      SaaStr · 2020-09-17
      · 2085d
    

Evaluating VP of Sales Candidates: Distinguishing Skill from Luck at High-Growth Companies

Jason Lemkin examines how to assess whether VP of Sales candidates from successful SaaS companies like Slack and Zoom are genuinely talented or simply benefited from fortunate circumstances. He provides a set of interview questions to distinguish real sales leadership capability from riding the wave of a successful company's growth.

3 metrics· Cited 0× in the knowledge base ·Open source ↗

Metrics in this report

Company ARR Threshold

100,000,000$

minimum

At which point hiring candidates without quota experience becomes more acceptable

Salesforce ARR Scale Reference

20,000,000,000$

historical

Example of scale where many sales leaders contributed to success

Team Quota Responsibility Example

6,400,000$

example calculation

8 sales reps at $800,000 per rep quota