About the speaker

Prof Sridhar Guda has been teaching at IIM Kozhikode for over 14 years now. His Linkedin profile says “Aim is to make Sales Profession nobler” which struck a chord with me. He is passionate about learning and advocating best practices in Selling, Rural Marketing and Distribution Channels.

Prof Sridhar has also written papers on a not-so-talked-about topic of Spirituality and Sales. You can check out some of his works here: https://scholar.google.co.in/citation…

Topics covered

• Defining spirituality in sales
• Individual vs. Workplace Spirituality
• What got Prof Sridhar to explore this topic in the context of customer facing roles
• Prof Sridhar’s enquiry into high performing sales reps, their skills and what drives them
• Indicators for sales leaders
• Can “Emotional Control” and spirituality be coached?
• Some audience questions

Call Notes

• Prof Sridhar from IIM Kozhikode
• Saurabh: First got to know about Prof. Sridhar’s work from the Book the Ultimate Sales Accelerator
• Saurabh was excited by the fact that Prof Sridhar researches Spirituality in Sales and his articulation of the subject
• Saurabh: How would you define spirituality considering we are complete novices?
• Prof Sridhar: People have been trying to define spirituality since the beginning of time. In academic circles spirituality is different from religiosity
• Religiosity will have certain rituals. These rituals are used to navigate the pursuit of god or a higher power. 
• With Spirituality the belief is that there is a supreme force and there is no specific means of driving it 
  • The definition of supreme differs from person to person
• Prof Sridhar: Spirituality is looking into your spirit – the invisible force you have at your disposal
• When it comes to your professional life – “Why am I in sales?” – if you are in pursuit of an answer to this question then you are on a quest for your spirit
• The purpose of sales, in Prof Sridhar’s opinion, is Serving. Whether it’s serving your organizations, customers, stakeholders, shareholders
• If you keep refining this in the quest of how to better “serve”, you’ve probably started your spiritual journey
• Saurabh: In some of your papers I’ve come across this term ”Workplace Spirituality”, could you elaborate?
• Prof Sridhar: Workplace spirituality is different from Individual Spirituality
• Workplace spirituality – Considers one element as self transcendence – going beyond what you are | treating everyone the way they need to be treated in a fair manner considering work as worship
• Individual Spirituality – involves looking inwards and finding what your purpose of life is
• When it comes to sales and spirituality, we are probably moving between workplace and individual spirituality
• Saurabh: What got you to explore the relationship between Spirituality and its relevance in an organization in a Customer Facing role?
• Prof Sridhar: A large chunk of credit goes to my first PhD scholar Vaibhav (Chawla) who was exploring this subject and the PGP students who keep asking questions around “Why Sales”
• To find the answers – Enquiry with executives gave Prof Sridhar critical insight
• When Prof Sridhar looked at high performers – “they are no longer bothered by targets that their bosses give them – they are in some sort of a trance – they are confident about achieving” 
• These people innately know that they can achieve even if they give you another picture
• High performers are at ease with their lives – they are on a quest to satisfy themselves on a higher level.
• After a conversation Prof Sridhar had with a top Sales Leader about the broad issue of “What are the problems with sales people?” -> they identified that one of the bigger issues are the psychological issues of low self esteem of sales people
• Successful salespeople transcend the self esteem problem – they tend to be “in the zone” for every moment of their lives and stay on top
• Saurabh: “So they aren’t really sweating target achievement in their heads?”
• Prof Sridhar: “Don’t mistake that spirituality means not sweating. Spirituality doesn’t mean relinquishing short or long term goals. They have found their purpose which is – serving whoever the role demands and they are in a constant quest to transform themselves to serve that role
• The 4 broad skills that sales people typically need are – 1. Selling skills 2. Knowledge of Product and Customer 3. Emotional Quotient and 4. A Healthy Mindset
• There is also a broad meta-construct of Spirituality. This drives them to learn -> become more skillful -> Be emotionally better -> and with a health mindset
• Saurabh: From the PoV of Sales leadership: “Are there certain behaviours which are different high performers who are spiritual vs. those who aren’t? Is this observable?
• Prof Sridhar: There could be 4-5 indicators 
  • Typically spiritual people are able to thread the fine line and navigate stressful and situations that challenge their self esteem
  • Tapovai dwandva sahanam (Refer article by Prof Guha) – which means a Tapasvi (who performs penance) can hold two opposites with forbearance. – How a sales person can hold both failures and success at the same time is an indication
  • There is a glow around this person – they remain reasonably Well or Happy over a meaningful period of time 
  • From the movie Door to Door – about a person with cerebral palsy who went on to become the greatest door to door salesman – he highlighted Persistence as his secret. More spiritual salespeople are typically more persistent
• Saurabh: One common point I notice is that these people typically have greater “Emotional Control” and tend to Not have emotional swings. Do you think this can be coached into sales reps?
• Prof Sridhar: Spirituality is an individual pursuit. Having said that – organizations can facilitate individual evolution.
