Latest / Cyber Go-To-Market Talk: The Cybersecurity Podcast About Cyber Sales, Marketing & Revenue Growth / How to Hire Cybr Donut's GTM Leaders - Josh White, SVP of North America, Intaso

Transcript

How to Hire Cybr Donut's GTM Leaders - Josh White, SVP of North America, Intaso · Cyber Go-To-Market Talk: The Cybersecurity Podcast About Cyber Sales, Marketing & Revenue Growth

• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Cyber Donut has got this far with a sales leader who is frankly more of a sales manager and with no one who's actually leading marketing.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: As you will hear in this episode, Q3 results were not that great, and CEO Bill Wallace is feeling a little bit nervous about his chances of hitting the$10 million ARR number by the end of next year.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: So he wants to hire a true sales leader and he wants the same sort of level of person for marketing so that in his mind he can de-risk the chances of getting to the$10 million ARR number for the end of next year.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: Which is why Josh White, the SPP of North America for Intasso, joins us today.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Josh routinely works with and advises CEOs and go-to-market leaders on their hiring.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: And in this episode, he does the same for Bill Wallace, who is the CEO of Cyber Donut.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: He surprisingly advises Bill not to hire one of the go-to-market leaders that he's thinking about right now.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: So listen to find out which one and why.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: And he talks about things like candidate profiles, timing of hires, how to select and go through the process, and also importantly, the real candy, which is how much Bill should expect to pay these go-to-market leaders when they come into the company.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Andrew Monahan, and this is the Cybersecurity Go to Market podcast where we tackle the question: how can Cyber Donut get to 10 million in ARR by the end of 2025?
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: All right, well, Josh, here we are.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the podcast and welcome everyone back.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: As we follow the journey of Cyber Donut, as we've talked about before, Cyber Donuts in a crunch.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: They have to hit$10 million of ARR by the end of next year.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, they will shut down.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: The VCs have said that uh there's already so much money around and they need to figure out the go-to market, they need to figure out the product market fit, the go-to market fit, and basically be a company that they feel like might actually make it by the end of next year.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a bit of a stretch.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Now, for those following along, on the Cyber Donut website, that's C-Y-B-R-Donut D-O-N-U-T.com.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: We got the numbers on there, so we know how we're doing.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: We just wrapped up Q3 2024.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Good and bad news.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: So we missed the revenue number.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: So the new ARR was only 332K.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_01: We added four customers in Q3.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think the number we were shooting for was more like five or six hundred, I forget exactly what it was, but we were way short of that.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Good news, slight better news, is we actually met the pipeline, the new pipeline uh generated goal.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: So you added 1.45 million in total pipe added in the quarter.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: So I think it was pretty much at number or just short of it, maybe.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: So right about the right sort of number.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: We when you go to the board, it's pretty much we hit the number, right?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: If you're within a within a few percentage points, we call call that good.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so we've got a mixed bag, right?
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: And uh as you go down and look at the head current, we've still got our sales leader in place.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have a marketing leader.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: We lost one of the AEs actually in the quarter, so we went down from six to five AEs.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: That guy decided it wasn't the right place for him and moved on.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: A couple SDRs, SEs.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: You can read along on the website.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Go to the website and scroll down, you'll see the all these numbers laid out quarter by quarter so we can track along and see how we're doing.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: For the relevance for this conversation is an interesting one, though.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: So Bill Wallace, who is the founder CEO, uh, he actually decided at the end of last year that he wanted someone to be the sales leader, but he didn't get someone too senior.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: He basically had someone who had been a first line manager somewhere else and brought them in.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, he knew that wasn't his strong point.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: So he wanted someone who was a bit more of a um execution type person in sales and could bring on a couple of good people.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: So that sales leader came on board.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: Really, you know, director level probably is the right kind of way to think about it, as opposed to VP or or CRO.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: He decided, Bill decided not to hire a marketing leader, right?
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: But uh he's had he's had a real uh demand gen person, product marketing person, and that's it.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: So he's had two there.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: And now Bill's kind of feeling the crunch, right?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, oh crap, you know, we we gotta get this whole thing figured out.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And he's feeling like the way that he's feeling is I really feel like I need to add in a proper sales leader, bring someone in who has maybe done this kind of not to 10 million before or one to 10 million before.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's what he feels like is the right thing to do.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: And because pipeline is gonna be, you know, pipeline's a big hole right now, although we hit the number, it was we're still way off, right?
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: We were supposed to do add an incremental, I think, seven or eight million in ARR next year, and we're sitting here with a total pipe of only four million, right?
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: So we got a problem, right?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: So he's thinking, well, why don't I bring in a proper CMO as the person coming in to actually take hold of this and uh you know make sure the programs are running are gonna be high impact and go from there?
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: So that's what he's feeling like, right?
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: He's feeling like he needs to add a couple of pretty senior heads into the go-to-market engine.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: As you hear that, given your background, you're the SVP of North America and Tasso, uh, as you hear that from Bill, is that a familiar thing that you hear from CEOs?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Is that common?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Are you you sitting there nodding your head and going, yeah, this is this happens all the time?
