20Sales: The $100M CRO Bubble: Why Anthropic Are Causing a Comp Crisis | Why You Should Never Hire From Salesforce or Service Now | How to Hire, Train and Forecase in a World of AI with Chad Peets and Chris Degnan
Chad Peets is one of the most straight-talking, no BS sales leaders of our time. Today, he partners with founders of the fastest growing companies in the world, like Harvey, Factory to build the best sales teams in a world of AI.
Chris Degnan is a legendary technology sales leader who achieved the historic feat of scaling Snowflake from $0 to $4BN in ARR.
AGENDA:
00:00 – The $100M CRO Packages Nobody Believes Are Real
04:10 – Why Most "Elite" Salespeople Are Actually Just Order Takers
08:00 – The Secret to Hiring Killer Sales Talent at Early-Stage Startups
10:05 – 20x Quotas & The Death of Traditional Pipeline Generation
16:20 – The ARR Scam: Why Most AI Revenue Numbers Are Fake
17:45 – Why the Best Engineers Do Not Want to Be Forward Deployed Engineers
21:10 – Why Paying Everyone the Same Kills Great Sales Organisations
24:15 – Anthropic's Crazy Compensation Is Breaking the Entire Sales Market
29:00 – The Brutal Truth About Replacing CROs & Firing Sales Leaders
32:20 – Forecasting in AI Is Completely Broken
38:20 – The Fatal Mistake Founders Make Chasing Venture Valuations
39:40 – Why Most VCs Give Absolutely Terrible Sales Advice
42:10 – Global Sales From Day One: The New AI Go-To-Market Playbook
44:15 – "Anthropic Is a $5 Trillion Company"
47:40 – The Death of the Traditional SDR & The Rise of Full-Stack AI Sellers
49:00 – Consumption Pricing, Vertical AI & Why SaaS Is Getting Rewritten
52:00 – What the Best Sales Cultures Still Get Right in the AI Era
20Sales: Why the Best Sales People are F**** in the Head | Why Remote Work is BS | Why Europe is a Nightmare for Recruiting Sales Teams | How to Build a Sales Machine | What Everyone Gets Wrong Today in Sales with Chad Peets
Chad Peets is one of the great sales leaders of our time. Previously, he was the sales saviour at Snowflake and was an advisor to the CEO there. He was also an MD at Sutter Hill where he sat on the board of companies like Sigma Computing and Augment Code.
AGENDA:
04:53 How to Recruit the Best Sales Talent Today
06:27 Why Europe is a Nightmare for Recruitment in Sales
11:29 How to Evaluate Sales Talent: Green and Red Flags
21:58 Why Remote Work is BS and You Have to be in Office
23:43 How to Improve Sales Team Performance in Just 24 Hours
27:45 When to Fire vs When to Give More Time
32:10 How to Set Sales Quotas Effectively
34:39 Adjusting Compensation Plans for Better Performance
37:50 Why Work Life Balance is Total BS
41:08 Biggest Lessons on Leading Sales Teams
50:37 What is The Future of Enterprise Sales with AI
58:40 Quick Fire Questions and Final Thoughts
20Sales: Why You Need a CRO Pre-Product | Why Remote Sales Teams Do Not Work | How Snowflake Built a Sales Machine with Chad Peets
Chad Peets is one of the greatest sales leaders and recruiters of the last 25 years. From 2018 to 2023, Chad was a Managing Director at Sutter Hill Ventures. Chad has worked with the world's best CEOs and CROs to build world-class go-to-market organizations. Chad is currently a member of the Board of Directors for Lacework and Luminary Cloud and on the boards of Clumio and Sigma Computing. He previously served as a board member for Astronomer, Transposit, and others. He was an early-stage investor at Snowflake, Sigma, Observe, Lacework, and Clumio.
In Today's Discussion with Chad Peet's We Discuss:
1. You Need a CRO Pre-Product:
Why does Chad believe that SaaS companies need a CRO pre-product?
Should the founder not be the right person to create the sales playbook?
What should the founder look for in their first CRO hire?
Does any great CRO really want to go back to an early startup and do it again?
2. What Everyone Gets Wrong in Building Sales Teams:
Why are most sales reps not performing?
How long does it take for sales teams to ramp? How does this change with PLG and enterprise?
What are the benchmarks of good vs great for average sales reps?
How do founders and VCs most often hurt their sales teams and performance?
3. How to Build a Hiring Machine:
What are the single biggest mistakes people make when hiring sales reps and teams?
Are sales people money motivated? How to create comp plans that incentivise and align?
Why does Chad believe that any sales rep that does not want to be in the office, is not putting their career and development first?
Why is it harder than ever to recruit great sales leaders today?
4. Lessons from Scaling Sales at Snowflake:
What are the single biggest lessons of what worked from scaling Snowflake's sales team?
What did not work? What would he do differently with the team again?
What did Snowflake teach Chad about success and culture and how they interplay together?
20Sales: How Snowflake Built a Sales Machine | Why You Have to Hire a CRO Pre-Product | Why Most Sales Reps Do Not Perform | Why Hiring Panels are BS in Interviews | Why Remote Sales Reps Do Not Care About Their Development with Chad Peets
Chad Peets is one of the greatest sales leaders and recruiters of the last 25 years. From 2018 to 2023, Chad was a Managing Director at Sutter Hill Ventures. Chad has worked with the world's best CEOs and CROs to build world-class go-to-market organizations. Chad is currently a member of the Board of Directors for Lacework and Luminary Cloud and on the boards of Clumio and Sigma Computing. He previously served as a board member for Astronomer, Transposit, and others. He was an early-stage investor at Snowflake, Sigma, Observe, Lacework, and Clumio.
In Today's Discussion with Chad Peet's We Discuss:
1. You Need a CRO Pre-Product:
Why does Chad believe that SaaS companies need a CRO pre-product?
Should the founder not be the right person to create the sales playbook?
What should the founder look for in their first CRO hire?
Does any great CRO really want to go back to an early startup and do it again?
2. What Everyone Gets Wrong in Building Sales Teams:
Why are most sales reps not performing?
How long does it take for sales teams to ramp? How does this change with PLG and enterprise?
What are the benchmarks of good vs great for average sales reps?
How do founders and VCs most often hurt their sales teams and performance?
3. How to Build a Hiring Machine:
What are the single biggest mistakes people make when hiring sales reps and teams?
Are sales people money motivated? How to create comp plans that incentivise and align?
Why does Chad believe that any sales rep that does not want to be in the office, is not putting their career and development first?
Why is it harder than ever to recruit great sales leaders today?
4. Lessons from Scaling Sales at Snowflake:
What are the single biggest lessons of what worked from scaling Snowflake's sales team?
What did not work? What would he do differently with the team again?
What did Snowflake teach Chad about success and culture and how they interplay together?