• From an unpublished research paper with Vaibhav on “delayed gratification”. There are indicators that sales people that typically delay gratification may not achieve short term targets but tend to be more customer centric and adaptive – this however is tough to implement in a fast moving world and is a question leaders have to consider
• Leaders have to highlight how salespeople create impact with their customers. Prof Sridhar has observed that salespeople in some industries don’t understand the on-ground product impact
• When a salesperson Feels they matter in the organizational scheme, there is a growth of faith – this is critical and leads to a slow movement towards what we call spirituality
• Saurabh: I see trends towards “mindfulness workshops”. If organizations can light a spark and make incremental changes I feel that’s a win.
• Prof Sridhar: The ultimate aim of an organization should be to make a salesperson remain in a state of happiness. Age old thinking says that you’d be more creative and productive in a state of happiness. In the current scenario of pressures and daily calls, the focus has shifted from a customer centric view to dwelling on what the boss is asking for (numbers, targets etc.)
• Saurabh: I personally believe coaching helps people find a center to an extent but there has to be an individual pursuit as you said to hold opposites – success and failure together.
• How do you identify people who are more spiritual in interviews (not limited to sales interviews)? Is it purely behaviour or is there more?
• Prof Sridhar: Tough question, tough to identify in a 30-minute interview. However let me try explaining using a famous story by Bhakt Thukaram, (could be hearsay) – He constantly chanted the name “Vithala” (A hindu deity worshipped predominantly in Maharashtra) even when he used the bathroom. More hardened scholars were unhappy and questioned how he could do this while in the bathroom and it was wrong. He stopped doing this, but they still heard the chant. They realized that every single pore resounded with “Vithala” – Coming back – We can at least look for – How much do candidates “own” the job they seek in an interview
• From modern examples – this scene from the movie Pursuit of Happiness will give you a good example
• Modern metrics and psychometrics tests can help also
• Saurabh: From my experience while taking interviews, candidates go into a “state of flow” of stories where they forget the coffee kept in front of them. 
• A lot of sales people are in a state of flow where they are constantly imagining client situations in their heads, they tend to rehearse these situations constantly
• Prof Sridhar: Agreed, these people do tend to be good mid-long term bets
• Saurabh: Yes, these people tend to be high performers but they also tend to be more Consistent
• Prof Sridhar: Measuring the right metrics also gives a good indication of teams and individual spirituality levels
• Saurabh: Managers do have a huge onus to measure but it does require high involvement to measure things required to find out how spiritually rooted their teams are
• Prof Sridhar: Frontline sales people are the crux of an organization so spending time there will yield results
• Saurabh: When I was asked why we were covering this topic of Spirituality in sales, I’ve felt it myself and having engaged in certain practices, I see the benefits of exploring this aspect
• Saurabh: One question from the audience – People who already enjoy sales, wouldn’t they already be aligned with the concept and be “more spiritual”?
• Prof Sridhar: Yes, this is what we call a “virtuous cycle”. Typically when you enjoy the process it is a virtuous cycle – when you get results -> you are happy -> you do better
• Saurabh: On the matter of self actualization, from my personal experience and people I’ve observed closely – self actualization may not be directly related to sales but as you said, improving their self esteem all the time. I’ve observed performers who enter other streams are still trying to win and looking to treat their self esteem in some way
• My takeaway and a layman definition – just look for people who are consistently joyful and at peace with themselves and you’d find they are more spiritual than others
• Prof Sridhar: I think sales has become a taboo becauses of it’s short term focus. It’s high time sales becomes a more noble profession, and this is a call that has to be taken at different levels. By elevating levels of spirituality, this will be achieved
• Saurabh: Question from the audience: Sometimes the work philosophy of a salesperson may not be aligned with an organization’s views. How do we navigate?
• Prof Sridhar: If you aren’t aligned, don’t be in that job. There is no dearth of jobs.
• However, in some cases, there may not be a choice for whatever reason – if your way of working is not aligned, things will be tough. One way out – sit with your boss and lay out your views. Contrary to popular belief – most bosses are good and will help
• Second, find out if you can work with other teams / roles where your alignment with organizational goals are higher
• Saurabh: I agree. You could try but there’s no assurance here. Eventually people move on. Personally, I think this is a good outcome. Eventually you find an organization that matches your views and the earlier this happens the better

About the speaker

Siddharth is a seasoned Business Leader and an expert at Talent Strategy. In his current role, he is the Director & Head – Talent Strategy at Lightspeed India Partners Advisors. He is responsible for working with founders to build a point-of-view around talent. He helps Lightspeed portfolio companies around Organisation Structuring, Assessment, Coaching, Hiring Partner network and CXO talent.