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think it's I think it's very common.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, most startups will have not one, not two, not three.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: They'll have multiple points in their life where you've got a CEO founder like Bill who's sat there looking at the looking at the revenue targets.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they're you know, a lot of the time, you know, the bills of the world sometimes have more technical backgrounds as opposed to sales backgrounds.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: So they're sort of scratching their head.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And and I think part of their challenge is not knowing how to challenge the sales leader that they have in place today.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, tell me more about that.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think um it in in this case, there is a high likelihood that this may be the first sales leader that Bill has managed.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so the challenging thing about managing someone in sales is salespeople are very charismatic, right?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: And if there's one thing they're really good at, it's selling themselves, selling their position.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I'm sure the upward management is very good, right?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like, hey, Bill, I know it's a big number next year, but if we just hire a couple more AEs, I reckon we got this.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe that's what's happening, right?
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't know.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: And and I like to think about this inflection point as do we need someone who's going to bring more process, more strategy, someone who is going to make Bill feel more assured that the goals next year are more likely to be met.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let's talk about that then.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: If you look at these numbers, right?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: So in the first quarter, they added three customers, then next one four, and then four.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: So he's kind of flatlined a little bit, adding four customers a quarter.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's not bad, right?
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: These are real live paying customers.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: They're not friends of Bill's, right?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: These are proper customers.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: So that's kind of good.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh missed the revenue number pretty big, though.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: So I think Bill Not friends of investors either.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: No, these are, you know, we've done some programs, we've been dialing for dollars or emailing for dollars, whatever, uh, whatever it might be.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: And we've got some progress, right?
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, you look at Q3, we missed the actual revenue number, even though we added four customers, we missed it.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe as you're saying, right, that Bill's kind of doesn't know that much about sales.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: He's feeling a little bit nervous, right?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: Is that is that one do?
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: I just need someone to come in and actually start delivering numbers.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's probably what he's thinking.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe we're not quite the scale yet to say we've got a we've got a model where we need to bring in some process.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's probably more someone who maybe has that earlier stage, let's deliver, you know, 10 more customers a quarter rather than four more quarters.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's that it's that transition from having a player coach sales leader to having someone who is hired to do more, you know, more sales management.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I get that.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then would you say this is the right time to bring in if you want if you did bring in the a leader and he did bring a CMO or a VPN marketing person, is this the right time?
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think that is good enough to get those two in, or would you delay one before you get the other?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think um, you know, there might be some uh marketers who would disagree with me right now, but you've got a demand generation person, you've got a product marketing person, you're arguably better off holding off on the um CMO, VP of marketing headcount, and having a, you know, maybe a VP of sales CRO who's also, you know, had exposure to leading marketing before.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that does exist, and I know it can be a controversial topic, but then you've got an opportunity to maybe invest in someone to do content marketing or invest in another, you know, two AEs.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that could be those could be the sort of game-changing head count.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you would not be short of uh finding salespeople who could tell Mark their side of market, right?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh it's a skill set that we have as salespeople.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: We we know how to do the easy stuff, right?
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: The marketing stuff.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um I thought that's insightful though, right?
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, CMO or or VP marketing, that's an expensive headcount.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe delay for a quarter or two and use that money.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: You could pump it in some programs, you could bring on a contractor, something like that to get some focus.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: But I think what what if what if Bill's feeling like, yeah, but I I don't I don't know.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, maybe the sales leader might help out, but I myself, as Bill, the CEO, you know, I don't really have the experience to know whether what they'll be telling me are good programs to run or not.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: How would you I would you advise them about that?
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think for someone who feels like they unsure whether to up level a hire or sign off on a you know on a new VP C-suite hire, first of all, they need to they need to think about the you know where they are at the moment, right?
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: If they're looking at their current situation, the current person running sales, do they do they think that the challenge is that that person isn't up to the task?
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it may be that if they go out to the market and hire someone at the same level, but who they feel is you know got a better track record, or you know, that might suffice in this circumstance.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: The reality is, I think most companies invest in a CRO or a CMO because they're stuck.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: They invest in that hire because they look to it as a silver bullet.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: I placed a CRO recently and um he he said to me, He said, Josh, so this is the this is one of the first times where I feel like I've been hired to actually do the type of job that they that that that will that will influence, right?
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like usually I'm hired and I get in there and I realize that oh the the technology doesn't work or there's no product market fit.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, these are things that you know that individual can obviously help with, but without a product or an engineering background, he's not going to make the technology work.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: And product market fit is uh is a challenging one because yes, I mean, look, sales and marketing can obviously help you in regard to that, but sometimes you're solving a problem that that doesn't need to be solved yet, right?
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: The market maturity.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: Do you hear from your CRO candidates, are they really uh zeroing in on that whole thing?
