The Sell Like A Leader Podcast

David Kreiger chats with Valerie Schlitt, the Founder of VSA Prospecting which she launched in 2001. She has recently sold VSA and entered a new life stage, managing the one customer service client she retained. In this episode, we dive into: Collaborating with competitors: Competitors becoming mentors and thought leaders for each other, the concept of "frienemies," shared learning, building relationships, common challenges, mutual help, and overcoming hesitation. Rapid fire Q&A   Connect with Valerie Schlitt:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/valerieschlitt/ Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

David Kreiger chats with Mitchell Kasprzyk, the VP of Sales at Compyl. He has driven growth across SaaS startups and enterprise organizations by shifting from traditional selling to a consultative approach that helps buyers make meaningful progress. In this episode, we dive into: Transitioning to management role: Mentorship and learning from thought leaders, focusing on team development, development of coaching and leadership mindset, reducing micromanagement, understanding your team's current capabilities, developing a performance framework, creating a transparent motivational environment, implementing data-driven decision-making, and fostering a continuous learning culture. Rapid fire Q&A   Connect with Mitchell Kasprzyk: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mitchell-kasprzyk-3296b898/ Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger/ https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes!  https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

David Kreiger chats with Maxwell Nee, the CRO of Scoreapp, a Quiz Marketing Platform with 7,000 paying clients. He's also a multi-award winning entrepreneur, bodybuilder & dancer and has been featured in TV, Radio, Forbes, Singapore's The Business Times & The Australian Business Review. In this episode, we dive into:  Innovation and trust in sale teams: focusing on picking mature impactful ideas for execution, building a successful team by having the right people in the right seats, the importance of two-way trust in team settings, the value of transparent feedback in a team setting and its impact on team dynamics, creating feedback loops for continuous improvement, how to maintain consistent accountability, using customized quizzes and tailored conversations for more effective lead engagement, deeply understanding client pain points with standardized assessments and the importance of prospecting opportunities to help others beyond just making a sale. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Maxwell Nee:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxwellnee/    Connect with David Kreiger:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

David Kreiger chats with Rich DeGuzman, an experienced revenue-focused GTM executive and VP at Vensure Employer Solutions, where he leads national HCM West strategy. Rich's expertise in GTM strategy, M&A, and B2B partnerships has earned him consistent recognition, including Chairman's Club and Board of Directors distinctions. In this episode, we dive into:    Leadership Coaching and Training in Sales: building a robust leadership bench within sales organizations, how to have conversations about career aspirations and leadership roles within your team, coaching reps to think strategically like leaders, avoiding common missteps in promotions, repurposing talent within your team, bridging the gap between theoretical training and real-world sales scenarios, active leadership exercises you can use, encouraging self-evaluation and continuous learning, leveraging internal champions to guide AI adoption, maximizing productivity with quick disqualification of opportunities, and the power of connectivity at in-person events.   Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Rich DeGuzman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richdeguzman/   Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Mike Kavanagh, VP of Commercial Sales N. America for OneTrust, a leader in data privacy and consent management. He has been in B2B sales for 16+ years, and transitioned into sales management about 10 years ago. During that time, he led Enterprise sales teams, partner teams, and cross functional teams including marketing, customer success, and operations. In this episode, we dive into:    B2B Sales Fundamentals - The challenges for sales leaders and their teams in 2024 and what's going to look like for 2025, how to structure the prospecting function, the concept of propensity data, getting the entire org to collaborate, talking about the product vs. learning about the buyer business' problems, how to instill business acumen in your sales reps so they can better understand the business context, presenting pricing as a story, modeling the sales behaviors you want to see as a leader, questions for team reviews, the metrics you can't miss in your dashboard, time management in sales, skill adjustments to help SDRs, how sales managers should be supporting AEs, hiring BDRs from your SDRs, the dark side of tools being used these days by SDRs, the best uses for AI and making the case for call recording.  Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Mike Kavanagh: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikejkavanagh Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Danny Wasserman, a former restaurateur turned Enterprise SaaS seller and currently a leader at Databricks. He has researched, architected, and delivered sales enablement content that globally serves SMB, Commercial, Enterprise, Partner, and Customer Success teams. Whether in front of the room facilitating, in the studio hosting a podcast, or in the back office ghostwriting communications for executives, Danny remains equally committed to always playing for the team and never losing sight of humility. In this episode, we dive into:  Conversation Intelligence (CI) and Revenue Intelligence (RI): the origin story of business intelligence, Gong and CI, the market pivot that made CI a necessity, the different adoption phases, how to assess basic adoption vs. applying a higher level of analysis, evaluating sales behaviors objectively, forecasting with a lot more science than humans could, transforming pipeline reviews meetings, making coaching good for the seller and the manager, lifting win rates, internal and external obstacles to using CI tools, aligning the implementation of CI and RI tools with your organization's cultural values to facilitate acceptance and utilization, and effective dashboard design.   Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Danny Wasserman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dannybwasserman/ Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Erin Dues, a seasoned sales leader with 13+ years of experience in technology and SaaS, incl. 9 years specializing in HR tech. As VP of Sales for Assessment and Succession within Korn Ferry's Digital business unit, Erin is focused on expanding Korn Ferry's talent technology solutions to a broader market. She has built high-performing sales teams at WorkTango, Asana, LinkedIn, and HubSpot. In this episode, we dive into:  The Listening Tour Strategy: The importance of doing a listening tour when joining a new organization, how to implement a listening tour step by step, why you should follow it with a vision mission session, running in-person and virtual interactive planning sessions, gaining buy-in before implementing change, how to create ongoing feedback loops within a sales team to maintain alignment and motivation, and radical candor as a leadership principle.  Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Erin Dues: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erindues/   Connect with David Kreiger:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger   https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

