AMA: UserTesting VP of Sales, Katie Harkins on Scaling a Sales Team

October 3 @ 10:00AM PT

Do you have any advice for a junior who is a first sales hire?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

I highly recommend doing a deep dive on understanding the landscape of the product or service you're about to sell. Take the time to thoroughly understand the products or services or competitive landscape. Make sure you can pitch this to your grandma blind folded. What are the key features, benefits and how do the current customers use your product in their day to day lives. This will enable you to be confident when you're engaging in sales cycles.

448 Views

1 request
What's the most effective way to scale a sales team beyond the first few reps?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

#1 - Hire strategically SDRs? BDRs? Solutions Consultants? AEs? Sales Managers? RevOps? All these roles internally should have a specific focus and set of responsibilities that helps generate, close and support global pipeline. #2 Structured Interview Process, Onboarding Process & Training Process Are your new hires are well-equipped to succeed? I recommend offering ongoing coaching, recorded call reviews and overall sales development. Everyone wants consistent feedback and improvement in th ...Read More

676 Views

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What's your framework to prioritizing needs/deliverables when you're the first sales leader at a company establishing the function?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

#1 Need = REVENUE. Never forget that. Do everything in your power to exceed your number, everything comes after that. When you're the first sales leader at a company you're wearing multiple hats and you're under a ton of pressure. You need to get to know your team, what makes them tick, why they joined the company in the first place, what records have they set or broken and what will get them to do that again. Do you know their dog's name? What do they do on the weekend? How do they celebrate a ...Read More

850 Views

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What does your sales team org structure look like?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

I personally think verticalizing a sales org died when COVID hit. If you had a hospitality and tourism vertical - they were bleeding big time when the world was shut down. For larger organizations, it makes sense to have a team specializing in healthcare or fintech for HIPAA and security reasons. I'm a big fan of AEs who can be chameleons and be Swiss army knives for pitching all titles and verticals. I've mostly seen sales orgs internally have teams by employee size. Segmenting by a company's t ...Read More

1,281 Views

1 request
How does "the way you motivate" your sales org change as your company scale?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

My old CRO use to say, "If your territory isn't shrinking or the company isn't hiring - you're at the wrong company." I love this mindset. As your company grows and scales, it means your equity is worth more. Motivation for AEs should be that change is a good thing, change is inevitable and change is the most constant thing in life. JFK said, "Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past and present are certain to miss the future." Motivation around embracing the change and you ...Read More

497 Views

1 request
How do you communicate sales updates and activities to the rest of the company?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

Sales updates can be done via slack or teams. We also have done weekly sales huddles every Monday at 9am PST to start the week strong. I've also done bi-monthly email updates to our CRO, CFO & CEO as to what we're hearing in the field. Here's my template for success: Stat Rat (asp, close ratios, # of net new logos, total contract value out for signature, total revenue booked on the quarter, total ARR) Self serve revenue #s People updates (records broken, houses purchased, upcoming babies on ...Read More

557 Views

1 request
How do you think about shared KPI’s with your demand generation? And what are ones that sales teams often miss?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

I love shared KPIs with Demand Generation. We're all on the same team. If marketing doesn't bring in the leads, sales teams are turning to outbounding which elongates sales cycles. I see the sales team missing content creation on assets that don't yet exist to handle objections within the sales cycle. Take your top 10 objections, partner with your Demand Generation team and create blog posts or one pager PDFs to address the objections and provide best practices to your prospects. They're looking ...Read More

1,287 Views

1 request
If your sales team has only one or two people responsible for covering multiple products with complex features, how would you recommend dividing the workload in the short-term so as best to support long-term growth and expansion of the team?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

For complex features, I recommend flash carding like you're in high school and listening to successful recorded call. This can be on an individual basis or in a group zoom setting. It's important that every quota carrying individual has a script that they can easily access and commit the sales script + top objections to memory. You can also bring in Solutions Engineers for demoing best practices to ramp up newer individuals on the team.

1,265 Views

1 request
What are the key processes you'd set up when expanding the sales team from 1 to multiple people?

Katie Harkins

Glide VP of Sales • 2y

Email Templates based on vertical & title you're selling to (Outreach or Sales Loft) SFDC Dashboards to track accountability metrics Closed Won Recorded Call Library (Chorus or Gong) Interview Scripts and Interview Processes with the recruiting team Onboarding Program with different departments internally Training Videos for the tech stack you have available Clear source codes from Marketing//Demand Generation Offsites with new team members and existing team members Practice sessions for val ...Read More

1,226 Views

1 request

AMA: UserTesting VP of Sales, Katie Harkins on Scaling a Sales Team

View AMA Answers

Do you have any advice for a junior who is a first sales hire?

What's the most effective way to scale a sales team beyond the first few reps?

What's your framework to prioritizing needs/deliverables when you're the first sales leader at a company establishing the function?

What does your sales team org structure look like?

How does "the way you motivate" your sales org change as your company scale?

How do you communicate sales updates and activities to the rest of the company?

How do you think about shared KPI’s with your demand generation? And what are ones that sales teams often miss?

If your sales team has only one or two people responsible for covering multiple products with complex features, how would you recommend dividing the workload in the short-term so as best to support long-term growth and expansion of the team?

What are the key processes you'd set up when expanding the sales team from 1 to multiple people?