US Senate Cocktail Party

Montreal. A slice of France in North America.

I'm naturally introverted. Never a big "cocktail party" guy. In fact, I dreaded them. But the higher I got in my career and the higher I got in my social circle, the more parties I had to go to. I had no choice. I had to get good. I had to learn a strategy. And here it is: Act like you're happy to be there. Seriously. I had no idea, but I used to be putting off a vibe that I was having a terrible time. Which wasn't untrue, but that vibe made people not gravitate to me, which made things even worse. When I consciously decided to ACT like I was having a good time, it forced me to think about putting out positive vibes. And like magic, people would loosen up around me. Conservations weren't so laborious. I started actually having fun, which I didn't think was even possible. It became a virtuous cycle rather than a vicious one.

The talent stack, popularized by @ScottAdamsSays, is a great concept. And it's exactly how you become a Sales Engineer. In our case, stack two talents (Tech and Sales) together, and you can suddenly make $200k as a Sales Engineer. You might need to be in the top 1% of all humans at sales to make $200k as a sales rep. You might need to be in the top 1% of all humans at tech to make $200k as a software engineer. But if you're top 20% of all humans at BOTH tech and sales, you are suddenly top 1% of all humans at Sales Engineering. This is how you stack your talents in a way that guarantees your success. And if you add more skills on top of this, you'll make even more. Follow me for daily tips and lessons on Sales Engineering!

Have 5 go-to stories for job interviews. - The "nothing can shock me after this one" story - The "serious disagreement but we worked it out" story - The "stumper problem that I creatively figured out" story - The "my biggest and proudest achievement" story - The "incredible teamwork" story These will serve you well in almost any interview situation. Any others that you'd recommend?

This account exists for those who want to escape Corporate America's trap. Never quite making enough to be truly satisfied, but just comfortable enough to keep maintaining the status quo. There's a better way. At 25, I had no idea how to get ahead in my career. I was making less than $50k in my IT job and staring at 40 more years of 9-5 drudgery without any real payoff. There were tons of people out there making hundreds of thousands per year. Why couldn't I be one of them? I decided I would be one of them. And that's when everything changed. Within a year, I'd tripled my salary and had landed in Sales Engineering - a job well-suited to my talents and lifestyle desires. Over a decade later, I have a wonderful family, a great career, and no more day-to-day money concerns. Over the last decade, I've become convinced that there's a high-paying, lifestyle-friendly career option for everyone. It's a matter of finding one that suits your talents and pursuing it relentlessly. Follow me for daily strategies and tips on using Corporate America to improve your life rather than drain it.

A Sales Engineer on my team is getting a $175,000 commission check this month. In our world, this happens. The contracts can be huge- many millions, multi years- with massive name brand companies. That's the type of deal he closed last month. Here's how he did it: 1. Networking: This job isn’t only about the tech. He set out to build as many relationships as possible within the account. This was the only way to understand the full picture of how our solution was perceived by the client. 2. Knowing what matters: In this case, expiring contracts, internal political considerations, compliance requirements, and partnerships with strategic consultants/integrators. 3. Grit: He showed up every working day (and many nights, weekends, and holidays) for more than a year. His tenacity proved that our company would do whatever it took to make things right. 4. VIP treatment: The customer felt like they had special inside access to our company, because they did. He was the loudest voice within our company advocating for his customer. 5. Outflanking the competition: Every conversation with a customer is a data point. Working with his sales counterpart, they were able to sniff out and defeat our competitor’s strategies. I love Sales Engineering as a career because you get what you put in. An outstanding win and a well-deserved reward.

1914. What was lost then has still not returned.

WTF is a Sales Engineer?? TL;DR: Earn $200k+ by being an expert communicator on tech. It’s a side of tech sales that I rarely see talked about on X, a side that happens to have been my career for the past 15+ years. It has many names, which may be why people don’t know much about it: - Sales engineer. - Solutions engineer. - Systems engineer. - Solutions architect. - Solutions consultant. And many more. I was an SE for more than 10 years, and have been in SE leadership for the past 5 and counting. It’s a great career. Let’s dive into what an SE is and what sets the great ones apart. My experience is with enterprise IT vendors who sell to large enterprises, so I will focus on what I know, but many of the principles apply to all SE roles. The best description I can come up with for what an SE does is this: We make sure our solution can and will deliver value. Typically, SEs partner with tech sales reps (who handle the business side of things), and have an assigned territory or account list and quota. The SE is responsible for the technical portion of the sales process, including but not limited to: - Demos - Technical presentations - Proof-of-concepts - Sizing/scoping of licenses and hardware - Building trusted relationships with customers and prospects - Maintaining domain expertise (not just your own product) - Educating channel partners and the technical community - Escalating issues and being a conduit into the company for feature requests, etc. The list goes on, but I will stop there for now. It can be a high-pressure job, and for the right personality, it’s a lot of fun. But the skill set it requires is fairly rare. - You must be able to sell. - You must have enough technical knowledge and experience to be credible and trustworthy. - You must know how to balance the above skills. Many people can sell, but aren’t technical. And many people are technical, but can’t sell. If you have both, you are SUPER VALUABLE in the market.

They don't teach you this stuff in training courses. The unwritten rules that actually govern how the high-stakes game of enterprise tech sales gets played: Rule #1: All the core buying "motions" your prospects describe are mostly lip service. There's always an even MORE powerful undercurrent driving decisions. That RFP? It was written by your competitor because they have better account control. Sorry. We love to pretend it's all about ROI calcs and use cases. But the real forces are opaque internal politics, fiefdoms, and personal agendas. The rep's #1 job? Sniff out these shadow motivations. Rule #2: At the highest levels, you can't be yet another "budget line item" vendor. AKA a nice to have. If there's not a strategic reason to buy your solution, it's not happening. This is where top reps really earn their money. How do you move your solution from the nice-to-have column to must-have? It's not just the WHAT anymore. Product is less important than process. You're selling WHO you are as their partner. You're de-risking the deal from every angle and making sure they're going to get the outcome they're paying for. Consigliere status. If you don't have it, your competitor probably does. Rule #3: Information is currency. Enterprise prospects will humor you with upbeat updates and doublespeak. "Things are tracking! We're so excited to get this done!" Maybe. Probably not. Reciprocity is a law of human nature. Give people information, and they'll return the favor. They want to know about industry intel, what's going on in the broader ecosystem, heads-up on reorgs, or gossip that presages a budget shift. In return, you'll get info coming your way too. If things aren't really tracking. If you're going to be greeted by a hostile executive in your next meeting, wouldn't it be nice to know that ahead of time? If we're working a big deal and the rep/SE aren't getting backchannel info, it's a huge red flag. Rule #4: If you're not escalating things with equal force to the customer (or even greater), you already lost before you started. You and your company are getting judged from the second you walk in the door. You've got to earn the business. If the customer has a request, be on top of it. We've won many deals where the customer complained that the competitive account team was unresponsive. Or their product is so complex "even the SE couldn't get it to work!" - and they were mired in support issues for weeks. If you have to engage support during an evaluation, be on top of it. Never let the customer be on their own dealing with support during the presales process. Put on your project manager hat. If they have a critical feature request, schedule a conversation with your product managers. Engage your executives to align with their executives. This rule is all about your professionalism and approach. Run the campaign in a way that befits the fact that you're in charge of multi-million dollar deals for huge companies.