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: Like, how do I know this company really has the traction and is ready to get the traction that they think they deserve?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think um I think for anyone who, you know, it's usually it usually takes for someone to get burnt once, right?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like usually I don't I don't think I know a CRO um sales leader who's joined a startup and and you know two months in has very quickly realized they don't need me.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we've got we've got problems that mean that I can keep scaling sales, but if the you know the technology or the market doesn't catch up, then you know we're we're a year or two off.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying we're never going to get there, but maybe we're a year off from me, maybe we're two years off from me.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I think when someone's had that experience before, it does become really important to them because you know, being a being a CRO, CMO, being a revenue leader is a really tough grind in a startup.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: And not all startups are created equal.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: How would they know though, Josh?
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: You talk about how the sales people are good at managing up and you know putting a positive spin.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: There's no one who gives more positive spin than the founder, usually, about how great things are.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: And we just need someone to come in and fix a couple of things and we're gonna take off, right?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: So how does a CRO know and cut through the BS and really know what's going on?
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: I honestly think from that perspective, what what they really need to do is is try is talk to some customers.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: I think if a I think it's a very reasonable ask for a potential hire to say, hey, can you set me up with, you know, three, three customers that aren't affiliated with any of your uh investors, right?
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um and have those conversations and and understand why they bought it, you know, what else they looked at, the the value it's bringing.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think if a I think if you can really get to the, you know, if you can really get under the under the hood on those things, then that really helps you qualify whether or not they've really got something that you can scale.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: And it is scalable.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: And look, there's other, there's loads of other market research that you should be doing, right?
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's funny, as you were talking there, I reminded myself a conversation I had with a head of sales last year.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: So he he actually just ended up landed a CRO gig um somewhere just now.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I was asking him, like, how you know, when you when you go to your next gig, how will you pick, you know, the company, right?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: We're more like market and company fit and things like that.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, it came out that part of his process is he actually he may also ask for customers, but what he does himself is he goes to his network and sets up for the company he's considering five calls.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: He goes, I'll just set these up for you, right?
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: My only deal is I sit in on the call, right?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so he sits on the call, he gets a chance to assess how they're pitching it, how they're talking.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: And if these are friendlies of his, so he goes to them afterwards and says, Okay, what do you think?
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: Is this do you even need this stuff?
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: How higher priority is it?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: Things like that.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you have a good network to be able to do that, and they'll want to help you out.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I think he's built up that trust over many years.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, I love that approach, right?
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: Because you're in control at that point about you know uh who you're talking to.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's no downside for the customer because they get a top to five new prospects potentially, right?
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you don't if you don't land your CRO, it's not the end of the world.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh you might have some more sales sales cycles going.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think the real big thing there is it's just about being really thorough with due diligence.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes you know, you get caught up in the in the charisma of the of the of the founder, of the enthusiasm of the investors, of the you know, the the two or three sort of you know, big logos that are on the website, and you know, the comp package and the equity they're talking about, and the hey, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna blow this thing up and sell it in four years, or we're gonna IPO.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: And and the danger is when you do get excited, that's when your guard's down, right?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you get the uh the post on LinkedIn with the LFG and the rocket ship emoji.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: A few fire emojis.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: So let's uh let's talk about this side.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: So we kind of put the marketing hire on hold, right?
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just say we're gonna wait for that.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: We do want to bring in, Bill does want to bring in his proper sales leader.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: What profile would you recommend the bill looks at um of that leader?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, looking at the looking at the team size um right now, you know, we've got five AEs, we've got two SDRs, two SEs, we've got a we've got a CAM, we've got a RevOps person.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we've got a decent, we've got a decent enough size team that I would say I probably wouldn't hand out a CRO title at this point.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I do think this is an important distinction because there will come another point, providing, providing that Cyber Donut meet their goals next year and they get more investment, there's going to be a point where this conversation's happening again, but we're saying they're stuck at 12 million and they want to get to 25 or they can't raise their next round of funding.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if you hire a CRO now, then it means that you can't easily hire one later without causing some upset.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: So what I would do personally is pitch it as a VP of sales role.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mean, I'm sure, I'm sure the right person might talk you into giving away the CRO title, but that might not be my recommendation from the from the first instance.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, VP of sales role, someone who has done a similar stage company.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't need to be that they've done one to ten.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: It could be that they've done, you know, actually five to five to twenty might be more interesting, but it's not gonna be someone who's done, you know, who's been a a cog in a in a much larger business.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely someone who's got a uh a real appreciation for sales process and sales methodology, all the all the stuff that that that that you're great at, right?
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Someone who is gonna be able to help drive closing more business.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, I think you referred to it earlier.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: When you look at the you look at the qualified pipeline and you look at how much they're closing, I mean, it's not it it could be a lot better.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing too is look for someone who, whilst they have great sales management skills and a focus on all of that good stuff, sales process, sales methodology, someone who wants to be out in the field with people.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: Because at the end of the day, like for a lot of these AEs, I mean, in a 15-person go-to-market org, you're gonna be out there trying to close every deal, whether it's uh, you know, 50k deal or uh, you know, or you're about to try and close your biggest ever at 250.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you're gonna need to be there.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I feel like at this stage, um, the head of sales should be all over every deal.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the you know, every possible deal should be all over that.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: You can't sit there and and say to the board, well, uh, you know, I didn't go to that meeting or I wasn't really involved, right?
