TECHRE RUITER Q3: 2018

YOUR INDUSTRY NEWSLETTER

INSIDE: How to bypass rejection From intern to leader in six short years: Q&A with Othot's David Babst Top 10 weird & wonderful job titles Conferences you don't want to miss! PLUS: The hottest jobs on the market

WELCOME TO THE NEWEST EDITION OF

TECHRE RUITER Brought to you by Adaptive Tech, TechRecruiter is a newsletter focused on the topics of career development and recruitment in the industry, both from the employer and employee perspective.

Within the coming pages you'll find industry insights, interviews with some of the biggest names in the business - and a few highlights from the Adaptive consulting team - not to mention some of our hottest jobs within the field at the moment.

Published quarterly, TR aims to be a forum in which Adaptive Tech's We hope you enjoy our latest network of business owners, edition and gain some valuable leaders and professionals can intel from this publication. share their expertise to discuss a range of issues and hot topics.

David James - CEO Adaptive Business Group

es David Jam

ADAPTIVE TECH'S HOT

EUROPEAN JOBS

Sales Manager – Video Platform – Circa £65,000 Base/£100,000+ OTE UK Sales Director – AI Solution for Retailers - £120,000/Double OTE EMEA Sales Manager – Central London – AdTech - £55k + comms VP of Sales EMEA – West London – Hospitality Tech - £100k + double OTE

To explore job opportunities, visit our website or get in touch with our recruitment team: info@adaptivetech.io

BLOCKED BY “NO BUDGET”? HOW TOP REPS BYPASS OBJECTION

It’s one of the most common (and frustrating) objections in software sales – after time invested in branding, lead generation, follow-up and finally nailing down an appointment with a potential customer… “Looks great, but we don’t have the budget.” Getting blocked like this can stop an otherwise promising opportunity in its tracks.

It’s an ideal – in physical terms maybe a spreadsheet or a Word document… maybe some numbers punched into a financial tool based on what happened last year. Budgets are created by people – and in 99% of cases, those same people still work at the company can change their minds if there’s a compelling reason to do so.

Here’s the other thing to keep in consideration – your prospect Here’s why it happens, and some didn’t know your product existed of the strategies top reps use to when they made their budget, so make sure this doesn’t shut down how could they have allowed for the conversation. it? Remember What a Budget Is

Understand How Budget Evolves

When you strip back all the formality and business jargon that surrounds it, a budget is in reality just a guide that a business uses to try and give shape to its finances.

There are three basic ways that budget can change within a company: 1) It switches (from something to something else)

2) It expands (more money is made available) 3) It starts from scratch (a new category is created) When you encounter budgetrelated obstacles, it’s critical to know which scenario is the most likely to resolve your issue. The authority to make the above three changes may not sit with the same person within a business hierarchy, so understanding the budget dynamics will help you work out which other stakeholders you need to include as you build your business case. Find out if Budget is the REAL Issue Most of the time, “no budget” is a brush-off when the product or pitch hasn’t really lit a fire of excitement.

You can get at the root of the objection by moving money to one side – if you could offer a year’s free trial, then what?

Business Development, Marketing, Operations and Finance shouldn’t get the same pitch.

There’s likely something else behind – compliance, timing, getting buy-in, a painful ordeal with another recent purchase…

Get There First Some reps have success by tackling the issue of budget head on, before their prospect can raise it.

Taking budget out of the equation can help uncover actual pain points and allow you to Rather than waiting for the refocus your approach. customer to block them on financing grounds, they develop If you are hitting “no budget” their sales pitch to pro-actively repeatedly and early in your sales put discussion around budget on process, your value proposition the back burner until later. and pitch might need some work, and it could be worth a few This naturally focuses the sessions with your manager to conversation on the product’s analyse what’s not working. value and ‘suspends’ talk of funding while the solution gets a Level UP chance to shine. If you’re blocked by someone claiming their hands are tied and they can’t pay for your product, you might not be selling high enough up the org chart. Managers often genuinely have rigid restrictions on their spending, so engaging prospects at director level and above can yield better outcomes.

Revisiting budget is then done in a different light, once the full value of the proposal has been demonstrated. While this doesn’t make a true budget-based obstacle go away, it can create a vital window to showcase value which may otherwise never have opened.

