Welcome to OrchestrateSales.com's Inside Sales Enablement Season 3 Enablement History. Where we hop in the Enablement Time machine and explore the past, present, and future of the elevation of a profession.

On ISEs3 Episode 12, Erich Starrett is joined by Dr. Shawn Fowler, whom he originally met when Shawn was VP, Sales Enablement (a true cross-functional #Orchestrator) at SalesLoft, and a gracious host of his first executive board meeting as President of the Atlanta Revenue Enablement Society back in early 2020. Before then, Dr. Fowler had been the World Wide Director of Enablement & Learning for IBM, and is now a Partner in his own sales strategy and sales enablement consulting venture: RevenueReady.

Highlights from the episode include...

PAST:

⌛️ Shawn "stumbled" into the profession working as the first services salesperson for Silverpop - essentially selling desired business outcomes. The SVP of sales, Todd McCormick, announced he was hiring a head of sales enablement and the hiring manager Drew Pronté said "hey, the CEO said that you should probably be the guy."

⌛️ He didn't know what sales enablement was. At the time he was pursuing a PhD in educational psychology so he combined what he learned from working as a sales engineer and as a services salesperson with what he knew about how psychology of learning works ...and he found himself implementing their first ever Sales Enablement program.

⌛️ His first Sales Enablement event was hosted by SiriusDecisions in Atlanta. "I was thinking we need to start something where we do that on a regular basis. This was easily the most valuable thing that I've done in the last six months."

⌛️ "Getting a seat at the table was probably the biggest factor in helping me be successful in sales enablement."

⌛️ Silverpop was purchased shortly thereafter by IBM when he then developed and executed their global expansion go-to-market plan. "I had the opportunity to see what it looks like in a much bigger level. IBM is basically a handful of multi billion dollar companies all put together. And I was part of one of those multi billion dollar companies inside of it. I got to see how these really big enterprise complex sales work, how you have to enable people across multiple different continents."

⌛️ Shaw was responsible for internal sales enablement including customer service and sales engineers and external - partner enablement - as well. "I think it makes a lot of sense, honestly, when you are in that position you have the opportunity to identify and eliminate a lot of the organizational issues that negatively affects your customer and that negatively affect the team as well."

PRESENT:

💼 Dr. Fowler diagnosed a few challenges that Sales Enablement faces today:

🩺 "I think there's not enough sharing of best practices"

🩺 "The quality of sales enablement as a profession has gone down pretty dramatically in the last five years."

1 - A lot of heads of sales are hearing from their investors that they need sales enablement but there was a period of time where I don't think a lot of them really knew what it meant.

2 - Heads of sales aren't always great at hiring enablement. Recognizing talent can be difficult.

3 - There is a lot of fluff. There was a period of time where sales was a lot easier and there's an entire generation of people who are in sales enablement who didn't have to figure out how to build a better machine. They could get away with adding more people to the machine and adding revenue by doing that. With venture capital drying up there's a much bigger focus on productivity. In order to achieve productivity per rep, you have to build a better machine.

🩺 The Doc offers REMEDIES to these challenges.

💼 Shawn shares a sample dive into RevenueReady's Customer Journey Workshops and parallel playbook creation approach.

💼 The power of a bottom-up approach, involving Sales Managment / the front line in the problem framing and in the solution process. A top-down only approach lacks the tactical information from the field needed to correctly identify and frame the problem, make good decisions, and design a solid solution. It also increases adoption because the front lines were involved in shaping it.

💼 In order to succeed you must both design an effective intervention, and then execute the reinforcement required to drive real change.

💼 "Sales (Revenue) Enablement is the change management arm of revenue." WGLL shoutout to Hillary Headlee who exemplified this at Zoom, having owned both global Ops AND Enablement ...during the height of Covid! And now she's doing it at the global Advisory Leader, Growth Team @ Insight Partners

for 500-700 companies.

💼 Interview advice for Enablement: Focus on the first 90 days through the lens of the CRO. Have the attitude that you will onboard as if you are planning to be in the top 10-15% of their sales team.

FUTURE:

🤖 There's increasing recognition of the role of enablement in change management and increasing recognition of the need for an explicit change managing function in organizations. At least in more successful companies, that's what what enablement is going to be seen as.

🤖 Increased focus on frontline managers on both the new and existing sales side of the house, because the reality is everything lives or dies with the frontline manager.

🤖 AI is going to evolve and facilitate some things. The power of artificial intelligence to comb through, for instance, the thousands of minutes that are produced on a weekly basis in Gong or SalesLoft or whatever, and distill that down into insights or into moments that everyone should take notice of can be really powerful when it comes to training, coaching, and identifying what works.

Please click 👇🏻, subscribe 📲, listen 🎧 ...and 🎙️ join the conversation! 

ORCHESTRATE Sales!

Erich

#RevenueEngine #DigitalTransformation

#RevenueEnablement

#AiCuriousHumanEnthusiast

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Erich Starrett: 00:00:00

Hello everyone, and welcome to Inside Sales Enablement,

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Season Three, Enablement History.

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And on today's episode, I

am so excited to have Dr.

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Sean Fowler himself on the show.

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He is an Atlantan I met him through

sales loft who was actually an incredible

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sponsor of the sales enablement society

way before I was even a part of it and

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they're near and dear to my heart as

a company and They, not only put on

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an amazing conference rainmaker back

in my earlier days Where I learned so

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much from sean and his peers and the

amazing people that they attracted but

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they also hosted our first executive

board session when I became president

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of the sales enablement society.

