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AJ Tennant

👤 Person
459 total appearances

Appearances Over Time

Podcast Appearances

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

What I'm looking for in that question is actually like higher level thinking of like, how can you think not only quickly, but strategically and then map it to what is actually going to be your job? Like you are going to get 100 accounts and you are going to need to figure out which ones you spend on.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

What I'm looking for in that question is actually like higher level thinking of like, how can you think not only quickly, but strategically and then map it to what is actually going to be your job? Like you are going to get 100 accounts and you are going to need to figure out which ones you spend on.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

And it's shocking to me how many AEs I asked this question to and they just get stumped at five. I'm like, are you kidding me? I could literally write 50.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

And it's shocking to me how many AEs I asked this question to and they just get stumped at five. I'm like, are you kidding me? I could literally write 50.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

And it's shocking to me how many AEs I asked this question to and they just get stumped at five. I'm like, are you kidding me? I could literally write 50.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

It's tough. Sales is fucking hard. I disagree with that. I thought you said something else. I thought you said if you're really sharp and insightful, you're going to be an AE. No. I think that this is very top of mind for me because I was very lucky and shouldn't have gotten into Harvard. I had a chip on my shoulder, worked all four years throughout college.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

It's tough. Sales is fucking hard. I disagree with that. I thought you said something else. I thought you said if you're really sharp and insightful, you're going to be an AE. No. I think that this is very top of mind for me because I was very lucky and shouldn't have gotten into Harvard. I had a chip on my shoulder, worked all four years throughout college.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

It's tough. Sales is fucking hard. I disagree with that. I thought you said something else. I thought you said if you're really sharp and insightful, you're going to be an AE. No. I think that this is very top of mind for me because I was very lucky and shouldn't have gotten into Harvard. I had a chip on my shoulder, worked all four years throughout college.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

My parents went bankrupt, so I graduated with $100,000 in debt. They got caught up in the 2008 crisis. All my friends went into investment banking, consulting.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

My parents went bankrupt, so I graduated with $100,000 in debt. They got caught up in the 2008 crisis. All my friends went into investment banking, consulting.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

My parents went bankrupt, so I graduated with $100,000 in debt. They got caught up in the 2008 crisis. All my friends went into investment banking, consulting.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

I think that technology sales has the potential to like capture some of the smartest minds because when you really peel back the layers of what technology and AI sales is, it is taking what's happening in investment banking, consulting, actually putting it to work on driving transformations within companies.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

I think that technology sales has the potential to like capture some of the smartest minds because when you really peel back the layers of what technology and AI sales is, it is taking what's happening in investment banking, consulting, actually putting it to work on driving transformations within companies.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

I think that technology sales has the potential to like capture some of the smartest minds because when you really peel back the layers of what technology and AI sales is, it is taking what's happening in investment banking, consulting, actually putting it to work on driving transformations within companies.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

Why I love sales is because, and why I love enterprise SaaS sales, like I went from ad sales at Facebook to B2B at Slack, and I'm never going back. Like the level of learning and depth you get to do, like figuring out how to make T-Mobile successful. I've been working with T-Mobile for almost eight years because I worked with them at Slack. I helped them learn about Glean.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

Why I love sales is because, and why I love enterprise SaaS sales, like I went from ad sales at Facebook to B2B at Slack, and I'm never going back. Like the level of learning and depth you get to do, like figuring out how to make T-Mobile successful. I've been working with T-Mobile for almost eight years because I worked with them at Slack. I helped them learn about Glean.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

Why I love sales is because, and why I love enterprise SaaS sales, like I went from ad sales at Facebook to B2B at Slack, and I'm never going back. Like the level of learning and depth you get to do, like figuring out how to make T-Mobile successful. I've been working with T-Mobile for almost eight years because I worked with them at Slack. I helped them learn about Glean.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

You can drive true business transformation if you choose the right product technology and you believe in it and you have- Do you think the smartest people coming out of Harvard today want to go into sales? They will after they talk to me. Yes. So I wouldn't say sales.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

You can drive true business transformation if you choose the right product technology and you believe in it and you have- Do you think the smartest people coming out of Harvard today want to go into sales? They will after they talk to me. Yes. So I wouldn't say sales.

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
20Sales: Biggest Lessons Scaling Slack from $6M to $1BN in ARR | How to Build a Customer Success Machine and Where Most Go Wrong | The Framework to Hire All Sales Reps: Take-Home Assignments, Hiring Panels and more with AJ Tennant @ Glean

You can drive true business transformation if you choose the right product technology and you believe in it and you have- Do you think the smartest people coming out of Harvard today want to go into sales? They will after they talk to me. Yes. So I wouldn't say sales.