The essence of presenting a convincing solution is not outlining a range of potential benefits for the customer if they invest in your product, but in successfully leading them to understand the contrast between life with and without your offering. If the differentiation between their current way of problemsolving and your solution is articulated effectively, seemingly insurmountable obstacles fade away. *** Adaptive Tech works with BDRs, SDRs, AEs, VPs, CSMs and other sales professionals across the SaaS community, connecting them with new opportunities across hundreds of growing software companies. *** To find out more about our

Sell a Solution to a Problem As you move within a hierarchy, remember that different directors have very different KPIs and objectives within the scopes of their own roles, so anticipating and addressing their needs is key.

New budget is either created from scratch or diverted from less important projects, as long as the reason to act is compelling enough.

available jobs in the market sectors of the SaaS space, serving software customers in

“Many of our most valuable purchases were never in the budget - and I gladly signed them to help make progress in our business.”

Marketing, Finance, Education, Healthcare, Human Resources & Analytics, click here.

ADAPTIVE TECH'S UNMISSABLE CONFERENCES Q4 2018

How often do you check the calendar and realise how quickly the year has gone? I mean, who would have really thought we're only a few months off of 2019... already! We've struggled to comprehend the speed of which 2018 has flown by, the season's changed as quick as the industry does, so we've put together a quick handy guide for you to check out the who, what, where,  when and why of some of the biggest and best industry-

specific conferences and trade events to earmark for next year. On a more general footing here are a few conferences Adaptive Tech's long and impressive contact list have attended with good reviews... We hope to see you there!

CONFERENCE PICKS: Q4 AMERICAS

The Machine Learning Conference

EGG Conference

Data Marketing Conference & Expo

Machine Learning for DevOps Summit.

AI World. Boston

NIPS 2018

Chief Data Officer Summit

DataX

Int. Conference on Machine Learning and Applications.

When? Oct 14th Where? San Francisco, CA

When? Nov 15 Where?  New York, NY

When? Nov 19-20 Where? Toronto, Canada

When? Nov 29-30 Where? Houston, TX

When? Dec 3-5 Where? Boston, MA

When? Dec 3-8 Where? Montreal, Canda

When? Dec 6-7 Where? New York, NY

When? Dec 12-13 Where? New York, NY

When? Dec 17-20 Where? Orlando, FL

CONFERENCE PICKS: Q4 EUROPE

PAW Business Predictive Analytics World Business

When? Nov 13-14 Where? Berlin

Data Natives

When? Nov 22-23 Where? Berlin

Data Leaders Scotland

Big Data Spain

World Data Summit.

techtown.

ConTech 2018

Global Predictive Analytics Forum

When? Nov 13-14 Where? Edinburgh

When? Nov 14-16 Where? Madrid

When? Nov 15-16 Where? Barcelona

When? Nov 19 Where? London

When? Nov 29-30 Where? London

When? Nov 29-30 Where? Milan

&

COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS OF CSM ROLES: Q&A WITH OTHOT'S DAVID BABST

WHAT'S LIFE LIKE AS VP OF SALES, MARKETING

AND CUSTOMER SUCCESS? David Babst is responsible for leading customer and revenue initiatives at Othot, ensuring the company's short and long-term growth goals are attained. With over 15 years in the industr and gaining strong sales, operations, and financial experience he certainly knows the best practices to plan sustainable growth for a company, and our Global Tech Director, Kerry Bowden, caught up with him. KB: How big is your CSM team currently, and how is it structured? DB: So far we have 3: Director of CS, Product Operations Manager, and CS Manager. We’re adding another CS Manager in the next few months. Our offering is a SaaS software solution that is currently built for higher education institutions – it includes custom predictive models that are supported by data curation, engineering, and data science teams.  Our internal teams work together to help customers interpret results and to develop action plans based upon that intelligence. The best thing we have been able to do over the past year is truly inject the customer mindset for every employee at Othot. KB: How have you made the entire company across all divisions customer-centric? DB: I think that people generally want to help, they just need to understand what role they need to play.  There is an element of pure education internally When and how we deliver invoices is a great example;  our job in CS is to make sure finance is in the know around the sensitivity that is part of their contribution that impacts the customer. Our CEO spends a lot of his time speaking with clients as well.  This sets a great example for others.  For me personally, I have worked in a

on-linear career path that has exposed me to a variety of roles and job functions and it’s helped me to gain an understanding of what makes for a meaningful customer experience from a number of angles. Perhaps most importantly, we have hired really well.  Our Director of CS leads the charge every day and our broader team is terrific.  KB: Do you believe renewals should be entirely separate from onboarding responsibilities? DB: Once a company matures, yes. Increased levels of specialization would certainly be required. We’re currently working with approximately 30 customers today but once that number triples, we need to be more delineated. For where we are right now, our team works most effectively in a combined effort.