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So Sean, you and sales loft are

a part of my enablement history,

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and I thank you for that.

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And I'm so glad that you are in my

present and hopefully future as well.

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So

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: That's awesome Erich.

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Thank you.

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I'm happy to be here today.

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Be here today.

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Erich Starrett: Dr.

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Fowler was the worldwide director

of enablement and learning for

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this little blue chip company

called IBM back in the day.

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That technology mecca, which informed him,

I'm sure, landing at Sales Loft and being

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the vice president of sales enablement.

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And now is a partner in revenue ready.

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Sean is one of the few folks that

I've met that truly, embodies this

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idea of enablement orchestration.

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Seeing how he interacted with everyone

in the company, he truly ran a cross

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functional enablement business within

a business at sales loft, which is

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one of the three founding positions

of the sales enablement society.

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And he had folks assigned doing different

flavors of enablement within the company.

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And he's been a part of elevating the

profession from his days back in IBM,

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whether or not enablement was a thing.

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Sean, I'm going to hand

the mic over to you.

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Finally.

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Thanks for being patient and

letting me wax poetic for a minute

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: Yeah, man.

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Thank you.

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I'm really excited to be

talking to you today..

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RevenueReady is it's been

a long time in the making.

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I first had the idea for the

company before I joined SalesLoft.

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Actually, if SalesLoft had not

offered me a job, I think I probably

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would have started the company then.

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But I don't think I would

have been As good at it.

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So remedy ready is basically

a sales strategy and sales

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enablement consulting company.

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We work primarily with B to B

sass organizations, typically

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series a to B and then on up.

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We've got some public companies

who are customers as well.

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And we basically are trying to.

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Remove the risk of sales execution

from your company strategy.

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There's a lot of reasons

a company can fail.

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Sales execution should not be one of them.

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So that's what we focus on.

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Erich Starrett: And what

about revenue operations.

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: We do

lightweight revenue operations.

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Like we've got some

reasonable rev ops jobs.

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You have to be good at enablement.

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I think, you have to really

understand the data, how to pull

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the data, which data is right for

which situation, things like that.

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But when it gets beyond light revenue

operations, we pull other people in.

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Typically we stay in our lane.

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Erich Starrett: Makes a lot of sense.

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Question number one, Sean.

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What do the words sales

enablement mean to you?

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And when did you first hear them?

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Dr: Yeah, I answered

the second part first.

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I started my entire

career was an accident.

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That's the first thing to point out.

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Erich Starrett: Sounds like my life.

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I love it.

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Dr: I was a, I was at a

company called silver pop.

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I was doing I was doing training.

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So I got hired to be a to train customers,

to be on the customer training team, and

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I mostly got hired to do the technical

parts of the training process because

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I have a programming background.

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So I was handling like the API

training and stuff like that.

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Like the nerdier stuff.

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And I done that for a couple of

years, went into sales engineering.

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Really enjoyed sales engineering.

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At some point they decided to hire

their first services salesperson.

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So I became the first

services salesperson.

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I had a quota that was just services

I had to attach to, new logo deals.

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And really leveled up a lot as a

salesperson during that brief period of

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time, because when you sell services,

you are literally selling outcomes.

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That's it.

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That's all you can sell.

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So you have to really get deep on

understanding what their desired goals

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are, why they can't reach those goals

right now, and helping to paint the

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picture of what it's gonna look like

once you help them become successful.

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We had a newer SVP of sales.

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And he announced in a meeting that he

was hiring the head of sales enablement.

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I was actually coaching a friend

to maybe apply for that role.

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And the hiring manager drew Pronte.

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One of the best managers I've ever had.

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He came to me and was like, Hey, the CEO

said that you should probably be the guy.

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So are you interested?

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I applied.

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I didn't know what sales enablement was.

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I didn't know it was a thing I had

to put together a presentation for

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like how I would handle the sales

enablement role at the time I was

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getting my PhD in educational psychology.

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So I just took what I learned

from working as a sales engineer

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and as a services salesperson and

combined it with what I knew about

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how psychology of learning works.

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And put it together, got the job

and then had to figure it all

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out as I went along at the time.

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That was 2013 probably

is when I got started.

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. Erich Starrett: So that is pre sales

enablement society post Forrester

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definition, starting to officially see it

clearly as a position and a function or

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else it wouldn't have been posted for you.

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Dr: Yeah.

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Shortly after I took

the role of silver pop.

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It was pretty clear to me.

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I didn't know what I was doing it.

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I remember we had a contract with

Serious Decisions, who is, I think

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they're owned by Forrester now.

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So at the time it was

just Serious Decisions.

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They focused primarily on marketing.

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And we had a contract with them and

I had the opportunity to go to a

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sales enablement event in Atlanta.

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There were other sales enablement

practitioners there, and it was incredible

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because there were other people,

some of them knew things I didn't.

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Most of us were all trying

to figure out the same thing.

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Serious decisions, had

some ideas around it.

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It was like super useful.

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And I remember leaving that event.

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And thinking I think we need

to start something where we

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do that on a regular basis.

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This was easily the most valuable

thing that I've done in the

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last six months, you know?

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But I was trying to get a PhD at the time.

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I had two small kids, had a full time

job, like I had, a lot of stuff going

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on, but I was happy that they were

just other people who were dealing

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with the same problems that I was, and

they were trying to find a way forward.

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It was useful to meet other people

who are doing the same things.

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Most of my mentors were actually people

that I worked directly with though.

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I've been fortunate to have had some

really good bosses at Silverpop.

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My boss, the head of rail ops

and enablement was Drew Pronte.

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And he reported to our SVP of sales,

Todd McCormick, both of those guys,

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I think had gone through both PGI and

career builder, if I remember correctly.

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And so those were really

good sales organizations.

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If you're in Atlanta, there was a

period of time where most of the

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people that you knew were probably

part of that diaspora, and so

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Erich Starrett: That is

a doctor word, diaspora.

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I'm going to have to look

that one up afterwards.

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I love it.

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: Getting a seat

at the table was probably the

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biggest factor in helping me be

successful in sales enablement.

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I had bosses who gave me a seat

at the table early on., Todd would

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pull us both in and be like, Hey,

here's what I'm seeing with the team.

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What do you think's going on here?

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And we would look at the data and

we would talk to the management and

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we would try to figure out what the

solution was and we would try stuff.

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And I didn't understand how things

operated at that strategic level.

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Until I got into that role and the fact

that I got to sit there and at first

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I didn't provide much value candidly.

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I could give them context based

on my experiences in the field,

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which I had a lot of, but I didn't

understand the physics of sales, right?

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And I learned all those

things from working with them.

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And then we were acquired by IBM and

I had the opportunity to see what it

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looks like in a much bigger level.

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I was part of a business unit that

it's IBM's basically a handful of multi

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billion dollar companies all put together.

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And I was part of one of those multi

billion dollar companies inside of it.

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Our business unit was, and I got to see

how these really big enterprise complex

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sales work, how you have to, Enable people

across multiple different continents.

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By the time I left, I was responsible

for both internal sales enablement

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and partner enablement as well.

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And the partner ecosystem is

really important if you're at IBM.

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And so you have to really distill down

what those value propositions are for

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the different products that you have,

who the personas are from the buyer

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perspective, what the challenges are that

they solve to make it clear to everyone.

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What they should be looking for and

how to tell the most effective story.

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Erich Starrett: Great backstory, what

I just heard you say is you're actually

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the first person on the show that has

said, I was doing partner enablement.

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We'll get to a minute, the shift from

sales enablement to revenue enablement,

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but part of that is encompassing partners

for sure, which I've always seen part

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of it and customer service, but you

were doing it all the way back to IBM.

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: Yeah, even in the first

role at silver pop, I had both new and

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existing sales under my purview, right?

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So I had the new sales team, like the AEs,

the SDRs, the sales engineers, but I also

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had the account management team, the CS

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And I think it makes a lot of sense,

honestly, when you are in that

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position where you've got both,

you New sales and existing sales.

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You have the opportunity to

identify and eliminate a lot of the

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organizational issues that negatively

affects your customer and that

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negatively affect the team as well.

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So I like having that opportunity.

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Erich Starrett: Agreed.

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And in the pre-show, we were talking

a little bit about how important it

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is to have either A, failed yourself

in approaches and or B, been the at

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a place or walked alongside others

who have been through a failure

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convert it to wisdom, and that's

where good enablement comes from.

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Through that lens.

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It sounds like almost natural

presupposition to do those things that a

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room of 100 people were just starting to

think about and I would argue still aren't

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being fully executed in enablement today.

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What led you there?

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Dr. Shawn Fowler: There's a few

things that we could unpack there.

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I'll start with the, what led you there?

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Like most of everything that I've

learned how to do, first off, when

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you talk to anybody who's been

doing enablement for a while, almost

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everybody does the same thing.

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The reality is there's a handful

of things that work, and we all

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make enough mistakes until we

figure out those things that work.

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The problem is, I think there's not enough

sharing of best practices, candidly.

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That's 1 thing because.

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When you figure out what works, you

have other people who are just other

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companies, other CROs, other heads of

enablement who are trying to figure out

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the same thing, solve the same problems.

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And most of them go through

and make the same mistakes that

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other people have already made.

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So that's a pretty common issue.

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There's a second factor here,

though, that I think is interesting.

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I think that the quality of sales

enablement as a professional has

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gone down pretty dramatically

in the last five years.

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In fact, I think the quality of

sales enablement has gone down as

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it's become increasingly prominent

because You There's a few reasons.

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Number one is I think a lot of heads of

sales know they need sales enablement.

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They're hearing from their investors

that they need sales enablement.

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But there was a period of time

where I don't think a lot of

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them really knew what it meant.

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And over again, even now we'll talk

to heads of sales who are looking

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to hire a head of sales enablement

or their only sales enablement hire.

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And we're like, Hey, what

do you want them focused on?

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And they really have one

or two projects in mind.

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But then when you ask what you want them

to do after that they're not sure they

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have immediate needs of things they want

done, but in an ongoing basis, they're

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not quite sure what that should be right.

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If the CRO isn't clear about what they

want the head of enablement to do,

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and the head of enablement's not going

to be clear about it unless they've

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done it before and they know what

they should be focused on and they

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can earn that credibility with the CRO

and the rest of the leadership team.

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And that's a big, if that requires a

lot of things that you have to have

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done in order to be in that position.

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The second thing is I think

heads of sales aren't always

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great at hiring and enablement.

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Ahead of sales probably was an SDR,

probably was an AE, probably was a

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manager, was a second line manager, right?

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They've done those jobs before and

they've hired for those jobs, probably

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dozens of times, sometimes hundreds

of times, they maybe hire two, three

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sales and people over the course of a

lifetime, like that's so recognizing

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talent can be difficult as well.

