Meet the Salesloft Staff: Wayne Henderson
Wayne’s Bio: Wayne joined Salesloft as the second account executive following a career at AirWatch. With an affable personality and gift of building client relationships, Wayne has contributed to the recent growth and profitability of the company. Known for his infamous beard, this Salesloft veteran keeps the Atlanta Tech Village lively with his wit and humor.
You have been at Salesloft since November 2013. What do you love most about working here?
I love the sense of freedom that we have here and the camaraderie. It’s a hard work environment, results driven but at the same time very relaxed and family oriented.
It’s a paradox. There is a strong sense of “team” inside the mindshare of Salesloft. We are a family. They say you get to choose your friends, not your family. Our sense of belonging and connection with one another is what we call “Culture”. I would almost say at Salesloft you don’t choose the culture, the culture chooses you.
You were one of the first account executives at Salesloft in the Million Dollar Club (meaning you hit $1mm in net recurring revenue). What’s your secret?
It comes down to consistency. My old football coach used to say, it’s the fundamentals. You have to run, block and tackle. Everyday. Day in and day out. Don’t get “too high” or “too low.”
From a sales point of view, find your strength and get better at it; make it stronger. If it’s running a demo – run the most informative, entertaining demo you can. If it’s follow up – follow up with all your heart in full sincerity. But by all means, if you don’t close deals then “what is it that you say you do here anyway?” – Office Space
Can you share a few best practices for Cadence and Prospector?
A personal best practice for me is using Cadence as a task manager for follow up on demos and important meetings or events. I’ve found that I, like most salespeople, will earnestly plan to follow up with someone meaningfully after an interaction and end up getting pulled into another priority project or just answering emails reactively all day. Cadence is what helps me swing the pendulum from reactive action to proactive action – even if that’s following up on demos. Time is of the essence.
Cadence helps me effectively manage a full pipeline while keeping it active with communication and setting next steps. It’s my own personal assistant to making the most use of my time while still selling with sincerity. I can’t imagine selling at any sort of volume without a tool like Cadence, where I’m still fully in control. A question I will leave on the table for anyone reading this and still not seeing the value is “Are you actively trying to sell as much as you can to as many people as you can? Isn’t time your most valuable resource?”
What’s one surprising stat or emerging trend anyone looking to make an impact in your field should know?
Between Forbes article in Jan 2015 “The Biggest Trend in Sales Today: This Thing Called Sales Development” and Gartner’s prediction that by 2017 the CMO will spend more on IT than the CIO, I would say we are in a multi-billion dollar space with a product platform that is constantly out innovating, out creating and pushing forward the space of sales development.
We host the application of record for Sales Development on the first complete end-to-end Prospecting Platform and the future is bright.
Here is the bottom-line: If nothing gets sold in a business then nothing happens. If no one prospects then nothing gets sold. It’s science. You can’t argue science.
What advice do you give to the new sales development reps or account executives at Salesloft?
Ask questions, listen to answers, ask more questions, listen even more. Never lose that sense of passion for where you want to be. Begin with the end in mind and work with all your might to make it a reality. Everyone has to start somewhere and if you made it into the culture and customer acquisition MACHINE that is the Salesloft sales team then someone must believe in you just as much as you believe in yourself. Follow the process and path that is laid out before you and execute.
At Salesloft, we play to win. Vince Lombardi said it best. “Winning is not a sometime thing; it’s an all the time thing. You don’t win once in a while; you don’t do things right once in a while; you do them right all of the time. Winning is a habit.”
Find your repeatable process and approach to the day in the form of time management and execute.
If you weren’t working in sales what would you want to be doing?
I would say hiking the full length of the Appalachian Trail, from end to end, Georgia to Maine, would be an excellent six month adventure if I weren’t at Salesloft.
T. S. Eliot said it best, “We shall not cease from exploration, and in the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
Who is a client that you have enjoyed working with?
That’s tough. I’ve had a fair share of instant connections with our clients. In all ridiculousness, that’s like choosing a favorite among your children or your pet animals. (I would choose, Hudson, my two year old yellow Labrador.)
What are you reading right now?
- “Reason for God” by Dr. Tim Keller
- “Every Good Endeavor” by Dr. Tim Keller
- “Next Generation Leader” by Andy Stanley
- “Compound Effect” by Darren Hardy
- “AWOL on the Appalachian Trail” by David Miller
How do you define “success”?
I would define success as outward actions aligning with internal beliefs. This definition is transferable to all areas of life. Pertaining to sales, do you believe you’re the best? Do your day to day activities and efforts reflect that? How do you plan to get to where you want to be?
And if all else fails, I will defer to the late great John Wooden on his definition of success:
Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.
What websites or apps are you particularly fond of right now?
That’s easy! These 6 websites alone increase my quality of life every day.
Favorite apps?
Outside of Salesloft, I would have to say aText, Rapportive and Ghostery. Solid Apps.
You post some very insightful quotes on Twitter… what is one of your favorite quotes (serious or humorous) to live by?
“In light of my past experience, current circumstances, future hopes and dreams, what’s the wise thing for me to do?” – Andy Stanley