"I like to understand whether someone is good at bringing a group of people together to accomplish something. If you can’t give examples of these essential qualities, that is my red flag."

KB: What is the most important soft skill a strong CSM can possess? DB: Level of collaboration with different minds and personalities. There are dramatic differences internally on how people are wired. An engineer and a data scientist think very differently than someone on the front lines and if a CSM can work collaborate and bring these folks together, the customer has a much better experience. KB: When interviewing CSMs, what is the biggest red flag for candidates who will not succeed? DB: For me, it comes down to whether you have a passion for helping people solve problems. Skills and experiences tend to build around this foundation. When I talk to more junior candidates, I’m less concerned with the past 23 years of internships and professional experience, and more interested with examples where they can exhibit that they have this passion in their life. I also like to understand whether someone is good at bringing a group of people together to accomplish something. If you can’t give examples of these essential qualities, that is my red flag.  *** You can reach out to both David and Adaptive Tech's Kerry via their LinkedIn pages.

To find out more about our available jobs in the market sectors of the SaaS space, serving software customers in Marketing, Finance, Education, Healthcare, Human Resources & Analytics, click here.

***

ADAPTIVE TOP 10: MOST INTERESTING INTERVIEW QUESTIONS... In this edition of Adaptive Top 10, we look at some of the most interesting questions asked on job interviews, according to job seekers.

1 2

Asked at SpaceX "When a hot dog expands, in which direction does it split and why?"

Asked at Whole Foods Market

"Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck, or 100 duck-sized horses?

3 4

Asked at Dropbox "If you're the CEO, what are the first three things you check about the business when you wake up?"

Asked at Urban Outfitters

"What would the name of your debut album be?"

5

Asked at J.W. Business Acquisitions "How would you sell hot cocoa in Florida?"

TOP 10 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

6

Asked at HubSpot "If I gave you $40,000 to start a business, what would you start?"

7

Asked at Trader Joe's

"What would you do if you found a penguin in the freezer?"

8

Asked at Boston Consulting Group "If you were a brand, what would be your motto?"

9

Asked at Delta Airlines

Asked at Uniqlo

10

How many basketballs

"If you had $2,000, how would

would fit in this room?"

you double it in 24 hours?"

We're sure all of you have seen some weird and wonderful job interviews in your time, why not share with us your favourite ones? Better still, find out if we can get you a new job with an even better title. Get in touch at info@adaptivetech.io

A GUIDE TO VALUING EQUITY IN SAAS SALES COMPENSATION

Commissions and bonuses aren’t the only way salespeople earn serious money in the software industry - with so many new market entrants launching in the SaaS space, many companies offer some form of equity as a way to attract top talent. But how do you calculate the value of equity in a compensation plan, and should it outweigh job opportunities offering more in guaranteed earnings when choosing a new role?

jaw-dropping IPO, the shareholders pocket lifechanging amounts of money from the proceeds. Who wouldn’t want to be along for a ride like that? It’s the reason equity has such a magnetic appeal as part of any compensation package, and many ambitious SaaS sales professionals will be faced with a difficult choice more than once in their careers:

package with an enticing equity piece. Going for the equity could be your ticket to fortune, but it could also leave you kicking yourself for not taking the ‘bird in the hand’ if things don’t work out how you’d hoped. So what to do? When it comes to equity, there are no crystal balls that can show the future.

The allure of equity isn’t hard to understand.

1) Take the ‘safe route’, and go with a job that offers a high salary and a proven track record of creating successful sales reps.

But there are some basic steps to follow to gauge of how much faith you should place in your opportunity to participate as a shareholder, not just an employee.