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And then there's a final factor, which

is I think there's a lot of fluff.

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Sales is never easy, but comparatively

there was a period of time in the

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mid to late 2010s where there was

a ton of venture capital at play.

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So lots of people were hiring,

it was easier to get results.

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There was a good economy.

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There were a lot of frankly,

SaaS companies who were just all

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buying stuff from each other.

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And so sales was a lot easier.

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: 00:13:10

And I think there's an entire

generation of people who are in sales

254

: 00:13:13

enablement, who didn't have to figure

out how to build a better machine.

255

: 00:13:18

They could get away with adding

more people to the machine and

256

: 00:13:21

adding revenue by doing that.

257

: 00:13:24

And now venture capital

has dried up a lot.

258

: 00:13:27

People aren't hiring as much.

259

: 00:13:28

There's a much bigger

focus on productivity.

260

: 00:13:31

Productivity per rep in particular, in

order to achieve productivity per rep,

261

: 00:13:36

you have to build a better machine.

262

: 00:13:38

And I think that's the thing that everyone

really needs to be focused on right now.

263

: 00:13:43

It means you really need to understand

the market that you're selling to.

264

: 00:13:46

It means you really need to

understand where the friction

265

: 00:13:48

points are, both for your customers

and for your internal teams.

266

: 00:13:52

And you really need to figure out how

you optimize every step in the process.

267

: 00:13:56

And that takes a Domain expertise

that takes background knowledge, and

268

: 00:14:00

it also takes strong organizational

and communication skills so that

269

: 00:14:05

you can affect the change management

that's required to get results.

270

: 00:14:08

Erich Starrett: That was phenomenal.

271

: 00:14:09

So to read that back a little bit, there's

not enough focus on strategically thinking

272

: 00:14:17

about the cross functional revenue engine.

273

: 00:14:21

That first position that they're a

are different flavors of enablement

274

: 00:14:26

and be that it to be effective.

275

: 00:14:28

It needs to be run cross

functionally, and they didn't use

276

: 00:14:31

the word but and strategically.

277

: 00:14:33

So there's kind of two sides of the coin.

278

: 00:14:36

And neither side is in good repair.

279

: 00:14:39

Meaning the folks who are hiring for

enablement don't necessarily know what

280

: 00:14:46

that role does strategically other

than tactically coming in and doing a

281

: 00:14:50

project or two that has a beginning,

middle, end, and is fixing something.

282

: 00:14:56

And number two, you don't have the

talent pool that has that ability going

283

: 00:15:01

back to chief productivity officer now

that we need productivity per person.

284

: 00:15:06

And it's not just.

285

: 00:15:07

It's not just throwing

additional heads at it.

286

: 00:15:09

Ramping those heads up as quickly as

possible, which is also an element

287

: 00:15:12

of productivity, but it's a there's

a lot more strategy in creating more

288

: 00:15:18

from less than just bringing in more

so that does that land about right?

289

: 00:15:23

Dr. Shawn Fowler: Yeah..

290

: 00:15:24

And I , I feel like I'm dogging

on sales enablement practitioners.

291

: 00:15:27

I'm not, I don't think

people are bad necessarily.

292

: 00:15:30

I just think that they

didn't have to be good.

293

: 00:15:33

So they didn't learn how to do some

of the hard things that you have to

294

: 00:15:35

do to really build a better machine.

295

: 00:15:37

, I think that two years from now,

the people who are still in sales

296

: 00:15:40

enablement will be pretty damn good

at what they do because they will have

297

: 00:15:43

had to have figured it out, right?

298

: 00:15:45

Erich Starrett: I'm with you.

299

: 00:15:46

What I'm hearing is not negativity

per se, it's opportunity.

300

: 00:15:51

Dr. Shawn Fowler: Yes.

301

: 00:15:51

That is a great phrasing.

302

: 00:15:53

Erich Starrett: Thank you.

303

: 00:15:53

There is opportunity here.

304

: 00:15:56

One question in your current business,

how do you address the, we'll call it the

305

: 00:16:01

buyer side of sales enablement, right?

306

: 00:16:05

How do you help your current clients

and maybe that will inform some

307

: 00:16:09

folks out there listening who are

CRO CMO, even chief strategy officer.

308

: 00:16:15

We've got Tim Reister over at corporate

visions is a CSO with enablement reporting

309

: 00:16:19

to him, which is one of the interesting

implementations I've seen of enablement.

310

: 00:16:24

How do you get your clients up

to speed to address that need

311

: 00:16:28

and harvest that opportunity?

312

: 00:16:31

Dr. Shawn Fowler: there's

a couple of things.

313

: 00:16:31

When it comes to like the customer

journey and how customers buy and

314

: 00:16:34

eliminating friction for them.

315

: 00:16:36

One of our most common initial projects

with customers is a customer journey

316

: 00:16:40

workshop, because if you haven't

really sat down with all of the major

317

: 00:16:44

stakeholders involved internally, And

intentionally designed to process,

318

: 00:16:50

you probably have massive gaps in

what we uncover over and over again

319

: 00:16:55

is especially during the handoffs,

320

: 00:16:57

Everybody thinks somebody else is

doing something and nobody's doing it.

321

: 00:17:02

Or they think somebody else

should be doing something and

322

: 00:17:04

there's not agreement on that.

323

: 00:17:05

Or there's a whole bunch of data

that's needed for one part of

324

: 00:17:08

the process that's not created

by the other part of the process.

