versus the other a hundred things that got going on. SS: I love that approach and clearly it must be working because you guys have recently increased the number of partner organizations that are engaging with Highspot by 21%. I’d love for you to walk us through that journey. What strategies played AQ role in driving these results? JS: Yeah, I mean it’s, it’s kind of, we mentioned before around a format, format launch and, and timeliness. When I joined the team in this specific role, having worked with partners before in various roles and be being a partner to a lot of organizations previously as well, I understood the importance of a content management system. You know, we have typically you have partner managers that. Manage your top under know 10, 15, 20% of partners, but then you’ve got this medium tail and this long tail that you need to activate and you do that through documentation. We had a pretty good Highspot experience previously, but again, there was, there was little organization done around it. And so the first thing I kind of did was, you know, take off my, my partner marketing hat and put my partner hat on access Highspot and go. Let me do the top five to 10 things that a partner would need to do, and I had that list after chatting with the partners in my first 60, 90 days, and I noticed that almost every single one of the top 10 things that a partner needs to do was a real struggle in Highspot and not because of the tool, but because of how we had structured our Highspot experience. It wasn’t aligned to how partners want to actually use it. And so we focused in 2023. In the early part of 24, we predominantly focused on three things. We focused on content, making sure we did a pretty comprehensive content audit. I think we had about something like six and a half thousand different assets on Highspot, and so we did a complete content audit. We removed the stuff that we didn’t need that needed to be archived. That was just, I think it was, was three groups. It was remove, archive, update and keep. Something like that. A key thing for me on the next phase was on the user, the more of a visual experience. Ours was good. It was a little bit more out of the box and I feel we working with some of our internal brand teams, we could prove that to be a little bit more similar to some of the other partner experiences that our partners have. On some of the other portals that we have, just a partner portal, a partner center, our partner hub. And so we work to bring in some of those brand elements from Meta and WhatsApp and our different platforms into Highspot. We’re able to do that with one of our partners. And then the last thing we did was test, though we updated our content. I’m a big stickler for content naming and having a really strong naming taxonomy and nomenclature around how you name your content. And if you ask my team or the team that we work with, I’m always pushing the team. If there’s something, if there’s an asset that’s, that I feel is not named correctly, people aren’t gonna click on that. So what’s the point of even building that asset if it’s not named correctly? People need to be really understand what they’re getting themselves into when they click on an asset. And so we did our content audit. We update a lot of our content. We renamed almost every single asset once we had archived. A lot of the assets rebuilt the design of our complete Highspot experience. We had different groupings, different categories, and then again, we had partnered as part of this journey. So we tested this with partners and we said, hey, if we had this, what do you think? A lot of these were just workshops with partners moving certain things around saying, hey, if we put this here, does that work? We put this here, does that work? And then we launched, we soft launched, I think to about 20% of our partners, we saw some good results and then we, we had launched for everyone else. I mean, we saw an initial spike straight away when we launched because we’ve completely redesigned high spot and it’s great experience and you’re gonna get a lot of people organically come in and say, hey, I wonder what this is about. So we saw a spike in the first two weeks, but after that, that’s when we started. We saw the drop after the spike, and then we saw the gradual. And importantly for us, we wanted partners that don’t visit us at all to start visiting our Highspot experience. We wanted more people within our partners visiting Highspot as well. And so eventually over the six months, we started seeing like a really steady, nice, gradual ramp up. And then some of our other metrics, the time spent on HighSpot, the number of things that they’re downloading, number of things that they’re opening, so views, a lot of these started improving. The challenge now is that now we’re getting really strong adoption on Highspot. We’re starting to see teams wanting to upload more and more content on it because we’re starting to see the value of a lot of the foundational work that we’ve done. And so whilst we don’t, obviously we don’t gate content, but we do wanna make sure that everything that’s uploaded. Is super intentional and is aligned with the risk of enablement program that we have. So it’s a good problem to have. SS: Absolutely. That is a great problem to have. And so, aside from some traffic, and you did talk about a couple other key metrics, but I’d love to understand, how do you think about the metrics that you need in order to continue to measure and optimize your channel enablement strategy. JS: If you’re kind of first principles that, and think about why do we have Highspot experience in the first place to enable our partner ecosystem. We have a partner ecosystem within business messaging which is evolving and growing. We’re expanding to, if you say we have about 12 different types of partners in their ecosystem, we’ve got really strong activation with. Probably a quarter of them. And we’re now focusing on evolving our partner ecosystem into the rest. And so our partner marketing goals are always aligned to our partner ecosystem goals and our channel goals in general. And then with end partner marketing, our enablement goals are aligned with what our channel strategy is. And so right now what we’re focusing on is ensuring that as we expand our private ecosystem to new and different type of partners. When they’re ready for enablement, we start taking them into that learn phase of the learner grow model. That experience is really positive for them, and it’s almost a page turner type experience where they’re really excited to move into the next phase, or really excited to be shown a different asset or for another asset to be uploaded and email to them and say, hey, you think you’re really like this? And so really key for me is ensuring that whatever, whatever I’m doing, whatever my team’s doing, is aligned completely to a partner ecosystem strategy. SS: I love that. And do you have some wins that you might be able to share? What are some of the initial business results that you’ve seen on Highspot specifically? JS: Look, I don’t have the numbers off the top of my head, but there were two things that we wanted to do. We wanted more partners, more net new partners on it, so partners that spend zero time on it and we can see from our dashboards that we build, I wanted to see more partners on it. ’cause that for me was, and they’ve been enabled on a Highspot before. They’ve got access, they’ve got a license, they know how to use it. They’re just not using it. And so for me, that was a real win to start seeing Partner X that hasn’t visited Highspot in three months to start seeing them, oh, hey, we’ve got one person from Partner X now in Highspot last month, and now I’ve got two people. The average time they spend on the platform was 60 seconds. Now it’s three minutes. Now it’s six minutes. But that was a great personal win for me because that’s almost, for me, that was proving them wrong. Initially, they had probably visited it and not enjoyed the experience, and in their mind it was something that I didn’t really need. And so for me to be able to turn that around with that team and rebuild the experience of them to say, oh, it’s actually pretty good now, that was a really great win for me because that’s turning a detractor into an advocate, which is just, just a, a great personal goal to have. And the second thing is starting to see people, I suppose we’re seeing people spend more time on it. We’ve got a hypothesis around why they spend more time on it is because we’ve got less content on there. Now, I don’t know exactly how many assets, but it’s not, it’s not close to 6,000 anymore, but there’s less assets on there. So the discoverability is far better. They can find the assets that they want. When they go into the search field and they search for something, they don’t come up with 40 different assets. It’s 12, which is manageable. And so they’re spending more time within those assets. So now we see new partners using it and existing partners using it more and better. The two things that we focus on, we’re seeing those move up into the right, which is great. We wanna start looking into different sorts of measures of success. This year we are looking into, you know, again, as I mentioned with the part ecosystem, how do we launch to a new partner type? Which is new, and so we haven’t done that yet. On Highspot, we had a bunch of partners already enabled on business messaging through a different portal. Then when we adopted Highspot, we moved them to there. But we’re gonna start looking at things like sharing. We’ve recently started using digital sales rooms, which is something that we didn’t do last year, and we’re testing about five to six different things with digital sales rooms. That’s a really powerful feature. We haven’t figured out exactly where, where the superpower is for us to use digital sales rooms. But once our pilots are finished, we’ll probably have a hypothesis there. But yeah, I think the metric for us this year is we know our partner numbers are gonna still go up and into the right. It’s gonna slow down a little bit our growth, but we know we’re in the right direction. So our other measure for success is how do we deepen our partner’s experience with Highspot? We know we’ve only scratched the surface of what Highspot can do for us. So we’re looking into what are the other things that we need to do, and also importantly, how do we connect the Highspot experience with some of our other tools that we have, and starting to integrate it more into the partner experience that we have versus a standalone CMS, which a little bit it is of now, but I know that’s something we’re working on with your team. SS: I love that. Jason, last question for you, and I don’t think we could. Get away from talking about AI these days. It’s everywhere. And at the conference you were at last fall, I know you were excited about some of the AI innovation that we, we showcased there, but I’d love to hear from you, how are you starting to envision AI playing a role in further enhancing your channel partner enablement strategy moving forward? JS: I mean, the buzzword of the year, right? It’s a little bit hard right now. We’ve just finished our foundational rebuild of Highspot, and we’re at a really comfortable stage with what we’ve delivered to our partners and the operations around it, including, you know, governance. Measurement content, strategy, et cetera, like when a really good spot there. I think there are some operating models around AI that make sense for our partners to want to lean in towards. When you talk about enablement, which we’re at different stages of exploring, I think the most powerful one would be how do we get the right content? It comes down to timeliness and relevance as we spoken at the start. How do we get the right content to the right partner at the right time? And so that’s more generative content enablement, if you will. And that’s tough because you need, you need sort of metadata to support that. But I think if you were to ask our partners what’s the main thing that they would want from AI and channel enablement or partner enablement, it would be, hey, be really useful instead of me looking for the, the asset for you to actually know that I need this asset right now or group of assets. I think that would be the main thing that they would want. And I get it. So we’ll get to that stage at some point. But right now we’re, we’re definitely focused on maintaining our strong grassroots and foundations right now, and then looking at more sort of piecemeal. Additions to that. So things like digital sales rooms, things like making it easier for them to be able to share content with their end clients on the go, which is one of the ask that they’ve sent from us. And so those are the few things that we’re focused on this year. SS: I love it. Jason, thank you again so much for joining our podcast today. I truly appreciate you sharing your insights and experience. JS: Of course. It’s been great. Thanks a lot, Shawnna. SS: 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.

Behind The Veil Podcast - The Real Weddings Study from The KnotThis week we welcome Tom Chelednik - The Associate Director of Vendor Engagement of North America to talk about the recently released "Real Weddings Study" from The Knot. In The Knot 2025 Real Weddings Study, we discover how couples are bringing this exciting day to life through the entire planning process. The wedding report includes insights from nearly 17,000 US couples who got married in 2024 as well as data from couples getting married in 2025 to help you understand how to plan a wedding. For the first time, it also includes user behavior trends from The Knot Vendor Marketplace, The Knot Registry and The Knot Invitations.And we are going to talk about all of it!Tom Chelednik is the Associate Director of Vendor Engagement of North America. He has over 25 years of experience in sales and marketing, with 16 specifically in the wedding industry. From 2008 - 2020, Tom held several sales positions at The Knot, including Regional Director of Sales and Director of Training and Enablement. He led teams instrumental in growing and retaining new business across 20 states and Canada, ultimately helping wedding professional book more weddings and grow their businesses. During his time at The Knot, Tom traveled the country 70% of each year to speak with and learn from wedding professionals. Tom is passionate about sharing the knowledge he has gained over the years and continues to coach pros, specifically to help them increase their leads and bookings. In addition to The Knot, Tom was the COO of The Treasury Venue Collection in St. Augustine, Florida, where he learned firsthand what it was like to operate a wedding venue. During that time, he also helped build an online learning platform called Venue Profit Pro, designed for wedding venues nationwide to improve their marketing and sales results. Tom rejoined The Knot Worldwide in the summer of 2022Support the showBehind The Veil Crew:Host: Keith Willard www.keithwillardevents.com www.instagram.com/keithwillard Co- Host: Marci Guttenberg www.anaffairtorememberbymarci.com www.instagram.com/anaffairtorememberbymarci

System statt Bauchgefühl? In vielen Vertriebsorganisationen fehlt es an Struktur, klaren Rollen und strategischer Planung. Ich bin Christopher Funk, und in dieser Folge zeige ich dir, warum dein Vertrieb mehr Organisation braucht - und wie du ihn mit wenigen, gezielten Schritten deutlich effizienter und erfolgreicher machst. Wie definierst du eigentlich die Rollen in deinem Vertriebsteam? Arbeiten alle nach dem One-size-fits-all-Prinzip oder hast du bereits spezialisierte Funktionen wie Hunter für die Neukundenakquise und Farmer für die Bestandskundenbetreuung? Ich erkläre dir, warum diese Trennung so wichtig ist und welche Rolle ein gut geplantes Organigramm für deine langfristige Vertriebsstrategie spielt. Außerdem: welche Supportfunktionen brauchst du, um deinen Vertrieb zu entlasten? Ob Sales Support, Enablement, Operations oder Pre-Sales: In dieser Folge erfährst du, wie du mit den richtigen Unterstützungsrollen dafür sorgst, dass deine Vertriebsmitarbeiter sich voll auf ihre Kernaufgaben konzentrieren können - nämlich den Kundenkontakt, die Akquise und den Abschluss. Du bekommst praxisnahe Beispiele, wie du deine Organisation weiterentwickeln kannst, wie du weiße Flecken erkennst und wie du deine Teamstruktur an deine Wachstumsziele anpasst. Auch das Thema Customer Success und warum du den Service als Teil deiner Vertriebsstrategie denken solltest, kommt nicht zu kurz. Egal, ob du Vertriebsleiter, Geschäftsführer oder Unternehmer bist: Diese Folge hilft dir, deinen Vertrieb vom Bauchgefühl zur Systematik zu bringen. Hör rein und erfahre, welche Fragen du dir heute stellen solltest, um morgen erfolgreicher zu sein.    