When a software company is acquired for head-spinning sums or makes the headlines with a

2) Share some risk with an upand-coming employer who sweetens their lower pay 

For anyone trying to get a clearer understanding of how to qualify equity offerings, read on...

GRANT VS OPTIONS

what happens after you leave the company etc.) is usually detailed in a separate agreement.

First things first, what are you even being offered? A grant means you are being given shares in the company. An option means what it says – you are being the option to buy shares, under a specific set of conditions.

Shareholders agreements are of critical importance and should be weighed in the balance along with more obvious factors such as how many shares you have the chance to own.

Vesting Share options are the most common type of equity offered to Most options will include a employees joining start-ups. vesting period or vesting schedule. This means that They give you the right to although you have a contractual purchase company shares at a right to your equity, you can’t predetermined price, and often have it all at once. within a fixed time window. The price is known as the strike price Vesting schedules typically mean or exercise price, and when you that you have to ‘unlock’ access choose to purchase some or all of to your allocated shares either your allocated shares, this is through employment tenure or known as exercising the option. performance. The concept is simple – early employees get a chance to buy shares at a low price, below the value on the open market. They can then either sell these shares privately, or wait until the company is acquired or goes public to reap the rewards of the difference between the strike price and the eventual sale price.

It’s common for vesting schedules to include a ‘cliff’, often one year in duration. This means that your shares don’t vest when you start work, but only once you are a year into the job. If you leave before this, you’ll leave empty handed.

Vesting isn’t only based on time. Some employers will offer you For both grants and options, the the chance to accelerate your details on what you can and can’t vesting schedule by hitting do with your shares (such as performance goals, or the selling them to someone else, vesting for those participating in

equity plans might be linked to the performance of the company as a whole – say hitting a certain revenue threshold. Calculating ownership It’s important to know not only the number of shares you are being offered, but the total shares outstanding. The relationship between these two determines how much of the company you own. Most companies will have a fixed employee equity pool of 10-20% of total shares outstanding. It’s also important to be aware of share dilution, which is what happens when a company issues more shares. When new shares are issued, there are now more available and the percentage owned by existing shareholders therefore decreases. Other factors While it’s an obvious point, it’s surprising how often employees fail to investigate a company’s exit strategy and time-frame.

IT’S AN OBVIOUS POINT, " WHILE IT’S SURPRISING HOW OFTEN EMPLOYEES FAIL TO INVESTIGATE A COMPANY’S EXIT STRATEGY AND TIME-FRAME.

"

Although the board is unlikely to share its full strategic secrets with a new hire, it’s reasonable to expect some frame of reference to help put the value of your equity in better context, especially if you’re being offered equity to compensate for a below-market guaranteed pay package. It’s also possible to get a read on a company’s valuation, often based on previous investment. Ultimately, share price market value is where the magic happens in equity programs, and if you’re able to see a rising trend in valuation through sequential fundraising rounds then you may be onto a winner. After all, owing 0.01% of a booming software business is better than owing 50% of a sinking ship. Resources The Wealthfront blog includes some great articles dealing with

the complexities of employee equity.

Looking to get your hands on some equity? Adaptive Tech recruits for start-up and early-

AngelList also has a great tool to help job-seekers sort salary and equity compensation by various job filters.

phase innovators in multiple SaaS sectors, including MarTech, AdTech, FinTech, HRTech and more.

Feel free to reach out for a

You can also check out this helpful calculator used by shared inbox application developer Front. You can also check out this helpful calculator used by shared inbox application developer Front.

networking conversation, or browse a full list of Adaptive Tech’s sales vacancies here.

***

GDPR: HOW DID IT AFFECT LIFE AT A GLOBAL LEADER IN DATA PRIVACY?

GDPR: HOW HAS IT AFFECTED ENSIGHTEN? FIVE MONTHS ON We all received the thousands of emails, desperate pleas from marketers to get us to opt in to continue receiving insights from their company, some of us were guilty of hitting the send button. The four letters G-D-P-R alone seem innocuous and have far reaching affects across many different areas of a company, but when put together they’re something Marketing Managers still have nightmares over today. GDPR, or the General Data Protection Regulation is, in essence, superseding the EU Data Protection Directive and essentially gives individuals a lot more power over the personal information companies have on them, they are able to opt out, have their records deleted and essentially leave email lists, getting a clean slate (and a not-so-cluttered inbox!) GDPR affected every company, although some will admittedly have been harder hit than others. Some do have ‘legitimate interests’ which will allow them to continue contacting you (this would include things like your bank and other such service). Five months down the line, many businesses will have adapted their marketing models and trialled new ways to rebuild their database to the once great heights, a large part of it is not just ensuring to comply with the ongoing actions, but being aware of changing guidelines which are still emerging.