325

: 00:17:11

And so you have these moments

where there's a lack of alignment

326

: 00:17:15

or a lack of insight that occurs

throughout the entire process that

327

: 00:17:19

negatively affects the customer.

328

: 00:17:20

And so you have these situations

where let's say I go to a web form

329

: 00:17:24

and I'm reading about these like

value propositions essentially that

330

: 00:17:28

can solve the problems that I have.

331

: 00:17:29

I fill out the web form

and then I get a response.

332

: 00:17:33

And somebody calls me six

times while I'm in meetings.

333

: 00:17:36

And finally I pick up and

I'm like, Oh, this is great.

334

: 00:17:39

Yes, let's talk.

335

: 00:17:40

I would like to solve this problem.

336

: 00:17:42

And then I have a conversation and they're

like, what's the problem that you have?

337

: 00:17:45

Okay let me ask you some pretty demeaning

questions about whether you're important

338

: 00:17:50

enough to It sounds like somebody's

saying are your mommy and daddy home?

339

: 00:17:53

And then, they're like, okay, it

sounds like we can definitely help you.

340

: 00:17:56

Let me put you on the phone with

somebody else who can help you.

341

: 00:17:59

That sucks like now I, like I just filled

out a form Oh, let's schedule something.

342

: 00:18:04

Let's go.

343

: 00:18:04

Like, why do I have to talk to?

344

: 00:18:06

And then you hop on the call with the

AE and let's say the AE does a fantastic

345

: 00:18:09

job and they show you a great demo

and they figure out what your projects

346

: 00:18:12

problems are and they help you prioritize.

347

: 00:18:15

All that stuff and the deal closes and

then you get introduced to somebody else.

348

: 00:18:21

And you have to have all the same

damn conversations again, all the same

349

: 00:18:26

.

As a buyer.

350

: 00:18:27

This is what will really open your eyes.

351

: 00:18:28

I spent years as a buyer.

352

: 00:18:29

And I was like, this sucks.

353

: 00:18:31

This sucks.

354

: 00:18:31

This sucks.

355

: 00:18:32

Like all the different things that I

felt as a buyer made me a much better

356

: 00:18:35

salesperson, but what it was like to

go through those steps in the process.

357

: 00:18:39

And so we really pay a lot of attention

to what happens during the transitions.

358

: 00:18:44

And a lot of what we focus on, we do these

workshops, Is creating the disagreement

359

: 00:18:51

that is required for actual agreement

and creating a safe space where we

360

: 00:18:57

can moderate those disagreements and

come to a conclusion that I don't know

361

: 00:19:01

if you're familiar with the Patrick

Lencioni stuff, Disagree & Commit.

362

: 00:19:04

Like at some point, whoever's is making

the call in the room has to make the call.

363

: 00:19:08

There's going to be disagreement,

but everybody understands why that

364

: 00:19:11

decision was made and everybody's

committed to walking out and executing.

365

: 00:19:14

The steps necessary to bring this

desired customer journey into reality.

366

: 00:19:19

It's a workshop typically, right?

367

: 00:19:21

Like a two day.

368

: 00:19:21

Yeah.

369

: 00:19:22

Erich Starrett: A role play on steroids.

370

: 00:19:23

It's a flavor of whenever someone comes

to me with a problem, I'm like, great,

371

: 00:19:27

bring it, but bring a solution or three,

at least the beginnings of it, it sounds

372

: 00:19:31

like that's the same kind of thing you

do in that room is we're not going to

373

: 00:19:34

get it perfect, but can everyone nod

their head that this is the path forward.

374

: 00:19:37

Back to this idea that there's

opportunity for enablement, How do I?

375

: 00:19:43

Sean get up to speed in a way that I can

come in and pick up where you left off

376

: 00:19:49

And be that strategic sales enablement

revenue enablement partner in perpetuity.

377

: 00:19:54

Is there, what does that look like

other than failing a bunch learning

378

: 00:19:59

and, actually trying to meet that

bar of not just ramping up a whole

379

: 00:20:04

bunch of people, but taking what I've

got and bringing more productivity.

380

: 00:20:08

Dr. Shawn Fowler: Yeah.

381

: 00:20:09

So there's a couple of things we focus on.

382

: 00:20:11

Number one, we document

everything that we do and we do.

383

: 00:20:15

We do like a playbook playbooks are great.

384

: 00:20:18

I understand.

385

: 00:20:19

I've written so many playbooks in my life.

386

: 00:20:21

Almost somebody reads the playbook, but

it's useful to have it because sometimes

387

: 00:20:24

you do have to reference stuff in it.

388

: 00:20:25

So the people can just take a

quick look, like a cheat sheet.

389

: 00:20:27

This is what I'm supposed to do

at this stage in the process.

390

: 00:20:29

This is the way it works.

391

: 00:20:31

And if it changes, you have to update it.

392

: 00:20:32

So we work on creating governance.

393

: 00:20:36

For change, usually when we do

these projects so that there's

394

: 00:20:39

a process in place by which

people can actually make changes.

395

: 00:20:43

The second thing, and this is actually

the most important thing is we

396

: 00:20:47

build as much as possible, the best

practices directly into the process.

397

: 00:20:53

So that as you execute the

process, you are actually

398

: 00:20:57

improving the process as well.

399

: 00:20:59

And it takes time to do that,

but it's really important.