In this samvaad, I will speak to Siddharth about sales leadership hiring at start-ups, their point of view on hiring sales leadership talent and what they look for.

Topics covered

• Basics of building your sales team
• Frameworks for identifying sales talent
• Availability of talent for tech companies in India
• Where should one look for sales talent: agencies/references
• Interviewing for sales roles
• Onboarding sales leadership talent
• Compensation for sales leadership
• What sectors should ne hire from?
• Top takeaways on sales hiring for founders

Call notes

Saurabh: Building Sales teams and Leadership – How do you build that up? Not just senior leadership, but the middle layer as well?

When leadership in your portfolio companies are beginning out, What do they tell you? Are they able to define their requirements clearly? What kind of conversations are these?

Siddharth: It’s a relevant space that you’ve picked out. First-time founders generally don’t come from a GTM background, they are typically from a product/technology background.

GTM seems like a mystical ball. Nobody is really clear upfront about what’s to be done. We try to sit and prioritize what’s relevant and important for them

What we try to do with the founder up front 

• Drill down and identify the stage the firm is at
• Based on this, define what needs to be done in this and the next 2 stages

Hiring and defining the role of a sales leader differs at a 0-1 / 1-10 / 10-100 stage.

Saurabh: Do you see them come to you after having burnt their fingers by hiring themselves?

Siddharth: It does happen, but we try not to let it get there for our portfolio companies.

What we try to do is assist in defining what a good sales leader looks like – identifying 

1. What are you hiring for? 
2. How are you evaluating what you are hiring for? 
3. How do you manage the person once they are on board?

Saurabh: Do you have some frameworks to identify this talent?

Siddharth: Typically the brief from the founder is a single line. Things like – “I have to get to x revenue stage” | “I have to get to a certain number of users/merchants on board” or something to that effect

At the 0-1 stage – The Evangelist. Founders are best suited for this – founders are the most passionate and will always sell at any opportunity. We recommend that they get their first set of clients on board themselves.

At the 1-10 stage – The Hustler – Working with 5-10 sales reps – here we’re looking for someone to come in and set up a repeatable sales playbook – a professional. 

It’s predominantly going to be someone who is a recent quota carrier with a lot of hustle and is looking to win at all costs. 

Also best to look for someone who has recently created a sales playbook.

This person should also be able to get insights from clients and move quickly.

At the 10-100 stage – The Professional – here the sales playbook should be repeatable and process driven, Coaching, culture, recruitment skills are key at this stage.

Look for experienced pros who have done this before.

Saurabh: In your experience, I assume these are people who may come from outside tech. Are you able to get enough talent in India from tech companies?

Siddharth: If you had asked me this 5 years ago I would have said no. Over the last couple of years, we can go to companies who have recently been at these stages and find people not necessarily even at higher levels.

However, this pool is still not deep enough and at times we need to go outside. The nuance here is that it does depend on the stage of the company.

Saurabh: When people come in from bigger companies do you see them finding it difficult?

Siddharth: I don’t want to generalize, but personally I see that the hustle is missing. 

People coming in from larger orgs have a lot of resources at their disposal which you don’t have at these startups and you have to get your hands dirty, some people are challenged here.

Saurabh: Taking a step back, the questions I get from founders often – “Where should I look for sales talent?” 

I think this comes from the fact that talent on job portals doesn’t cut it and working with agencies is uncomfortable while doing outbound recruitment.

What would you say to these people?

Siddharth: I don’t think this is only relevant to sales but to every role in your core team. Your first few leaders have to be “Talent Magnets”. They have to be capable of building a following.

Try and find out how many people follow these people across companies, teams etc.

Saurabh: How do you find that out?

Siddharth: Ask them straight up: Questions like: 

“How many people followed you in the last 3-4 organizations?”  

“Tell me who are the best performing people in your team” 

Questions around quota achievement of team members and how many people don’t get to it. 

“Over the last 2 stints, how many people within your teams have gone on to be sales leaders?”

These should give you good indications of – 

1. Are they capable of creating good sales people repeatedly
2. They come with solid references of these people they have already spent time building

References / Reference hires are extremely potent. 

I do tell founders to do 360 references when hiring sales leaders. 10/10 references and glowing recommendations aren’t necessarily great. 

General references aren’t very insightful. 

Know what you are hiring for, know the Gaps and take these to your reference calls!

Saurabh: Do founders need to be working with outbound agencies?

Siddharth: Not as much. I’d say the best way to start is references. Usually it’s never agencies when you are starting off. 

Cold hiring will be a low priority in this case and I would not suggest this up front.

Leverage your network and references.

Saurabh: So building a solid network seems to be critical up front to ensure you get the right talent.

Siddharth: Yes, that’s bang-on.

Saurabh: One concern I have with founders interviewing sales leaders is that they are too used to hiring technology talent and they come with the same mindset to sales interviews. 

What kind of changes do they need to make to interview for sales?

Siddharth: Very relevant. What we’ve done is we divide what to evaluate for a sales leader. We ask them to start with 

• common things like- culture fit, work ethic – founders can do this part themselves as it doesn’t change for roles
• For sales / technical part of the interview – we recommend this be done with an experienced sales leader. We have founders have initial conversation and bring in external “technical experts” / experienced sales leaders to have these conversations with inputs with the founders with founders shadowing them and observing to learn the nuances of these conversations

Saurabh: On onboarding sales leadership talent: 

What challenges have you seen? 

Siddharth: Where it doesn’t work out is poor expectation setting. Expectations set in interviews vs. what they are expected to do once they join don’t match.

Some leaders tend to do the same things that they hire these leaders to do and responsibilities overlap. These people are brought on board as experts.

I typically tell founders to pick the right people and enable them with the right resources to make decisions themselves.

Saurabh: It’s speculated that if you’re coming from an established industry / organization and joining a startup, you will have to sacrifice compensation – how far is this true?

Siddharth: It’s not true, however, I’ll caveat that with the fact that we tell founders to have discussions with a long view (5 years) and it depends on the stage of the company you are joining, potential growth pace and opportunity

If you are coming into an early stage firm you may sacrifice on cash early on but there will be significant long term upside in the form of ESOPs, growth pace etc. 

We also tell these leaders to use this 6 month – 1 year ramp up time to figure out whether this is working for them or not.

Audience question: If we’re trying to hire from the FMCG sector, what are your views on bringing these people in at the product market fit stage?

Siddharth: We’ve hired a lot from these sectors and we suggest founders to bring these people in at the growth stage and perhaps not at a very early stage if they have no prior startup experience.

What you’re really getting from these folks is the ability to scale things really fast. They are great “scalers”.

If the same person has startup experience already, creating sales playbooks, this is a fantastic hire.

Saurabh: In closing, what would you suggest founders keep in mind, top 3-4 things?

Siddharth:

     Few things: 

1. Go Benchmark what / who you consider to be a good sales leader – talk to these people about what you should be looking for. Ask them if they’d be keen to come in as experts to help you evaluate talent

2. When you bring sales leaders on board, remind yourself that you have trusted these people and they have gone through your evaluation cycle – give them the space to make decisions

3. Do deep reference checks. Be on these calls yourself. Do not outsource this.

      4. If things don’t work out in a reasonable time, take quick calls

About the speaker

Kshitij was the first salesperson at DJUBO, one of India’s largest all-in-one hotel booking SaaS platform. 

Vikas was the first salesperson at Zomato, India’s leading restaurant discovery and online ordering platform. 

Summary

In a freewheeling chat, Kshitij & Vikas talk about their experience of being one of the first salespeople in their respective organizations.  The conversation flows into 

How difficult is it to be the first salesperson and what are the challenges?

How was the selection process for the first few salespeople?

How can people apply for sales jobs at startups?

How do you keep your motivation when selling in a challenging market?

How do you effectively communicate client feedback and sales issues to founders?

How do you identify sales talent for early stage sales at a startup?

Vikas & Kshitij talk about some interesting anecdotes about dealing with clients in the initial stage.

About the speaker

Roshan Cariappa has done the zero to one journey multiple times as an operator and founder over the last 13 years. He heads Marketing at Vymo – a Sequoia & Emergence-funded SaaS startup that is disrupting Sales & Distribution for Financial Services. Roshan curates wisdom from founders, operators, and investors on his podcast – The Startup Operator (https://open.spotify.com/show/1kRdGSs…) and you can connect with him on Twitter @RoshanCariappa.

Summary

In this frank conversation, Roshan holds up a mirror to the current state of CRM adoption across most organizations and why they are almost universally disliked by salespeople. 

He explains why he believes that CRM systems need to be designed for the ‘sales person’ for them to be adopted and how that has been the single most important reason for multiple CRM implementation failures. 

He shares some key factors an organization should consider before embarking on their CRM journey. He touches upon key prerequisites that an organization should fulfill to be able to successfully adopt a CRM system and help create a sustainable sales engine.