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report 2024, organizations that use one unified enablement platform are 80% more likely to increase their win rate. So, how can you optimize your tech stack to improve adoption and drive results? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Jacob Dinsdale, the sales enablement leader at Molina Healthcare. Thank you for joining us. Jacob. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Jacob Dinsdale: Thanks. Happy to be here. My background, I’ve been in sales for a long time, a couple of decades now. My sales career started in financial services, working for one of the largest global investment managers. Everything from the trading floor to wealth management moved on the technology side there. Ended up moving into the tech side of sales in general during the.com boom. I was the first sales hire for a European company moving into the United States. Built that into a large company. So I’ve worked in pretty much all areas of the sales process. Whether it’s carrying a quota as an individual rep, running a team, or running a sales organization full of lots of teams and lots of sales channels. SS: Well, Jacob, we’re lucky to have you here. Given your extensive sales experience as well as the experience that you have with Molina Healthcare, I’d love to understand from your perspective, what are some of the unique challenges that sales reps in the healthcare industry face, and how can enablement help overcome these? JD: That’s a great question, and I think that’s one of the things that makes us unique. For those who aren’t familiar, Molina is one of the largest healthcare organizations in the United States. I think at the last ranking, we are number 1 76 in the Fortune 500. But unless you live in a particular state, you may not be familiar with who they are. Specifically, we handle healthcare for people that are in some sort of a government-sponsored healthcare situation, whether that’s Medicare, Medicaid, or they bought their own individual plan through the Affordable Care Act in the marketplace. So that’s one of the things that makes us unique and in healthcare as a regulated industry, especially when we’re engaging in government-sponsored sales operations, having. The right and trustworthy material is very important to us. So, you know, all of our agents are, you know, fully licensed in the state and federally. And then as an organization we have responsibilities there. So making sure that we are only giving correct and timely information in the approved methods, and all of our methodology and communication is compliant with our customers. So with those constraints. We’re somewhat unique and we realized that also created bottlenecks for us. SS: I see. And you also recently implemented an enablement platform for the first time. What were some of the challenges that your team faced that led you to invest in a solution and, and how have you overcome some of those since implementing an enablement platform? JD: One of the things that we realized is we had a lot of problems that we solved individually, and that created a lot of different and disparate systems that we use to solve those individual problems. Whether it’s using SharePoint to manage documents, using Salesforce to communicate, using whatever random tool or individual sales organizations might be using to communicate with potential new members. So, from our standpoint, having one kind of unified location that we can have confidence in the governance of what we’re doing, knowledge about the processes of what we’re doing, control over what can and can’t happen, and that creates confidence for us as an organization. But I think also that lets us move that confidence back to our salespeople who don’t want to really. Focus on a lot of the details they’d like to be sewing. So if they know that the sandbox that they’re playing in is fully compliant, fully usable for them, then they can take that sandbox and really be free to do what they do best as a salesperson. So, you know, that was kind of our goals, is to try and come up with a unified message in that and having unified tools that all of our organization can use. SS: I love that. And you played a key role in the implementation of Highspot, so I’d love to learn from you, and I’m sure our audience would as well. What are some of your best practices for driving adoption from the start and really engaging the teams you support in your enablement programs? JD: You know, and this might come from my background, working in sales to begin with, but one of the things that I always believe is. Having a destination in mind and working backwards. So when you’re talking about driving revenue and driving sales at a company, ultimately you wanna have that dotted line. You wanna complete a transaction from us as a process, knowing where we want to be, knowing that we want to have strong, rich content that empowers our different sales channels to do really well in what they want. That lets us. We’re backward to have that and build what we need along the way so we don’t end up building a road to nowhere. We’re building the road to our destination, and I think that was important for us to make sure that defining the route, defining the map, working backwards to where we want to go, helped us get all the stakeholders aligned because anytime there was a disagreement, we could always work backwards to that north star, right? That guiding privilege that we have as an idea we want to get to. SS: I love that. I always think that it is a fantastic philosophy to start with the end in mind. Now, I know that you guys have seen success in a lot of areas, but I know one of the areas that you’ve seen success in is through the use of digital rooms. I’d love to learn from you. Could you share more about how you’re using digital rooms to optimize workflows for your teams? JD: Digital Rooms are a great compliment for us in one of our sales channels. So we sell directly. We have our own licensed insurance agents that bring in new members into Molina Healthcare, but in some markets that doesn’t make sense. And this also exists in the insurance industry in general. There’s a lot of independent brokers, so we have a broker channel sales. Department around the country that works with these independent brokers who are then working with members. They generally work with many different companies, but what we want to be able to do is to make it easy for them to do business with us and to make it easy for them to do business with us is, is having quality content and information on their fingertips. So if a customer says, hey, is this medication gonna be covered under this new plan? I live in the Bay Area and I practice traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture. Is that something that’ll be covered under this plan? To be an expert on all of that with the different companies isn’t something an independent broker can do, but we’re able to use these digital rooms as a microsite to have this information that these external brokers can use, but also for us to make sure. We know that we have the most timely information and we’re seeing some changes in the Center for Medicare and Medicaid with CMS right now and new leadership. That required us having new, updated documentation, what we have there. So we’re always using the current and most approved documentation, but we can also be dynamic in our communication to our sales channels. SS: I love that. Can you walk me through that a little bit? The strategy in particular for the Digital Rooms, for your broker channel sales partners. How are they structured and delivered and what impact have you seen so far? JD: They’re structured by our market. So in any particular market, we’re working with various, uh, levels of different health plans and the health plan, we’re going to be providing basic information. So they’ll have access to, you know, enrollment forms, basic government documentation, but they’ll also have important things like, hey, is my transportation to see the doctor covered? You know, do I get a OTC benefit spent at CVS every quarter, little bits of information and have that in the same location is important. I think, again, this is something that we’ve seen both with our internal sales channels and our external sales channels, having the buy-in and confidence from the users that know, oh, I don’t know where to find it everywhere, but I know that I can probably find it in Highspot. That gives us a really good ability to get that stickiness from the user base that we wanna see. SS: I love that. I think that’s fantastic. To pivot a little bit, I know you also plan to utilize AI features in Highspot to elevate your enablement efforts. How do you envision leveraging AI capabilities to improve productivity across the teams you support? JD: Well, as a mature long-term industry, you know, using AI is something that I think a lot of organizations find scary in including us as well, and knowing where we can or can’t do that. So from our standpoint, it’s going to be very, very subdued in what we do. But where we’re going to use AI is the ability to generate summary content, to generate ideas about. Hey, you might want to try and look to this, either look to this as an option that you’ll be able to use that might be successful in this particular type of interaction. So from our standpoint, I think our first implementation of AI is going to be to help support the efficiency of our sales channels and our sales teams rather than two. Have anything externally facing. SS: That makes a ton of sense, and I’m excited to see what you guys are able to do within Molina Healthcare on that front. Now, since launching Highspot, what results have you seen? Are there any key wins or notable business outcomes you can share? JD: Well, I think key wins that we’ve seen, and you know, one of the things that I appreciated with our relationship with Highspot is that we do have customer health check-ins. We’re looking at where we’re growing and we’re seeing a lot of interaction and usage with what we do. So external shares, quality content, number of digital rooms, number of plays, active users, those are all going up. On a quarter by quarter basis. I think some of our bigger wins have been since we realized the reliability of our content that we have hosted. We’re having other divisions within our company that want to use Highspot again, is that it’s a term that’s used a lot, but in sales, that single source of truth, right? We’re getting to a point where we’re seeing our sales and marketing departments that normally want to have a communication that they’re hosting internally. They’re now saying, hey, HighSpot is a great tool for us to use that internally as well. And so I think our biggest win has been. The adoption of using it again, it’s almost to the point that we’re selling and providing information to all of our internal customers as well. So having these other departments come in and want to utilize the features that they see that kind of surpass what they’re currently doing, and that’s made us busy, but it’s, again, that’s building a reliability for us as a tool. SS: That is phenomenal. Last question for you, Jacob, to close. If you could give one piece of advice to someone who’s looking to drive adoption and engagement of their en enablement programs, what would it be? JD: One of the things, you know, I mentioned this at the beginning, begin with an end in mind. I have that goal, have that target, talk to all the stakeholders that are involved. So some stakeholders only want to look at KPIs and engagement and look at the metrics. Some people really only want to care about revenue. Some people want to care about training and all the details that we have along the way. So there’s a lot of stakeholders along the way. And what I would say is, find out the goals that each of these departments and stakeholders in the company have, articulate those goals with the tools that you’re developing, and really kind of have a strong point of view. So whenever anyone asks, you can say, this is why we’re doing this. We’re doing this to overcome these struggles that we’ve had already. This will let us do this, this, and this. And this also puts us on a launching pad, which for us is, uh, expansion of our capabilities and how we’re using this that we see happening later on this year and in 2026 as well. So I think having that strong point of view. That you begin with, right? It might be a charter that a company or a vision statement, whatever that might be. But have that with your implementation as well. So whenever you, again, have a question, you can always refer back to why are we doing this? What is our end goal and how are we gonna measure success? And do these decisions align with doing that as well? SS: I love that advice. Jacob, thank you again so much for joining us today. I appreciate it. JD: I’m happy to be on the podcast and thank you so much for the interview. SS: 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 of Troubleshooting Enablement, Devon McDermott sits down with Felix Krueger—former consultant, startup founder, and longtime enabler—to explore what it really takes to go from in-house to independent.From his early days in enterprise enablement to building and selling his own company, Felix has worn nearly every hat in go-to-market. Today, he's back in-house at CarSales while continuing to advise enablers looking to branch out on their own.If you've ever considered becoming a consultant, questioned how to package your skills, or wondered how to find clients without selling your soul… this episode is for you.Here's what we cover:✅ Where to start – Why defining your niche, auditing your past wins, and leveraging your network are non-negotiables.✅ What to offer – The three consulting models enablers should consider: diagnostic projects, structured implementations, and retainers.✅ Who to sell to – Why CROs and founders are more likely buyers than enablement leads (and how to navigate both worlds).✅ How to set your rate – Why you should charge more than you think—and how to scope and price engagements to avoid burnout.✅ What to avoid – Common mistakes new consultants make—from getting lost in branding to underestimating the power of execution.Whether you're enablement-curious, actively exploring your next move, or simply want to better understand what makes a successful consultant tick, this episode is packed with practical insight.

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report 2024, organizations are 80% more likely to increase their win rate when using a unified platform for all of their enablement needs. So how can you leverage a unified platform to drive sales productivity?Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Karl-Philippe Clement, the VP of Sales and customer experience at RIB software. Thank you for joining us KP. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Karl-Philippe Clement: Yeah, well the pleasure is all mine. I’m responsible for everything which is sales operations. We very often call it, or sales excellence related to software company RIB software. We do sell software for the construction industry. We were acquired by Schneider Electric. It was a lot of smaller company, and now we are consolidating our approach, working much closer with the software. Of Schneider Electric, and we have possibility also to improve our sales enablement, but also our sales approach and sales operation for our market. So I’ve been hired two years ago by this company specifically for this approach for sales operation. Previously I worked for Bosch Rexroth and Siemens, and I was there 6 and 16 years respectively. I was able to really focus on growing sales operation and sales improvement along the way. SS: Wonderful. Well, we’re excited to have you here, KP Now you have a lot of experience in both sales, marketing, as well as customer experience. How does this experience across go to market teams really helped to influence your approach to sales enablement at RIB? KC: Well, the experience has a lot to do because when we talk with sales very often, it’s uh, you have multiple age group. What I’ve been seeing, and you have people which are much more familiar with new technology and some are less familiar with technology, some are less ready to go with new technology while the. Looking back at the experience that I was faced with a different job, it was really about not only the customer experience, but the user experience of our salespeople in order to bring sales enablement to the next level. If we cannot tackle our users, our people enablement, I’ll have a big problem to reach our objectives with sales enablement. That’s definitely one of the biggest experiences I gathered in the last years. SS: Absolutely. And RIB actually recently implemented Highspot as its enablement platform. What were the main challenges that led to this decision to invest in enablement and, um, how do you see a unified platform helping to overcome those challenges? KC: There was multiple challenge, right? The user challenge was definitely one, right? Fortunately, with HighSpot, I must really be honest. It helped us a lot because it’s really user friendly. It’s also part of our approach to roll out our new CRM, where HighSpot will be able to help us getting a better user experience within Salesforce. That said, there were also multiple objections to getting another tool. Why I say another tool? Because we are submerged with quantities of tool and different company coming to us, hey, my tool is better than the other tool. Which tool should I use? And there’s so many different tools and we come to an IT stack, which. Unsustainable. So it’s really about how we approach to rationalize what do we really need and what will be the output. So this was a challenge to bring IT organization and make sure that we have the money to fund a new approach, because this is definitely one of the challenge. What do you get? And everybody has their own answers – hey, you can make a lot of money with the tool. So it was one of the challenge we were able to, with the help of Highspot supporting us there for the use case, we were able to resolve those challenge and a much nicer way I would say, which facts very clearly that we could put in front of our. SS: I’d love to learn a little bit more about that, especially as a leader in the evaluation process. How did you go about building the business case for enablement and, and securing that stakeholder buy-in? KC: If I can be honest, Highspot helped us a lot. That’s what I mentioned a little bit prior, they took the time and, and I must say that working with Burak, who work with us from Highspot, really taking a deep dive on looking at our process and really taking the time to analyze and build a pilot and get the right data out. And then we are able to go forward. It’s not rocket science in a way, but the support made it a reality, and that’s mainly how we took the problem to fix it. SS: I love that. I’m curious, as you go about implementing this new platform for the first time, how do you plan to drive adoption and, and really build excitement amongst your sellers? KC: It’s all about the value they can get. It’s quite simple. It’s all about the value they can get. So far from what we’ve been doing during the pilot, the value that the sellers could get out of Highspot was quite high. It was pretty good user journey and they got a lot of value. They were able to tackle, uh, lease much faster. They were able to focus on the leads that are interested in what we sent, and see directly activities in the Digital Rooms and everything. So it’s really about what values the users get so they sell more, they get more incentive. Everybody’s happy. And that’s really to the basic, how can I sell more and faster? Everybody’s focused on efficiency, so it’s as simple as that. SS: I love that. And I know RIB has a diverse set of products and use cases. How can enablement help sellers effectively navigate that complexity at RIB? KC: Well, having the right documentation in the right place. And this was one of the reasons we selected to go with a sales enablement tool. This was one of our challenge, finding the right documentation, making sure it’s adapted in the right way. This was one of the main thing. We have a lot of a portfolio, not everybody is an expert of everything. Onboarding new sellers is definitely one of the challenge. So in this way, we’re able to navigate and help reduce complexity on this aspect. The other aspect is to focus where we need to focus. We need to focus on all these, or do we need to focus on the one that has a real interest. So that was mainly the two main aspects in it. SS: Amazing. And one of your current initiatives is transitioning to a new subscription-based business model. How do you plan to leverage your enablement tech stack to help drive this transition? KC: Well, like I said earlier, a seller is about efficiency and it’s about how much money can you make based on an incentive, right? So from a strategic perspective, we can say from a company, this is where we wanna focus, but it’s really to put the means at the right place. So the enablement will help our seller to be more effective to follow up on the right leads. The incentive, I must say, is a big portion on how will we get more into subscription, or how do we wanna focus of getting the maximum outta subscription. So whether we use annual contract value, a CV, or conditionable a CV to help our people focus on the. More focus. More focus on those needs. The proper needs. SS: I love that. So, shifting gears a little bit, ’cause you just mentioned the importance of, you know, that agility and speed as well as the results in your enablement approach. How do you bring this philosophy to life in your enablement efforts using data and insights? KC: Well, there’s always two sides, right? There’s the side that we have. Data needs to be perfect, needs to be exact, and we need to use the data. And there’s the the other side to say, let’s look at the big picture and not necessarily too much on the details of every single data point. If you’re in sales, it’s about speed. It’s about making the right decision and looking at the data will be perfect. So on speed and on right? From this big, it’s really about speed. SS: Absolutely. I could not agree more. And one of the ways that seems to be creating a lot of expediency these days is AI. So I’d love to understand KP, I know you plan on leveraging AI to enhance seller performance. Can you share more about how you envision using AI to elevate your enablement effort? KC: Well, I can share more a little bit on my expectations. We have not used AI yet since we’re, we need to roll it out on our new CRM platform. We just had the pilot project. Again, it’s about speed. How can AI help us have the right insight, make the right decisions? Increase speed to grab the right customer or grab the right leads and make the most out of it. For me, that’s really where AI is. It’s not gonna replace anybody. I don’t believe it’s gonna replace sellers. I believe it’ll be kind of a co-pilot, don’t want to use this word, but it’s. Being beside our sellers and supporting his approach to really, maybe he’s missing a few points, he’s missing some comments, coming outta discussion. He’s missing some different views to help him make him the right decision. That’s how I see that AI will help a lot. SS: Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, I’m excited for you to get started on that front. What do you think is the potential long-term value of embracing innovations in technology like AI to both help the seller and improve the customer experience? KC: It’s about trying right? Try and error to a certain point. Better try and find out as fast as possible. Competition will do, try and if it works well, well much faster than in. So for me, trial error and always keeping up to date and keeping the speed and trying to make it faster because nobody sleeping and definitely not the competition. SS: Absolutely KP. Last question for you. What is one piece of advice you would give to other companies that are considering investing in enablement for the first time? KC: Do your homework. Look, but also be very clear on what you’re trying to achieve and where do you want to go. Keep the end in mind of where you wanna go. Speed is a key essence of any implementation and rollout to make this a reality supported by the user experience, your user experience, your sellers to embrace and make the most out of it, because there’s a lot of technology there that even looks great on paper if the users are not using it. It’s not gonna make the best. A fool with the tool is still a fool. So make sure that you get the right tool to make sure that the people will use it properly and will get the most out of it. SS: Thank you KP. Appreciate the advice and thank you for joining the podcast. I’ve greatly appreciated your insight. KC: It was my pleasure. Thank you very much. SS: 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.