A Sales Engineer on my team is getting a $175,000 commission check this month. He's worked his ass off for it. Well deserved. There's a ridiculous amount of money to be made in this business.

There is no bearish case. Absolute digital scarcity.

The difference between the sales rep and sales engineer...

The first sales VP I worked under was notorious for sending out cheesy motivational emails at the end of quarters. Song lyrics. Pictures. Quotes. Inspirational stories. Sports analogies. Everything. He had a successful run. After he left, the motivational emails stopped. As much as we all made fun of them, they made us feel like we were part of a team. And it made him seem like more of a leader. In my detached, millennial, post-ironic mind, I thought that motivational emails were maximum cringe. I couldn't believe that anyone could send these out without dying of embarrassment. But in reality, they worked. Whether they helped to close business or not, they did provide predictability, structure, and a bit of a warm fuzzy feeling. The team felt that much more cohesive. And I didn't miss them until they were gone.

Tech sales reps and sales engineers are ridiculously highly paid for one reason: We have to be. If you’re in charge of a multi-million dollar project at your company, do you want to entrust your career with the output from an AI chatbot? Or would you rather discuss it with a highly-qualified, highly paid consulting engineer whose entire job is making sure solutions work correctly in your specific ecosystem? Would you rather get on hold with support for an unknown period of time and work through red tape and processes when things are broken? Or would you rather call up your commissioned sales rep whose paycheck is on the line if you don’t renew the contract? This is why reps and SEs will always be around in some form.

I 3x'd my income in my mid-20s by moving from IT to Sales Engineering. Steal my strategy and do it yourself: 1. Make the decision. If you have any sort of technical background, you can make the jump. It's not necessary to be an expert. But if you don't believe it's possible, or won't commit, it won't happen. 2. Learn the foundations of the technical area you want to specialize in - YouTube, ChatGPT, Wikipedia, and podcasts are great resources. Become conversational in it. 3. Frame your resume and LinkedIn as a sales engineer. Look at the profiles of sales engineers in your field. Be inspired by these profiles and highlight the parts of your background that are relevant to solving business problems. 4. Practice presenting and delivering demos. This is a huge part of the job, and of the interview process, so you want to be on point with this skill. 5. Network, network, network. This is the hardest part for some people, myself included. But it's necessary if this is your first SE job. Reach out to people and explain what you're trying to do. If you have a clear goal, people will help you. 6. De-risk yourself. You have to convince a hiring manager and sales reps to take a chance on you as a first-time SE. You want to control all the controllable variables about yourself and remove as much risk as possible. This is why confidence, a clear goal, and proactive effort is so big. It took me about 3 months to make it happen for myself. I'm still reaping the rewards over a decade later.

Move your deals forward with structured demos: Problem, Solution, Benefit

The richest tech sales reps turn their territories into a perpetual money printer - one that follows them no matter what company they're at. You can copy their strategy: 1. They make it clear to prospects that the goal is for them to be so thrilled, they'll want to serve as a reference account. 2. They get to know EVERYONE even tangentially involved. Not just the core buyers, but all those adjacencies who may touch the tech. They shake every hand, remember every name and role. 3. They actively broker connections and backchannels between their happiest customers. Make intros, facilitate them helping each other. Strengthen their networks. A rising tide lifts all boats - especially when those strivers inevitably get promoted with buying power elsewhere. 4. They've built such a strong foundation that they have zero qualms about asking clients for referrals. The industry is small and a good word means a lot. And at this point, they've cultivated an inner circle that people want to be a part of. People will want invites to parties at your lake house. 5. They invest social capital by hanging where their customers hang. Hitting the same golf clubs/networking events/community functions. Never selling at these, but simply being a present and active member of the community with personal accountability. 6. Above all, they view customers as their true client - not their employer. They fight for what their customers need. Professionalism AND fierce loyalty, even if it means ruffling some internal feathers. At the end of the day, champions and referrals don't come from doing transactional deals. They happen when you make customers' successes your SOLE priority. The best thing about it - this doesn't require any special skillset or 4D chess thinking. It's simply about treating your territory as the franchise that it is, and caring about your customers' success.

The saddest part of remote-first tech sales is the decline of the whiteboard. Virtual versions are nowhere near as good. An SE's ability to translate, on the fly, the prospect's words into a visual diagram? It's a sales superpower that's been neutered. Also why if you can go onsite, you should go onsite. No one should be bigger fans of return-to-office than those of us in tech sales.

Tech sales teams that understand risk are the ones who consistently blow out their numbers. Consciously or not, risk is the #1 variable in buyers’ minds. Everything from the intro meeting, to demo, to evaluation, to financials, must serve to reduce real and perceived risk. - What if we don’t really need a solution like this? - What happens if we do nothing? - What if it doesn’t work with our existing tech stack? - What if there are unexpected issues? - What if we overpay? - Why are they better than the competitors? - What will the renewal cost? - How will this help or hurt my career if I go with this? - How is this different than things we’ve tried before? - Is this a better use of budget than everything else we could spend it on? Addressing these up front (and adding benefits to each) will go a long way to improving your close rates. It requires empathy and thinking about the situation from the buyer’s perspective.

Years ago, I met a guy who changed everything I thought I knew about tech sales. The Mayor. He was a young rep, around my age. But he outsold the veteran AEs who'd been doing it for decades. We became friends and I started paying close attention to his methods. What shocked me: I'm an engineer. My bias is towards delivering a quality solution. If the solution works, gives them the benefit, why wouldn't they buy? Or so I thought. He didn't care one bit about the tech. His method was 100% an interpersonal persistence strategy. The exposure effect. What he realized was that humans are wired to adapt and get used to whatever we're exposed to a lot. This is especially true with being exposed to people. We're social animals. His goal was to have as many voice interactions with as many people as he possibly could. If it could be sent by text, he'd rather say it over the phone. So he'd call people. All day long. But not to sell. Just to talk. If you're seen, if you're heard, if you're present - consistently - even if it starts off seeming strange or annoying, you'll eventually become familiar enough that people start paying attention to you. I never thought this would work. I laughed when he described it. It sounded to me like a great way to get kicked out of your accounts for being a pest. But he didn't. He'd show up anywhere. He'd call anyone. He called our senior executives, just to chit-chat. It was under the guise of talking about a deal, but they'd finish the deal stuff in 3 minutes and then chat for another 30. He'd do the same with clients. He'd call them all the time, but he'd also randomly show up at their office with quality snacks (but never company swag). He'd send books to people, personalized to something they'd talked about. His network was MASSIVE because he just kept reaching out and being a friendly ear once he got someone on the line. As it turns out, most people like talking to someone who will listen. Was he a great presenter? Nope. Was he a slick guy? Not at all. Smart and strategic? Definitely. He knew exactly what he was doing. Once he built the relationships at the right level, getting deals came down to "my solution will check the right boxes, and I'll give you a fair price on it." And he consistently got great margins - no crazy discounts or giveaways. Just a fair price for a good solution. All this to say - tech sales is still a people business. He treated his territory like he was the mayor and he wanted to personally know all his constituents. Shaking hands, kissing babies. It was the polar opposite of my engineer mindset at the time. But it opened my eyes to the real dynamics behind deals and taught me a lot about the world. PS: This guy rose through the ranks with ease - turns out this strategy works internally too.

