AMA: Jacky Ye on Establishing the Revenue Ops Function

I think it comes down to a few things and I don't think this is specific to revenue ops. I borrow this concept from one of my favorite Youtubers, Ali Abdaal, who notes in his upcoming book that meaningful work boils down to three P's - power, play, and people. And if you have a team or an organization that does all three well, you'll have a good chance of retaining people. * Power is about autonomy and progress, the feeling that people have control over the work that they do. It also encapsulates a feeling of progress, and having a destination to work towards. Do people feel like they have a path forward? Do they have autonomy? Being able to say "Yes" to both is necessary to retaining (and hiring) talent. * Play is simple - it's enjoyment. It's the idea that doing the thing, the work in and of itself, is joyful and fun. Do they enjoy the work? Are they being challenged enough? Are they bored? * People is many things, but fundamentally I think it's about teams. I picture this as an inner circle and an outer circle. The inner circle is the immediate team that someone is in, their manager, their direct coworkers, the people they interact with on a daily basis. Is there a sense of connection with the team? Do people feel like they have to compete with one another? How are ideas discussed? How are they criticized? It's often said that people leave managers (and teams), not companies, and that's what the inner circle is about. The outer circle is the broader organization and company. It's less relevant than the inner circle, but still important. A strong sense of connection the company's mission is a indicator of retention.

One of my managers is fond of saying that to succeed in this role, there's only two things you really need to know how to do - analyze data and tell a good story. There's a lot of detail we could unpack but when you distill it down, it comes down to whether or not you can take raw data - quantitative and qualitative - and write a compelling story about it to influence decision-making. In "business" speak, it's knowing how to mine insights, investigate hypotheses, model scenarios, and synthesize all of above into succinct strategic recommendations. In the process, there's a lot of ambiguity and complexity that requires sensible assumption making and structured reasoning. Consequently, the interview process we have and that I went through tests for the above. There's the standard behavioral component that evaluates for interest in the role, background experience, and general "fit" and then there's a case component that mirrors a real project we would work on, involving data analysis and a presentation to pitch your proposal in front of a panel. * On the technical side, the interview assesses whether someone has the technical chops to analyze data under time pressure and put a deck to tell a cohesive narrative about it. * On the softer side, the interview also assesses things like whether a candidate knows how to read an audience, speak at the right altitude and level of detail, respond to feedback, and challenge their thinking further.

Prior to joining Adobe, I worked as an economic consultant specializing in antitrust and competition. Like most consultants joining fresh out of undergrad, I saw consulting as a stepping stone and a great opportunity to learn a lot while figuring out what I wanted to do long term. At the time I was debating three exit ops: (1) get an MBA, (2) get a PhD in economics and become a professor, or (3) work in tech. After working for two years, the third option appealed to me most because it represented the most choice, and in some ways, almost a round two of consulting - a great place to learn a ton of useful skills while figuring out what I enjoy long term. In the absence of clarity, pick a direction that seems reasonable and figure it out along the way. That's advice a lot of mentors have given me. Most of us don't know what we "really" want to do, so prioritize learning and give yourself the best shot possible to keep growing. That's what attracted me the most about my current role. Although Adobe is an old organization (as far as tech companies go), the team I'm in is relatively new and growing quickly. There's a ton of whitespace, a ton of new challenges, and consequently a lot of opportunities to grow. That said, it's not all work, all hustle, all the time. Within tech, Adobe has a strong reputation for promoting work-life balance and in my experience, that's been true. As an example, Adobe has company wide week-long shutdowns in the summer and winter, true time off to unplug where since everyone's offline, there's no pressure to still work/check emails. Put those things together and this role felt like the perfect launchpad into the next stage of my career, balancing both career growth and personal well-being. I loved how one Exponent article put it, "One of the best parts of a BizOps role is that you can be like a chameleon—morphing and changing to address the most critical needs of a business. [...] You get enormous visibility into how a company thinks from the top down. How each team sets priorities can help you see how a business is growing and preparing for the future." On vision, the one-liner is to be true strategic partners rather than simply data aggregators. Internally, we call the latter function "reporting the news" where traditionally, ops has been focused on running day-to-day operations - things like measuring and reporting pipeline, tracking deals, etc. These are are vital functions and necessary for running the business, but the vision is to go one step further and think of ways to also change the business. It's the difference between just reporting pipeline coverage vs. coming up with initiatives to improve pipeline coverage (by increasing generation, conversion, quality, etc.). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Footnote: on why an MBA and a PhD didn't make sense for me after consulting * On (1), I felt that getting an MBA felt pre-mature without first working in a different industry and getting broader functional exposure. I also didn't have a clear idea of what I would be doing the MBA for and didn't have a strong vision of what I wanted to do afterwards. It simply felt like something I "should" do. I know many people who have gone straight into their MBA after consulting and done very well, but it didn't feel right for me. * On (2), I don't know that I've completely thrown out the idea of becoming a professor. I've always loved teaching/mentoring and there's something quite appealing about living out in a college town and being able to teach and study and research things you love. But I'm not convinced I love economics (or any subject frankly) enough to devote 5 years of grad school and the rest of my immediate future to it.