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's uh you you you want to be there, you want to help drive it, and then give the credit to the AE, right?
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: You want to make sure that they do they absolutely, yeah.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and the and in the in the wrong circumstance, someone you know might feel like their pipeline is being uh micromanaged, but really what they need to look at it at is, you know, the right the right sales leader who's really gonna move the move the dial for a company like Cyberdonut is gonna be the person that means that your win rate increases because they're bringing it's not just about credibility, right?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: But it's about experience, it's about having the nerve to say, yeah, we're not gonna drop five percentage points.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: We know that your team are, you know, you're sat there with procurement and procurement are trying to hammer you down, and actually those those little things make a real difference.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: No, would you advise Bill to stay with someone inside cybersecurity or to look beyond cyber somewhere?
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: I would say that someone from cyber is is is critical.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: Why isn't that?
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: There's a couple of reasons.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: One, the chances are that they and look, I don't think that the you know Rolodexes are the are what they used to be, because I think the world's changed and selling's changed a lot.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: But someone who's got some relationships is going to make a big difference, right?
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like if they can help you open a few more doors in some large enterprise customers, that's a game changer.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Someone who knows the partner ecosystem, again, that is such a big multiplier and such a big opportunity for a small startup like Cyberdonut.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, when you think about hiring, I mean, building an entire team through me is expensive, right?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you hire a VP of sales who doesn't come from cyber, they're not gonna bring a network of people they could bring with you, with them, right?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: If you hire someone from cybersecurity, then they're so much more likely to have all of these great people that they've worked with before that they trust, that they've got, you know, buy-in from, who can come and work with Cyber Donut too.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it's gonna reduce your headhunter spend dramatically.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: All right, Josh, let's get to know you a little bit better.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I've got, believe it or not, 49 questions on my list right here.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: The good news is I don't ask you 49 questions.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna spin this wheel and it's gonna have three completely random questions for you.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: And as a longtime listener of the podcast, you'll know that our advanced algorithm that does all sorts of ML and AI stuff makes sure that the questions that we get that spit out are completely random and uh we we can ensure the integrity of the whole system by doing that, right?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna spin this wheel, I'm gonna see what questions it comes up with.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: You ready to go?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, good to go.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that doesn't happen very often.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: Question number one is how did you make money as a kid?
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, honestly, I was I was one of those kids that got into like all sorts of different stuff from like just like going around my parents' house, finding you know, bits and bobs to sell, like old like sky uh, you know, cable boxes.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: I used to order headphones on eBay and then go around school.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: selling them.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I got my first job when I was technically a kid.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think I was 15 years old working in a house of Fraser, a department store in England selling suitcases.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I would say I was uh sales was uh sales was the only route for me pretty early on.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: And which part of the world, which part of Eng England were you in?
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in Farnborough in Hampshire, so about an hour south of London.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Famous for his air show.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly, yeah.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Which for most people is quite an exciting thing.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: For me growing up, I used to just complain about it.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: Even though like when you're a kid it meant that you got like uh like the afternoons off for like a week so that was pretty good but besides that traffic and noise.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: Noise for sure I would imagine.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: All right let's move on to the next question.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: Let me spin the the random wheel of greatness here.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: All right number 37 what's an embarrassing or memorable moment in your career so far?
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I actually I had one a few years ago I I think it was like you know around the holidays I realized I've been really head down delivering on a load of searches.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: I hadn't been in touch with a lot of my network so I thought you know what I'll send out one of those famous mass emails from a CRM saying like does anyone want to catch up and uh just completely did the wrong thing with like the first name thing.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I ended up sending an email to like 200 people who knew me saying hello first name and uh I mean there's a lot of good stories that came off the back of it but incredibly most of it was people calling me to laugh at me.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: That was the first part of it.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then the second part of it was I actually ended up picking up quite a lot of business off the back of it.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I probably had like three or four people that were like weird email Josh like you not sure that's what you meant to do but do you want to help me with this job?