The truth about enterprise tech sales: Everyone in it is a millionaire. If you've been in this game for more than 10 years, which most on the enterprise side have been, it's hard not to be. Of course, most have also increased their lifestyles along the way. So we still need to work. And let's face it, if you're in sales in any capacity, you like money and want more of it. A million ain't what it used to be. But if you're looking for a path out of mediocrity, tech sales is the best corporate way to get there.

Working in corporate America is a $1 million game. Make your first million and you can do whatever you want from there. I was working a sub-$50k IT job when it hit me- the math was clear. Even if I doubled my salary, it’d still take decades to hit a million. I looked around for solutions. Law school? Business school? Starting a company? I investigated all of them. Every “viable” path involved massive amounts of debt. Then I looked in my own proverbial backyard: tech sales. All I knew was that the tech sales reps that I met all drove cars that cost more than my yearly salary. There must be something there. After talking to some people in the industry and doing my own research, I realized tech sales was by far the best way for me to make my million. Everyone else seemed to be doing it- why not me? I made it my mission to get in. I originally tried to get in as a sales rep. But it quickly became clear that with my tech background I’d be a better candidate as a Sales Engineer. It didn’t even take that long- maybe 3 months of dedicated, focused, intentional effort. And I found a boss that was willing to take a chance on a hungry young guy. I tripled my salary that year. That was 15 years ago. I hit the $1 million mark in the late-2010’s. Being forced to look at your career as a million dollar game opens up your mind to different possibilities. It has to. A mediocre status quo isn’t an option. And now, I enjoy my career. I definitely didn’t when I was young and broke. The mindset is totally different. Corporate still has its warts. But paths exist for people like us who want more. Tech sales is one of them.

Delta is an absolute horror show. Platinum for years. Here’s my day: - Woke up at 4AM for 6AM flight out of LAS - Airport is already a zoo thanks to outages, hourlong wait at Sky Priority line to check bag - Flight is delayed until 11AM - We board flight and sit there on the tarmac for 2 hours - Captain times out of duty - flight is cancelled and we deplane - App is down, can’t rebook, and wait time for agent is 8 hours on the platinum line - Stand in line for another hour waiting for agent to help us rebook. Earliest we can get home is a full TWO DAYS later (Sunday evening) - Currently standing in line to get our checked bag bag. Delta forces you stand in line for 2 hours to submit a request for them to go get your bag from the plane. Then after you stand in line for 2 hours, you have to wait ANOTHER 2 hours for them to go get your bag. Looking at another few hours here. @Delta, I’ve been loyal for years but this is an absolute disaster. We have to find child care for 2 days on a weekend, book 2 extra nights in a hotel, and hang out at the airport for hours for no reason just to get our bags. But in return, I got a $12 meal voucher. Thanks, y’all.

A dirty secret of tech sales: Most companies have terrible sales presentations. You can lap the competition with a killer presentation. Here's how: Ditch the 80 slides of MEGATRENDS and incomprehensible wheel-like diagrams. Or the pile of squares and rectangles representing your company's product platform. Verbose, confusing, boring. BTW: It's even worse when you pull up the 80 slide deck and tell the prospect you're skipping over the "marketecture" Amateur hour. Come prepared with a well-crafted story and curated, custom slides. Know your audience. You should have at least 3 versions of your main pitch: 1. Broad, high level, for all audiences 2. Technical/operator focused 3. Executive/business focused You can create even more versions for things like verticals, integrations, and specific use cases. There will be overlap between them. Include real-life stories (with PEOPLE with NAMES). Run A/B tests in your real meetings to see what type of messaging resonates with your customer base. Once you find something sticky, double down. Keep it short: the content of a sales presentation should be no more than 15 minutes. If you do it right, the discussion it generates should take up most of the meeting. Hammer your memorable points. You need the customer to remember ONE thing from the meeting. Make sure you repeat it, repeat it, and then send a follow-up email repeating it again. The presentation is sales art in its purest form. It's my favorite part of the game. Learn to love it.

To make a lot of money in tech sales, you must understand corporate thinking without falling into corporate thinking yourself. Corporate thinking revolves around risk and ass-covering. It's powered by groupthink and consensus. It typically takes the path of least resistance. Inertia. This is the default state of corporate America. It takes a strong personality and a strong strategy to overcome these things. So your choices are to use corporate thinking to your advantage, or develop a champion with enough juice to make things happen. Some of the questions you should be asking yourself: - Who stands to benefit or lose if they go with us? - What other implications are there? Does going with us mean that it displaces another product a team is already trained on? - Will this decision cause someone to get fired or promoted? - What kind of questions will be asked internally when you're not in the room? - Are there relationships in play that you're not aware of? - What would you have to do to cement yourself as the default, least risky option?

TFW you realize that corporate America is basically high school

The dynamics in tech sales would make an interesting novel or fictional TV show. SDRs typically come across as good-natured frat guys, which they mostly are. AEs come in two flavors: the strivers and the survivors. The strivers are annoying to deal with: they want to micromanage everything and take their jobs overly seriously. But their overpreparedness can result in winning deals, so we put up with it. The survivors tend to be more relationship-based and more easygoing (when not drinking). They can win deals by making a few phone calls to their golf buddies. They go south when their rolodex dries up, though. Sales engineers are the cynical, wise-cracking buddy. But none of these are high-prestige jobs. Once you're in management and running a team it's decent. But I still feel like I'm swimming in the kids pool when I talk to some of the dads with finance/law/medical careers, even though I make as much (or more) than they do.

Putting up elaborate Christmas light installations. Is it wrong to want to start on it the day after Halloween?

Fun fact: The sales team at your company runs the whole show behind the scenes. IT? Finance? Engineering? They're cost centers leadership is always trying to trim. But sales? Sales is the engine. Money is the fuel. Companies throw money at salespeople to power that engine. Sales Engineers are the bridge between the product & revenue. If you're a technical person, this is where you want to be. The comp plans for sales engineers? $200K+/yr as a default, with uncapped potential for star performers. Contrast that to your run-of-the-mill IT admin, firefighting 24/7 amid crippling on-call rotations & constantly threatened outsourcing all for an $80K salary cap. Tech sales, especially as a sales engineer, is the career path smart, technical guys should be prioritizing.

In 2011, my career skyrocketed and my income 3x'd within the span of 6 months. Everything changed for me when I realized the power of the talent stack. It can change your life, too. Here's why: Lots of people have technical skills. Few people with technical skills also understand sales. Even fewer people with technical skills understand sales and are comfortable performing in front of people they’ve never met. This is what sales engineers (aka PreSales) do- and why they’re so sought after. When I did straight-up technical work, I made less than $50,000. When I combined technical knowledge and sales skills in PreSales, I upped it to over $150,000. You can keep going deeper, too. What if you’re a sales engineer who is also good with financials? Operations? Football? Art? Soon, you’ll be the one person in the world with your specific talent stack. And that’s when it gets fun.

