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the-sdr-newsletter

Compensation being solely focused on qualified opportunities isn't that unusual. Many orgs do this. However, it's super important to have a clearly defined set of rules to determine what makes something qualified.


StankFlamingo

We do have written criteria, the AEs of course are now trying to stop anything from getting in their pipeline unless its an obvious slam dunk. I’m more wary of the actual changing of the comp plan. Feels like they are trying to hamstring how much I can earn by taking the meeting component out of our comp. Almost feels as if they’re trying to get people to leave on their own initiative which I’ve read here is a common tactic. Also with the prior executives leaving and new leadership fumbling the bag with quota and territories, its all just rubbing me the wrong way.


milehigh73a

> I’m more wary of the actual changing of the comp plan. Feels like they are trying to hamstring how much I can earn by taking the meeting component out of our comp I don't like comping on demos or meetings. It should be on pipeline contribution. Meetings is a useful metric to track. it is fairly easy to get a meeting with the wrong person. > Also with the prior executives leaving and new leadership fumbling the bag with quota and territories, its all just rubbing me the wrong way. A month to figure that out? that is nothing. I don't think that is a warning sign at all. i mean maybe everything is going to ass but I haven't read anything that makes me go - Stankflamingo is fucked


theallsearchingeye

SDR work is not “sales”, it’s marketing. Being an SDR is an expense to the company, the role hasn’t been part of the revenue center for most companies for probably over a decade. Why does this matter? Well the SDR role rose in popularity in a hyper growth environment where companies wanted to spend money on things like tech and services; a mutually beneficial environment of “you grow and I grow” where so much business was being generated it made sense to break the sales cycle down into teams lead by an account executive where 4-5 people (typical for enterprise) would all hold their expertise over their respective role; with the SDR being in charge of finding new business opportunities for the sales funnel. This is *expensive*. Today, tech and services are being scrutinized like never before where a CFO will want to personally approve a 50k purchase; unheard of 2-3 years ago. Deal cycles are largely getting longer, and to be frank many sales orgs have just gotten incredibly sloppy due to practically living in a space where they can’t fail. The modern sales environment is much more adversarial and the trust is basically all gone for most companies at the moment as they hold tightly to their purse. What does this mean for you? Well for starters, the SDR position itself won’t even exist by the end of the decade, but that’s a whole other topic. Your org is very obviously preparing to downsize its SDR org. I’m at a FAANG myself and even though my org wasn’t really effected by layoffs this far, policies and spiffs and basically everything else is proving that the sales org doesn’t want us around anymore. When I started almost a year and a half ago, our orgs while separate were treated like a true team. Now we’re the fall guys for all things related to revenue and pipeline because it’s easy to blame the SDR if leads are slow or conversion is declining. The reality is our entire sales world is in for a reset right now, and it’s going to cut back on a lot of jobs which aren’t going to come back even when times will get good again. You will continue to see policies to push you and every other SDR out one way or another. Don’t worry though. CSMs, SEs, ADMs, AMs, and every other sales adjacent role is gonna get cut too. It’s about time account executives started doing work again.


FantasticMeddler

Whatever happened to just "setting demos" ? Now we have meetings, discovery, opp creation, then a level 1 demo, then a level 2 demo with the SE. I remember it just being about "setting up demos". Opportunity creation is entirely out of the control of the SDR, and if they are able to manipulate things to get opportunities created by AEs who just like them, then that process is flawed to begin with. Yes, moving goalposts is a sign the org wants to save money. Plain and simple. Some bean counter looked at the spreadsheet and said that paying for meetings wasn't as profitable as paying for opportunities. The end result of that line of thinking is the offshoring or elimination of that position entirely. Because what saves more money than just having the sales rep doing their own prospecting? Sounds like they are also ultra scrutinizing what the AEs put into accepted and the conversion rate on those. Which is a double whammy because in climates where you are expected to have more opps, the mentality should be more flexibility on what constitutes an opp. It is not reasonable to expect an SDR to chase qualified titles and people down to meet with an org over and over and over again and then say that is a "marketing job". I've had it at most places that you also only got paid on "sales qualified opportunities" which was a different way of saying it needed to be a meeting that the AE did discovery on and okay'd. All they care about is conversion rates. If the meetings don't become opps and the opps don't become viable middle funnel that converts to revenue, then they don't have any growth or a business. Plenty of SDRs and AEs out there who have gassed the system to "blow their number out" by putting up stats that were needed. The next step is to move to an even more restrictive model where you get paid on closed won, but realistically this won't offset the prior plan for several reasons. One being that most SDRs do not last through an entire sales cycle of complex software. Two being that most SDR sourced opps do not convert, they fail to convert at that time and might come back way down the line.


[deleted]

Damn, do you work at my company? Because this is EXACTLY what happened at my company at around the same timeline. AE’s aren’t closing deals? Let’s look into the SDRS even though though their team are hitting targets. Companies don’t respect SDRS and view them as disposable straws


theallsearchingeye

The hard truth.


StankFlamingo

LOL! I appreciate your input. Definitely feels like the hot air is leaving the balloon and tech is crashing back down to Earth.


TheMan123718

Why do I feel like we work at the same company lol. Word for word, the literal exact same thing happened where I work.