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: So you know it was embarrassing but it worked out no that one worked out for sure.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: All right let's go with the the next question I'm gonna spin the wheel here.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: All right number 21 what is the story behind your first or getting your first job in the cybersecurity world yeah I was I was a uh finance transformation headhunter in the UK and the company that I worked for at the time were looking for you know I was asked to come uh out to the US they wanted to open up in the US and I thought we were going to do finance transformation again which was a market that I knew really well and then they sort of said hey I think we're gonna do this cybersecurity thing I knew basically nothing about it until I got here which was five years ago uh October five years ago in October you moved out of here to tell was it financial integrations uh positions is that what it was yeah it was it was we used to um we used to like uh we used to recruit people to do like large scale finance transformation programs so ERP transformation shared service centers so but anyway like the world of recruiting for cybersecurity startups is to be honest way more way more interesting um and uh you know I predominantly recruit for salespeople so I get to you know talk to people that that quite frankly I I probably get on with better than maybe I got on with uh with some of the finance execs so we've looked at all the let's call them the tangible things experience the the background you know what they're at things like that what tips would you have for a bill to really get to know this person let's say they're down to you know a couple of people on the short list how would you recommend a bill to go really get to know and get past the you know all the glossy stuff we talked about beforehand to really get to know the the two candidates yeah I think I think if you're starting to get serious you should go spend some time in person.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know and I think I think at that point it's appropriate to you know spend a couple of hours do some sort of you know some whiteboarding if that's what you're feeling um you know go for a lunch go for a dinner I think it's making an effort to try and to simulate what a working relationship might feel like but also what a working personal relationship would look like.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know get to know what I think what a CEO founder really needs to do is get to know that person what's motivating them why are they doing this why you know they've done it before and they've they've probably had some wins and some losses why why do they want to do it again?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: Are they crazy?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like have they not have they looked at Cyberdonuts you know progress and thought oh yeah a mil to a mil to 10 10 mil in a in a in a year I mean that's that's a it's tall order right and you often sit in the middle Josh right so you're there you're you're like counselor right uh in between the the founder and and the CRO candidates what do you see as you're trying to bring them together what are you what what data points or or personality points are you looking at to say I want to you because you want to make sure the right people match up you don't want to you know have someone jam down their throats and just hope it sticks right yeah I think um look there's there's lots of there's lots of questions that that I ask people you know I I can say to someone you know well what's it what's it like to work for you right and they'll give me a perspective but it's really um through multiple meetings is when I really start to get a feel for for someone's for someone's personality and I also think that after someone after you know after Bill's met two candidates through me and I start you know getting a feel for right what did he like what did he dislike what did he gravitate to why did he gravitate towards that that that's when I that's when I really start to build a a good sort of benchmark on on what they're really you know what's really important to them.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I also think it's challenging right it's saying hey you you said you didn't like this person because of X, but I'm not sure whether that's right.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think you should reconsider that.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I think through spending through spending time with people through the process you really start to learn what's going to work.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: But it's also it's just getting a getting a real feel for for their culture and their working styles you know a lot of these CEOs founders I mean they they don't sleep you know they they they'll email you at 7 p.m 8 p.m and guess what if you don't respond you know until 8 a.m the next day they're probably gonna hold that against you and I think you know I always talk about the good the bad and the ugly right and I met a I met a CEO founder yesterday and he was you know they're looking at hiring their sort of first I guess three four go-to-market people in the US I said to him yeah what's the what's the worst thing about working for you and he was very honest that he's a bit of a maniac you know works all hours um you know responds to stuff at bizarre times very demanding and I think the most important thing that I can do with that is not talk to a candidate and say he's a great guy very relaxed you know really values work-life balance the reality is I'm you know I'll go and say look he's probably gonna work you like a dog and that's not for everyone right yeah some people gravitate towards that and go yeah that's my jam right now I'm you know whatever and some people are gonna kind of run a mile the other direction can you think of uh you said before that you you've had to challenge CEOs to say well do you really really want that right can you think of an example where you've had to do that and what the outcome was yeah I mean I had one I've I've I've definitely had ones where I mean the most the most awkward one is when someone perceives that their business is more sexy than it is.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: That never happens Josh come on founders founders never believe their stuff doesn't smell right and you know you talk to and it's it's trying to articulate that trying to educate them on all right I know that you want someone up here your business is is here right now so you know let's reset reset out expectations and why don't we look at some people here and see what you think but at the end of the day you know sometimes sometimes people want to be proved wrong for themselves right they want to go after the person who's the you know the the A star the dream hire for them and sometimes they need to offer them for them to get rejected and then for me to not say I told you so but say all right let's regroup and let's consider looking at people you know that have done X instead of Y.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know I mean everyone tries to gamify hiring so someone will look at a a company that's done really well right a company that's had unicorn status that's you know been the fastest growing to to 100 million ARR, whatever that is, and they'll look at it and go, if I hire someone from there, that will happen to me.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that is the that is the most common thing I mean and it's it's not true.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: Well I imagine if I'm Bill right now right uh you know tough hire right because as you say in two years they need to go from zero to 10 million in ERR right that's basically what we're asking them to do.