What if the key to unlocking more profitable and efficient building automation projects was already at your fingertips? In Episode 488, you're invited into a detailed conversation tailored specifically for building automation professionals. This episode explores how OEMs like Johnson Controls are equipping their contractor channels with advanced tools - not just to sell, but to successfully deliver full BAS solutions from estimation to final commissioning. This episode is about helping you rethink the way you approach your BAS projects. Whether you're estimating, designing, installing, or managing the handoff to operations, there are resources out there that can make you faster, more accurate, and more profitable. You won't just hear about features - you'll hear how these tools and processes can be applied to your business and your daily operations. Key topics explored include: The underestimated power of estimation tools and how they impact risk, labor, and material accuracy. How engineering efforts in the sales phase can translate into operational success and earlier cash flow. What to consider when transitioning to IP controls and how OEM partnerships are shaping the network infrastructure conversation. How to strategically manage materials to drive revenue and reduce risk before a project even breaks ground. How automation and evolving software tools are reducing human error and accelerating project timelines. If you're a contractor, estimator, engineer, or project manager in the BAS space, this episode will give you insight into what's possible with the right toolset and the right approach. You'll walk away with new perspectives on how to enhance your current workflows and set your projects up for greater success. Listen in to discover how the strategies discussed can impact your business.

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report, an estimated 90% of organizations now have enablement functions, representing a 20% year-over-year increase. So with this growth in mind, how can organizations successfully implement an enablement platform that ensures long-term success? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Shara Simms, the Director of Global Revenue Enablement at Cloudinary. Thank you for joining us Shara. I’d love for you to tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, and your role. Shara Simms: Thanks for having me. My name’s Shara. I am from the San Francisco Bay area originally moved down to San Diego and never left, married. Two beautiful little girls. I’m the director of Global Revenue Enablement at Cloudinary. The scope of my role is not just the sales teams, but also our customer support teams as well as our partners. So the revenue enablement kind of umbrella hits all of those different teams. And I think something probably really important to call out around the role is when people hear the term enablement, a lot of times they hear or focus on just the training aspect of it. But I think it’s, it’s so much more than that. It’s strategic partnership, it’s sales process, efficiency. It’s the connector between everything going on in the product world and the go-to-market motion and how that information gets filtered down to sales or again, partners or customer support. So that’s a little bit about me and my role. Shawnna Sumaoang: Thank you Shara! We’re glad that you’re here with us. And I couldn’t agree more. I’ve seen the evolution of the enablement profession just absolutely change from kind of being focused on content or focused on training to really taking a strategic seat at the table to help lead the strategy for the organization and how we bring kind of all the go to market motions together. So I love to hear that you’re kind of overseeing that for Cloudinary today, and you have a ton of experience in both sales enablement and leadership roles. I would love for you to talk to us a little bit more about that journey into enablement and how has your approach to sales enablement evolved over the years? Shara Simms: So I actually started out in the finance world working really closely with financial advisors in a customer support manager role. Just supporting day-to-day operations internal systems processes. I was in my, my young twenties, still trying to figure out, you know, what direction I really wanted to take my career. And there was a part of me that had considered going into teaching. I had realized this, this passion that I had for just taking complex situations or overwhelming scenarios and breaking them down into digestible information. And so with that in mind, and while I was working in this support role, an opportunity came up at the same financial company to do some internal training, onboarding for financial advisors, industry best practices, that type of thing. And I think that that was really the first turning point in my career where I realized I can take my business degree and this learned, you know, financial and business literacy and combine it with adult learning. Yeah. So adult learning quickly became not just a job, but really a passion and spent a good amount of my career at this. Finance company going beyond operations and into more marketing and sales type training. From there, I eventually made a jump into tech. I was with ServiceNow for a couple of years, doing a variety of roles from strategy to learning design, and then leading a team of instructional designers and trainers. And then I eventually made the move to Cloudinary and I would say after what has been my career so far that the background of adult learning mixed with the operational and business fluency is really what has served me well. And I think even though I don’t have a background as a seller per se, that’s really the background. The adult learning background and operational and business is what I’ve been able to effectively apply into the world of tech sales and enablement. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. I love that operational background that you have. I think it will apply to a lot of what I’d like to talk to you about today. As I mentioned in the introduction,sales enablement is becoming more and more mainstream for a lot of organizations, and those same organizations are trying to figure out, you know, what are the right people, processes, and tools that I need to have in place. Place in order to really do enablement. Right. You know, to your point at that sort of strategic level, and I know that you guys at Cloudinary had been on a previous enablement platform, and moved over to Highspot. I’d love to understand what motivated you to reevaluate and change your enablement tech stack. Shara Simms: So yes, we did move to Highspot a few months ago. I would say there were two really big motivators there for us. The first one, one of the largest ones would be the G Suite interability. There are a lot of platforms out there that have G Suite integration, but Highspot was able to support more of an advanced use case that we had, and the specific example, the previous platform we were on, so they did integrate with Google Drive in the sense that you could make updates to your master Google documents and then those updates would flow through to the version that the sales reps accessed on the platform. I think most platforms can do that, but beyond that basic integration, we had to jump through some hoops to achieve kind of what we really wanted, which was ultimately to take our internal customer data, have that flow through the platform, and then automatically transpose onto our templated customer facing slides for things like account reviews, which saves our CSMs and our account managers just hours of time Highspot can support this, which was really important for us. Whereas the previous platform, we would’ve needed to get virtual machines like parallels, for example, which came at an incremental cost. But more than that, our security team just they weren’t thrilled with that, and it was just extra workaround. So that G Suite Interability was huge in being able to apply our internal data to the slides. And then the, the second big motivator was the administration piece of it. We are a very small team, but a mighty team. But we spent a lot of hours trying to maintain and effectively administrate our previous platform. So the ease of use on Highspot, specifically ease of use with Salesforce integration, that and G Suite was the two big motivators. Shawnna Sumaoang: m. Well I’m glad that you are now a Highspot customer and I think when you make an investment in the right tools for your teams, you wanna make sure that it’s getting adopted and, and they’re able to take full advantage of it. And I know there can be challenges sometimes when rolling out a new enablement platform in driving that adoption, along with maybe, you know, a few other challenges that come along with kind of that change management, what are some of the biggest challenges that you think enablement practitioners might face when they’re rolling out a new enablement platform, and how have you overcome some of those challenges as you prepare to launch? Shara Simms: Yeah. I think first and foremost, the challenge of having a really good and realistic strategy for the rollout and the adoption. I’ll circle back to that thought in just a moment, and the other would be, again, the hurdle of maintenance and administration. It really is time consuming and if you’re a small team without a dedicated resource, it can be challenging. So with that in mind, circling back to my original thought, which was that realistic strategy for rollout and adoption, what we did was recognize, okay, we don’t have a lot of resources here. What is going to be the most impactful thing to our teams and drive, I wouldn’t say drive adoption right out the gate, but drive that initial buy-in and the excitement from our sales teams. We all love our salespeople, but we also know that behavior change and new system adoption can definitely be a challenge. So what’s going to get them excited to where they want to use this platform? For us, we determined it was seeing that Salesforce integration before even getting into building out landing pages and navigation and fancy training curriculums. Just having that Salesforce or whatever, CRM, you may use integration with Highspot so that. The sales individuals can see the recommended content to use right there within their opportunity page. Rolling that out. Got them really excited and bought in and, and it got them asking me on a weekly basis, when are we getting this whole platform? So we took a phased approach, realistic expectations of what we could do within our given resources. Phase one, Salesforce and Highspot integration Phase two, which is where we are right now, Digital Sales Rooms customizing content and sales facing landing pages. We purposely did not want to rush this portion of it because having a really well thought out organization of content on the various landing pages or HighSpot calls ’em spots, we use the term landing page internally. I think that’s probably a really important piece. So that went into our phase two. Then lastly, phase three will be the second half of the year, all of our learning and training curriculums. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. I know building strong professional relationships is another key focus of yours. As you implement a new enablement platform, how do you plan to drive adoption and build excitement? As you mentioned, how critical that is just a moment ago for your programs amongst the sales teams that you support. Shara Simms: Yeah, retouching on, you know, the strategy of our phased approach, but beyond that, I think maintaining really close relationships with our sales leaders is very important. It’s something that I do, you know, ensuring that they’re bought in and that we have a measurement of success that the teams will be held to as well is critical. So for example, we’re currently tracking our sales collateral usage. Are the teams using it effectively at the right stages, what’s working, what’s not? And as part of this tracking, we have an agreement with our sales leaders going into phase two of our Highspot rollout. And the agreement is we will be tracking that the teams are using certain pieces of collateral that have been deemed. Essentially a required piece of content to share for all deals. And we’re tracking that. They share it via Highspot. So if they have their own version or own copy of the material that they send directly, we aren’t tracking that. If they didn’t send it through to Highspot, it didn’t happen. And again, the sales leaders are partnering with us to hold their teams accountable. So that kind of strategic relationship at the sales leadership level I think is really important and it’s what’s helped driving our success with adoption of the platform. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. As you mentioned in your introduction, shara, you have a lot of experience in training. What are some of your best practices for designing and implementing effective training, and how do you see a new enablement platform optimizing these efforts? Shara Simms: Yeah, so first and foremost, always having clearly defined and stated objectives. This is your North Star. It’s gonna help you define if the. Expectation is a behavior change if it’s truly just knowledge retention, if it’s more so a communication versus training. So without a doubt, I want to call that out as probably the most important thing, and not only stating the objective, but also having really clear alignment and agreement of those objectives with your stakeholders. Beyond that, which was maybe stating the obvious. I think a blended learning approach is always the best tactic to use as well, which is one thing I’m really excited about to build enablement on Highspot with this kind of mixed learning. We’re gonna have the ability to pull in my live webinar schedules combined with any on-demand training courses, then technical product documentation that I need the team to read as part of the overarching curriculum. And it’s all going to be on one platform and one curriculum. We also use a tool called Second Nature, which is like an AI simulation tool for sales. It’s pretty cool. And we can also integrate those AI role plays into the same high spot curriculums. So just the ease of pulling in all of those different types of learning elements into one place. It’s gonna be a really exciting second half of the year for us. I’m also really excited to build out curriculums that are role-based or skill-based. So tying in not only the learning component, but then any collateral or resources from the platform into one place based on the specific role or the specific skill gap that I am ultimately trying to solve for. I think lastly, of course, the measurement component is also key. Being able to get insights that I can actively move against and identify, you know, where do I need to spend more of my time? By rep, by individual rep scorecards. So really, really excited for all of those kind of components and pulling in the best practices of learning. Shawnna Sumaoang: On the topic of insights, as you move forward with the implementation, how do you plan to use data and insights to continue to refine your strategy and really ensure a successful launch? Shara Simms: So I mentioned before that we are tracking collateral usage. Obviously we want to know what reps are using, not using how that correlates back to one or lost deals, but also from a behavioral change perspective. We want to also use that data to help us see how well our reps are following the sales process and where we might need to double down on either reviewing the content because it’s not working or reviewing our actual process because there’s some hurdle in the way for them that we need to solve. There’s also the customer engagement cracking that we’re hoping will help move the needle. So for example, as our reps start using the digital sales rooms, if they share a proposal there and the customer views it, great, there’s an indicator for the rep to follow up, see what questions they may have if the customer doesn’t view a case study that was shared. Okay, follow up with an email, highlight the key points from that case study to ensure the customer sees it. The customer engagement tracking is going to be a really big one that we’re going to to build off of. And then the last thing I’ll say in regards to data is. Specifically sales leaders or the manager’s insights, it’s going to be really important that my team actively works with the sales managers so that they understand, you know, how to read their teams. Data and their team’s insights. Again, I keep talking about behavior change, but really putting a focus on helping the manager turn into an effective coach for their team versus just a manager, right? Manager versus coaching, and really being able to use that data to help their teams get better. So I think those are the three big points. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. And, and while we’re on the topic of data, and as you mentioned earlier, you’ve been working on making sure that you have the integration set up between Salesforce. And Highspot, what value do you see in this integration and what outcomes are you hoping to achieve? Shara Simms: Yeah, the Salesforce integration is wonderful. I absolutely love it. We are definitely trying to drive better use of our internal collateral. Not only just using the content, but using the right content at the right stage, and being able to easily track that. Right now it’s very manual for us. Another big piece of this is. Time efficiency. You know, no more searching around to find the piece of collateral that, that a salesperson might need. It’s gonna appear right there in the opportunity for them. And then lastly, selfishly, from an administrative perspective, gaining a lot of time back in maintaining the Salesforce integration already. The integration works seamlessly. I’ve not had. Any trouble versus our, our last platform, we really just never got it to work correctly. Anytime we would update a field name on Salesforce, we would need to manually update the field, you know, in the platform. And that’s just not the case with Highspot. It’s just all in automatic flow. It’s saved us a ton of time. Shawnna Sumaoang: I’m glad to hear that. And as we look ahead, as you look to post-launch, what are some of the key go-to-market initiatives that you’ll be focused on driving? And how will your enablement programs help support these? Shara Simms: Yeah. Our biggest initiative right now that I think is we’re gonna support is the sales process. Adherence the right collateral. Right messaging, right process, all at the right, you know, time and the right stage. This is a mix of the SFDC integration and the landing pages we’re creating in Highspot, which are going to follow more of a sales process versus product-led theme. And what I mean by that is basically being guided by the opportunity situation versus having a seller go in and say, Hey, I just need information on this product. Well, do you really? Or are you jumping straight to solutioning? Where are you right now? Are you in discovery? And you need to pull in this material and have this type of conversation? So it’s really the entire go to market. Sales process that we’re trying to refine and ensure that our sales team is again, following the actions that should be taken versus jumping straight to product or solution material. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. This has been fantastic. Shara, last question for you, for our audience, for folks that are looking to roll out a new enablement platform, what’s maybe one piece of advice that you would give them to set them up for success as they get started? Shara Simms: Before you start organizing your content, have a solidified agreement behind the scenes on the methodology for how you want that content to be served up to reps and what content you want to be served up for your reps. It can be really easy to fall into a bottomless pit of content. On a platform, all of the internal resources, all of the FAQs, everything that product or product marketing has ever created, and it contend to get out of hand for reps really quickly. I think it’s fine if you want all of that internal material available, but just have a really smart way that you’re organizing and serving up the content. And I’ll give you our example. So I’m sure there’s, you know, a hundred different ways to do this as a best practice and the way that I do it might not be the best way for you, but again, that’s why we did the SFDC integration first, so that just the key content. Was rolling into the opportunity while we gave ourselves extra time to really think about content organization on our backend and align with product marketing on how we were gonna organize it to be fed out to the teams. Shawnna Sumaoang: I love that. I do think that’s a fantastic tip for our audience. So Shara, thank you again so much for joining us today. I really appreciate it. 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 of The State of Sales Enablement, Coach K sits down with Dr. Tom Tonkin—sales enablement OG, academic, and data whisperer—to explore what truly makes enablement work.From his early days as a sales leader at Oracle to earning a PhD in Organizational Leadership, Tom's unique journey has equipped him with rare insight into what actually moves the needle in sales performance. Today, he's on a mission to bring statistical rigor to the world of enablement—and help practitioners avoid chasing shiny objects.If you've ever relied on vendor reports, built programs based on industry surveys, or wondered why your initiatives aren't getting the results you expected… this episode is for you.Here's what we cover:✅ Why most industry surveys are statistically useless – The difference between descriptive and predictive data—and how to spot flawed claims.✅ Charters, methodologies, and other myths – The surprising things that don't actually move the revenue needle.✅ The 4 levels of insight – Descriptive, diagnostic, predictive, and prescriptive—what they are and why most enablement teams are stuck at level one.✅ What enablers need to learn next – Why basic statistical literacy might be the most underrated skill in enablement today.Whether you're an enabler, sales leader, or data-curious professional, this episode will change the way you think about metrics, measurement, and what it truly means to be "data-driven."Episode LinksConnect with Dr. Tom Tonkin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drtomtonkin/Connect with Coach K on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmkmba/Mentioned in this episode:

