Becoming an unstoppable force
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I’ve listened to a fair number of “success story” interviews over the years. And there’s one point that comes up again and again. To paraphrase: “Yeah it took longer than I thought… but honestly I was just spinning my wheels for the first year or so. Once I really kicked it into high gear, the result actually came pretty quickly.” There was a multiyear stretch where I was “in the trenches,” “grinding,” and all that. But honestly, deep down, I know that’s only half true. It really just took me a few years to fully switch on and start moving with intention. Once I was moving with intensity things actually scaled up quite quickly. This is where Katie really stood out in my Summer Accelerator. She moved with intensity from day one. I’d give her notes, and by the next time we spoke, she’d implemented every single suggestion I had. She came in with a starting target company list already built. She had a strong sense of what specifically she wanted my help with. And she even pulled out a killer move that I believe was a big part of the reason she got her offer from Harvey (it’s so good I’m now making it part of the accelerator's core curriculum). This is all 100% in your control. Effort is a choice. Katie actively used me as a resource, while still driving the process. And that’s why she went from a rough situation to a $230k offer at Harvey (plus equity) in under 50 days. Make no mistake. She had other offers on the table as well. I offer a lot of access to the reps I work with, but you’d be surprised how few take full advantage of it. Too many still operate with a corporate “weekly check-in” mentality. That’s not moving with intention. When we work together, I’ll be expecting updates and questions a few times a week. I want you to be contacting me frequently. That’s the mentality of a rep who’s going to win - both in the job search and on the job. If you want to work with me over the next 6 weeks to land a major outcome like Katie’s, you can read more about my next Accelerator here: Questions? Hit me back - this is my personal email. Talk soon, Sam |
Hiring for Sales
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Let me tell you a bit more about Katie, the woman I worked with who recently signed a deal for $230,000 + a bunch of RSUs at Harvey. If you’re even vaguely aware of the game, you should be aware that Harvey isn’t the average startup to work for. It’s like joining Databricks in 2019. Stripe in 2014. It's resume gold. I could go on. But let’s get back to Katie. She emailed me on June 12th of this year asking a few questions about how to find good companies to work for. I’ll discuss this in more...
I’ve been teasing something big for a few weeks now… Here it is. Katie (name changed for privacy), joined my Summer Career Accelerator at the end of June… And she recently signed an offer with Harvey, the AI Legaltech startup, with a £170,000 OTE + RSUs. If you’re making USD, that’s ~$230,000. And for you Brits, don’t let anyone on Twitter tell you there are no high salaries to be found in the UK. All it took was ~6 weeks of focused execution with tight feedback loops working together. When...
The raw number of salespeople that startups need to hire is far higher than you think. Let's take an example, with a hypothetical sales team that is doubling in size from 20 → 40 reps in one year. For the sake of this exercise, we're going to assume that the sales team is 50% SDRs and 50% Account Executives. Sales Development Representative Attrition You can expect an SDR to stay in their seat for a year. You might be able to extend this a few months longer, say to 14-15 months. Go beyond...