If you do Sales Engineering right, your biggest problems will be: - Turning down job offers without burning bridges - Where to invest your latest commission check - Finding a babysitter for your trip to President's Club - Picking the airline and hotel chain you want status with

Thanksgiving at 25: I was adrift. Making under $50k. Unsure of how I'd ever be able to afford a car, much less a house and family. I've always felt in my bones that I would "make it." But at that moment? I had no idea how. Driving home from my parents' house, I knew I was thankful for my family and my health, but not much else. Something was eating at me. Everyone else seemed to be doing better than I was. Why was I stuck? I needed a plan. I needed a real goal. It was great to fantasize about suddenly making a million dollars, but at some point it becomes empty if there's no action or realistic method behind it. Tech sales, in my case sales engineering, offered the path I was looking for. High pay. A reasonable lifestyle. Suitable for my talent stack. I went all-in. And it paid off. I met my now-wife shortly after starting that Sales Engineering job. I have it to thank for my beautiful family and kids. This Thanksgiving, I thank the Sales Engineering profession for giving me a way out of my malaise. And maybe it could be a way out of yours, too.

Most of the talk on tech sales X is about bringing in net new logos. Hunting. But in the enterprise, especially in platform sales, much of your revenue comes from: Upselling existing customers. This is where sales engineers really move the needle and make big $. Here’s how: - Being a trusted advisor who knows the customer environment. Check in with your customers regularly and establish relationships. - Be the “insider” who can help your customer escalate issues and get feature requests prioritized. - Provide regular roadmap updates and industry best practices and tips. - Do health checks on their configurations and make sure they’re using the tech properly. - Help them build practices and procedures around your tech. There’s a line between post-sales and presales work, but customers will want to do more with SEs who treat them well. And it’s far easier to get more from an existing client than to try to land a new one.

Human beings are designed for movement, action, and building. We get deep satisfaction from all of these. Modern society puts us in a weird stasis that we have no biological answer for.

Proud to release my first FREE ebook: CRUSH IT! 7 Proven Strategies to Nail Your Technical Interview Link below. This guide will help you get through the toughest part of the Sales Engineer interview process: the Tech Screen. patrick-daniel.ck.page/28a59…

My wife is more brutal than any sales manager I’ve ever worked with. “Has it closed? What are you even doing all day?” Results or GTFO, basically.

I've been in tech sales engineering for nearly 20 years. My first 5 years were INSANELY stressful, and almost every day I was looking for a way out. I took the GMAT and LSAT thinking grad school could launch me into a different, similarly high-paying career. What saved my career in tech sales was one thing: Becoming the best at one thing. I was living under a cloud of imposter syndrome, feeling unqualified, judged, every day feeling like the day I'd get found out. I didn't have a foundation. Or, I didn't feel like I did. My urges to go to grad school and change careers were because I felt like that would give me a solid foundation doing something else. But did I really have to give up my career and go into hundreds of thousands of debt for that? I instead decided to look at what I enjoyed and what I was good at. My strengths are these: 1. Public speaking and presenting 2. Figuring out complex things 3. Simplifying those complex things into plain language All three of these strengths are exactly what sales engineering is. I was too busy focusing on the things I didn't enjoy (support tickets, knowing 100% of how every feature worked, documentation) and ignoring the things I did enjoy. So I decided to just go for it and become the best presenter and speaker on the SE team, and focus on that strength. My mindset immediately changed. Instead of an imposter who couldn't focus on producing documentation or reading the latest release notes, I was a dynamic customer-facing presenter. I volunteered to do webinars and speak at SKOs. That helped me get noticed and make connections with higher-ups in my company, which eventually led to a promotion into leadership. I haven't really felt overwhelming workplace stress since. Sure, there have been moments where I want to throw my computer at the wall. But the existential dread? Gone.

Corporate America is not hard to figure out. You're competing with people who are largely lazy and don't want more responsibility. It doesn't take that much work to stand out above this average. In 1 hour or less per day, you can ensure your own promotion: - Find something that doesn't work well in an area that touches your day job (should be tons of these in corporate) - Create a way to fix it that doesn't require spending money (right away) or step on anyone's toes. The fix doesn't have to be that good, but it should look good on paper. - Once you have your draft solution ready, ask your peers for feedback. - Now, bring the solution to your boss, mentioning you teamed up with your peers to create this solution. Ask if you can talk about it in a team meeting. Preferably a meeting where more than just your direct team is in attendance (you want visibility). The team part of this is big. Creating solutions on your own is fine, but won't get you promoted. Leading a team that creates a solution? Corporate loves that. Even if the team is mostly fake and doesn't help, you being the leader of the team makes a big difference. Plus, if you give shoutouts to the people who "helped" you publicly (even if they did nothing), they will love you and your leadership perception will go up. Seriously: One hour or less per day doing this. You'll get promoted within a year.

Think you can handle being an Enterprise Cybersecurity Sales Engineer? - Average deal size $250k-$750k - Large deals up to $10M - 5-10 active opportunities at any given time - Demanding customers - Ruthless competitors - New threats popping up daily - Complex technical stack - High stakes - 6-12 month sales cycles There's a reason that Sales Engineers make $200k and above. The job can have a lot of pressure and stress, especially when you're responsible for executing a well-run proof-of-concept in a large and complex customer environment. Or when you're presenting your solution to an audience that spans from systems operators to C-level executives. But for those who thrive in dynamic and competitive situations, there's nothing quite like it. In my book? There's no better job in Corporate America.

The most heartbreaking moment in sales: When you think everything is going great - buying signals, rapport, momentum. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the deal suddenly implodes. It's often because you misjudged WHO really held the power. You'll find research stating that in the enterprise, 88% of buying decisions involve 5+ stakeholders. But there are leaders and followers within those buying teams. Misidentifying the real power players is fatal to your sales campaign. And it's not always the highest title or loudest voice in the room. Who commands implicit respect via credibility and results? Who is the driving force behind other projects? Who do you see getting things done, even from the outside? THAT'S who you want on your side. Of course, it's still smart to build relationships with other players too. Those "followers" can be vital sources of intel. And you want allies, not enemies. But don't be fooled into hitching your wagon to ineffective champions - ones who lack true decisioning capital. The best sellers are students of human nature and corporate politics.

At the board level, pipeline is one of the most important metrics for any (B2B) tech company. Pipeline is what drives headcount. Investment decisions. Everything that affects the GTM team is a function of pipeline. The reason for this is that investors are looking at what's happening in the medium-to-long term. I've seen companies absolutely blow out their number, have a great quarter, but still let go a ton of people since the pipeline looks bad. You have to approach your business and life the same way. Always be building pipeline, new opportunities that could come to fruition. The more you have, the better position you'll be in.

X is a great platform. And I’m honored to share it with ONE THOUSAND of my new friends. If you’re: -Hungry to make your mark in the world -Searching for how to get ahead in your career -Uncertain about the path to get there You are my people. I was there. I lived it. And my mission is to give real world advice for those who are living it now.