400

: 00:21:02

The third thing is we involve

the managers and the reps in the

401

: 00:21:07

creation of the processes themselves.

402

: 00:21:10

This is very often what happens is you

have these top down approaches to a

403

: 00:21:15

sales process or a top down approach

to messaging or a top down approach

404

: 00:21:19

to negotiation or skill development

or whatever you want it to be, right?

405

: 00:21:23

And it falls flat.

406

: 00:21:24

It falls flat for a couple of reasons.

407

: 00:21:26

Number one, When you do it top down,

a lot of times you don't actually

408

: 00:21:29

have the tactical information you

need from the field to make good

409

: 00:21:32

decisions, to design a good solution.

410

: 00:21:34

In fact, a lot of times you haven't

correctly framed the problem.

411

: 00:21:36

And if you haven't correctly framed

the problem, you're never going

412

: 00:21:39

to find the right solution, right?

413

: 00:21:40

So we make sure we involve managers

and reps in the problem framing and

414

: 00:21:47

in the solution process, because

that's going to give us a much better

415

: 00:21:51

picture of what's actually happening

and what the real problems are.

416

: 00:21:54

It's going to give us

a much better solution.

417

: 00:21:55

Plus.

418

: 00:21:56

When it's time to roll that

solution out, we've already

419

: 00:21:59

had all the holes poked in it.

420

: 00:22:00

We spent weeks having meetings

where people were poking holes and

421

: 00:22:04

we're iterating and we're iterating.

422

: 00:22:06

So it's a really good product that

those people are now going to champion.

423

: 00:22:10

Those people help design it.

424

: 00:22:11

If you get the right people in the room,

you've got really powerful champions

425

: 00:22:14

who can go out and get other people.

426

: 00:22:17

To adopt it, the managers are

already aware of what's going

427

: 00:22:20

on because they help shape it.

428

: 00:22:21

Plus we do extensive manager training

before we ever roll anything else out.

429

: 00:22:25

And then we do manager

reinforcement training.

430

: 00:22:27

So we create these methods, these avenues

for reinforcement as part of the project.

431

: 00:22:32

So that for the next month or

quarter, there's going to be

432

: 00:22:36

people who are actually working to

drive adoption of those changes.

433

: 00:22:39

And the reality is the project

itself, the intervention itself is

434

: 00:22:44

usually about one fifth of the amount

of time it takes to get results.

435

: 00:22:49

The other four fifths is all the stuff

you do before the project and all the

436

: 00:22:52

stuff you do after the projects to create

alignment, to get buy in, to design

437

: 00:22:57

a really effective intervention, and

then to actually do the reinforcement

438

: 00:23:01

that's required to drive real change.

439

: 00:23:04

Erich Starrett: We've got a listening

audience here of enablement practitioners.

440

: 00:23:07

Is it a, "and we recommend getting a sales

enablement professional" at the end of

441

: 00:23:12

that if they don't have someone on staff.

442

: 00:23:15

Or is it a, pretty much we've given

you the engine you need to maintain,

443

: 00:23:22

just keep doing what you're doing.

444

: 00:23:24

Dr. Shawn Fowler: A lot of

our customers have existing

445

: 00:23:27

sales enablement staff, right?

446

: 00:23:28

It's just, two or three.

447

: 00:23:30

And for this project, you need,

three or four more for six months,

448

: 00:23:33

like that's the reality is there's

certain pieces of infrastructure that

449

: 00:23:36

are really heavy to put in place.

450

: 00:23:38

Or you need to move quickly to get

these changes in place and your team

451

: 00:23:41

doesn't have the bandwidth to do it.

452

: 00:23:43

Like those are the most common

situations we get involved in.

453

: 00:23:46

If we are working with someone who

doesn't have sales enablement at all,

454

: 00:23:50

usually there's a chief of staff or

a head of rev ops, or somebody who is

455

: 00:23:56

a manager who we use as our primary

point of contact, who's the change

456

: 00:23:59

agent internally in those situations.

457

: 00:24:02

But we pretty much always recommend that

they hire someone to own an enablement

458

: 00:24:06

over the long term, because if nobody

owns it, it's not going to get done.

459

: 00:24:09

Erich Starrett: Outstanding.

460

: 00:24:10

And therein lies, I think the

answer to my question, which is.

461

: 00:24:13

Hey everybody out there in enablement

land if you feel woefully unequipped to

462

: 00:24:18

do all of those things that dr Fowler

is sharing bring on RevenueReady because

463

: 00:24:23

you're going to be part Seriously,

you're going to be part of that team

464

: 00:24:27

that the best way to get trained is to

walk alongside He and his advisors at

465

: 00:24:31

revenue ready and learn alongside them.

466

: 00:24:34

And then you do that in perpetuity, right?

467

: 00:24:36

That would be the answer.

468

: 00:24:38

There's not a secret place to go off and

study or at least currently a place to go

469

: 00:24:44

and interact and get those best practices.

470

: 00:24:46

Dr. Shawn Fowler: I think you should

design our sales pitch, Erich!

471

: 00:24:48

Yeah.

472

: 00:24:49

This is actually an important

thing to talk about though,

473

: 00:24:51

because I've been in this situation

before as a head of enablement.

474

: 00:24:53

It's hard to get headcount.

475

: 00:24:55

It is very hard to get headcount, but

the reality is your boss wants results.

476

: 00:25:00

Like the company needs results.

477

: 00:25:01

And one of the things that I think

a lot of companies are realizing

478

: 00:25:05

right now is because things

are, I've gotten harder to sell.

