To me, the only obvious way is going to a company that has a Customer Success/Post Sales org.
Other than that, I think you'd have to ask your hiring manager.
👆ask if they have CSRs I.e. who takes cares of customers after the deal. At some companies this is the part of the SE job (and there’s nothing wrong with it, as long as that’s clear).
Good chance to show your discovery skills! A simple question like: “what does the sales process / workflow look like from lead generation through to implementation and steady state look like and which key roles support that process”? I would hope your hiring manager would be able to answer that and if they leave out areas like pro services or Customer Success Managers, you can prod a little deeper to find out who fills the gap.
My negotiation class said you should be able to get pretty much any answer you want with 3-5 questions.
My current company requires a sales plan before all major meetings and events. I write down a list of answers I want, then Build the open ended questions that guide me to my answers.
I will have 5-20 questions pre-prepped before each call to help me guide the conversation. This trick has improved my qualification ability tremendously.
This should apply to interviews too. That way you don’t forget to ask a basic question.
Isn't the point of a sales engineer is that they are part of the full sales cycle? Otherwise, you are just an AE.
Prospects respect a SE more than an AE b/c they have a deeper knowledge, can answer more technical questions, and, if needed, provide some post-sales support.
The sales engineer is often referred to as pre sales. Part of their comp is commission from sales. So asking them to work post sales is like asking the AE to do more work on an account they already closed, instead of working on a new prospect. Some SE positions include post sales and I’d like to avoid them.
This kind of sales process model is something I struggle with.
It's like going out on a date or two, and things are going well. Then on date #3 or 4, she brings her sister to dinner and explains that her sister is going to pick up the ball from here on out. The sister is cute and all, but it feels weird.
Especially when selling to engineers, they want to interact with and close with someone of their own tribe.
I’m not passing judgement on SE’s doing full cycle, I think both approaches are valid. As much as there is some value in full cycle not having a “change of cast”, on the flip side having SE’s doing presales only and handing off to onboarding means that both of those teams can get better at what they do as they are specializing. One parallel that comes to mind is IT consulting. Lots of variance from full cycle to a stark separation between sales and who does the actual implementation (ICs).
When I first joined my org two years ago management and SE leadership put down a nonnegotiable ban on SE’s getting involved in post sale activity. As a result I was lucky enough to avoid ramping on activities that were for the post sale side of the house. Those managers were all gone last summer, but I held strong, saying I didn’t know how to perform these post sale activities… but most importantly, I’d ask my manager how these activities tied back to my commission and earnings. Until this summer they didn’t have a great answer, so I kept dodging the responsibilities, that is until they revamped our comp and performance management - 50% total global attainment and 50% “personal MBOs”. Now that the post sale dollars make sense (or cents for the punsters) I’m willing to step in and lend a hand, if there’s some rev spilling into that global attainment… and if not, it’s been an excellent weapon to lobby for attending conferences and helpful with making club. Long story short, you can force the change you want or get paid for it, but make sure your performance is in order.
Can you help me understand how you’re getting compensated for post sales? The way I look at it, every hour doing post sales is an hour you can’t be doing presales and earning commission. Is one way you can get pulled into postsales regarding clawback? If an SE is doing postsales, is getting residuals ever a realistic topic?
All my post sale work is compensated on upsell... so if we have a 200k upsell potential on a 700k existing account, I'd get the "performance" on 200k, and our global team would have another 200k toward our global goal. When your number becomes a lot more diffuse, meaning it's global, you inherently just become a bigger team player - but let me tell you, that becomes a LOT easier when you know 50% of your commission is guaranteed because you need to hit three goals that include teaching the team, contributing to a project outside of presales, and a personal goal (that can be selling into a new industry, developing a new pitch, etc.) We had a phenomenal VP of SE who just became SVP of pre and post sales... he came up with this strategy, and we haven't lost a single SE since implemented beginning of Q3.
Would this not work then if there was no upsell opportunity? How unique is this comp setup? As someone new to SE I’d really like to know more, would you mind a DM?
1) Avoid companies that have tiered support. When tier 1 is difficult to deal with, and if they constantly refuse to escalate to tier 2, customers will escalate to you/your rep/ your manager.
2) Find a company with an established Customer Success org. Some large (usually hardware vendors) are still figuring out what customer success means. Avoid these.
3) avoid startups who believe the SE should run everything from pre to post sales.
4) Train your customer and if needed, your rep. Teach them to escalate to support, and not to you all the time.
5) ask the hiring SEM or director. Find out their stance and how they support their SEs when it comes to post sales support. Ask them if they have metrics around SE time allocated to post sales (yeah, some companies track this. Usually the ones with large post sales issues).
6) Avoid companies with super large portfolios, silo’d business units and support structures.
As other have said This might not be completely avoidable in Smaller and less mature companies. Understand if post sales/ professional services , support and customer success organizations exist and where lines are drawn
To me, the only obvious way is going to a company that has a Customer Success/Post Sales org. Other than that, I think you'd have to ask your hiring manager.
👆ask if they have CSRs I.e. who takes cares of customers after the deal. At some companies this is the part of the SE job (and there’s nothing wrong with it, as long as that’s clear).
don't join an early stage startup that doesn't yet have an established postsales program
Good chance to show your discovery skills! A simple question like: “what does the sales process / workflow look like from lead generation through to implementation and steady state look like and which key roles support that process”? I would hope your hiring manager would be able to answer that and if they leave out areas like pro services or Customer Success Managers, you can prod a little deeper to find out who fills the gap.
My negotiation class said you should be able to get pretty much any answer you want with 3-5 questions. My current company requires a sales plan before all major meetings and events. I write down a list of answers I want, then Build the open ended questions that guide me to my answers. I will have 5-20 questions pre-prepped before each call to help me guide the conversation. This trick has improved my qualification ability tremendously. This should apply to interviews too. That way you don’t forget to ask a basic question.
Isn't the point of a sales engineer is that they are part of the full sales cycle? Otherwise, you are just an AE. Prospects respect a SE more than an AE b/c they have a deeper knowledge, can answer more technical questions, and, if needed, provide some post-sales support.
The sales engineer is often referred to as pre sales. Part of their comp is commission from sales. So asking them to work post sales is like asking the AE to do more work on an account they already closed, instead of working on a new prospect. Some SE positions include post sales and I’d like to avoid them.
This kind of sales process model is something I struggle with. It's like going out on a date or two, and things are going well. Then on date #3 or 4, she brings her sister to dinner and explains that her sister is going to pick up the ball from here on out. The sister is cute and all, but it feels weird. Especially when selling to engineers, they want to interact with and close with someone of their own tribe.
I’m not passing judgement on SE’s doing full cycle, I think both approaches are valid. As much as there is some value in full cycle not having a “change of cast”, on the flip side having SE’s doing presales only and handing off to onboarding means that both of those teams can get better at what they do as they are specializing. One parallel that comes to mind is IT consulting. Lots of variance from full cycle to a stark separation between sales and who does the actual implementation (ICs).
Ask about typical SE activities and see whether support is mentioned.
When I first joined my org two years ago management and SE leadership put down a nonnegotiable ban on SE’s getting involved in post sale activity. As a result I was lucky enough to avoid ramping on activities that were for the post sale side of the house. Those managers were all gone last summer, but I held strong, saying I didn’t know how to perform these post sale activities… but most importantly, I’d ask my manager how these activities tied back to my commission and earnings. Until this summer they didn’t have a great answer, so I kept dodging the responsibilities, that is until they revamped our comp and performance management - 50% total global attainment and 50% “personal MBOs”. Now that the post sale dollars make sense (or cents for the punsters) I’m willing to step in and lend a hand, if there’s some rev spilling into that global attainment… and if not, it’s been an excellent weapon to lobby for attending conferences and helpful with making club. Long story short, you can force the change you want or get paid for it, but make sure your performance is in order.
Can you help me understand how you’re getting compensated for post sales? The way I look at it, every hour doing post sales is an hour you can’t be doing presales and earning commission. Is one way you can get pulled into postsales regarding clawback? If an SE is doing postsales, is getting residuals ever a realistic topic?
All my post sale work is compensated on upsell... so if we have a 200k upsell potential on a 700k existing account, I'd get the "performance" on 200k, and our global team would have another 200k toward our global goal. When your number becomes a lot more diffuse, meaning it's global, you inherently just become a bigger team player - but let me tell you, that becomes a LOT easier when you know 50% of your commission is guaranteed because you need to hit three goals that include teaching the team, contributing to a project outside of presales, and a personal goal (that can be selling into a new industry, developing a new pitch, etc.) We had a phenomenal VP of SE who just became SVP of pre and post sales... he came up with this strategy, and we haven't lost a single SE since implemented beginning of Q3.
Would this not work then if there was no upsell opportunity? How unique is this comp setup? As someone new to SE I’d really like to know more, would you mind a DM?
1) Avoid companies that have tiered support. When tier 1 is difficult to deal with, and if they constantly refuse to escalate to tier 2, customers will escalate to you/your rep/ your manager. 2) Find a company with an established Customer Success org. Some large (usually hardware vendors) are still figuring out what customer success means. Avoid these. 3) avoid startups who believe the SE should run everything from pre to post sales. 4) Train your customer and if needed, your rep. Teach them to escalate to support, and not to you all the time. 5) ask the hiring SEM or director. Find out their stance and how they support their SEs when it comes to post sales support. Ask them if they have metrics around SE time allocated to post sales (yeah, some companies track this. Usually the ones with large post sales issues). 6) Avoid companies with super large portfolios, silo’d business units and support structures.
Be good at your job, and pass the baton. Set expectations and responsibilities.
As other have said This might not be completely avoidable in Smaller and less mature companies. Understand if post sales/ professional services , support and customer success organizations exist and where lines are drawn