Ian Woolley, Chief Revenue Officer at Ensighten, the global leaders in data privacy and client of Adaptive Tech, said that the initiation of GDPR really changed their sales approach in several ways, including the way that they communicated with those requesting and downloading information – he said that, even being leaders in the market, the company knew that they too would lose data, but this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Ian said: “We made changes before the deadline, and we lost data in doing so, which was expected. People were still engaging with us through downloading our resources and getting in contact, so we were still making a difference, but they

were requesting not to be contacted as frequently. Some of the data we previously held was no longer useable, we had to either recollect consent, or delete it. This did affect the way we prospected and as a result we developed far better inbound marketing strategies to fuel our sales funnel. However, the individuals who gave their consent were much more interested in our platform and obviously wanted to be contacted, they were therefore more likely to continue to engage with us on many levels” He added that we had to be cognisant of the ever changing landscape: “We spent 2017 focussing on engineering and developing our platform, future-proofing for potential compliance issues around senate legislation in California and other impending regulation. There is no one size fits all – especially from an Enterprise perspective. Maybe for SMB’s because they can’t afford to customize. However, on the Enterprise side with GDPR we were surprised how the same vertical and same sector view the legislation, it was not unusual to have two very different interpretations, so we needed to build that flexibility into our solution. During the build up to the implementation of the regulation many people did not know too much about

"The first thing that we discovered was the lack of knowledge and the impact of GDPR." what the rules were and what they actually mean and in some cases it’s not really much clearer today. Ian said: “The first thing we discovered was the lack of knowledge around the impact of GDPR. So to help people understand what it meant and what was required we created a video and other pieces of supporting collateral, we also staged a number of webinars, one with a large legal firm to allow  for in depth Q&A. Stage one was educating around the legislation and stage two was explaining what they needed and answering their questions and concerns” Since the May deadline, ensuring all material is not in breach of the rules and regulations has been a challenge, but Ensighten has provided some of their important information on complying and really getting to grips with GDPR. Ian said: “GDPR was really a catalyst for market change around customer data collection. When we went to speak to our 6-7 largest clients in the world, we would go to speak about marketing security and data privacy, but our aim was to remind Enterprise businesses of the important of data 

governance and in our opinion, regardless of regulation, it’s always been the right thing to do.” He added: “Daily updates on breaches make it more obvious that this should be very high on all organisations’ agendas There was a lot of noise about the fines at the beginning– up to 20 million euros or 4 percent of annual global company turnover. That is one thing, but, what’s more important is the damage done to the brand when a data breach happens. Businesses should be thinking about what power the ICO has over them and the reputational damage - it’s not just about the fines.” GDPR was put in place not only to protect our data, but our clients’, too, and the additional rules put in place will certainly ensure that businesses are doing the right thing when it comes to data protection duties; especially now that comprehensive guides are at the click of a button. It’s really important to familiarise yourself with the information published, not only before, but since the implementation. GDPR is not something that has just been forgotten about since the talk-up prior to May 25th – it’s constantly being updated, and relevant obligations are being put in place.

The California Consumer Privacy Act although not as expansive as the GDPR goes into effect in January 2020, how long before other States bring in legislation of their own? It has become evident that you cannot safeguard against breaches with process alone, technology will play a big part in compliance and governance. To find out more about Ensighten’s GDPR web compliance and marketing security solution, visit their website: https://www.ensighten.com/website-gdprcompliance/

ADAPTIVE TECH'S HOT

USA JOBS

AdTech Sales Director in NYC. $300k+, Programmatic Experience Required BI Inside Account Executive in Dallas Marketing Analytics Enterprise AE in Seattle Director of Client Operations in Boston Director of Customer Success, Remote, Tag Management

To explore job opportunities, visit our website or get in touch with our recruitment team: info@adaptivetech.io