479

: 00:25:08

" Your ability to thrive as

a company depends directly

480

: 00:25:12

on your ability to change.

481

: 00:25:13

To effectively manage change.

482

: 00:25:15

The companies that make it are the

ones who can accommodate the changes

483

: 00:25:18

as they evolve in the market, they

have change management functions

484

: 00:25:22

built in to their strategy and that's

what sales enablement really is.

485

: 00:25:27

Sales enablement is the change

management arm of revenue."

486

: 00:25:30

That's what it is.

487

: 00:25:31

And if you don't realize that you're

never going to hire the right people.

488

: 00:25:35

You're never going to give them

the seat at the table they need.

489

: 00:25:38

But if you do realize that, then

whenever you have to change pricing or

490

: 00:25:42

your competition got better or whatever

it is you have to accommodate, you've

491

: 00:25:46

got this ability to evolve quickly

and rapidly and roll with the punches.

492

: 00:25:51

Erich Starrett: Sean, you just took

the words right out of my mouth.

493

: 00:25:55

Sales enablement, revenue

enablement is the change

494

: 00:26:00

management of the revenue engine.

495

: 00:26:03

What you and your team come in and

do, what a good solid RevOps team does

496

: 00:26:07

from the ground up, but Hillary Headlee

over at Insight Partners, and informed

497

: 00:26:11

by her having run, at zoom, both

rev ops and sales enablement, right?

498

: 00:26:18

And now she's doing it

for five, 700 companies.

499

: 00:26:21

That's what good looks like.

500

: 00:26:23

It's that incubated in a well

thought out strategic cross

501

: 00:26:28

functional engine where all the

seats of the table are represented.

502

: 00:26:32

And then having an enablement

professional who can take that.

503

: 00:26:36

Be a change manager and be the

bidirectional voice of that entire

504

: 00:26:41

engine out to sales out to now partners

and to customer service and back in.

505

: 00:26:47

And that's the important part.

506

: 00:26:48

And a lot of times that back

end part's not happening.

507

: 00:26:52

And another opportunity I see,

and I'd love to hear your thoughts

508

: 00:26:56

for Sales or revenue enablement

is getting in the trenches, right?

509

: 00:27:02

So you can be the voice of sales and

the customer and bring that back in

510

: 00:27:06

and now you're really cooking, right?

511

: 00:27:09

Dr. Shawn Fowler: It's nice to be in the

industry for a while because you meet

512

: 00:27:11

a lot of people and I end up talking

to a lot of like people who are newer

513

: 00:27:15

in their careers or like mid career.

514

: 00:27:17

Who are getting their first kind

of, I'm the only enablement person

515

: 00:27:20

opportunity is where I'm the first

head of enablement opportunities.

516

: 00:27:24

And something they ask a lot is what

should I have this interview with the

517

: 00:27:27

CRO, it's my last interview tomorrow

what do you think I should focus on?

518

: 00:27:30

And the thing I always say is the

first 90 days, like really, you really

519

: 00:27:34

need to think through what you're

going to do in your first 90 days.

520

: 00:27:36

How are you going to

structure your first 90 days?

521

: 00:27:39

And one of the things that I've always

focused on whenever I've joined a company

522

: 00:27:42

is I need to being in the top 10 sales

reps, I need to learn enough that if I

523

: 00:27:49

need to go sell this, I can go sell it.

524

: 00:27:51

I understand the market.

525

: 00:27:53

I understand the product.

526

: 00:27:54

I understand the problems solve.

527

: 00:27:56

I the competition does.

528

: 00:27:57

Cause if you can't do that, why should

anybody listen to what you have to say?

529

: 00:28:02

That's just the reality.

530

: 00:28:03

Like you need to be able to go have the,

you don't have to be the best, right?

531

: 00:28:07

But you should probably be in the top

10 to 15 percent if you had to be.

532

: 00:28:10

Erich Starrett: And back to role play

man If you can legit spar with the

533

: 00:28:14

top 10 of the company You're going

to provide such an amazing service,

534

: 00:28:19

it's getting out on the court with

those better than you, making you

535

: 00:28:22

better and you making them better.

536

: 00:28:24

Dr. Shawn Fowler: And if they have a Gong

or a SalesLoft or a Clari I guess Chorus

537

: 00:28:27

Clari, whatever, if they have that you

have no excuse not to be able to do that.

538

: 00:28:32

That's straight up.

539

: 00:28:33

Like you can sit there and listen to

the calls that the best sales reps made.

540

: 00:28:37

You can listen to the

calls that people wash.

541

: 00:28:39

You can listen to the calls where you

got the, you can listen to all that.

542

: 00:28:43

And if you do two a day for a month,

you can go a long way towards really

543

: 00:28:48

understanding what works and what doesn't.

544

: 00:28:50

Erich Starrett: Awesome sean.

545

: 00:28:51

Let's shift to the move from sales

enablement to revenue enablement You

546

: 00:28:55

I'm curious what that means to you.

547

: 00:28:58

Dr. Shawn Fowler: First thing is I don't

know how much I care about the name change

548

: 00:29:01

because I think sometimes people just

use different words to sound different.

549

: 00:29:06

I do like the idea of sales enablement

truly being a revenue enablement.

550

: 00:29:10

But there's a good way and a

bad way for that to work out.

551

: 00:29:13

The good way is that they

actually have a seat at the table.

552

: 00:29:17

They're involved in the diagnosis

of the problems and coming up with a

553

: 00:29:20

strategy and frankly, prioritization.

