[Arran NorthParticipant]

Over the past two years of occupying a sales focused role within a Group Marketing department it has become clear that there is many advantages to having a dedicated Sales Enablement role – many of the reasons covered at the recent TRANSFORM event in London.

I’m aspiring to encourage my Director to sponsor the formation of this role, and was curious to read about any similar plans that were successful? Internal initiatives to develop / define a new Sales Enablement role.

[Mathieu BaertParticipant]

Hi Arran,
I can relate to your question.

At TRANSFORM we saw VP, directors and heads of Sales Enablement teams. And even though we might aspire to have a full blown dedicated Sales Enablement (SE) team, a dedicated SE role doesn’t need to be a 1 FTE.
What every company needs is one or more people that have allowance to spend x amount of their time on SE.
Asking for f.e. a 1/4 FTE will be a lot easier to get clearance for than coming in with high demands and full guns blazing.

I started out with this approach, picked some of the low hanging fruit. Then went back to ask for more resources and so and so forth.
“snackable” and “bite-sized” were buzz-words on TRANSFORM. Keep what you ask from your director also “bite-sized” and just keep asking slowly but steadily for more I suggest.
regards,
Mathieu Baert

[Arran NorthParticipant]

Hello Matthieu,

Thank you for your reply. I appreciate your observations and experience on the matter.

At present, we have begun to realise the value of having my role within the Group Marketing department, focusing on sales material and curated marketing material where applicable for the sales team to use. My background is graphic design/multimedia and then Marcomms team management. I’ve occupied this “Sales Channel Marketing” role for 2 years. It was a role that didn’t have much definition or charter and really required a high level of self direction to establish it.

I am seeking a formalised role, defined as SE as recognition by Directors/Senior management to highlight the importance of this function, and then for this to send a message throughout the ranks of the business. At present it is a real battle to communicate value / enlist corporation where required. It is admittedly becoming easier to gain traction as time passes and strides with initiatives such as deploying the Showpad platform etc have been noticed… and felt throughout.

SE being part of Group Marketing will always have a level of marketing bias, in my view.

I acknowledge and take on your points with taking bite-size chunks at forming this defined role, and will consider how to take this approach some more. Early thought stages right now.

[Mathieu BaertParticipant]

Hi Arran,

If I understand well, you don’t have an ally in the c-suite flying your flag or fully understanding what SE means and can bring to the table?
Do you have a charter in place?
Was someone of senior management involved with the implementation process of Showpad?

[Author]

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