According to a study from Gallup, training can improve a company’s productivity by 17% and profitability by 21% when offered to engaged employees. So how can you train and coach your reps to keep them engaged and help them hit their quotas? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win Win podcast. I am your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this is James Petkovski, the director of enablement technology at MetLife. Thank you for joining us, James. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. James Petkovski: Thank you for having me. I’m really excited to be here. And a little bit of a background on me and my role, so I was born and raised in New Jersey, entire family is there, I ended up venturing off to Arizona for college, trying to really experience life on my own, met my beautiful wife there, and then after about 10 years, we relocated back to New Jersey for a little where we had our daughter and I ultimately got my start at MetLife and started my career. At MetLife, I’m providing support for our sales teams in regards to their state licensing and FINRA registration. And I was in that role for a little over a year before I transitioned into sales enablement. Progressed through the enablement role from a consultant to a manager, and now to a director where I currently oversee the technology for our market enablement organization and can’t be happier. Enablement was one of those things I attended an ATD conference and was like, wow, so much sales enablement. And it just struck a chord. And I was like, I’m home. This is exactly what I want to be in. SS: It really is a career calling, I think, for the right folks, so I’m glad that it pulled you in, James. And, you know, as you mentioned, you have a wealth of experience as a sales enablement leader and as a technical analyst at MetLife. You walked us through your journey a bit into enablement. I’d love to understand how does your analytical background influence your enablement strategy? JP: So, always had a passion for the creative arts and One of the awesome parts of enablement is being able to blend both of those from that business analytical side with the creative side. And that really helped me excel in my role in enablement as I was able to solve the business needs with creativity, whether that was developing a learning path, creating videos, podcasts, e-learnings, like really thinking outside the box when it came to how are we going to deliver this in a fun and interesting way. And pulling into my analytical nature, some say I’m crazy, right? But my enjoyment in looking at data really helped me to think through and deliver the best strategy based on, you know, what were we needing? How can we take advantage from data from past learnings, like looking at trends on how our, you know, sales and service reps were engaging with, you know, that format that we provided? Did it, was it effective? So data really helped me tell the story and direct where we needed to go to make sure we’re putting that best learning forward. SS: I love that. I love that you’re applying both that creativity and that analytical component to it as well. It’s both art and science, I guess you could say. Now at MetLife, you’re responsible for developing and managing the training programs. What did training look like at your organization before you started to leverage Highspot and how has it evolved since then? JP: I think some aspects are similar, right? Before and after, we still do e-learnings. We still do videos, webinars, podcasts, the whole kind of learning gamut. I think the real difference came from, previously was a lot of manual work, from pulling reports from various platforms to derive. How effective was the learning? Was it attended? Excel trackers to guide a user through their quote on quote learning pathway. There was just a lot that was done manually, which took time, right? It took resources, and capacity. And this applied to the reps taking those programs as well, having to email their weekly trackers and take all their activities in different systems. So they were bouncing around. I just thought really put that experience together in providing that one-stop shop area for everything. So all those learning activities were all done and access right from the Highspot platform. So it really made that training journey truly about learning and not about how do I need to complete this and what system was I doing it in and kind of the nuances of that. And not only did it simplify the journey for the learner, but also like on the admin side, allowed us to capture that needed data, to be able to quickly look at completion statuses and see, Hey, where were opportunities, right? Like how I think having that quick insight allowed us to adapt quicker. SS: I love that. I love that. I want to circle back to that, but you had mentioned something earlier about all of the variety of learning content, including videos, simulations, and I should have known you had podcasts in there because you were a pro and you hopped on this podcast line already. But in your view, what are some of the key building blocks for effective training content? I JP: I think the biggest key is understanding each training is unique and you really need to come at it from that angle. What are you trying to get across to the audience? Like how quickly do you need to get that message across? And is it more in-the-moment learning or is it a big announcement that was changing the way people were? I think videos really allowed us to get information across quickly. It made things a little bit more bite-sized where we could also include best practices with it, which best practices really resonated. Podcasts allowed for that more conversational, to dive a little bit more into some of the nuances that just sometimes don’t come across in like maybe a direct webinar. And then e-learning and simulations allowed that. You know, hands-on experience and gave a little more interactivity and engagement to some longer form training. And I think the nice thing with the e-learnings and simulations is when you have systems that you’re training on, like being able to have a user get in there, click through some things like, hey, here’s what this area does. Those simulations help in that fail proof environment. And one thing I’ll share is. I don’t feel like a training needs to be one or another, right? Like I think series played a big part in what we do. And that could be starting with a quick introduction video, getting people grounded in a topic, then a webinar to really talk about the meat and potatoes. And then, you know, finally a podcast to wrap it up with some of those conversational nuances. So I would say like just each training come at it from a fresh angle. Thinking through what needs to be done and don’t be afraid to experiment and take that longer form, maybe like shorter tidbits, as opposed to just kind of, Hey, we’re just doing this, right? I think we have a lot of technology at our fingertips. SS: I love that. So going back to what you were saying, you really are at MetLife fostering a culture of continuous learning amongst your sales teams. I’d Love to understand how you, you foster that and you motivate them to enhance their skills and knowledge over time. JP: So I think having Highspot be that one stop shop really allows us to blend in with that continuous learning, right? Like having the resources all on the Highspot platform allows reps once they’re out of, say for example, like a new hire program or an academy program. They know that that content is still there in Highspot and they know how to locate that. So they’re getting accustomed to that being able to leverage the managed content feature within various other content in Highspot allows us to continue that training when needed mindset where for rep pulls up a certain marketing content, it’s, hey, have you taken this training or, hey, have you reviewed these speaking points? So being able to meet the reps where they are, whether they know they need it or not, I think is really how you kind of foster that continuing education is getting them set up with that structured program, having an area where they have access to continuing education on bite-sized topics. And then, Lastly, make sure that you’re kind of connecting that content with the past trainings that have been done. SS: I love that, that continuous learning journey for the folks that are in there. And you have achieved an amazing adoption of active learners and Highspot. I think you guys saw a 38 percent increase in active learners recently. How do you ensure reps consistently engage with and adopt your training programs? JP: So I attribute that to really the amazing work our training team do in our market enablement organization and by giving them a stellar, concise pathway, the reps that are, you know, that they know will walk them through the journey and get them to the finish line, building that rapport with not only the learners, but managers as well, like giving them that confidence that we got you, right? We got, we got them, right? Like for managers, we’re going to make sure they’re prepared with the knowledge. That’s part of those learning pathways is that managers also get that insight into how their reps are performing through it all as well. So they can keep in touch and really align with those opportunity areas that I was speaking a little bit about how on an admin backend side, like being able to quickly look at those analytics, it really allows you to tailor, hey, how do I focus my energy and efforts? SS: I love that. Now, going back to your analytics background, when you’re evaluating the success of your training initiatives and the overall sales readiness of the team, how do you leverage data to optimize these programs? JP: So we look at a lot of items and I would say it’s kind of a never-ending review on effectiveness. It’s taken us a while and we continue to this day, to grow in our understanding of what to do and how do we change and make things better. You know, from the time that rep starts to well after how have they been performing months, years after a training program, after taking it, looking only data and analytics, but gathering feedback too, is there anything we could have changed to prepare you better? Feedback is king, good or bad, I think, never be afraid of it. SS: I love that. And since implementing Highspot, what are maybe some of the business results that you’ve achieved and do you have any wins you can share? JP: Yeah, so I think from an admin side, the time to build pathways, courses, lessons has drastically decreased, you know, we have saved days with this as everything is really simple to create and previously where, you know, my team would have a large hand in building out the courses throughout the year after we set up the initial framework and templates. We have really been able to pass that down to some of our other devoted training teams within our market enablement to continue that process. And the process is straightforward that, you know, we just provide that guidance, but they’re the ones adding in that new content for the program. So this saves them time as well. Saves us time really allows us to really put our efforts toward guiding the reps. And then also thinking, hey, how do we innovate and push the boundary next time. And then from a ramp up timeframe, we’ve been really able to give reps not only a quicker timeframe to get ready for their role, but also get them familiar with the platform that they will be using day in and day out with Highspot. This helps with that easy transition, right? When they go to their full-time role, the dedicated courses and pathways with everything captured in one spot really allow them to get their learning done. And focus on the day to day work and shadowing afterwards. SS: I love that. And I have to say another win I saw was that you shared on LinkedIn that MetLife was named to Fortune’s world best workplaces list. And from an enablement leadership perspective, how do your training programs help cultivate a strong and healthy sales culture? JP: Yeah, so we have amazing onboarding and continuing education training teams and programs. I think having a great team definitely helps. I think the best part that we do is really setting up a rep with a fresh start. It’s not muddy. It’s direct. It gives not only reps what they need, but managers too. Becoming a leader, knowing that from the leadership side that my reps are being taken care of, and I don’t have to do all this work myself. And I have, you know, this amazing team around me. It really makes the process of preparing reps to do what they’ve been really brought here to do, and that is to achieve their best. So being able to get everyone on that same starting ground, just set them up for success and drives us to that healthy culture. I recently just had a new hire come on board my team and. Just the way we onboard them and get them all set up. It was nice because I didn’t have that much pressure on me. So it really allowed me to know that they were in that trusted hand. So that is one of the things that I think sets in a healthy culture of the manager has that confidence. And then that rep also has that confidence as well, getting started. SS: Amazing. Last question, James. To close, if you could give one piece of advice to someone looking to enhance training within their teams, what would it be? JP: I would say don’t be afraid. Whether it’s of feedback, of change, of data. Use that to cultivate and adapt the world of training and technology is ever evolving and the beauty of the connection we have nowadays from forums and conferences and you know, the works we have so much education out there that don’t be afraid of it. Take it one at a time. Don’t know how something will come across to your team? Implement a series, like have that be a portion of the learning. Maybe have a pilot group — pilot the idea with a certain team, see how it does, ask for feedback. Don’t be afraid and be bold. SS: Fantastic advice. Thank you so much for joining us today. I appreciate your time. JP: Thank you. Have a great day. SS: 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.

