Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
#07 | Career Shifts, AI Myths, and the Hard Truth on Diversity at Work - Chai Clarkson
17 Plays11 months ago
In this episode of Nelly Talks, Nelya is joined by Chai Clarkson, Head of Sales at Cygnetise, to talk about tokenism in hiring, levelling up and the power of human relationships over AI.
This episode includes:
• The truth about what makes a great leader (and common pitfalls to avoid)
• Why mentorship matters more than ever for sales success
• Real talk on diversity as a business advantage, not just a trend
Timeline:
00:00 Nelly Talks Intro
01:00 Meet Chai Clarkson
01:15 How did your career transition from recruitment to sales?
01:53 Do you feel like strong leadership is important to entry level sales roles?
02:09 Did you always know that this is what you wanted to do?
03:37 What do you enjoy most about your current role?
04:40 What do are the biggest challenges in your current role?
06:08 Does this role allow you to have a good work life balance?
07:32 How has the rise of AI impacted your industry?
09:43 Do you see more diversity in your field vs when you started?
11:08 Is there anything else that businesses can do to increase interest from diverse candidates?
13:31 What advice would you give to your younger self?
15:32 Nelly Talks Outro
Recommended
Transcript
00:00:03
Speaker
You need to build trust, confidence and faith from your your senior execs, but you also do need to push back sometimes. and It's important there's a balance there, but it's important that you're not just hiring for that reason.
Introduction to 'Nelly Talks'
00:00:19
Speaker
Hey everyone, I'm Nellia from Nelly Wax. Welcome to my podcast, Nelly Talks, a careers-focused show for those who are considering careers in tech industry, or maybe looking for a change of direction in this space. We will be interviewing different speakers in this field to understand their journeys, their hurdles to face, how they overcame those, and any tips and hints that they would like to share on the way.
Career Transition: Recruitment to Sales
00:00:54
Speaker
Today we have Che on the podcast with us. Please introduce yourself to our audience. Yeah. Hey guys. Um, my name is Che, head of sales at a company called Signetize. Been in sales for over a decade now. Yeah. Really excited to to be on the podcast. Very excited to have you Che. I know you've actually started in recruitment. How did you go from recruitment and moving into sales? Um, interesting career path.
00:01:22
Speaker
Do you know what it was? Having people as my commodity was just too stressed with me. I worked for a really good company. My boss at the time moved and she kind of just said, look, I think you'd be really good in a role that we've got.
00:01:38
Speaker
It just kind of felt really natural. It's always easier to land somewhere when you've got somebody above you who really trusts your ability. You kind of feel confident going into it and just feeling as if I could really kind of learn from the person who was bringing me across and have have that trust in my skillset really.
The Role of Leadership in Sales
00:01:54
Speaker
And do you feel like having that strong leadership is important at the start of your sales career?
00:02:00
Speaker
Without A Shadow Without, I know for sure my seven years without Hubbell, without the leaders that I had, I wouldn't be able to make the steps up that I have. Growing up, did you always know kind of through, you know, school, ah when you started thinking about jobs that you wanted to do something kind of obviously initially in recruitment and sales, or did you have kind of different aspirations altogether?
00:02:25
Speaker
so different. It's weird because I would consider myself a people person, but I've always been obsessed with maths. It's just been my thing. So at primary school, we had to write where we wanted to be in 10 years. And I said, I wanted to be an accountant. And then secondary school, I had a crazy Irish teacher, Mr. Hartnett.
00:02:43
Speaker
He was telling me about accountancy is cool, but if you really want to be in the numbers, you need to become an actuary. So at a secondary school, I really wanted to study actuarial science at the London School of Economics. Didn't quite have the cognitive functions but to make that happen. All the patients, to be honest, I mean, I studied accountancy and maths and all that stuff at school, but fell out of love for it. So if anything, when I was growing up, I wanted to sit in front of a computer on an Excel spreadsheet. Thankfully, now sales is a bit more data driven. I can, I can still do that. It's really interesting. Look, you've got a failed lawyer here, so ended up in recruitment. I think these are the sort of roles sometimes you fall into and they work out, especially if you have the leadership that kind of sees the talents that you don't often see. I've had a crazy teacher like that, Mr. Pucci. I thought I'll be a translator that, and obviously went into law randomly and then ended up in recruitment. So yeah, career paths can change. And in terms of your current role, what do you enjoy most
Challenges and Mentoring in Sales
00:03:41
Speaker
about it? I like numbers, I like order, right? So the most enjoyment I found is identifying where the challenges are, identifying where there are some levers that we can pull, either quick wins or long-term changes, and then more strategically mapping out what that's going to look like. That's what I found most enjoyable. And also just working with mentoring, coaching junior salespeople, because I've been a salesperson who is a bit, wasn't necessarily serious about my career ah um in the early stages,
00:04:10
Speaker
And it took a good leader to kind of get me on the right track. I'm fortunate enough that the guys here just way ahead of where I was, but it's been able to kind of shape that and mold that and see how I can build a ah framework with which they can use to grow and and and improve their skill sets and and and grow grow their careers. It sounds like you're a great manager to have and it'll be a mighty team to watch. And I guess like with any you know job, there are always downsides to any position.