David Kreiger chats with Bob Spina, who is developing a Sales Advisory practice and has just departed from ON24, where he led Enterprise Sales. Previously, Bob led the Strategic sales team to record growth at Gong. He has a proven track record of unlocking seller performance and building high-performing teams across various organizations, from startups to mid-sized firms, and even a half-billion-dollar business at Cisco.  In this episode, we dive into:  Strategies for high-performing enterprise sales teams: behind the scenes of Gong's growth, the need for a different playbook when transitioning from SMB to enterprise sales, tackling enterprise-level challenges, the right time to hire frontline managers when building enterprise sales teams, coaching your team on account planning, the "Groundswell Outbound Approach", why extended enablement programs are key, the role of customer success when going upmarket and building trust between sales leaders and their teams. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Bob Spina: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobspina/   Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Michael Maximoff, the owner of Belkins, a top-ranked B2B Lead Generation Agency. Michael specializes in creating budget-smart strategies that deliver impactful growth solutions for clients and is also the driving force behind the newsletter "From Zero to Agency Hero" and the voice of the popular Growth Podcast. In this episode, we dive into:  Cold Email Playbooks for Sales Teams: the most important thing in the outreach approach (is not personalization!), how to start building a cold outreach playbook for your team, defining a strategy to engage and nurture your leads, how to generate appointments with higher buying intent, deciding when to do cold calling and when to do cold emailing, omnichannel vs. multichannel outreach approach, the hidden cost of AI in SDR teams and how your team can improve email deliverability. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Michael Maximoff: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-maximoff/ Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

In this episode, David Kreiger chats with Terence Lee, Protecht's VP of Risk for North America. His deep understanding of the market has been key to rapidly facilitating Protecht's growth across NA. Before Protecht, he held sales leadership roles at companies like Origami Risk and SAI Global, where he helped build successful sales departments. In this episode, we dive into: Market entry to expansion: Initial steps in market entry, tackling challenges, balancing short-term and long-term strategies, lead generation tactics, the importance of parallel outreach efforts, outsourcing vs. internal team management, conversation value, complementary strategies, critical sales skills, and building trust and credibility. Rapid Fire Q&A    Connect with Terence Lee: https://www.linkedin.com/in/terenceplee/ Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

In this episode, David Kreiger talks with Brian Signorelli, the advisor at Tome. Brian began his tech sales career at HubSpot in 2012 as one of the first 50 AEs. Over nine years, he helped grow the company from $30M to $1B in revenue and later held senior sales leadership roles at Vendr and Lattice before joining Tome. In this episode, we dive into: Stepping into a new team: Understanding the company context, evaluating key differences in early-stage vs. later-stage company needs, skill adaptation by stage, aligning vectors for scalable growth, adjusting managerial skills over time, putting the right team in place, and navigating the intersection of AI and sales Rapid Fire Q&A   Connect with Brian Signorelli: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-signorelli/ www.quotarelief.co Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/  

David Kreiger chats with David Rubinstein, a seasoned sales leader with 15+ years of experience. He started building sales teams at Gen Video before scaling operations at Salesforce for 6 years. He grew the team from 5 to 50 while boosting revenue from $75M to $250M at Outreach and oversaw a team of 50+ driving sales, solutions, operations, and enablement at Kustomer. Now, he is the SVP of Sales at Spark. In this episode, we dive into: Measuring Enterprise Sales Performance: Managing different levels of performance, understanding the plan and filling gaps, weekly activity sharing for reflection and self-assessment, and monitoring through the right metrics. Scaling Enterprise Sales Teams: Focusing on relationship mapping and structuring territory, standardizing decisions to streamline the process, identifying parallels with competitors, and maintaining a good culture. Rapid Fire Q&A   Connect with David Rubinstein: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daverubinstein/   Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger/ https://salesroads.com/   Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Craig Herman, CRO at Aware where he is responsible for all GTM functions - Sales, CS, Marketing & Partnerships. Craig has more than 20 years of success in driving revenue in several areas, including enterprise software, SaaS, and partner sales, to name a few.   In this episode, we dive into: Ecosystem Strategy: Three key pillars for entering new markets, the importance of technology partnerships in ecosystems, the role of resellers, using AI and technology to find industry-specific communities, and the power of networking and building contacts. Effective Sales Tactics for New Markets: Structuring partnerships and consultant agreements, the role of BDRs in building networks and tapping into communities, leveraging internal and partner networks for warm introductions, and adding value and mutual benefit in sales outreach. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Craig Herman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/craig-herman-aab3/   Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Andy Hershey, CRO at Sovos where he leverages his expertise to drive growth as a leader in global tax compliance solutions. Andy has over 23 years of experience in sales and leadership roles across three companies, including Splunk and NS1. At Splunk, he spearheaded the transition from on-premises to SaaS, scaling a $2 million SaaS business to over $1 billion as Global VP. In this episode, we dive into: Adoption in the sales cycle: Selling with an adoption mindset, bringing customer success expertise, the new metric of success for salespeople, non-transactional sales processes, preventing wrong expectations, and reducing customer churn. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Andy Hershey: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyhershey/ Check open sales roles at Sovos: https://sovos.com/careers/ Connect with David Kreiger: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger/ https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/

David Kreiger chats with Stevie "KillCreek" Case, who started her 20+ year tech career accidentally as the world's first female pro gamer; she has led sales teams and revenue organizations at 0 to 1 startups and big brands, including Visa and Twilio. Currently, she is the CRO of Vanta, an extremely fast-growing company helping SaaS automate their compliance, where she leads all go-to-market efforts. Stevie is also a Founding Partner in a new $5M fund called 20SALES with seven other female GTM leaders from leading SaaS standouts. In this episode, we dive into:  Scaling global remote sales teams: the challenge of maintaining a consistent experience for both customers and employees across a large international remote-first team, diversifying the team to reflect a growing diverse customer base and create a balanced and inclusive organizational culture, how to foster idea generation and feedback at all levels, gathering and acting on "wacky ideas," building strong interpersonal bonds within a remote-first team, implementing regular QBR meetings for team alignment and performance monitoring, and why training and development should be priorities for rapidly growing organizations. Rapid Fire Q&A Connect with Stevie Case: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steviecase/ Connect with David Kreiger:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidkreiger https://salesroads.com/ Subscribe to the podcast and follow our Podcast LinkedIn page so you don't miss any episodes! https://www.linkedin.com/company/sell-like-a-leader-podcast/