Our guest for Episode 72 is Karan Singh, VP GTM Strategy, Revenue Operations & Enablement, LaunchDarkly. Before joining LaunchDarkly, Karan held senior leadership positions at Sapphire Ventures, Procore Technologies, and SalesSource, where he spearheaded major product rollouts and guided organizational growth. In this episode, Ross and Karan discuss the importance of establishing consistent rituals and cadences, break down how to set and track SMART goals, and examine how technology can act as a force multiplier.

Explore our Business Central on-demand training courses at https://www.learndynamics.com/    Microsoft Fabric is transforming how businesses handle data in Dynamics 365 Business Central. By offering an end-to-end solution for data analytics, Fabric simplifies complex processes and opens the door to real-time insights   In this episode, Belinda Allen, Director of Enablement at iLink Digital and a Microsoft Certified Trainer, shares insights into the key benefits of integrating Fabric with Business Central.    Learn how Fabric enhances data management, separates compute from storage, and streamlines data modeling with tools like Azure Data Factory and Power BI. As Belinda Allen explains, “Fabric consolidates tools and eliminates the need to move data around, making workflows far more efficient.”    Explore how Fabric is reshaping data management and analytics in Business Central.    Listen now and see how to bring simplicity and power to your data workflows!

Christina Brady is a sales leader, entrepreneur, and the CEO of Luster.ai, a company dedicated to measuring and improving sales proficiency through AI. With 18 years of experience in sales, she is passionate about fixing broken hiring and onboarding processes and enabling professionals to succeed. Christina is also the Chicago Chapter Head of Pavilion and serves on the executive team at Women in Sales. Three Key Quotes from Christina Brady “If you don't measure proficiency, you don't know who you're hiring, how to up-level them, or why they struggle.” “AI isn't here to replace you—it's here to make you better at what you do.” “Founders have ‘magic' because they know the mistakes that have been made and the risks they're willing to take. You can't expect a new hire to replicate that.” In this insightful conversation, Christina Brady discusses why hiring and onboarding in sales are fundamentally broken and how AI can transform proficiency measurement. She also breaks down the “founder magic” that makes transitioning from founder-led to AE-led sales so difficult. This episode is a must-listen for leaders looking to scale effectively. 5 Key Takeaways on Finding Your Catalyst 1. The Hiring Process is Fundamentally Broken Companies often hire without a clear understanding of what makes a candidate successful. The interview process is subjective, leading to mismatches between candidates and roles. Relying on past success (e.g., quota attainment at another company) does not predict future success. 2. Onboarding Needs to Be Personalized and Continuous Most onboarding programs are generic and fail to address individual deficiencies. Employees are often left confused after onboarding, with no clear roadmap for success. The best organizations move from "onboarding" to "everboarding," offering continuous training and development. 3. Measuring Proficiency is the Key to Success Companies struggle because they don't objectively measure proficiency at the skill level. AI tools can now map skills, identify deficiencies, and predict performance gaps before they become issues. Without measurement, companies rely on subjective “gut feelings,” leading to inefficiencies and lost talent. 4. AI is a Tool for Enablement, Not Replacement AI should be used to enhance human capability, not replace it. The right AI tools help sales teams avoid revenue-impacting mistakes before they happen. Leaders must shift their mindset from fear to experimentation when adopting AI. 5. Founder-Led Sales is a Different Game Founders have “magic” because they understand the product deeply and can flexibly adjust deals. Expecting an AE to replicate a founder's selling process is unrealistic. The transition from founder-led to AE-led sales requires a structured process, proper tooling, and realistic expectations. Final Thought Learn. Think. and Act. with us every Sunday. Our Sunday email is filled with sections dedicated to helping leaders Learn. Think. and Act. These short weekly emails will help you make a difference and accelerate speed to impact at work, with self, and within your family. Subscribe here: https://www.findmycatalyst.com/learn-think-act-opt-in

In this special episode of The State of Sales Enablement, Felix Krueger flips the script and welcomes the show's own co-host, Jonathan Kvarfordt (Coach K), to the other side of the mic. Known for his deep insights into AI, sales enablement, and go-to-market strategies, Coach K shares his vision for AI in sales, the evolution of AI agents, and the intersection of human connection and automation.We dive into his latest role as Head of GTM Growth at Momentum, the launch of the AI Business Network, and how AI is reshaping everything from customer interactions to sales enablement workflows.Here's what we'll cover:✅ The role of AI in sales—how AI is shifting from a tool to a co-pilot for sales teams.✅ GPTs vs. AI Agents—the key differences and why agents are the next big leap.✅ AI automation in sales enablement—how enablers can amplify their impact using AI.✅ The future of AI in customer interactions—can AI replace sales teams, or does human connection still reign?✅ Momentum's approach to AI-driven sales workflows—why real-time conversation intelligence is a game-changer.✅ The risks of AI over-reliance—how to maintain critical thinking in an AI-first world.✅ Why authenticity will become a premium experience—how live interactions and in-person events will stand out in an AI-saturated world.Tune in to hear Coach K's unique perspective on where AI is headed, how it's already impacting sales and enablement, and what the future holds for human-AI collaboration.Connect with Coach K:

According to research from Forrester, organizations that align their go-to-market teams grow 19% faster and are 15% more profitable. So how can you foster effective cross-functional communication to break down silos and secure leadership buy-in for your enablement strategies? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Sonal Patel, the director of GTM enablement at Rakuten. Thank you for joining us, Sonal. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background and your role. Sonal Patel: Thank you for having me. So my name is Sonal Patel. I’m born in the fantastic city that is London, UK. Shout out to any fellow Londoners listening in. That was my base until about two years ago where I got an opportunity to relocate to US. I’m now living in a much warmer climate based out of Frisco, Dallas. So a little bit about my background. I started my career in digital marketing affiliates client side, which led me to join Rakuten Advertising, managing clients and leading the UK client services team. From there, I moved into a strategy and sales engineering role, supporting sales teams this time with deal analysis, pricing profitability, which was a great transition into sales enablement where I now support commercial teams globally. SS: We’re so excited to have you here now at Rakuten. You have held roles across the go-to-market organization from account management to client services and operations. Talk to us about your journey into your current role and how this experience influences your approach to go to market enablement. SP: Yeah, sure. How much time do we have for this one? Okay. So as I said, I started my career in client services and account management, and this gave me a deep understanding of client, needs and the challenges of building strong relationships and really driving that customer satisfaction. Managing complex accounts, leading high performing teams taught me what it takes to really deliver results. This experience, I would say shaped my approach to enablement. I focus on supporting commercial teams today with the right tools, a clear messaging, and content that really aligns with client expectations and business goals. I also, in this role, work very closely with our delivery teams to help our commercial groups really navigate that internal noise, ensuring that we’ve got alignment. So this spans across teams like product, product marketing, marketing, sales solutions, and more. SS: I love that journey. On LinkedIn, you also mentioned that you specialize in helping leaders overcome challenges to drive success. Can you share an example of a challenge that you’ve been able to help overcome for your business through enablement? SP: Yeah, a big challenge I came to understand is for our sellers really tailoring the experience to buyer needs while navigating really lengthy sales processes to stand out in the market. We really needed to streamline our messaging and make that experience more impactful. So one way I tackled this was by implementing digital showrooms, taking you back a bit. It started when a seller ran out of time during a pitch process to demo our dashboards. So we created short bite-sized demo videos showcasing our features. That prospects really cared about the most. And from there, I developed custom digital room templates that basically allows our sales teams to share our full product suite, as well as RFP documents and all of those documents that is needed within that sales process in less than five clicks. So this has been an absolute game changer. It’s helping us deliver tailored, engaging experiences, while really most importantly, simplifying that process for our sales teams. SS: Another common challenge I hear a lot about, I know a lot of enablement teams face, is gaining leadership buy-in, and this is an area where you have had a lot of success. I’d love to understand, what are some of your best practices for securing support for your programs from your executive leaders? SP: Yeah, sure. Great question. Securing leadership buy-in is tough. It’s not just about getting your foot in the door, it’s about keeping it there. It’s taken me years to figure out, if I’m honest. For me, it comes down to three things. Identifying the right stakeholders. Understanding their pain points and keeping the relationship ongoing and fluid. One aspect I’ll talk about here is early in my career, I thought I was a good listener, but I was really just waiting for my turn to talk. I’d latch onto a keyword and start crafting my response instead of actually processing what was being said. But when I started truly listening, things started changing. Leadership tells you exactly what they care about. And problem solving becomes a two-way conversation by focusing on their needs. And showcasing how my programs address their priorities. I’ve been able to build that trust and secure their support. But like I said, it’s taken years to really figure that out. It’s not a one-time effort. It’s really about maintaining that dialogue, staying adaptable and really continuing to deliver that value over time. So a lot of perseverance, I’d say it doesn’t come overnight. But yeah, I would go back to those kind of three things that I really identified to really help secure a leadership buy-in. SS: And what would you say is the impact of having strong executive support for enablement? SP: Strong executive support, I’d say is critical for enablement because it really drives that credibility, the prioritization and the adoption across the organization. It also ensures enablement is seen as that strategic function that it really is that impacts business outcomes and it’s not just a nice to have. I’m a pretty lean team here at Rakuten Advertising. So that again has taken. A good few years to really establish when leaders champion enablement, it really helps break down those silos. It aligns teams towards shared goals, secures the resources. I really need within enablement to really scale programs. And most importantly, I’d say, it fosters a culture of continuous learning, really empowering those teams to perform at their best and deliver better results for the business, ultimately, is our shared outcome. SS: Now, beyond executive leaders, how do you build and maintain strong relationships with key stakeholders at all levels of the organization, like cross-functional partners and frontline reps? SP: Yeah, great question. Another one that could probably spend a long time talking about. Building strong relationships with key stakeholders, especially reps. It’s all about the three pillars, if you like, which is consistency, collaboration, and trust. I focus on building rep relationships first, since they’re the ones using the tools and programs we create. One way I’ve done this is by launching a champions program. So partnering with our early adopters to test use cases, gather their feedback and then refine programs. So these champions also provide testimonials that have really helped me drive adoption across the various projects and deliverables that I’ve set out. It does take time and perseverance to build that trust and credibility, but it’s incredibly worth it. I also lean on my support system. What I mean by support system, this is my mentors at work, external enablement resources and events, coffee chats with other enablement professionals to really stay sharp and learn from their experiences. And I bring that into the activity that I’m running as well. So I’d say staying connected and open to feedback has really helped me build those kind of strong and lasting relationships. SS: And how have these strong stakeholder relationships helped you optimize and innovate your enablement programs? SP: Great question. The stakeholder relationships are really key for any enablement leader, in my opinion, because enablement is a partnership with sales leaders. We’re not the stick when enforcing things. We need sales leaders to really drive that accountability and frontline managers as well have to get behind the programs that we create for them to really succeed. My role, or an enablement role if you like, is to execute, really protect our sellers. And keep that chaos down by streamlining their experience. So when you have that trust and buy-in from stakeholders, from frontline managers, it’s easier to get that honest feedback to make improvements and create programs that actually work and are embraced by the team. So you’ve got that buy-in across all levels. SS: I love that. Shifting a little bit, one area where you’ve started to see a lot of traction with your reps is in the use of Digital Rooms. Can you tell us about your strategy for leveraging Digital Rooms and some of the results you’re seeing so far? SP: Yeah, so Digital Rooms have been a game changer for our reps. I spoke about this a little bit earlier. I’m going to go into a bit more detail. It all started when we couldn’t do a live demo during an RFP pitch. So working closely with sales reps and sales solutions, I created our first digital showroom tailored to our client’s needs, including 25 plus custom videos, centralizing resources, such as RFP decks, commercial proposals, and case studies. From there, I worked with sales leaders to get their buy-in. And what I mean by that is I took this one room that we created. Showcased it to sales leaders, and that led to the creating of regional and then vertical-specific rooms. After a lot of, I’d say, initial hand-holding and training, reps can now create a bespoke room in just under five clicks. We’ve scaled to over ten global templates, and these rooms are really helping reps deliver more tailored, impactful experiences, while making the process so much easier for them. A recent win for the business. That we secured in our sales or prospect actually called out the digital showroom as a standout feature versus competitors. They were speaking to it’s building that kind of trust, building those testimonials, going back to having your champions on the field. That’s really helped us kind of elevate digital showrooms and get the adoption that we have today. SS: Fantastic results. And on that note, how do you measure the impact of your enablement strategy and demonstrate that impact to your stakeholders? Are there any key wins you can share with us? SP: One way I measure the impact of enablement strategy at Rakuten is using heat maps to track activity on playbooks and initiatives. So we have a number of different plays that we push out to the business using high spot as well as digital room and pitch activity. So I share this with leaders to really show that engagement. I also work very closely in conjunction with sales leaders, as well as. Working closely with our content SMEs. So all of our subject matter experts that are producing a lot of this content to review the success of it. So the metrics that I focus on here are internal usage, as well as external engagement, especially through digital rooms by setting shared goals with all of these stakeholders quarterly. It helps my efforts stay aligned and focused on delivering business outcomes that we’ve set out. So it is a shared best practice there. SS: Last question. For enablement leaders looking to gain leadership buy- in within their organization, what is the biggest takeaway you’d leave them with? SP: I’ll share three takeaways with you that have really resonated with me. First is listen first, then act. And what I mean by that is take your time to truly understand leadership pain points and priorities. This took me years. Build trust by showing you’re solving their specific challenges and you’re not just pushing your own agenda. Second, I would say align enablement to business goals. Really clearly connect your programs to measurable outcomes that matter to leadership. So things like revenue growth, pipeline acceleration, or improved rep performance. Show them the why behind your initiatives. And then finally, the last thought I’d leave you with is around building those ongoing relationships. It’s really key. Leadership buy-in isn’t a one- time effort. Keep that relationship fluid by regularly sharing progress, results, and feedback, and really make them feel like partners in the process, not just stakeholders. SS: Thank you so much, Sonal, for joining us. I really appreciate it. SP: Thank you. Closing remarks, if I may, I would like to give a quick shout-out to some of my enablement coffee chat mentors that I talked about. The impact that a lot of the individuals I’m about to share with you have been really pivotal to my enablement journey and where I am today, my coffee trap mentors include Sheevaun Thatcher, Del Nakhi, Kate Jack, they’re all pretty big influences in the enablement space and they were fantastic to take some time out to speak to me about. They started their career in enablement and I was able to take a lot of those learnings and apply them to my day-to-day. Highspot leaders. We’ve got some fantastic mentors that I leaned in a lot and I continue to lean in. Raksha, Lisa, Laura in EMEA, and Matthew. And then finally my manager, mentor friend who gives me the space to really grow, test and learn and has been and is instrumental in contributing to my enablement success in recent years. And that’s Eric Nakano. SS: 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.