I was making $50k a year at 26 at a VAR. I heard these "Pre-Sales Engineers" were making $200k and my jaw dropped. They were doing similar work to me, but making 4 times more. I made it my mission to figure out how to get a SE job. I did, within a year and a half. There were zero resources online about Sales Engineering at the time. In my opinion, Sales Engineering is probably the best 9-5 job that exists. - Work from home (you cover your home region) - Flexible schedule (you work with your rep and customers to book meetings) - High pay (though not as high as your sales rep if you're successful) You should be aware of the following: - Lots of public speaking/presenting required - Good social skills required - Must be willing to go deep on tech - Must keep up with tech industry trends & integrations - Must be willing to deal with high pressure Give me a follow if you think Sales Engineering might be right for you - daily tips on my feed.

You might not like it, but you must learn to play golf if you're in tech sales. Engineers too. There is quite simply no better way to build relationships than spending several hours together in a beautiful landscape, chatting about anything and everything. You will miss out on inside information if you're not doing this. You will not build as much trust as the guy who's doing it. Plus, it's a lot of fun. Beats sitting in meetings all day.

If you’re in sales, always plan your personal financial budget on your base salary. Your commission is for the extras. Lake house. Speculative investments. Impractical cars. The fun stuff. Seen too many people need their commission checks to pay the bills. Not the situation you want to be in. Even the best have lean quarters and lean years. If you’re smart about it, this career can set your life up nicely. If not, you’ll be sweating every deal and your desperation will become obvious.

If you’re early career and interested in becoming a sales engineer, here are some paths to get you started: - Tech support (get experience and GET OUT) - Managed service providers (operational type roles) - Systems administration (to build knowledge and experience) - Network engineering - Cloud architecture - Cybersecurity engineering - Professional services And many more. These technical roles will help give you a skill set and introduce you to contacts who can set you up on the presales path.

The more you learn about Bitcoin, the more of a maxi you become. It’s inevitable.

Tech sales jobs are temporary by nature. Layoffs, attrition, acquisitions, and the fickle market make every seat a hot seat. Assume the clock is ticking from day one. You've got 2 years, if you're lucky. Figure out where you want to go soon after you start. Aiming for a promotion is a good idea, if you are interested in leadership. Plant those seeds early, because they take time to sprout. Hint: the best way to get promoted is to execute a system that you can scale once you move into leadership. You can also aim to build a big network with clients that you can farm throughout a long selling career, no matter who you work for. Whatever you choose, have a plan. Tech sales is NOT a place where you can hang out and hope to climb the ladder by inertia. It requires focus and strategy. But the rewards are massive for those who figure this out.

Deal closed? Don't move on yet. The real work starts now. Priority #1 after ink dries? Prevent buyer's remorse. Find a quick win. Build momentum. Get them feeling the love ASAP. Most sellers move on once the PO lands. Massive mistake. That fresh post-close period is peak anxiety for the buyer. The deal is REAL now. No backpedaling. Invest upfront in making them feel brilliant about pulling the trigger. Don't let doubts creep in. The goodwill & trust you accrue here pays dividends later. Momentum, references, expansions. The type of stuff that will fill your pipeline for years to come. They stick with you through the rocky parts BECAUSE you did the hard work of feeling celebrated early. Don't phone it in post-close. Be different, and double down on making sure things go well. This is the difference between the rep who has to scratch and claw to make quota every year, and the rep who already has his number lined up for the next 5 years.

I sit in on a LOT of sales presentations, both for my company and from vendors pitching me. You win or lose in the first inning. If your initial presentation loses the prospect's interest from the first slides, you're done. It has to resonate - quick. The question you should always be asking: "WHY SHOULD THEY CARE?" If a slide doesn't answer this question, don't use it in the first meeting. Try a deck that: - Uses zero acronyms - Never mentions a product name - Translates complex technical topics into plain language Your solution will FEEL less intimidating and less risky. It also creates easy talking points for when you aren't in the room. If the SE is the only one who can explain the product, what happens during the 99% of the time when the SE isn't there? Make your messaging easy for your customers to digest, share, and act upon.

I know high school dropouts who have made millions as sales engineers. Tech sales is one of the last true meritocracies. If you can get it done, you'll rise. I went to Generic State U and have managed many people older than me who went to Ivies and prestigious schools.

Emotional day in our house. We said goodbye to our dog of 9 years, Archie. It was tough. I shed quite a few tears. But like we told the kids, it’s important we treasure the memories and don’t take our loved ones for granted. This is his final picture. A fun day at the river yesterday. Goodbye, Archie.

If you’re giving a demo to a (future) operator of your solution, put the demo in the context of a “day in the life” narrative. If you structure it in this way, the prospect can’t help but envision themselves using the product. They will ask relevant questions that apply directly to how they want to use the solution. This is how you start to build technical champions. If you want to get to the next steps in the sales cycle, build your demos with this narrative in mind and watch how your conversion improves.

Closing multi-million dollar deals doesn’t happen by luck. And, in 15+ years, I’ve never seen a multi-million deal won on “features.” At that level, it’s always about solving a bigger business problem. But more importantly, it’s about creating a mutually beneficial coalition inside your account. You must create a situation where every stakeholder wins if you get the business. This is why relationships and politics are priority #1 for AEs and Sales Engineers in major accounts. There are competing interests within accounts. Teams who don’t get along. People fighting for promotion. Agendas. If you don’t understand these dynamics, you have no chance to win. You have to know your tech. But if you focus only on tech and ignore the people, you will lose 90% of the time. Build a group of allies by getting to know people and figuring out what they want and stand to gain. The more people you can help, the better. And when in doubt, back the strong horse. If your champion has a lot of clout and is well-respected, you’ll have a far easier time winning. This is an art. It takes a lot of practice to master. But once you do, you will crack the code of selling huge deals to huge accounts. And you’ll start cashing huge commission checks.

At 25, I needed a new car. I was making under $50k. The cars I wanted cost more than my yearly salary. Something had to change. That's when I discovered Sales Engineering. Within a year, I tripled my salary. The first thing I did? I bought a brand new BMW. It cost more than $50k. More than I made the entire previous year. Stupid financial decision? Maybe. But I was done living like a loser. I was done with the beater car that had broken air conditioning, a window that wouldn't roll down, and a passenger-side door that wouldn't open. I was done with ratty apartments. I was done with broken furniture. I was ready to live like a man. And I was driving that BMW when I met my now-wife. The car wasn't just a car. It was a symbol of my ability to change my life. Sometimes you just have to make the decision that you're going to do better. That you're going to be better. And do what it takes to make it happen.

Sales engineers make $200k to talk tech. 5 actions you can take today on your path to becoming a Sales Engineer: 1. Write a 200-300 word post on a tech topic of your choice. 2. Record a 30-second video of yourself explaining something technical to your grandmother. 3. Connect with someone new on X or LinkedIn and ask them about their job. 4. Map your organization. Understand the social and power dynamics. 5. Read 5 tech articles. Star the ones that are interesting to you.

Just finished up hiring a new SE for a critical territory. Very strong group of candidates. I personally called each of the finalists we didn't hire to let them know my decision. Many, or most, managers don't do this. And I can't understand why. These candidates put in a ton of time and effort to prepare for the interviews. It's a multi-round, multi-week process. It takes a lot of mental real estate. The least I can do is make a quick decision and let them know. I've been ghosted by recruiters and managers before. We all have. But I won't do it to others. It was a tough decision. They all crushed the interview process. Sometimes the little things can move the needle one way or the other. In this case, geographic location and the bond with the AE were the deciding factors.