Balancing Vision and Goals in Sales
00:04:40
Speaker
What would you say are kind of are the biggest challenges of being in a senior sales role?
00:04:46
Speaker
I'd say the first thing is short term versus long term. How do you balance your priorities? Either any VC funded startup, you raise, you grow, you raise, you grow, you exit. So you're always on that roller coaster of needing to grow revenue, but you've also got a long term vision for the business and try to find that balance and use your time effectively is really important.
00:05:09
Speaker
And then the second thing is managing up as well as managing down. How do you protect your team and, you know, make sure they know what they need to know, but they can focus on their day to day roles. At the same time, this is the most important thing is how do you manage up? You need to build trust, confidence, and faith from your your senior execs, but you also do need to push back sometimes because they've hired you to do a job. And if you don't put your neck on the line with your own opinions as the expert in that role,
00:05:37
Speaker
while you're there, it takes a bit of experience to make the mistakes of maybe being too soft. When managing up, things are over promising and you get stung by that and then you kind of realise that this is the way of of business and then senior sales leadership. Yeah, a lot of the selling happens internally. I think a lot of people don't realise it when they go into sales roles, which is, you know, and As important, and thank you for sharing that. I mean, it sounds like it's a kind of quite full on, you know, high pressure position as most leadership roles are. Do you feel like this role allows you to have a good work life balance? How do you kind of juggle between home life and work life and prioritize and fence off their time?
00:06:19
Speaker
Yeah, do you know I've always been so fortunate. All of my businesses have had an incredible work life balance and even since leading teams over the past few years, that's been maintained. I think you've got to be very careful not to take too much home. I probably slip up in that sense because I'm quite an open book. But in terms of feeling pressured to take it home. I've never worked at a business in that scenario. The pressure I take home is stuff I put in myself. So I've been really fortunate in that sense. You got to have a good ah good home life as well, right? It's it's what big what bounces you back to work in the morning and keeps you feeling positive about about what you're doing as well. You know, a good a good wholesome life outside of work helps you really handle the stresses and the rollercoaster that is sales.
00:07:02
Speaker
a bad, a thing. and Hopefully everyone works to earn 11, done left to right. I know it's not always the case. It's hard to use sometimes, you know, balance. yeah It sounds like a great attitude and it's great that you've been able to maintain it as your role responsibilities. Right.
AI's Impact on Sales
00:07:21
Speaker
And from kind of slightly different topic now, Tae, we know that kind of AI has been really disruptive in a lot of jobs and a lot of industries. How have you found it, if at all, um impacting sales functions in the businesses? I caveat this with saying I'm a bit of a technophobe at times. I don't know whether that's the control freaking me somewhere, even though I wouldn't really consider myself one. But I personally just don't feel like AI is at a point where we can trust in it enough to be fully reliant upon it. And in that sense, I probably shunned it a little bit more than I should have. That being said, you know, we still use it.
00:08:01
Speaker
A lot of the software tools that we use day-to-day utilize AI, but I think that it still has a fair bit to go until it is the tool that we need it to be. But I also think sales is so cyclical, right? You look at sales in, I don't know, or the late 90s, early 2000s.
00:08:20
Speaker
very much on the phone, you got your rolodex and that's how you work. And then emails become huge and AI is just super powered that and now everybody's inboxes are full. And I think we're going to go on this natural roller coaster where people start to detox from these things. It's like, actually, let's have a face-to-face meeting. Let's just get on the phone and have a conversation.
00:08:41
Speaker
And I guess in a relationship focused role, it's not an area that AI or technology can fully replace. It can enhance, automate some workflows, but ah you know, people still buy from people. yeah ah yeah It's been huge in recruitment, as I'm sure you can imagine. yeah um But having spoken to my first candidate ah on the phone in three years, pretty much since COVID, it was so nice, so weird.
00:09:09
Speaker
but so nice not to have to kind of, you're not watching them. You're not in hands. You can just have a chat, right? And actually talk about what you want to talk about. I felt like this is really old school. I have to pick up the phone and dial the number. and But you know, like I probably got more out of the phone call than maybe three, four VCs that I would have had to have with him to scheduling, booking, et cetera. So yeah, I think the the retro is coming back in kind of relationship focused roles. I think he was always there.
00:09:36
Speaker
with perhaps just maybe this sometimes to rely too much on tech.
Diversity and Hiring Practices
00:09:40
Speaker
A big topic on this podcast is diversity, diversity in tech. Do you see more diversity in representation in your field now ah versus perhaps when you're starting up in your role?