Faith Believes In Divine Enablement by Chicago Tabernacle

In this episode of The State of Sales Enablement, Felix sits down with Carolyn Breeze (CEO) and Lauren Calautti (Chief Revenue Rocketeer) from Scalare Partners, an ASX-listed investment firm operating in Australia and USA. Unlike traditional VC firms, Scolari Partners takes a hands-on approach—providing commercial services that help startup founders and scale-ups build and refine their sales motions for sustainable revenue growth.Carolyn and Lauren share their unique perspectives on sales enablement in the startup world, emphasizing why sales is just as critical as product development. Whether you're a founder, enabler, or sales leader, this episode is packed with insights on how to build scalable sales strategies from day one and how corporates can learn from startup agility.Here's what we'll cover:✅ The biggest sales challenges for startup founders—why sales is often an afterthought and how to correct that.✅ Building scalable sales functions—the process VC firms use to diagnose sales issues and implement effective strategies.✅ Sales acceleration in startups vs. enterprises—why corporate sales teams often lack the scrappy, high-impact approach of startups.✅ Technology for sales enablement—which tools are transforming sales efficiency and effectiveness.✅ VC firms as sales enablers—how VC firms can embed commercial success into their investment strategy.

2 Corinthians 10:7-18

02/16/2025At Covenant Word Church in Key West FL.

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report 2024, 20% of organizations see sales process as a key strategic priority. So how can you streamline your sales process and equip reps to win more and win faster? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win Win podcast. I am your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Scott McNabb, the chief sales officer at Verisk Marketing Solutions. Thank you for joining us, Scott. I'd love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Scott McNabb: Yeah, I'm thrilled to death to be here. Thank you so much. As mentioned, I'm the Chief Sales Officer for Verisk Marketing Solutions. I have been in and around the world, solving problems for major brands, major carriers, major tech companies, et cetera, for the better part of the last 20 years, so since I was nine years old, that's a joke, and have been leading sales teams, both in the data world and also in the SaaS software world over the course of my career. SS: Amazing. Well, Scott, we are honored to have you here. Given your extensive experience as a sales leader, you have seen the landscape evolve. I'm sure throughout that journey, but especially in recent years. What are some of the top challenges that you would say sales teams face today? SM: You know, I would say as relates to my use of different tools in the sales cycle, what I continue to evolve and learn from is the notion that sellers may not understand analytically where a Buyer stands in their buyer's journey. And it's evidenced by the fact that, again, going back to the conversational topic, they don't know the right material to provide to the right buyer at the right time that might resonate with them at the proper deal stage, more importantly, at the proper. Sort of category of ICP, right? The ideal customer profile. So sending the wrong material to the wrong buyer at the wrong time in the stage, and before you know it, you get lost in the deal cycle. And it is the number one challenge that sellers face, both in my current role and in previous companies that I've worked with is understanding where they are from a situational awareness perspective in the deal sort of cycle. I've got a military aviation background, and one of the things that we teach in fighter pilot school is helping the aviator understand where they are in the fight at any given moment, right? Where's the nearest, you know, fuel stop? Where's the enemy line versus the friendly line? You know, where do you stand three-dimensionally in relation to the buyer? In this particular example, but in relation to the enemy, you know, am I positioned properly to either fight and win or escape and save myself for another day? So to use the vernacular, that situational awareness is something that we teach in, you know, in our aviation community. And it's a construct situational awareness is a construct that we try. To guide, teach, coach, and sort of replicate for the sellers so that when they're in the deal cycle, that they understand where they are in relation to the challenge that the buyer faces. Does that make sense? SS: Absolutely. And I have to say, Scott, also very cool that you are in the aviation space. That is amazing. SM: It's 15 years of my life, lots and lots of time doing it, and it's amazing the corollaries between that situational awareness, the thing that you have to teach, and oftentimes young up-and-coming aviators, they get that they're flying the plane, and they get that it's moving in a forward direction, and they get what they have to do to get from here to there, do the thing you have to do, and return safely. But, you know, sort of advanced instruction is understanding three dimensionally where you fit in the fight. SS: I can see how that is a great analogy to sales. Now, from your perspective, how can enablement help sales teams overcome some of these challenges to achieve more success? SM: Well, let's be clear. So there's training and there's enablement. I think we get these two things confused. Training is what you do when you're trying to show somebody how to lift in the gym, right? Enablement is when they're thinking from a, again, three-dimensional perspective when we're guiding them to have critical thinking skills and understand if I'm here, then my next move is there, and we call it in our world, next best action. We built our entire sales enablement model around MBAs and the most often reasons why sales reps won't put deals and commit is because of the fear that if I asked you to commit, or if you're willing to stick your neck out and commit to a deal, Then somebody is going to ask you to have a plan for how you're going to execute on the mission. Right? And so it is the number one challenge. They say that I learned this from an amazing sales leader. Light is the world's best disinfectant, right? So enablement is about bringing deals into the light and via example, leading from the front, guiding, coaching. Enablement is not something that lives exclusively in an enablement department. It is something that is truly something that is to be led by the leaders. They have to exhibit and exemplify these skill sets so that the seller will feel as though we're all in the same set of airplanes after the same mission. And so enablement. Is that guidance tool, but again, it's not the enablement department exclusively. It is the seller, the sales leaders function. This is what, uh, I've got a sales leadership summit next week in Chicago with all my leaders and a big part of what I'm coaching on is how do you coach and enable your sellers? You can't just depend upon the enablement department to solve for the challenge. SS: I love that. You've essentially made enablement a cultural priority across your organization. And I know that you're passionate about developing high performance cultures. What are some of your best practices for building that culture within a sales team? SM: They say that culture eats strategy for breakfast. It's an old school book that's been around for 30 years and it's still never more true. And so culturally we have to guide the sellers from a culture perspective. Around the notion of franchise ownership, right? They have to own, understand the mission, be clear on the goals, be clear on the steps, and then accountability comes with culture. So again, a big part of what we're teaching next week is really just sort of an agreement between the sales leader and the sales rep on what is accountability and what does that mean, and then finally, Culture, whereby our one on ones are designed around four key concepts. Revenue first, right? Where you stand in the revenue picture, people, right? What people are you struggling with process? What processes are kicking your butt? And then finally innovation, right? Where we make it the responsibility of everybody culturally in the sales team to constantly be looking for ways to improve and innovate our process, right? So it's just not do it because I say that you do it. They have to be bought into that concept. And more importantly, they have to be challengers who look at the process and go, all right, well, look, that's kicking my butt. That's stupid. Why are we doing it that way? I got an idea. Why don't we do it this way, because we can shave three days off of the opposing cycle, or we can accelerate our deals because finally, culturally, it's all about velocity of deals. Culture has to be sort of digging in on the notion of increasing the velocity at which we move deals through the cycle. Because, you know, they say an army travels on its stomach, a sales team travels on velocity. SS: I could not agree more. So we talked in the intro and you mentioned it just now about the importance of a solid sales process. How can the sales process influence a high-performance culture? And what have you done to streamline the sales process to help kind of boost sales performance? SM: I love the question. Look, I think first and foremost, there's a massive change around this notion of servant leadership. So it's important that we start backwards from the challenge, which is a high-performing sales organization. It's funny. 10 years ago, servant leadership was not in vogue and as our sales teams have grown up, and we have Gen Z and we have Gen X and, and et cetera, all of a sudden they come from worlds where maybe they were not guided and coached the proper way. So weirdly enough, serving our teams, serving to the people that we were responsible for is back in vogue all of a sudden. So I think that step one is let's make sure that we start with the servant leadership methodology. Two, I think it's remarkably important that we pivot our sales model from a sales-led model to a customer-driven model, right? Our sales processes historically have been, where do you think you are in the deal? I'm at stage three, which means that I'm going to push them to do a thing. And then stage four, I'm going to hand them, these are the things that we do to manage our process. Whereas switching to a buyer-centric methodology, which is if I call the customer and ask them questions about where they are in their buying cycle, stage four, stage three, stage five, would the customer say that's where I am in my process for acquiring the thing that you sell, right? So switching to a customer centric model away from a sales centric model, this still exists and pervades. All over the industry, when it comes to sales organizations, we're tracking where you think you are in the deal. I want to know, where do you think the customer thinks they are in the buying cycle? If that resonates with you. SS: Oh, it absolutely does. And from your perspective, what would you then say is the strategic advantage that an enablement platform provides for improving the sales process? SM: All right, I'm going to go back to situational awareness. Sorry. At the end of the day, it helps the seller know more about where the customer is in their buyer's journey. Whereas in the old days, we would just, you know, enablement wise, we'd send out stuff and, you know, I wouldn't even know necessarily what they're looking at or what they're engaging with or what of my content resonates with them. But with an enablement platform, and I've used your platform in. Now, this is my third company and purchased it in two previous companies. You know, I find that it's a game changer because you're competing in a world whereby many don't have this thing and therefore the seller is blind. Again, going back to the military flying example, there's a notion called no joy, which means when I'm looking for the enemy and I can't find them. On the radio, you click off no joy, which means I don't have sight of where this guy is. This human that is my adversary. These kinds of tools provide the seller with that no joy moment where they go. All right. I do know exactly where they are. They're 300 feet below me. They're there at this speed and this course. And the enablement tool is a, for lack of a better term, it's a game changer for knowing where The customer is and where I as a seller can make better decisions about where they are in their buyer's journey down to the point of this materials not resonating. I sent the wrong stuff at the right time. In my current company, we use our enablement tool for both sales and CSMs and our solutions consultants and our marketing team, obviously to replace SharePoint so that we not only I can see as a leader. What's working? What's not? Where are they using? What pieces of content and what stage of the buyers journey? Wrong time, wrong content, wrong message, et cetera. So now I've got analytical knowledge on why is the deal stalling in stage, right? So I can run analytics out of salesforce that goes, all right, you're in stage four. We've shipped over a raft of content, but why is the deal, why is it not resonating with the buyer at this stage in the journey? Let's go backwards a step and figure out what did we miss and let the data then tell us and analytically help us understand where are we stalling in deals. And what's causing a velocity change? You get what I'm saying? SS: I do. I love that data-driven approach. How do you leverage data? If you have a few examples to refine and optimize the sales process? SM: Well, look, I think it comes down to and sorry, I'm going to go off track just two seconds, but know that I feel like that present company excepted. I have led sales leadership teams before where they were managing using analytics as a crutch. Instead of trying to understand what's going on, we're managing to the metrics. Activity wise, instead of managing to the metrics again around velocity around understanding what pieces of content resonates best, we're using analytics the wrong way. In my opinion, accountability. Yes, but activity for activity sake. No, right? Can't work that way anymore. So the less mature sales leaders are the ones that are basically sitting behind the steering wheel, looking at analytics to give them a false sense of security. Right. We got to take the analytical information and help us understand and make better decisions about what's working in the deal cycle. Why are things not progressing? Where are things stalling? Let's get a better picture about the deal cycle and not just lean on old school metrics. You know, email open rates and click through rates - they don't tell me anything. It's a vanity metric, right? Understanding how many sales meetings that they had this week, while that is a core metric for activity, it doesn't really tell me the quality of the meetings that you're having, right? That's what I care about. Yes, I certainly want you making the dials and I want you making the connections, but what I care most about is that Those amazing interactions with the buyers are turning into a valuable velocity change in the deal cycle. SS: I love that. And I know that all of that data is helping to inform a lot of the innovation that's coming out of AI. And I know that AI sales tactics are an area of interest to you. I'd love to hear directly from you. How do you plan to leverage innovation like AI to improve the sales process and the performance of your teams? SM: Again, great question. Timely topic. Obviously, at the beginning of that journey is where I would say that we are, but just getting sellers to use AI to even sort of have it guide them on what conversation would resonate with the buyer at this stage. With this problem, it's really not about AI. If you think about it, it's about building a library of AI prompts, because I find that the reason why sellers don't use AI is not because they can't figure out how to ask a question they're asking the wrong. Questions of the AI engine, and then they're surprised when they get a really, you know, stupid or flat line answer from the AI tool. It's not the AI tool's fault. It's we're asking the wrong question. So what I've asked my enablement team to do is build and load into my enablement platform a library of AI prompts that will provide the proper response. SS: I love that. I think that's phenomenal. Scott, last question for you. If you could give other sales leaders who are looking to improve their sales process one piece of advice for the year ahead, what would it be? SM: You know, I think it's impossible for me to give one piece of advice, but I think the predominant one is be a servant leader first, right? Have the team that you support. Accountability comes with servitude, right? So if we're serving the teams that we're supporting, then they will feel supported and guided and coached. If you've ever worked for a company that does not espouse the notion of servant leadership and is the opposite of that, which is often known as top-down leadership, then you don't feel very supported and you're not pulled Up, right? Servant leadership, I think, is back in vogue because people weren't feeling guided and coached and pulled, right? It's, I'm going to stand on you for what you're not doing, but not guide you on what you could be, what's possible to be done. And so that's, if anybody asked me, that's my number one thought is start backwards from servant leadership and Okay. Get really amazing at guiding, coaching, teaching, leading from the front. You know, it's the old-school model. I never am going to ask anybody to do something that I wouldn't do myself. That's an old school military term, but at the end of the day, it still works. Still works like a dream. SS: Absolutely. Scott, thank you so much for sharing your advice with our listeners today. I greatly appreciate the time. SM: It's my pleasure. Good luck, everybody. SS: 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.