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: I might be sitting there going you know Josh I need you go and headhunt Colin Jones from Wiz right he was the first CRO go get him right and you'll be sitting there going dude you're asking zero to 10 million in two years you know you might want to just think about what that really means and who might take that on right uh it might be Colin it might not be Colin right I don't know right but uh you might want to you know dial down your expectations bill a little bit yeah yeah I mean the reality of what I do is you know I'm I'm always very comfortable to I always tell people you know I'm I'm I'm anything but a yes man.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'll always be the first one to to challenge you constructively but if you tell me you want me to try and go after Colin at Wiz I'll pick up the phones Colin at Wiz and I'll let you know what he says.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: And you might not want to know it.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah yeah yeah a slight slightly different tangent uh I I talked to uh a founder a few months back and he decided not to hire a leader but got he actually went to his biggest competitor and hired what he called their top three or four salespeople and he told me he said within four months three of the four had gone it wasn't entirely clear I got the impression he moved them on right his thing was they just weren't working out they didn't deliver stuff or whatever uh what if you were to hear that what are you thinking are you thinking you know maybe you didn't know how to manage them how to work with them is it not a good idea to go after competitors people I'm thinking that they probably if he hired someone from a top competitor that means that he's probably putting that competitor on a pedestal right so he's he's impressed by what they've done and you know they want to replicate some of that success.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_00: And chances are they might have um you know their products might be better um their their infrastructure might be better they might have more referenceable customers they might have better uh sales support in terms of you know anything from tools to systems to you know whatever that might be they might just have more research resources I mean the biggest the biggest reason I think why a lot of you know reps would do well at company A who have got to a hundred million but not company B who are at you know a million ARR and want to be at 100 million ARR is exactly is exactly the company B doesn't have the same hype around it.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah people don't underestimate that um one of the things I I was talking to another leader recently and he asked me the question you know would you go work for a company again and I said yeah I might do and then he said so what would you look for and one of the things I said is that I would be absolutely zeroed in on who are the CEO founders who have that thing right when they stand up people stop and listen.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: When they when they have a viewpoint people nod and don't fall asleep right when when they're in the room there's the aura they have the command they they get the PR just naturally about who they are because that makes your life so much easier when you're out there when you have someone like that versus someone and I've taught the CEOs like this on the uh and on the podcast I've probably had a couple that might qualify as this they're very reserved and you kind of it's it's hard work and when they listen you're kind of wondering what you're having for dinner that night you know when when you talk when they talk you're wondering what you're having for dinner that night I know I'd rather have the former that's for sure.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah and it's you know I mean I met someone recently third time founder it's gonna be some of the easiest recruitment I ever do because you know the only thing that you know I mean everyone wants to work for someone who's done it before someone who's done it twice successfully and sold to big names in the industry I mean that is that's the dream.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah I remember final story on this and then we'll get on to the next topic I two years ago I got on a call got on an episode to record an interview with Eric Olden who is the CEO at Strata right and I've got to admit to it I if Eric's listened to this I you know I'll I'll tell him this but I had a couple calls before it I was running very fast that day I had some notes about who he was and what he'd done but I didn't sit there for half an hour prepping as I should have done and I kind of cut on the call and I realized in the first five 10 minutes of the call this guy this guy knows his shit right and uh I realized he said yeah he said I built two identity companies already sold them both to RSA for 500 million and 700 million or something like that.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: This is my third go-around you know and he showed up my little interview on my podcast with like four pages of notes about what he wanted to talk about with the topics that we pre-agreed to talk about it.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: He was ready to go right I sat there just as you said right I sat there went here's a guy I would work for right this he knows a shit he knows how to get it done he has some really interesting takes about how to do go to market which I thought were very informed as opposed to well I just heard a dude at a conference last week say something like this right uh very different uh experience or around Eric than some others yeah let's go back to Cyber Donut right so we could have narrowed down a little bit the type of person um how long for Bill you know he's being he's just come out of Q3 he's a little bit pennant about the numbers he's saying I need to hire someone tomorrow right how long will it take Bill to get someone on board do you think?
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I mean realistically you're probably looking at two to three weeks of of search and I you know I'm not saying it's gonna take me two three weeks to find some people I'll probably have people in the first few days but you know it's as we as we sort of weed through people is you know I think by the end of the third week you're probably gonna have a a sort of a a group of people progressing beyond first beyond second that you feel quite excited about.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_00: After that it really it really depends on how long your interview process is I I recommend that really you should be getting interview processes wrapped up in two to three weeks.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know CEOs founders are busy the investors that they probably need to meet are busy so it doesn't always work out that way if everything goes to plan then you know you could have someone at the very earliest probably six seven weeks from from commencing the search if if scheduling's a nightmare if expectations are unrealistic we could be still having this conversation two months later three months later that sounds like a bit of a nightmare for someone like Bill right who's who needs to deliver some results you said something there interesting though it depends on the process you know on on sales LinkedIn these days there's a lot of noise around never ending hiring processes and things like that.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_01: What are you seeing out there?
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_01: Is that is that real is that what's happening?
