Do Not Hire
Consider Skills, Cost, and Tenure, and Then Draw Your Conclusion
“Double the business revenue over the next 18 months.”
from a recently published job description
Two weeks ago, I spoke with an executive that was brought into a business to do strategic work and now finds himself handholding and babysitting sales reps. Certainly not an uncommon occurrence. Many hires find themselves in a situation where the work shifts over time, or where from the very beginning, they find they were sold a bill of goods.
It isn’t always a situation that can legally be labeled “fraudulent inducement of employment.” Especially in the startup world, pivots on everything from product to GTM strategy are very common. Most of those directly impact employees. And even without major pivots, startups go through phases or stages in their growth process.
I spent 11 years with a startup leading their sales efforts until the company was acquired. Around seven of those years were essentially in one role, leading global sales. During this tenure, we obviously went through various growth stages. In each phase, I had to learn, often through trial and error, what worked and what didn't:
At zero revenue, defining the GTM in a new geography.
Winning the first 5-10 clients.
Building a sales team (Hire, Onboard, Train, Coach).
Entering a new vertical; and likely a few more distinct phases.
In hindsight, the business likely wasted a lot of resources on my learning curve. Don't get me wrong, to this day, I am very grateful for the experience and for the fact that the founder stuck with and supported me every step of the way.
And as I work with hundreds of executives today, I also understand that my experience is far from the norm. The average tenure of a sales leader in a startup is somewhere between 12-18 months, not 11 years!
The average, though, speaks to a few factors:
Bad hiring.
Scapegoating.
Skills.
To the last point: Every growth stage of a business requires a different skill set. A job description that only emphasizes, “Double the business revenue over the next 18 months" takes that into account. But in most cases, hiring happens with a longer-term focus in mind. And there is the mismatch.
With an understanding and focus on the skills that are required just in the next 12-18 months, as well as transparent communication with the executive taking the role, both sides are better off. There won’t be any surprises or misunderstandings when the next growth stage comes around, and the order of the day is, rinse and repeat.
And that brings us to the title of this article: Do Not Hire. In a cycle like that, there is no room for six months and $50k in executive recruiting every 12-18 months. Instead, contract, with the added advantage that if the skills you require for this next phase are not needed full time, you can go fractional and only pay for what you need.
Talk to us and find out how we can support you if you choose to engage a fractional or interim sales leader that comes with just the right skillset.
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Photo by Anne Gosewehr