Major sign that it's time to re-evaluate your career choice is how you feel coming back to work after a long holiday break. When I worked IT, I felt the dread creep in days before going back. After moving into Sales Engineering? I enjoyed meeting with customers and doing demos and presentations. I enjoyed seeing behind the curtain of how our products are developed and testing out new features. I got to travel and eat lunch at nice restaurants almost every day, on the company dime. Plus, I made a lot more money. No more dread coming back to work. Tech sales isn't for everyone, but if you're itching for a more interesting day job, it's worth looking into. It changed my life.

If you sell SaaS, you're probably aware that churn is a huge problem. The #1 reason for churn is that they never fully onboarded or implemented your solution. As a sales rep, you might not care. As long as you get the deal booked, it's on someone else after that. This is a recipe for a short career in tech sales. Part of your job is to set the customer up for success - even before the purchase order hits. Many of the problems that plague customers post-sale are also present in the presales phase. Disorganization. Lack of communication/cooperation between teams. Other priorities moving up. A key player leaving or a new one coming in. Identifying and planning for this stuff ahead of time will not only help you close more deals, but make you and your solution stickier in the account. Stay close with the decision maker. Schedule weekly 15-minute check-ins for the first 3 months to make sure everything is going well. Proactively offer to intervene. If there's a support case bogging things down, escalate. If professional services, customer success, or your partners aren't making progress, you need to know about it. The first 90 days after purchase are critical. If things stall in this window, momentum is lost, the customer has moved on to other projects, and you're probably going to churn. Most sales teams disappear after the PO hits and only show up again 60 days before the renewal. Don't be that rep (or SE). This goes back to the job vs lifestyle framing. If you frame selling as your day job, you want to do the minimum. You will let others dictate the outcomes YOUR customers get. The lifestyle seller owns the outcome and makes sure his customers are successful. Some amount of churn is inevitable. But in my opinion, most of it is avoidable with a little effort up front.

I started exercising daily over 3 years ago, at age 36. I’m in the best shape of my life at 39 and still improving. It’s not about doing the exercise. It’s about becoming the man who does the exercise. I rarely spend more than 5 minutes a day (outside of the gym) thinking about exercise. It’s just something I do. Autopilot. I’m a guy who exercises. I make time to do it, and I do it. This is the only strategy that can result in long term habit changes. If you fight against yourself, you will lose. If you become the change you want, you will win.

The easy answer is that most white collar work is soulless and accomplishes nothing of lasting value. The blue collar appeal is that you're actually doing something. But I know enough to know I'd be out of my element there.

The ON-CALL ROTATION. Nothing sucks more in the IT world. Every 2 months, for 2 weeks, I was on-call. 24/7. I was making under $50k a year for this. If anything broke overnight, the on-call guy had to fix it. At a party, drunk? Don't go to parties. Watching the game? Tough. 3AM and you can barely function? Part of the job. I knew I couldn't live like this for much longer. When I became a Sales Engineer, I was blown away. I was making 3x what I made before, AND there was no on-call rotation! We had an entire support team working 24/7 for us! It was a dream come true. I knew I could never go back to being on-call. And I never have.

HOW TO CRUSH YOUR TECH SALES INTERVIEW: I've been a tech sales (SE) hiring manager for 5+ years, and I've also successfully landed these jobs myself. These are 100% proven tips: - Research the hiring manager AND your potential co-workers. - Find any connection. School, company, LinkedIn mutuals, sports teams, hobbies, anything you have in common to anyone you'll be working with. - Make a list of the names and your connection to them. - Reach out to some of them on LinkedIn and introduce yourself, using the connection as a hook for why they should talk to you. - Build a "personality profile" of the hiring manager based on their social media posts, work history, and intel you get from the recruiter and other insiders. You are trying to figure out what they care about most. - Do your research on the company and the industry. Make sure you can name the competitors and what each of the players do best. - Prepare a primary talk track based on what you've discovered in your research. For example, if you think the manager is a technical stickler, make sure your talking points emphasize that part of your background. - Prepare a secondary (generic) talk track in case you discover your initial thoughts were wrong and you need to pivot. - Begin the interview by building rapport over your connections. You should have a fairly large list of potential connection points between the manager and the co-workers. Keep introducing them until one "sticks" and you can build from there. - Ask the first question. After you've bonded over your connection, take the initiative and jump in with how you did a lot of research but just couldn't find this one thing, and you've been anxious to ask. - Tell your story. Your story should be full of progressions and life lessons, all culminating with how perfect you are for THIS job, and how you're going to absolutely crush it in the role due to your unique experience. - Managers love behavioral questions. Have some stories ready about a problem you solved, a tough deal you won, a difficult situation. Make sure those stories emphasize your elite thought process. - Use the ending of your stories to pivot into another question for the hiring manager. For example: "And thanks to the creative structure of the deal we were able to get it across the finish line before the end of quarter - curious how you handle those kind of situations here?" - Ideally, you want the manager talking MORE than you. Not always possible but do what you can. - Talk about your values. And be real. Why do you wake up in the morning to do this job? - Keep a great question or two in your back pocket for the end. Make these unique to the company you're interviewing with. - Close. When the time comes, genuinely thank the manager and be frank that you want to understand the entirety of the process and if you'll be moving forward. You throw everything you have into whatever you're pursuing, so respectfully you'd like to know whether the manager thinks you're a fit or not. Good luck with your interview! But you won't need luck after reading this.

The tech sales elite? They master the risk/reward ratio better than anyone. It's the force multiplier behind the sales rep + sales engineer combo. The rep's all about painting that "reward" upside. The ROI visions, the business impacts. The no-brainer benefits that even an executive can understand. Meanwhile, the sales engineer is tackling risk. Dismantling blockers and fears about the solution not working as promised. It's sort of a dance. The roles can flip too, especially for disruptors and startups with innovative tech. The rep sells risk removal (why going with an unproven startup is SAFE financially, politically, etc). And the SE? They become the one dangling the "reward" carrot with new tech that's 10x better than what they had before. Doesn't matter which side plays which part. And sometimes the personalities of the buyers come into play. A risk-averse CFO, or a daring, ambitious technical decision maker can necessitate flexibility. But at the highest level, the best are playing the risk/reward game in every deal that matters.

If you're in your 20s, there's never been a better time to get into sales engineering. There is a distinct lack of young talent in this field. And you have energy. You are hungry to solve problems. You pick up new technology easily. You have all the qualities necessary to knock it out of the park in this job. And make a ton of money doing it. The problem is, sales engineering is poorly marketed. No one knows it exists. But you can use that fact to your advantage. There is less competition. For now.

I personally make these calls to the runner-up finalists every time I go through the hiring process. It takes 5 minutes, and I think it's a respectful thing to do. It's also saved my ass - I once had a candidate accept a counter-offer and I had to go back to one of the runners-up (who I really liked). He mentioned that he was considering another offer but the extra step of me being transparent through the process and reaching out directly was his deciding factor in ultimately going with us. He's one of our best SE's now.

