When orienting yourself as a new leader in an organization, how do you ensure that you get an accurate picture of past strategies?
The hope is to be joining a company that's got some good data and documentation hygiene :)
Unfortunately, if this is missing, then the source of truth for me is Salesforce. I will always go to the sales operations team to start at revenue and work my way back toward up to the top of the funnel to marketing camapigns' successes or shortcomings.
The way I do this is to tie back campaign launches and the spending to calculate CAC:LTV over time.
As a new leader at an organization, I recommend reviewing as many of the items below as possible. The more the better so that you can have the full picture. Even better if you can get a few different perspectives so that you can truly get a lay of the land.
- Documentation. This is huge. Review as much documentation as available.
- Data, reports, and dashboards. I’m a big believer in data and the insights that can surface from data. Get your hands on as much quality data and reporting as you can.
- Access to platforms (e.g., Google Ads) for in platform reporting. In-platform data can be helpful to give you a different lens to view the data.
- Speak with colleagues. Have conversations with colleagues, direct reports, and other individuals in the org to ensure you are understanding their historical perspectives.
You’ll have to absorb all of the information and formulate a hypothesis on past strategies. You can then use this as a starting point under your leadership and strategy going forward.