According to the State of Sales Enablement Report 2024, 20% of organizations see sales process as a key strategic priority. So how can you streamline your sales process and equip reps to win more and win faster? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win Win podcast. I am your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Scott McNabb, the chief sales officer at Verisk Marketing Solutions. Thank you for joining us, Scott. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Scott McNabb: Yeah, I’m thrilled to death to be here. Thank you so much. As mentioned, I’m the Chief Sales Officer for Verisk Marketing Solutions. I have been in and around the world, solving problems for major brands, major carriers, major tech companies, et cetera, for the better part of the last 20 years, so since I was nine years old, that’s a joke, and have been leading sales teams, both in the data world and also in the SaaS software world over the course of my career. SS: Amazing. Well, Scott, we are honored to have you here. Given your extensive experience as a sales leader, you have seen the landscape evolve. I’m sure throughout that journey, but especially in recent years. What are some of the top challenges that you would say sales teams face today? SM: You know, I would say as relates to my use of different tools in the sales cycle, what I continue to evolve and learn from is the notion that sellers may not understand analytically where a Buyer stands in their buyer’s journey. And it’s evidenced by the fact that, again, going back to the conversational topic, they don’t know the right material to provide to the right buyer at the right time that might resonate with them at the proper deal stage, more importantly, at the proper. Sort of category of ICP, right? The ideal customer profile. So sending the wrong material to the wrong buyer at the wrong time in the stage, and before you know it, you get lost in the deal cycle. And it is the number one challenge that sellers face, both in my current role and in previous companies that I’ve worked with is understanding where they are from a situational awareness perspective in the deal sort of cycle. I’ve got a military aviation background, and one of the things that we teach in fighter pilot school is helping the aviator understand where they are in the fight at any given moment, right? Where’s the nearest, you know, fuel stop? Where’s the enemy line versus the friendly line? You know, where do you stand three-dimensionally in relation to the buyer? In this particular example, but in relation to the enemy, you know, am I positioned properly to either fight and win or escape and save myself for another day? So to use the vernacular, that situational awareness is something that we teach in, you know, in our aviation community. And it’s a construct situational awareness is a construct that we try. To guide, teach, coach, and sort of replicate for the sellers so that when they’re in the deal cycle, that they understand where they are in relation to the challenge that the buyer faces. Does that make sense? SS: Absolutely. And I have to say, Scott, also very cool that you are in the aviation space. That is amazing. SM: It’s 15 years of my life, lots and lots of time doing it, and it’s amazing the corollaries between that situational awareness, the thing that you have to teach, and oftentimes young up-and-coming aviators, they get that they’re flying the plane, and they get that it’s moving in a forward direction, and they get what they have to do to get from here to there, do the thing you have to do, and return safely. But, you know, sort of advanced instruction is understanding three dimensionally where you fit in the fight. SS: I can see how that is a great analogy to sales. Now, from your perspective, how can enablement help sales teams overcome some of these challenges to achieve more success? SM: Well, let’s be clear. So there’s training and there’s enablement. I think we get these two things confused. Training is what you do when you’re trying to show somebody how to lift in the gym, right? Enablement is when they’re thinking from a, again, three-dimensional perspective when we’re guiding them to have critical thinking skills and understand if I’m here, then my next move is there, and we call it in our world, next best action. We built our entire sales enablement model around MBAs and the most often reasons why sales reps won’t put deals and commit is because of the fear that if I asked you to commit, or if you’re willing to stick your neck out and commit to a deal, Then somebody is going to ask you to have a plan for how you’re going to execute on the mission. Right? And so it is the number one challenge. They say that I learned this from an amazing sales leader. Light is the world’s best disinfectant, right? So enablement is about bringing deals into the light and via example, leading from the front, guiding, coaching. Enablement is not something that lives exclusively in an enablement department. It is something that is truly something that is to be led by the leaders. They have to exhibit and exemplify these skill sets so that the seller will feel as though we’re all in the same set of airplanes after the same mission. And so enablement. Is that guidance tool, but again, it’s not the enablement department exclusively. It is the seller, the sales leaders function. This is what, uh, I’ve got a sales leadership summit next week in Chicago with all my leaders and a big part of what I’m coaching on is how do you coach and enable your sellers? You can’t just depend upon the enablement department to solve for the challenge. SS: I love that. You’ve essentially made enablement a cultural priority across your organization. And I know that you’re passionate about developing high performance cultures. What are some of your best practices for building that culture within a sales team? SM: They say that culture eats strategy for breakfast. It’s an old school book that’s been around for 30 years and it’s still never more true. And so culturally we have to guide the sellers from a culture perspective. Around the notion of franchise ownership, right? They have to own, understand the mission, be clear on the goals, be clear on the steps, and then accountability comes with culture. So again, a big part of what we’re teaching next week is really just sort of an agreement between the sales leader and the sales rep on what is accountability and what does that mean, and then finally, Culture, whereby our one on ones are designed around four key concepts. Revenue first, right? Where you stand in the revenue picture, people, right? What people are you struggling with process? What processes are kicking your butt? And then finally innovation, right? Where we make it the responsibility of everybody culturally in the sales team to constantly be looking for ways to improve and innovate our process, right? So it’s just not do it because I say that you do it. They have to be bought into that concept. And more importantly, they have to be challengers who look at the process and go, all right, well, look, that’s kicking my butt. That’s stupid. Why are we doing it that way? I got an idea. Why don’t we do it this way, because we can shave three days off of the opposing cycle, or we can accelerate our deals because finally, culturally, it’s all about velocity of deals. Culture has to be sort of digging in on the notion of increasing the velocity at which we move deals through the cycle. Because, you know, they say an army travels on its stomach, a sales team travels on velocity. SS: I could not agree more. So we talked in the intro and you mentioned it just now about the importance of a solid sales process. How can the sales process influence a high-performance culture? And what have you done to streamline the sales process to help kind of boost sales performance? SM: I love the question. Look, I think first and foremost, there’s a massive change around this notion of servant leadership. So it’s important that we start backwards from the challenge, which is a high-performing sales organization. It’s funny. 10 years ago, servant leadership was not in vogue and as our sales teams have grown up, and we have Gen Z and we have Gen X and, and et cetera, all of a sudden they come from worlds where maybe they were not guided and coached the proper way. So weirdly enough, serving our teams, serving to the people that we were responsible for is back in vogue all of a sudden. So I think that step one is let’s make sure that we start with the servant leadership methodology. Two, I think it’s remarkably important that we pivot our sales model from a sales-led model to a customer-driven model, right? Our sales processes historically have been, where do you think you are in the deal? I’m at stage three, which means that I’m going to push them to do a thing. And then stage four, I’m going to hand them, these are the things that we do to manage our process. Whereas switching to a buyer-centric methodology, which is if I call the customer and ask them questions about where they are in their buying cycle, stage four, stage three, stage five, would the customer say that’s where I am in my process for acquiring the thing that you sell, right? So switching to a customer centric model away from a sales centric model, this still exists and pervades. All over the industry, when it comes to sales organizations, we’re tracking where you think you are in the deal. I want to know, where do you think the customer thinks they are in the buying cycle? If that resonates with you. SS: Oh, it absolutely does. And from your perspective, what would you then say is the strategic advantage that an enablement platform provides for improving the sales process? SM: All right, I’m going to go back to situational awareness. Sorry. At the end of the day, it helps the seller know more about where the customer is in their buyer’s journey. Whereas in the old days, we would just, you know, enablement wise, we’d send out stuff and, you know, I wouldn’t even know necessarily what they’re looking at or what they’re engaging with or what of my content resonates with them. But with an enablement platform, and I’ve used your platform in. Now, this is my third company and purchased it in two previous companies. You know, I find that it’s a game changer because you’re competing in a world whereby many don’t have this thing and therefore the seller is blind. Again, going back to the military flying example, there’s a notion called no joy, which means when I’m looking for the enemy and I can’t find them. On the radio, you click off no joy, which means I don’t have sight of where this guy is. This human that is my adversary. These kinds of tools provide the seller with that no joy moment where they go. All right. I do know exactly where they are. They’re 300 feet below me. They’re there at this speed and this course. And the enablement tool is a, for lack of a better term, it’s a game changer for knowing where The customer is and where I as a seller can make better decisions about where they are in their buyer’s journey down to the point of this materials not resonating. I sent the wrong stuff at the right time. In my current company, we use our enablement tool for both sales and CSMs and our solutions consultants and our marketing team, obviously to replace SharePoint so that we not only I can see as a leader. What’s working? What’s not? Where are they using? What pieces of content and what stage of the buyers journey? Wrong time, wrong content, wrong message, et cetera. So now I’ve got analytical knowledge on why is the deal stalling in stage, right? So I can run analytics out of salesforce that goes, all right, you’re in stage four. We’ve shipped over a raft of content, but why is the deal, why is it not resonating with the buyer at this stage in the journey? Let’s go backwards a step and figure out what did we miss and let the data then tell us and analytically help us understand where are we stalling in deals. And what’s causing a velocity change? You get what I’m saying? SS: I do. I love that data-driven approach. How do you leverage data? If you have a few examples to refine and optimize the sales process? SM: Well, look, I think it comes down to and sorry, I’m going to go off track just two seconds, but know that I feel like that present company excepted. I have led sales leadership teams before where they were managing using analytics as a crutch. Instead of trying to understand what’s going on, we’re managing to the metrics. Activity wise, instead of managing to the metrics again around velocity around understanding what pieces of content resonates best, we’re using analytics the wrong way. In my opinion, accountability. Yes, but activity for activity sake. No, right? Can’t work that way anymore. So the less mature sales leaders are the ones that are basically sitting behind the steering wheel, looking at analytics to give them a false sense of security. Right. We got to take the analytical information and help us understand and make better decisions about what’s working in the deal cycle. Why are things not progressing? Where are things stalling? Let’s get a better picture about the deal cycle and not just lean on old school metrics. You know, email open rates and click through rates – they don’t tell me anything. It’s a vanity metric, right? Understanding how many sales meetings that they had this week, while that is a core metric for activity, it doesn’t really tell me the quality of the meetings that you’re having, right? That’s what I care about. Yes, I certainly want you making the dials and I want you making the connections, but what I care most about is that Those amazing interactions with the buyers are turning into a valuable velocity change in the deal cycle. SS: I love that. And I know that all of that data is helping to inform a lot of the innovation that’s coming out of AI. And I know that AI sales tactics are an area of interest to you. I’d love to hear directly from you. How do you plan to leverage innovation like AI to improve the sales process and the performance of your teams? SM: Again, great question. Timely topic. Obviously, at the beginning of that journey is where I would say that we are, but just getting sellers to use AI to even sort of have it guide them on what conversation would resonate with the buyer at this stage. With this problem, it’s really not about AI. If you think about it, it’s about building a library of AI prompts, because I find that the reason why sellers don’t use AI is not because they can’t figure out how to ask a question they’re asking the wrong. Questions of the AI engine, and then they’re surprised when they get a really, you know, stupid or flat line answer from the AI tool. It’s not the AI tool’s fault. It’s we’re asking the wrong question. So what I’ve asked my enablement team to do is build and load into my enablement platform a library of AI prompts that will provide the proper response. SS: I love that. I think that’s phenomenal. Scott, last question for you. If you could give other sales leaders who are looking to improve their sales process one piece of advice for the year ahead, what would it be? SM: You know, I think it’s impossible for me to give one piece of advice, but I think the predominant one is be a servant leader first, right? Have the team that you support. Accountability comes with servitude, right? So if we’re serving the teams that we’re supporting, then they will feel supported and guided and coached. If you’ve ever worked for a company that does not espouse the notion of servant leadership and is the opposite of that, which is often known as top-down leadership, then you don’t feel very supported and you’re not pulled Up, right? Servant leadership, I think, is back in vogue because people weren’t feeling guided and coached and pulled, right? It’s, I’m going to stand on you for what you’re not doing, but not guide you on what you could be, what’s possible to be done. And so that’s, if anybody asked me, that’s my number one thought is start backwards from servant leadership and Okay. Get really amazing at guiding, coaching, teaching, leading from the front. You know, it’s the old-school model. I never am going to ask anybody to do something that I wouldn’t do myself. That’s an old school military term, but at the end of the day, it still works. Still works like a dream. SS: Absolutely. Scott, thank you so much for sharing your advice with our listeners today. I greatly appreciate the time. SM: It’s my pleasure. Good luck, everybody. SS: 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 of The State of Sales Enablement, Coach K welcomes Alex Matyushenko, a seasoned enablement leader with experience at AWS, Google, and Microsoft. From driving sales excellence to leveraging AI for scalable impact, Alex shares his expertise on influencing at scale, enabling leaders, and building high-performing teams—even when those teams don't report directly to you.Here's what we'll cover:Enablement in 2025: What modern enablement really is and why it's more critical than ever.AI as an Enablement Superpower: How AI can enhance onboarding, sales readiness, and skill-building at scale.Influencing Without Authority: How to drive meaningful change even when you don't manage the sales team directly.The Power of Research: How Alex prepares for leadership conversations, identifies performance gaps, and builds enablement strategies that work.Execution Over Advice: Why enablement fails when it stays in “consulting mode” and how to ensure you deliver tangible business impact.The 3 Leadership Principles: Alex's framework for inspiring and leading teams effectively.Tune in for an insightful conversation packed with practical enablement strategies, leadership lessons, and AI-driven innovations that can help any enabler increase their influence and impact in 2025 and beyond.Connect with Alexander Matyushenko:

 People managers have a hard job. They have to set goals, manage resources, support real humans who are not always easy to support, and keep everything moving on time and within budget so the organization can meet its goals.That's why I've invited  Kamaria Scott, an I/O psychologist focused on people manager development and enablement, to join me on this episode. She's sharing how you can improve the health of your organization by investing in your people managers. ▶️ Improving the Health of Your Nonprofit through People Manager Development and Enablement with Kamaria Scott ▶️ Key Points:00:58 The role of a people manager04:18 Kamaria Scott's background and career journey 11:04 Defining people manager development and enablement15:24 Challenges nonprofits face with their people managers19:51 Solutions for effective nonprofit people manager support23:42 Evidence-based leadership28:21 The first step to investing in your nonprofit's people leadersResources from this episode:Join the Nonprofit Learning and Development Collective: https://www.skillmastersmarket.com/nonprofit-learning-and-development-collectiveWas this episode helpful? If you're listening on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, follow and leave a review!