Wins from 2023: - Did 30+ minutes of exercise 354/365 days. The off days were all either illness or Christmas. - Daily posting on X since late September 0 -> 1100+ followers (thank you!) - Hit OTE in a down year for tech sales - Learned to develop mobile apps and launched my first one - Created a LLC and started doing business for myself with the app and social media opportunities - Learned a ton about building software, business, and entrepreneurship, and much about myself - Expanded my social circle and network of contacts Looking forward to achieving a lot more than this in 2024. Happy new year!

Tech sales isn't about tech. It's about solving business problems.

Whatever we train ourselves to do, we do. If you train yourself to work 9-5 and "get through" the day, that's what you'll do. If you train yourself to go big, you'll win big.

Become a Sales Engineer: Part 4 You’ve followed Steps 1, 2 and 3: - You’ve chosen and studied your ecosystem - You’ve improved your storytelling skills - You have some experience in an adjacent field - You’ve crafted your resume and your LinkedIn profile Now let’s talk about recruiters and the recruiting process. Your job with the recruiter is to make it past the recruiter. Recruiters come in two flavors: internal (employees of the company) and external (third-party searching on the company’s behalf). As a general rule, external recruiters are more responsive and advocate more for you, because they get paid a commission for placements. But they also will screen you more intensely, because they need a reputation for delivering high-quality candidates or else they won’t get retained. Internal recruiters may have some of their comp tied to placement, but it’s more common that they have MBOs or a bonus structure rather than a strict commission like external recruiters. Internal recruiters tend to be more “by the book” and look for a very narrow range of keywords and backgrounds, especially if they are more junior. All recruiters prefer a high-energy, upbeat style from candidates. You may get the urge to play it cool, like they should be the ones chasing you. But believe me, you’re not special to the recruiter. They’ve talked with dozens, or even hundreds, of people just like you. It’s shocking how similar many of the candidates are. The best way to stand out is with an energetic and upbeat attitude. Check all of the boxes. Right now, playing it cool won’t work unless they’re really desperate. They can just move on to the next resume if you play it cool. No big deal. You can play it cool once you’re done with the interview process and they’ve decided to hire you. At that point, you’ll have the leverage. Hiring managers typically give recruiters characteristics of what they’re looking for. SE leaders usually fall into one of two categories: - Super techie, want the smartest possible candidate - Sales-focused, looking more for instincts and soft skills I fall into the latter category. I will almost always prefer a socially aware, charismatic SE who needs a bit of training on tech, over a PhD with mediocre social skills. But be aware that some SE leaders are in the techie camp. Figure out which type of leader you want to work for and make sure that side of you shows. You can pick up clues about this in your initial conversation with a recruiter, very early in the conversation. They will either drop hints or you can ask about the ideal candidate profile. Listen to your internal radar here. If you’re a sales-focused SE, you probably don’t want to work for a deep techie SE leader. And vice-versa. Your life will be easier if you mesh with the style of your boss. On the other hand, it can be good to get exposure to different styles so you can improve yourself. You will be forced to improve your tech skills if you work for a techie boss. If that’s what you want, great. Show enthusiasm to the recruiter about it. Read up on behavioral interviewing. You want to have stories that relate to some of the key areas of the job. Have some in the back of your mind. Here are some ideas: - How you used your technical skills to uncover a hidden business problem - Navigating a complex technical integration environment (pulled in resources from various vendors) - How you and your rep worked together to create a winning territory strategy and overachieved goal - How you build relationships and technical communities within your region, with examples - How you helped elevate your peers by coming up with a new process or unique insight And you need to make sure you’re hitting the baseline qualifications of the job. Make sure you’re clear that you’re qualified and check the boxes, and then let your enthusiasm and stories do the heavy lifting. There is a lot more I could say about this topic, but this will likely be enough to get you past the recruiter. I can’t emphasize having a good attitude enough. If you act low energy and like you need to be sold on the role, you probably won’t make it through. I see so many people fall into the trap of playing it cool/coy and it's just not gonna work. Check the boxes. Great attitude. Great stories. Do that, and you'll move forward. Next time, I'll talk about the conversation with the hiring manager.

Two things are holding you back from being a dynamic and interesting presence on Zoom. This is a must watch if you’re an SE who does a lot of remote sales calls and demos.

If you're in IT, you need to think about becoming a Sales Engineer. Why? - Double your income. - Work from home. - Set your own schedule (with your customers) - Consistent new challenges Follow me for tips and lessons on how to become and excel as a Sales Engineer.

So you’ve heard about tech sales but you’re not the cold calling type? Maybe you’re more interested in the tech itself? Join the club. There’s a side of tech sales that I rarely see talked about on X, a side that happens to have been my career for the past 15+ years. It has many names, which may be why people don’t know much about it: - Sales engineer. - Solutions engineer. - Systems engineer. - Solutions architect. - Solutions consultant. And many more. I was an SE for more than 10 years, and have been in SE leadership for the past 5 and counting. It’s a great career. Let’s dive into what an SE is and what sets the great ones apart. My experience is with enterprise IT vendors who sell to large enterprises, so I will focus on what I know, but many of the principles apply to all SE roles. The best description I can come up with for what an SE does is this: We make sure our solution can and will deliver value. Typically, SEs partner with tech sales reps (who handle the business side of things), and have an assigned territory or account list and quota. The SE is responsible for the technical portion of the sales process, including but not limited to: - Demos - Technical presentations - Proof-of-concepts - Sizing/scoping of licenses and hardware - Building trusted relationships with customers and prospects - Maintaining domain expertise (not just your own product) - Educating channel partners and the technical community - Escalating issues and being a conduit into the company for feature requests, etc. The list goes on, but I will stop there for now. It can be a high-pressure job, and for the right personality, it’s a lot of fun. But the skill set it requires is fairly rare. - You must be able to sell. - You must have enough technical knowledge and experience to be credible and trustworthy. - You must know how to balance the above skills. Many people can sell, but aren’t technical. And many people are technical, but can’t sell. If you have both, you are SUPER VALUABLE in the market. I’ll be writing long form posts about specific SE topics, but this is a primer. Please comment below if you’re an SE or have interacted with SE’s as a customer or sales rep!

If you work as a Sales Engineer for 10 years, you'll have enough to retire. But you won't want to. Of all the corporate jobs out there, Sales Engineering offers the best combination of compensation and lifestyle. In return, you've gotta be good. Great soft skills combined with great tech skills. This skill stack is extremely valuable, which is why it pays so well. And why you'll find former Sales Engineers in almost every high-level role imaginable, from sales leaders to CTOs to CEOs. It teaches you everything you need to know about business.

Being an introvert can cost you millions of dollars. I realized this in my mid-20s. As an introvert, it terrified me. I had 2 choices: 1. Hope that my credentials and skills would be enough to land jobs consistently for the next 40 years. 2. Find a career that had the side benefits of building my network and introducing me to opportunities I’d never even considered. I went with option 2 and chose Sales Engineering because it's the introvert’s sales job. this let me outsource the most unpleasant parts while still allowing me to meet people and build my network chops. The sales rep is the SE’s wingman, and it's the difference makers for introverts. Meeting people, networking, and sales are fundamental to business and success. I had to accept this in order to succeed. The good news is that there are careers and strategies for those of us who aren’t extroverted. Sales Engineering was the perfect option for me. And if you are an introvert it may be the best option for YOU.

