Founders, Inventors, CEO’s – Beware of the Siren’s Song

Inventors, Founders, and CEOs at the helm of early stage ventures have heard, or will hear at some point, a siren’s song. While shipwreck is not the penalty, those who listen may squander the scarce resources of time and money.

It’s time to hire a Salesperson.

The product is ready, the product is great, all you need is someone who will make calls.
You need a Vice President of Sales.
You need to hire an up and coming Chief Revenue Officer from a competitor and use equity to get her or him to join.

These can all be siren’s songs at the wrong point. The reality is that many early stage ventures do not yet need a full time VP of Sales or Chief Sales Officer or Chief Revenue Officer. A fractional CRO can work with them to put the necessary sales practices, process and structure in place necessary to enable sales success.

Others feel that it is worth the significant investment required to hire a sales leader with domain experience at this early stage. However, even the most talented sales leader might struggle in the confines of an early stage venture. In addition, the investment required consumes a level of funding sufficient to hire two or three sales hunters. Will the c-level sales leader hired be willing to pick up the phone and hunt and work inside the CRM?

On the other hand, a siren’s song could cause a founder and other early stage venture leaders to hire a sales person they knew to be a previous top-performer, a sales ace. The euphoria of the hire sometimes turns quickly when the sales person fails to meet expectations or even struggles or fails in their system. What causes this? More times than not, there simply isn’t a good fit between the sale type and the natural traits and characteristics of the sales person. They might very well have succeeded in a past role.

And then there are the challenges of designing variable sales compensation plans that motivate and inspire the correct behaviors and outcomes. Blind spots become apparent after the difficult and, often, costly lessons are learned. Fractional CROs can help you navigate around these perils as well.

Fractional Chief Revenue Officers help companies build sales talent models and hiring processes to effectively identify and evaluate fit and avoid these costly missteps. This drives proof of concept and accelerate revenue with which to scale.

By leveraging Treeline’s sales consulting services, companies gain access to industry-leading sales expertise that can drive success.

For more about Treeline CRO services, please visit https://www.treelineinc.com/sales-recruiting/fractional-cro-service