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I mean I think yeah I think it exists you know the most punchy processes tend to be four stages you know sales leadership though like I don't think it's absurd if you're a if you're hiring a sales leader to put them through a six eight interview process right and to be diligent with sort of back channeling um you know it's a big it's a big hire it's very important you you don't want to rush that so you know yeah I think in some circumstances it is dragged out I think the noise on LinkedIn about it is not always about leadership roles and much more about sort of you know junior roles maybe even mid to senior level roles to a degree where people are just in you know just having decision paralysis.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: And you're seeing that you're seeing a lot of that in the last 18 months because the hiring market the hiring landscape changed so so much.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know we had 2020 2021 2022 to a degree big boom years and then things kind of dropped right off so there was a time where people were you know hiring like crazy and trying to push someone through four interviews in a week just to secure the talent because it was a race for talent right now it's flipped there's more people available so guess what companies take their time a little bit more and they're a bit more choosy.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah feels like the you you have to get the balance though because you keep waiting and waiting for the best can the best candidate right and you feel like oh there's gonna be someone better next week and you just never get to actually get someone on board.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: You must have to manage that that process for people.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_00: Just the the cost the cost to the cost of getting it wrong is so high but you know realistically we don't we don't get every hire right the most important thing and I say this all the time and I think sometimes people think it's um counterintuitive advice from someone in my industry is is firing fast is really important.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that is what I see that most startups aren't good at they hold on to someone they're so scared to not have someone in that role doing that work that they would almost rather have someone doing a mediocre job than not have someone.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah yeah warm body rather than nobody right yeah which uh you know when you've got a small number of people it's whether you can really afford to do that if you're a large company you can get away with that and you know we've seen that right but uh startups is different.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: But it creates creates a toxicity in the in the culture right which slows down the whole business.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah it it permeates everywhere it's it's like a cancer.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh speaking of things which maybe startups might not be the best at how do you help people or how do you assess interview processes and and the intentionality around interviews you know what I've experienced before is we've got someone coming in today for this role will you talk to them for half an hour right and and then you go talk to them and then you say what do you think?
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's no structure to I don't know so what what do you see and how do you help you kind of not make the mistakes yeah I mean I always I always do a bit of information gathering have you hired someone like this before um you know what what what things are you assessing through the process and then from there I'm able to you know give some advice and and that that makes a big difference but you know again like I think the biggest thing that I really urge people to do is is to prepare.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like take the time to look at the person's profile read read their resume.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: I know that's old fashioned advice these days but read the piece of paper make notes on it turn up to that interview as prepared as you would expect that other person because if that other person you know if the if the person you're interviewing turned around and said so tell me what you guys do you'd you'd probably end it right there, right?
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_00: You'd be like how dare they turn up to an interview and not know you know you would be you'd be infuriated.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I think I think the biggest bit of advice I give is is prepare for success.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah that's that's so good.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think um I don't know if you have templates or things like Git people but I feel like people are crying out for that a little bit to say here's the profile we're looking for here's the types of things we want to ask the person now we'll divide up who does what and you know come come together afterwards I feel like they're maybe crying out for that sort of structure sometimes.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: So Josh let's talk about one of probably the most important thing for people listening to this let's talk about comp uh so we got this VP of sales they've they're they're somewhat experienced they might have done something early stage before with the best success.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's who we're looking at what are we paying these people these days let's talk about OTE let's talk about stock let's talk about weird and wacky things which might be in the comp package somewhere I would I would say you know for the for the size of company we're talking about we're probably looking 4000 OTE on the low end and 5000 on the high end.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_00: In terms of factors that might change that I mean you know maybe you're saying that someone who's at the higher end of the budget is in a you know is in San Francisco, is in New York we might be saying that they are coming from a competitor you know lots of factors.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you they might have some stock that they've got that they're walking away from so they want something a little bit extra coming in but yeah 400 to 500 OTE on a 50-50 split should absolutely get you someone here.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_00: Equity equity is a funny one there are there are so many factors you know how much you've raised how diluted there are how many stocks how many classes of stock there are I've seen anything from you know for this sort of level anywhere from 0.5 to probably two and a half percent which you know I mean is the the more meaningful stuff I think is you know what the cliff is.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_00: I mean the standard cliff is a year right so if you can get anything better than that that's great because you know I mean you look At the average tenure of a sales leader in cybersecurity, it's it's probably 18 months roughly.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_00: So most people, you know, they get to their cliff and then maybe they get partly vested.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_00: Usually you're seeing a four-year vest.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_00: I've seen accelerated vesting schedules, they do exist.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think they're a great thing to negotiate if you can negotiate them.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's very mission-centric.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like if the company says, Hey, we want to go from in this case, if Cyber Donut said, look, we want to go from 15 customers to 50 customers, and then you know, we think we're gonna sell, then you might say, Well, you know, I think I want a two-year vest, not a four-year vest, because you know, if we sell in two years, I'm only gonna be, you know, 50% vested.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_00: You've got accelerated vesting.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: So should the should the company go through a liquidity event, then your remaining shares get auto-vested.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_00: That's quite a that's quite a tricky one to negotiate.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_00: We we saw that a lot in 2020 and 2021 and parts of 2022, but with the market shifting, uh, that's being given away a lot less now.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think severance is a really important thing that feels very awkward for people.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think for a for a VP of sales, for a VP of Martin, CRO, CMO, you know, the average tenure, as I said, is probably 18 months.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_00: And realistically, in a market like today, it could take you six months on average to find a new gig.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you get fired from that role not because you've done anything wrong, not because you're not good at your job, but because, hey, startups don't always work out, right?