Makes sense. The 60k ETF buyer will likely sell at some point before 100x. And if you make your first entry point at 6M, you’re holding for the long run, not speculating.

I credit all of my career success to being unafraid to pursue jobs that were "out of my reach." We get brainwashed watching standard career progressions in our fields. We think it's necessary to follow the established path. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Managing stress is non-negotiable if you're going to last in tech sales. Anxiety. Depression. Health problems. Even heart attacks and strokes. It's all too common. You've got to disassociate from outcomes. Which is hard in a very outcome-based, numbers-driven world. This is why building an operating system is a must. Run your playbook. If you know you're doing what you should be doing, it helps to disconnect the jumbled nerves and generalized anxiety we all feel in this gig. And tech sales isn't life or death, as much as we feel like it is sometimes. Don't make it life or death for you.

I like to think I am pretty good at managing people. My teams have been high performers throughout my career, and I've been consistently promoted every year or two. But it's a big mindset shift. You go from being responsible for yourself to being accountable FOR others. The #1 skill to learn is judgment. I don't mean judging other people - I mean figuring out what matters and what doesn't matter. Bad managers focus maniacally on things that don't matter. Good ones, in my opinion, have an intuitive sense for this. I'm under pressure from my leadership to achieve certain results. The SE team is an easy scapegoat if a rep doesn't close a deal. It's my job to listen to these higher-level internal conversations, figure out where landmines are, and get my team ahead of it. And high performance from the team is all about culture. There is no micromanagement system I could ever implement that is as effective as peer pressure. People see others doing good work and want to live up to that standard. No one wants to be the worst one on the team. So I relentlessly hype the people who are doing things the right way. I give them recognition throughout the company. We're in sales. I sell them an outcome: you will make a shitload of money and get the glory if you do things the right way. I could go way deeper into this, but I'll save that for future posts.

If you've been working in IT for 5 years or more: You don't have to dread Mondays. Move into Sales Engineering and start enjoying your work. $200k+ salary. Flexible schedule. Work from home - travel as you need. New situations and interesting challenges daily. Build a huge and supportive network. If you're looking for something new in your career, follow me for daily tips and lessons about Sales Engineering.

Lifting bros: What’s the best exercise to increase my core strength for putting heavy weights on my back for squats? Feel like my core/back gives out before my legs would.

Managing up: the secret to being perceived as an A-Player. Few Sales Engineers enjoy playing corporate politics. But a few low-effort tricks can get you most of the benefits without much work. 1. Create a template of something you're doing. Management's favorite word is "scale" - even a one-page document that takes you 5 minutes to write can easily spread around the company as a best practice. 2. Become "The Guy" who knows how to beat a certain competitor. Most people put in zero effort into learning competing products, so you can by default become "The Guy" by downloading a few data sheets from the competition. 3. Volunteer to talk and/or present in team meetings. Leaders are always looking for content to fill up meeting agendas. Unless you're terrible at your job, they should agree. Once you've spoken in several meetings, you will begin to be perceived as an authority figure around the company. 4. Make friends with as many sales reps as you can. Reps love to talk, and a few of them saying how great you are can easily get to almost everyone up the leadership chain. The opposite is also true.

Career hack for SEs: Be good enough that your AE counterpart would throw a hissy fit if you left. Reps talk. You want them putting word out that you need to be taken care of. Takes the dirty work off your hands.

What do you do when your product doesn’t have all the features that your customer is asking for? Do you give up? Demand that product management add all the missing features to the roadmap? Or do you work together with your customer to creatively overcome some of the gaps and build something better than they had before?

Sales is a measure of your ability to get things done with people. This is why it's the most valuable skill you can possibly learn. It beats anything technical, hands down. People are the ultimate multiplier. It's also why money and politics will always be intertwined.

Spot on. Incentives drive behavior. For buyers there's a business "why" and there's a personal "why" The business why is what they'll tell you- sometimes. Especially when it's a competitive situation with similar solutions at similar price points. But what'll build champions is the personal why. What does someone stand to gain (or lose) by going to bat for you internally? Why would they do it? IMO it's impossible to be successful in enterprise sales if you don't get this at a gut level.

A positive attitude, even if faked, is a secret weapon in corporate America. Until I got into leadership I didn’t realize how pervasive complaining is. It really stands out when you’re upbeat and pleasant about the state of things.

This is why I went into field sales. I feel like I've been to this exact office working with these exact people. Then you realize all the offices look the same and all the people look the same.

On the importance of energy in sales:

The easiest way to give yourself a 25-50% raise if you're an IT engineer? Become a Sales Engineer. Don't wait for corporate to reward you for your contributions. You'll still be waiting when you're dead. A thread on the 7 steps between you and your dream Sales Engineering job:

My resting heart rate is usually in the upper 40’s. When I drink, even one glass, the next day it spikes up by 10 bpm. Takes 2 days to fully recover. This is the real world effect of alcohol.

I was just informed that in 2023, I was the #1 member at my gym. I went more days than anyone else. Over 1500 members. Still not even close to the most ripped one there. But my wife is going to be hearing about this all year. Gotta keep my title. 💪

A great partnership between a Sales Engineer and a Sales Rep is like a great Buddy Cop movie. There will be ups and downs. Drama. Arguments. Battles against the competition. Maybe even a car chase. But in the end, if you can learn to love each other, you'll be an unstoppable team. The AE will see opportunity where you see tumbleweeds. The SE will see the competition's flanking maneuvers and adjust to counter. One of the great parts of the Sales Engineering job is that you get to go out into the field with your sales rep and make it happen yourselves. You own your territory, for better or for worse. You can be a loose cannon, as long as you hit your number.

Transform your sales game with this controversial mindset shift that 150% quota performers swear by: Stop answering questions. Yup. Especially early in our careers, we want to please our prospects. And we may find it annoying if we're talking to a salesperson who doesn't give us straightforward answers. You're thinking of the ones who do what I'm about to describe poorly. Pros respond to questions with questions, and draw out better information about the prospect's situation and needs. Turn the question into a conversation - and a connection. Show off your listening skills. This is very difficult for sales engineers. We're wired to go to solutions as quickly as possible. But if you answer a question without the full context, you may blow your chance at the deal. It takes a bit of practice and finesse to do this without seeming evasive. But once you nail it, it'll 2x the amount of business you close.

How do you beat your competition in tech sales? Hint: If the first time you're interacting with a customer is responding to an RFP, you've already lost. Deals are won and lost in the first inning. Anchoring isn't just about price. It's about the terms of the entire sales process. You're laying the groundwork so that your solution is the only one that meets all of the qualifications. That means understanding the customer's business at a deep level. It means understanding the dynamics of the customer's organization. It means using feature requirements as a means to an end, not as an end in itself. The rep who is wining and dining the decision makers years before the contract is awarded? My money's on that rep to ultimately win the business. They will know what matters to the prospect and have tons of context that latecomers won't. This is what separates great reps from the average. The great ones make it look easy, because they put in the effort up front. What are you doing today to win next year's battles?