AMA: Dbt Labs Head of Revenue Operations, James Darragh on Establishing the Revenue Ops Function

We have a centralized ops team at dbt Labs - rolling up to the G&A org. I've worked in both siloed and centralized operations teams in the past and have a strong preference for a centralized structure (i.e. all rev ops functions roll up to one leader vs. marketing ops rolling up to a CMO and sales ops rolling up to a VP of Sales). The rev ops team is broken into specific functional groups (marketing ops, sales ops, CS/Support Ops and Business Systems Engineering). Our functional roles are 'e ...Read More

I hit on this somewhat above but generally it should be 30 Days: Learning and Discovery Meet with key stakeholders (Managers and ICs) to learn current processes, bottlenecks, and paint points. Since ops roles are very cross functional, make sure you are meeting with people not just in your direct domain (sales ops people should meet with marketers, marketing ops with sales folks, etc.). Get to know the business - what’s humming along and what areas need your attention. Spend time on general comp ...Read More

This is a great question - so many things about talent retention have to do with the company as a whole vs. things that I have control over on the operations team. So the first thing is to join a company that aligns with your values and where you believe in the mission and leadership; retention is much easier if it’s a great place to work! On the ops team in particular - make sure your team is working on projects that interest them, that they have a voice in setting their roadmap and OKRs and th ...Read More

Rev ops should be a Day 2 hire - the systems and tools a company are implementing from very early days (e.g. SFDC) would benefit from a dedicated operations person to ensure that things are being built for scale. I may be biased as an ops person myself, but I think it’s extremely important to invest in these resources early on. I’ve never talked to a leader who says ‘I hired my rev ops person too early,’ but have heard many people lament the opposite. Practically, I think that after a company ha ...Read More

I think the biggest surprise is what you take for granted when rev ops is already an established function. The problems and decisions you make affect many more people at an established org - but they are very different in scope (instead of deciding accelerator percentage buckets on a comp plan, you’re thinking about how to pay people commissions in general or if accelerators should even exist). The decisions you make when establishing a rev ops function set a precedent that people will look back ...Read More

Focus on getting the big systems in place first (on the sales side, for example, think CRM, data enrichment, sales engagement platform) and audit all the existing tools and processes currently in place. Ripping and replacing part of a tech stack is painful, but the earlier you make this decision, the easier it will be - so getting these tools procured and set up early-on is important. If you already have the main tech-stack pillars in place, ensure you have all the ‘future state’ tracking you’ll ...Read More

The org structure I mentioned really lends itself to working cross functionally. Our marketing ops folks are embedded on the marketing team and work together to create and cascade down quarterly OKRs and KPIs. The quarterly roadmap and project plans are built collaboratively and team goals and metrics roll-up to our larger company level OKRs. We have several ongoing synchronous meetings and async updates with key stakeholders (one on leads, one on pipeline, one on SDR work, etc.) as well as quar ...Read More