00:09:51
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I don't think we're quite yet where we need to be from a diversity inclusion point. and And I think the main reason I've identified for that is that it became such a big focus that hiring for hiring sake became an issue and people were very aware of it. And there's also that bias around, well, we just need to get the numbers up here in terms of, you know, ethnic minorities or gender, whatever that might be.
00:10:16
Speaker
And it's important there's a balance there, but it's important that you're not just hiring for that reason. There's some really great kind of networks. So the Black Tech Sales Network is an incredible forum for ethnic um minorities within the sales world to be able to share ideas, experiences and help each other to grow.
00:10:35
Speaker
So there's a long way to go and it's definitely improved in the decade or so that I've been in sales, but we've also just got to be very careful because it's about skill set and your ability to do well. And that should always be the most important thing. Yeah. Yeah. And I've seen that push for like a positive discrimination and you know, no one likes to be a token hire. You know, whether you're kind of a woman in tag, a foreign, you know, whatever that statistic that you happen to fall into, it's always good to know that you've been chosen because you just get what you do. You're kind of the best out of everyone else in the pack. Anything else you think that businesses can perhaps do from their side as employer to encourage more applications, let's say for sales roles, from more diverse candidates.
Diverse Role Models in Sales
00:11:21
Speaker
It takes a bit of time for that first real big cohort of women or ethnic hierarchies to progress in their careers and find opportunities of seniority or leadership, whatever that might look like. So the the next people that are coming along can actually see, oh, there's Che, who's a young black guy with dreadlocks who's leading a sales team, right? And it's about helping people find those pathways to more seniority so they can be above the parapet, so they can be seen. And that's what will give the next generations of salespeople the confidence to step into a role and think, I can do this. I can get to to where I want to be. And again, businesses just need to facilitate that. They need to care about it. It also needs to be about giving those those minorities real confidence, right? You look at the gender pay gap and statistically women asking for raises less, for example.
00:12:16
Speaker
That also works the same in asking for a promotion or saying, what can I do in order to be given the opportunity to take that next step? And so leaders within our community need to really make sure that they are helping build confidence of those in more junior roles to go out and ask, you know, what's it going to take to get promoted? I think I've got weaknesses in this, this, in this area. Can you help me to upskill so that I'm a more well-rounded salesperson? those are the Those are the things that I would point to. really, a really good hints. I think as you say, attracting talent, evening out the playing fields, you know, from inclusive hiring training, and then also then developing the talent because the reality is if you're not giving them those sort opportunities, they'll move on somewhere else in the team or a manager that will nurture those aspirations. I think you're right.
00:13:05
Speaker
seeing the likes of yourself, people who sound, look like you in the leadership roles, does help people to have that confidence. So, and and you know, a we do see drop off when it comes to diversity from ICs to senior leadership. So it's businesses who invest in that will ultimately when more diverse teams perform better,
00:13:24
Speaker
um and it's good to have kind of difference of opinion and background in any team, which makes it more fun normally. And to wrap us up, what advice would you give someone who's considering a career in sale?
Advice for Excelling in Sales
00:13:38
Speaker
Any kind of overarching things that helped you in your career to get through any hurdles? Also, this could relate to kind of going from an IC to senior leadership role as well.
00:13:53
Speaker
you're always going to have a couple of top performers in the team. And one thing that I did to try and really force my Hubble's hand, it gives me the opportunity to be promoted was make sure the numbers are good, but then you make sure that you're super efficient. If you've got capacity and your numbers are still high, then you can ask for extra responsibilities. You can take the things off your manager's plate that he or she doesn't like doing. And then you have more visibility from the exact teams. That could be, for me, it was always My manager, Hubble, didn't really enjoy sitting in spreadsheets and doing commission plans or whatever it might look like. That was my bag, right? Okay, I'll happily do that. I'm on target, over target. I've got some time left in my day. I've time blocked properly. What can I take on? The key thing throughout a salesperson's career is don't just hit the number. You need to almost show that you can do the next job before you've got the next job. The second thing is around
00:14:49
Speaker
just mindset. My wife and my dog walks is is is one thing that that keeps me sane, but just a good network, friends, both inside and outside sales, who you can bounce off of because sales is so up and down that if you've got friends and sales, they'll always just give you a nice size five, just one of those courses that you got to get over it. So that's super important network. And then the third thing is be really calculated. And I think calculated sometimes has a a bit of a negative connotation to it. But um like I said, inboxes are full. There's a huge amount of talent out there who's who are selling against you. You need to be really thought out. You don't necessarily need to be gung-ho. Take your time in your approach to everything you do, but always be a doer, not just a thinker. Great insights. Thank you so much for sharing, Tae. It's been great to have you today on the podcast. I'm sure our listeners andness will take loads away. Really appreciate it.