SummaryLuis Baez, a sales and revenue enablement leader. Luis shares his journey from growing up in poverty in Puerto Rico and the Bronx to achieving success in the corporate world. He discusses the importance of cultural identity, empathy, and effective communication in both personal and professional settings. Luis emphasizes the significance of understanding different perspectives and the common human experiences that connect us all. He also delves into his transition into sales and leadership, highlighting the confidence he gained and the impact he aims to have on others through his work in sales enablement.Learn More about Sam KnickerbockerFuel Your Legacy: 9-Pillars to Build a Meaningful LegacyLearnFromLuis.comTakeawaysLuis Baez emphasizes the importance of cultural identity in shaping one's perspective.Empathy is a crucial skill developed through diverse life experiences.Direct communication can be misinterpreted in different cultural contexts.Sales enablement is about connecting sales, marketing, and operations for success.Imposter syndrome is a common experience among successful individuals.The confidence gained in sales can lead to broader opportunities in leadership.Understanding the DNA of a team is essential for fostering a positive work environment.Celebrating success is vital for team morale and motivation.Luis's journey reflects the power of resilience and adaptability.Helping others achieve their goals is a core part of Luis's mission. Chapters00:00 Introduction to Luis Baez and His Journey01:32 Luis's Early Life and Background11:46 Cultural Identity and Empathy20:14 Navigating Communication Styles27:28 Transitioning into Sales and Leadership39:12 Sales Enablement and Business Success

In this special episode of "Stepping into your Leadership," host Christine Courtney invites a distinguished guest who's not only an inspiring CEO but also her partner in life— Phillip Courtney. Phillip Courtney shares invaluable insights into how the Six Types of Working Genius can transform any workplace, drawing from his own experience as the CEO of Urban Arts.Urban Arts, under Phillip's leadership, revolutionizes education through arts and technology across the country. Phillip discusses the three pillars of their mission— game development, college access, and connecting alumni to the workforce, all while emphasizing that a child's education shouldn't depend on their zip code. The episode provides a compelling behind-the-scenes look at how the Six Types of Working Genius have positively influenced his organization.Episode Highlights:Introduction to the Six Types of Working Genius: Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, and Tenacity.Real-life examples of how implementing the Six Types of Working Genius has improved team dynamics and productivity at Urban Arts.How understanding and utilizing these working geniuses can help place staff in roles where they find the most joy and satisfaction.Tips on using the Six Types of Working Genius for better meetings, teamwork, and identifying the right roles for team members.Phillip mentions the utility of the model in everyday work, from running meetings to goal-setting.Christine and Phillip discuss how they apply the principles of the Six Types of Working Genius in both their personal and professional lives.The importance of not "gaming" the test and answering authentically to get the most accurate insights.Practical tips for CEOs and leaders on using the Working Genius framework to boost morale and efficiency.Use the Working Genius results to build well-rounded teams.Plan meetings and projects with individual geniuses in mind to ensure the best outcomes.Join us as we dive deep into this dynamic framework and discover how you can start applying these principles immediately to see positive changes in your work environment.Listen now and step into your leadership with the wisdom of the Six Types of Working Genius! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the season finale of The Enablement Edge, hosts Steve and Amber chat with Stephanie Middaugh, Founder & CEO of Phoenix GTM Consulting, about where to succeed in enablement in 2025.Together, they tackle the industry's current challenges, including burnout and exhaustion among professionals, while highlighting the need to sustain passion and empathy in these roles. Stephanie shares actionable strategies for navigating market uncertainties and organizational obstacles, emphasizing the importance of prioritizing skill-building over task-focused activities and looking to what is actually within your control.The discussion also explores Stephanie's book, Elevate and Optimize: Your Enablement Maturity Journey, which provides practical guidance on advancing enablement functions and setting achievable goals. Stephanie shares her insights into effective maturity models, the current and future impact of AI on enablement, and the transformative potential of a well-aligned enablement strategy. Her advice inspires listeners to stay focused on their enablement objectives and drive meaningful change within their organizations.—Guest BioStephanie Middaugh is a seasoned expert in revenue enablement and sales operations, known for her innovative approach to training and process improvement. She is currently a CSM with Luster, a cutting-edge AI sales practice and upskilling solution that is revolutionizing how go-to-market teams learn and practice. However, Stephanie is also the Founder & CEO of her own business, Phoenix GTM Consulting.Most recently, Stephanie was the Head of Global GTM at Pinecone. With a career spanning leadership roles at Zoom, Divvy Inc., DataStax, Alteryx, and Sage, she has consistently built scalable enablement frameworks supporting global sales teams. Passionate about fostering community and delivering impactful programs, Stephanie continues to be a thought leader in the enablement space.—Guest Quote“People are tired, exhausted, and burnt out. But that passion is still burning. We want to help. So we're still going to be there. Enablement as a profession is still going to get these initiatives, trainings, and everything [else] through. We're still going to be bought into helping our reps succeed and seeing the business move forward. Even though it kind of goes through these ups and downs and ebbs and flows, enablement is going to be here for a while, and it's the companies that know how to properly leverage it that are going to see the results at the end of the day.” —Time Stamps 00:00 Episode Start4:45  How Stephanie defines enablement6:38 Facing burnout in 20259:56  Where is all this pressure coming from?12:50  Moving foward despite uncertainty16:13 Focus in on what you can control18:20 Elevate and Optimize: Your Enablement Maturity Journey24:37 Does your enablement team have to be large to be mature?28:11 Transformational enablement31:40 On the Edge—LinksConnect with Stephanie Middaugh on LinkedInRead “Elevate and Optimize: Your Enablement Maturity Journey”Check out Phoenix GTM ConsultingCheck out LusterConnect with Steve Watt on LinkedInConnect with Amber Mellano on LinkedInCheck out Seismic

In this episode of The State of Sales Enablement, Jonathan Kvarfordt (Coach K) welcomes Aaron Evans, co-founder of Flow State, a B2B sales performance and transformation consultancy. Aaron has spent 15 years in enablement, working across multinational corporations and fast-moving startups, and today he shares his insights on sales transformation, methodology adoption, and why enablement must be laser-focused on pipeline impact.Here's what Jonathan and Aaron discussed:

Dr. Josh Prieur was a former Vice Principal, and now works for Prodigy Education as the Director of Education Enablement. In this episode, we discuss how he made the switch from the classroom to the EdTech industry, how to make game-based learning impactful in classrooms—as well as fun, and more! Join us to learn more about Josh, Prodigy, and his EdTech journey! Find Josh on Linkedin.  Free Quiz: What career outside of the classroom is right for you? Explore the course that has helped thousands of teachers successfully transition out of the classroom and into new careers: The Teacher Career Coach Course Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of The Tech Trek, Amir Bormand sits down with Scott Peachey, Director of Data Governance and Oversight at Bread Financial, to explore the evolving world of data enablement. Together, they unpack how rebranding data governance can shift perceptions, make data accessible across organizations, and foster a culture of collaboration. Scott shares his insights on tackling the challenges of data literacy, meeting business stakeholders where they are, and the importance of tailoring governance approaches to align with organizational goals. The conversation also delves into the intersection of advanced technologies like generative AI and governance, examining how businesses can adopt AI strategically without blindly following trends. Key Takeaways Data Enablement Redefined: Rebranding "data governance" to "data enablement" highlights its role in empowering organizations to use data effectively, not just managing compliance. Meeting Stakeholders Where They Are: Effective data governance requires understanding the unique needs of each business line and tailoring solutions to fit their objectives. Shifting Left: Engaging governance professionals early in the decision-making process helps prevent costly, reactive fixes and ensures alignment with business goals. AI: A Hammer Searching for a Nail?: Many companies adopt AI without clear goals, risking wasted resources. Scott advocates for purposeful, strategic AI integration. Governance as a Value Driver: Data governance should go beyond risk mitigation, enabling other teams to focus on their core work while maintaining efficiency and compliance. Timestamped Highlights [00:01:00] What is Data Enablement? Redefining governance for a modern era. [00:03:00] Origins of Governance: From Enron to privacy-driven modern policies. [00:06:00] Data Literacy Challenges: Bridging the gap with tailored governance approaches. [00:08:52] Adapting Governance for Business Needs: Customizing solutions for different teams. [00:11:00] The Future of Data Governance: Moving from reactive to proactive. [00:21:41] AI Governance and Ethics: Why "keeping up with the Joneses" is not enough. [00:27:00] Is AI Investment Worth It? Balancing ROI with ethical considerations. Notable Quote "Data governance professionals enable other data professionals to focus on their craft. Governance isn't about saying 'no'; it's about building the right framework to help businesses thrive."– Scott Peachey Resources and Follow-Up Connect with Scott Peachey on LinkedIn Check out his podcast: Data with Peachey Follow him on social media: Twitter/Instagram @TheScottPeachey Join the Conversation If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to The Tech Trek, leave a review, and share your thoughts on how data governance impacts your organization.

Christine Boremeester, Senior Director of Strategy & Enablement at Deltek, joins Kristi Faltorusso, CCO at ClientSuccess, and Josh Schachter, Co-Founder & CEO of UpdateAI, to share invaluable insights into how Deltek continues to innovate and serve its global customer base. Tune in to explore Deltek's ambitious initiatives, including the creation of specialized customer success roles and the challenges of standardizing processes across a diverse range of products and customers. Christine also highlights her team's excitement and anticipation as they prepare to launch these transformative changes, aimed at elevating customer relationships and driving business growth. Timestamps 0:00 - Preview & Intros 3:00 - Christine's Career Evolution 4:15 - Formation of the Strategy and Enablement Group 11:00 - Team Structure & Implementation 12: 19 - Hiring Plans & Profiles 13:40 - Expectations from CSMs 17:40 - Diverse challenges due to multiple products and systems 20:51 - Team Sentiment and Engagement ___________________________

In this TACoS Tuesday episode, we answer over 20 of your top Amazon PPC questions with the help of our first-time expert guest who brings a wealth of knowledge to our show. ► Instagram: instagram.com/serioussellerspodcast ► Free Amazon Seller Chrome Extension: https://h10.me/extension ► Sign Up For Helium 10: https://h10.me/signup  (Use SSP10 To Save 10% For Life) ► Learn How To Sell on Amazon: https://h10.me/ft ► Watch The Podcasts On YouTube: youtube.com/@Helium10/videos How can you elevate your Amazon advertising game and maximize your e-commerce success? Join us as we welcome Anne Harrell, Head of Product Evangelism & Enablement from Pacvue, to answer over 20 of the most pressing PPC questions from our listeners. Bradley and Anne's deep expertise offers a fresh perspective on how Helium 10 and Pacvue can complement each other, helping brands at various stages of their Amazon-selling journey. She dives into the latest innovations Amazon has lined up for 2024, like AMC and expanded sponsored ads, which aim to give sellers unprecedented insights into customer behavior. Throughout the episode, Anne shares actionable strategies for mastering Amazon ad campaigns. Bradley and Anne also break down the complexities of setting up effective campaigns, sharing how tech tools like Helium 10's Keyword Tracker can fine-tune your bids beyond basic estimates. We also touch on the power of automation with tools inside Pacvue, which can alleviate the burdens of manual campaign management and enhance overall efficiency. Anne emphasizes the role of external traffic and audience maximization within Amazon's ecosystem, offering a balanced approach to boost organic sales alongside advertising efforts. Finally, we explore the nuances of Amazon PPC strategy, from mitigating rising ACoS to the strategic use of AI in campaign management. Anne shares her fascinating journey from the advertising world to her pivotal role at Pacvue, along with resources like TACoS Tuesday for those keen on deepening their PPC knowledge. Whether you're working to optimize your PPC campaigns or looking to learn effective strategies, this episode is packed with insights to fuel your Amazon success story. In episode 633 of the Serious Sellers Podcast, Bradley and Anne discuss: 00:00 - Amazon Advertising Solutions 02:57 - Helium 10 and Pacvue 06:32 - Amazon Ads, CES Announcement 08:30 - PPC Campaign Optimization Strategies 09:25 - Optimizing Keyword Bids for Product Launch 12:42 - Optimizing Amazon Campaigns for Keywords 16:05 - Optimizing Campaign Management Frequency 22:56 - Effective Ad vs. Organic Sales Ratio 23:34 - Driving Sales Through Advertising and Optimization 28:34 - Finding Trending Keywords for Sponsored Products 32:22 - Product Display Ads Optimization & Competitor Avoidance

Coach K (Jonathan) is an AI and Enablement expert and business consultant, deeply engaged in how emerging technology reshapes industries. Known for his sharp insights into leveraging AI for efficiency, scalability, and innovation, Jonathan shares transformative ideas about staying ahead in a rapidly evolving tech landscape. Key Quotes: "AI isn't just a tool; it's an amplifier for human potential. It's about taking what makes you unique and multiplying it by ten." "Are you willing to think and do things differently from what you've done before?" "The moat of the future will be humans and what one person can do with a fleet of AI agents." Jonathan (Coach K) explores the transformative power of AI agents, challenging listeners to rethink their approaches to business and technology. From automation to amplifying human skills, he unpacks the mindset shifts needed to thrive in a future where innovation is constant, and adaptability determines success. Find your Catalyst at https://www.findmycatalyst.com/ 5 Key Takeaways: The Role of AI as a Catalyst: AI amplifies individual capabilities, turning a person's expertise into scalable results. Effective prompting and expertise produce exponentially better AI outputs. Companies leveraging AI for automation experience dramatic efficiency gains. Thinking Differently in the AI Era: Adopting a beginner's mindset allows exploration and continuous learning. Old strategies may not apply—AI opens doors for innovative solutions. Success requires being uncomfortable and testing boundaries. The Power of Agents in Automation: Agents go beyond chatbots by making decisions and executing tasks autonomously. They can create workflows, analyze results, and iterate without constant input. Businesses must learn to trust and train AI for complex operations. AI as a Revenue Plumber: AI can identify inefficiencies and leaks in business processes. Outcome-based approaches ensure technology is aligned with measurable results. Thinking of AI as a partner, not just a tool, maximizes its potential. Bridging the Comfort Gap: Start small but aim for large-scale innovation by testing AI in safe areas. Challenge limiting mindsets, such as seeing AI as an "intern." Encourage teams to view AI as an extension of expertise, not a replacement. Connect with Coach K: Find Jonathan (Coach K) on LinkedIn for updates, insights, and resources. Stay tuned for his upcoming projects on leveraging AI agents to create transformational change. Connect with Coach K at https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmkmba/ 

In this episode of the Professional Services Pursuit, Banoo is joined by Meredith Brake, VP and Head of Service Ops and Enablement at Altus Group, to kick off a new series simplifying the complex process of purchasing technology or software solutions. This series breaks down each step, making it easier to navigate. Meredith shares actionable insights on evaluating workflows, addressing pain points, and setting clear goals for implementing new software solutions. The discussion highlights the selection and implementation of a platform, offering best practices for success.Core topics covered:Defining business requirements: Separating must-haves from nice-to-havesImplementation best practices and successful change managementUsing data to improve decision-making and track engagement marginsStrategies for effective training and ongoing support Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.