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I think negotiating, you know, at least six months severance is a really good thing to do.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: And would you get pushback from the founder CEO that I can't believe this person's asking for this?
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_00: All the time, yeah.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I've had it before where people have been like, you know, I can't believe that they'd ask for this.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like, are they planning to not work out?
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I always I always like to explain it like um football or soccer managers, right?
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you have you have bought me in on a three-year contract.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_00: If you choose to go a different direction within that three-year period, then you're buying me out of the rest of my contract.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_00: If I choose, you know, if someone chooses to try and take me somewhere else, then they have to buy you out of this contract.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that that side of it happens less in our world.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_00: But definitely the, you know, the the the former, I think it's a I think it's a good example.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_01: And you usually get the finders to kind of see the light on it a little bit and understand why the motivations are sometimes it's a hard no.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's 50-50.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_00: I would say all of these things are, you know, I always think about everything as being different, different levers to pull, right?
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like accelerated vesting, right?
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_00: If you get that, but you don't get the severance, maybe that's a win.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of I think maybe one thing that people don't realize is a lot of levers out there, right?
• 47:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, there's give and take and all the rest of it, you gotta figure out how you're gonna mute and meet in the middle sometimes.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing is is um is guarantees around compensation, right?
• 47:40
  SPEAKER_00: You look at a company like Cyberdonut, and um, you know, I know lots of VPs of sales who, you know, who join and they're you know, they're I don't know, 200k base, and they might not, you know, sometimes sales leaders don't start seeing bonuses until the teams at 70% of their number, which means, you know, they might have two, three quarters where they're making nothing but their base.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm not saying it's not enough to live on, but if you're coming from a more established role where you've got run rate and you're, you know, you're earning commission and sales bonus every every quarter to go into Cyber Donut where you've got a tall order.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, some guarantees around cash comp for the first six months is very reasonable because the work that you do isn't probably gonna impact the number for the next quarter or two.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna take a while for things to work out for sure.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, looking at this four orders a quarter, I mean it's not zero, but it's not not a lot.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_01: You need a couple of those not to quite work out, and suddenly you're you're not doing too well, right?
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I could see that.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, any weird and wacky stories, Josh, about uh situations you thought you got all buttoned up and they fell apart or weird demands from a founder or from a CRO that you kind of scratch your head at a little bit?
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, so many.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the biggest, the biggest and most common one is just um is is egos in the chase.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I've had it so many times where it's like, you know, the founder wants the candidate to say, I want you guys, and the candidate wants the the candidate, you know, it's it's it's the vice versa.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like neither party, right?
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like it's like the dating world, which I've not been in for a very long time, but it's like, you know, these these people get to the the third or fourth date and they haven't told each other that they like each other.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so I always say to people, look, put your put your cards on the table.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what's the worst that's gonna happen?
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's quite a it's quite a vulnerable, vulnerable thing.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_00: Hiring or hiring or taking a new job, like we really open ourselves up a little bit, and I think um, you know, it's in a in a startup, you are always one good hire away from feeling like you've taken 10 steps forward.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_00: Or 10 steps back, or 10 steps back if you get it wrong.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_00: I bet.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: Well, on that note, Josh, thanks so much for joining us.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna give you the search for our VP of sales who's gonna deliver whiz-like results.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_01: So so we're gonna give you a tall order to go out there.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna pay them below market race, but expect the world from you.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so we're looking forward to bringing our new VP of sales onto Cyber Donut and start making a difference because good God knows we need it, right?
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna go from right now, our ARR is 1.2 million.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_01: You can get up to 10 million in just five quarters.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's gonna be tough to do, but we got some great advisors.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_01: You've just joined the advisory board for Cyber Donut.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_01: We have some really cool people in there already.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_01: I've got my Save Cyber Donut swag on.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_01: Those that are watching on video can see that.
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_00: How do I get myself one of those?
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_00: Do I have to be successful with the search?
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know what?
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_01: Rather than pay you hard cash, Josh, I'm gonna send you a t-shirt.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's what uh that's how much we pay our search uh partners these days.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so a nice t-shirt is gonna head off to Chicago for you, okay?
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_01: But listen, thanks for joining me.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: What's the best way to get a hold of you, Josh?
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh LinkedIn.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_00: I am uh yeah, busy on it, noisy on it.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_00: So that is a good place to see me.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_01: You're a very reasoned and logical and balanced person in LinkedIn.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like the love of it.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I commend you for that.
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_01: So uh anyway, that's how people get a hold of you.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_01: And uh talk to you next time.
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_01: All right, see you soon, Andrew.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.