554

: 00:29:22

Prioritization is really one of the

keys to success in enablement in that

555

: 00:29:26

they can actually help solve straight

up revenue problems, not just sales

556

: 00:29:30

problems, but it means that you need

to be resourced so that you have people

557

: 00:29:33

aligned to both of those leaders.

558

: 00:29:34

If there are separate leaders,

that's super important to me.

559

: 00:29:37

The bad way is it just slowly

evolves into L and D I don't

560

: 00:29:42

have anything against L and D.

561

: 00:29:43

I started my career in L and D.

562

: 00:29:46

But that's not what sales enablement is.

563

: 00:29:48

That's not what revenue

enablement should be.

564

: 00:29:50

And I see a lot of companies where it's

revenue enablement in name, but it's

565

: 00:29:54

glorified L and D and I don't think

that's the best use of enablement.

566

: 00:29:59

Erich Starrett: and back to

those founding flavors, they're

567

: 00:30:02

stuck in talent development only

and not thinking strategically?

568

: 00:30:09

Dr. Shawn Fowler: A lot of times

they don't have the domain expertise

569

: 00:30:11

to help shape the conversation

either in that situation.

570

: 00:30:14

You're just creating a bunch of trainings

that nobody ever takes or they take

571

: 00:30:16

it while they do their expenses, like

that's not going to move the needle.

572

: 00:30:20

Cool.

573

: 00:30:20

Erich Starrett: Wrapping up here.

574

: 00:30:21

I would love to hear Dr.

575

: 00:30:23

Sean Fowler the future.

576

: 00:30:26

Give us, we'll give you the final word.

577

: 00:30:29

Where are we headed?

578

: 00:30:30

You mentioned earlier that you can

see over the next couple years,

579

: 00:30:34

those who are really embodying

this spirit of a cross functional

580

: 00:30:39

sales or revenue enablement role.

581

: 00:30:43

What do you see about the future?

582

: 00:30:44

What are those opportunities

for our listening audience?

583

: 00:30:48

Dr. Shawn Fowler: I would hesitate

to forecast any farther than three

584

: 00:30:50

or four years out, honestly, but

585

: 00:30:52

I think there's increasing recognition

of the role of enablement in change

586

: 00:30:59

management and increasing recognition

of the need for an explicit change

587

: 00:31:03

managing function in organizations.

588

: 00:31:06

So I think at least in more

successful companies, that's what what

589

: 00:31:11

enablements going to be seen as right?

590

: 00:31:13

I think one of the things that's going

to incorporate is increased focus on

591

: 00:31:18

frontline managers on both the new

and existing sales side of the house,

592

: 00:31:23

because the reality is everything lives

or dies for the frontline manager.

593

: 00:31:27

If the frontline manager cannot

effectively execute the change, or if

594

: 00:31:31

they're not bought in, or if they don't

understand clearly why they're doing what

595

: 00:31:35

they're doing and how it aligns with the

company's strategy, it's not going to work

596

: 00:31:39

and you're literally wasting your time.

597

: 00:31:41

You're wasting everyone's time to try

to do anything unless they're bought

598

: 00:31:46

in and equipped to be successful.

599

: 00:31:48

I think people are beginning to see

that and I think there's going to be

600

: 00:31:51

a shift, frankly, from the field to

frontline managers in terms of resources.

601

: 00:31:57

Those are the two biggest things

I think are going to happen.

602

: 00:31:59

Erich Starrett: I think AI is going

to evolve and facilitate some things.

603

: 00:32:04

I know there's a lot of AI

coaching and stuff like that.

604

: 00:32:06

I don't love it.

605

: 00:32:07

Candidly, but I think the power

of artificial intelligence to comb

606

: 00:32:12

through, for instance, the thousands

of minutes that are produced on a

607

: 00:32:15

weekly basis in gong or sales loft or

whatever, and distill that down into

608

: 00:32:20

insights or into moments that everyone

should take notice of can be really

609

: 00:32:24

powerful when it comes to training,

coaching, and identifying what works

610

: 00:32:29

great place to land, Sean.

611

: 00:32:31

. Thanks for all that you've done

for the profession, for Atlanta

612

: 00:32:34

for that matter specifically.

613

: 00:32:36

Maybe we can even get you out to a

Revenue Enablement Society meeting

614

: 00:32:40

here and have you wax poetic on

some of these things and help people

615

: 00:32:44

better understand the opportunity.

616

: 00:32:46

Dr. Shawn Fowler: Only if

there's beer afterward.

617

: 00:32:48

Erich Starrett: Yeah, absolutely.

618

: 00:32:49

For sure.

619

: 00:32:50

That wouldn't be face to face

without a beer at the bar.

620

: 00:32:55

Any final words you'd like to share,

Sean, on your way out the door

621

: 00:32:58

here in the orchestrate section?

622

: 00:32:59

Dr. Shawn Fowler: This was just wonderful.

623

: 00:33:00

It was a fantastic opportunity

to talk to you, Eric.

624

: 00:33:01

I really enjoyed it.

625

: 00:33:02

Erich Starrett: you too, man.

626

: 00:33:03

Great to see your face.

627

: 00:33:04

And I'm so excited for our listening

audience to benefit from this.

628

: 00:33:08

Appreciate your time

and we'll see you soon

629

: 00:33:11

Dr. Shawn Fowler: Thanks a lot, man.

630

: 00:33:11

Take care.