Collin Cadmus Podcast Collin Cadmus, LLC

It's safe to say the average salesperson in 2023 is significantly better than the average salesperson of 10 years ago, yet the average quota attainment continues to decline.

This is the result of an inflationary economic system that drove competitive recruitment efforts toward the promise of higher OTEs, which inevitably led to higher quotas, which eventually far outpaced any salesperson's ability to keep up.

This means the "valuation narrative game" ultimately resulted in over-stressing talented salespeople to the point of exhaustion and an illusion of failure which was often actually stellar performance. In this episode I dive into how the quota system became what it is today (broken) and what needs to be done to fix it.

There's work to do on both sides; salespeople knowing how to vet employers and employers knowing how to incentivize salespeople for optimized results. Strategy is best left for folks managing the front-lines, not the folks balancing the spreadsheets.

Whether you agree or disagree, I appreciate hearing your perspective so please don't hesitate to share your thoughts in the comments and begin a dialogue on YouTube.

Sit back, relax, enjoy the episode, and thank you for listening, viewing, and subscribing.

Also available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.

Welcome back to the pod! In this first episode I take a short break from my usual personality of bubbly positivity to begin this new season on a serious note and set the pace for what's to come.

The world has changed, the economy has changed, Silicon Valley has changed, and B2B SaaS has changed forever. Decades of mistakes have led to where we're at but valuable lessons are here to be learned.

I'm voicing these sentiments because they need to be said, need not to be forgotten, and need to be the foundation upon which we learn and rebuild the B2B SaaS industry into something bigger, better, and more honorable than ever before.

Whether you agree or disagree, I appreciate hearing your perspective so please don't hesitate to share your thoughts in the comments and begin a dialogue.

Don't forget to like the video and subscribe to the channel. Sit back, relax, enjoy the episode, and thank you for watching. 

Available on: YouTube, Rumble, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.

 

Antoinette is a survivor, author, and speaker.  On August 19, 2013, Antoinette was working as a bookkeeper at an elementary school in Atlanta, severely depressed because her husband of 33 years had recently left. She, now, as a single mom, was faced with the daunting challenges of raising a son with multiple disabilities and a daughter in law school.

Never did she think that she would become a hero saving roughly 1,000 lives, a best-selling author, an international celebrity, an expert on community safety, the Founder and CEO of a non-profit, Kids on the Move for Success, or a guest of Michelle Obama at the State of the Union Address.

The next day her life changed forever. Antoinette, an accidental hostage negotiator, used her experiences with challenging life issues to successfully convince an armed gunman to give her his AK-47.  This is the only school shooter situation in the US that ended without death or injury to students, faculty, parents or the shooter himself.  Experienced hostage negotiators, law enforcement, and community leaders have praised her intuitive, yet textbook, hostage negotiation skills that she used on August 20, 2013 to save roughly 1,000 lives.

When I came across Antoinette’s story and saw that she speaks about it, I knew this would be the perfect way to conclude the first season of this podcast. Negotiation spans much farther into our lives than just sales, and there’s no better example of that than what Antoinette experienced that day.

Antoinette’s story is so incredible, in 2018 it got the recognition it deserved when Seven-time Grammy Award winner, Toni Braxton, starred as Antoinette, in the movie “Faith Under Fire” for Lifetime TV. This is her story.

Available on: YouTube, Rumble, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.

Anna is one of the most successful east coast SaaS marketers of the last decade. She’s from MA, went to UMass Amherst, started her career as an Account Manager and Client Service Supervisor, but then she went to work for a company that would change the trajectory of her career forever, ZoomInfo. 

Anna started at ZoomInfo in 2012 as a Marketing Communications Manager and climbed the ladder for 8 years all the way up to VP of  Marketing. She led ZoomInfo’s marketing through an enormous growth phase and successful IPO in June 2020. And then in November, Anna found her new home as Chief Marketing Officer at Spiff. 

She’s one of the few people I know who has worked for 13+ years across only 2 companies. She makes it look easy, but we know it isn’t. This is her story.

Available on: YouTube, Rumble, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.

He’s been selling something to someone his entire life. He’s been teaching and coaching salespeople for almost 20 years. He’s the Founder and President of A Sales Guy Inc. and the Author of GAP Selling, but you know him best as Keenan. The man who needs only one name. This is his story.

Available on: YouTube, Rumble, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.

Jason graduated from Harvard University and Berkeley Law, he started his career as a Corporate Counsel, and then transitioned into various technology leadership roles, eventually leading him to co-founding EchoSign which was later acquired by Adobe.

Jason then founded SaaStr, a social community of over 500,000 SaaS founders & executives and over 3M content views each month. If you haven’t discovered it already, checkout SaaStr.com, it’s loaded with valuable content and resources for everyone in SaaS. Jason also co-authored the book From Impossible to Inevitable with Aaron Ross. This is his story.

Available on: YouTube, Rumble, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts.