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Interview Jul 9, 2025 48 min

What Every CRO Needs To Do in the First 6 Months of a New Role

What Every CRO Needs To Do in the First 6 Months of a New Role
Episode summary

Warren Zenna on this episode

Warren Zenna, founder and CEO of The CRO Collective, brings deep expertise in scaling revenue organizations and executive onboarding. In this episode, he outlines a strategic framework for Chief Revenue Officers entering new roles, emphasizing the importance of defining the modern CRO mandate before day one.

The core thesis: successful CRO onboarding requires pre-hire alignment on scope, organizational restructuring, and conflict resolution, not just post-hire scrambling. Zenna stresses that the first six months should focus on understanding organizational dynamics, uncovering misalignments between revenue functions (sales, marketing, customer success), and building a detailed roadmap for systemic change. Most critically, a new CRO must distinguish between the traditional sales-focused CRO role and the full revenue operations CRO, which oversees the entire go-to-market engine.

Zenna explains that many CRO tenures fail within 16-18 months because of miscommunication and unresolved conflicts established during the interview process. He walks through real examples of how to identify "lumps under the bed"—unaddressed tensions between sales and marketing, reporting structure concerns, and competency gaps—before they become irreversible obstacles. The episode covers due diligence frameworks, stakeholder alignment conversations, town hall messaging, customer research, and how to handle internal resistance without sacrificing vision. Zenna emphasizes that people, communication, and conflict management are the non-negotiable foundations; systems and tactics follow only after those are solid.

Topics discussed

What we cover in this episode

  1. 0:33
    Defining the modern CRO role Distinguishing between traditional sales-only CROs and revenue-focused CROs who oversee sales, marketing, customer success, and often product alignment.
  2. 5:28
    Uncovering organizational dynamics How to identify hidden conflicts, reporting structure tensions, and misalignments between departments during pre-onboarding due diligence.
  3. 13:48
    Addressing the CMO conflict Strategies for navigating the common scenario where an existing CMO must now report to the incoming CRO, and getting alignment before day one.
  4. 23:57
    Formulating the onboarding plan A structured approach to the first six months: discovery work (months 1-3), customer and data analysis, then roadmap and implementation planning (months 3-6).
  5. 29:10
    The welcome meeting and tone-setting How to run a transparent, open town hall in the first week to communicate vision, address fears, and set expectations for upcoming changes.
  6. 38:19
    Engaging customers and analyzing data Meeting key customers, recent wins, lost customers, and prospects to understand market perception and operational maturity.
  7. 40:50
    Conflict as a tool for change Reframing organizational conflict as expected friction from change, and developing skills to lead people through discomfort productively.
  8. 42:51
    Communication as problem-solving Using transparent dialogue, fact-finding, and interpretation to resolve conflicts and build shared understanding across revenue teams.
Quotable moments

The lines worth sharing

This is the stuff that screws up the job for people. These are the things that don't work.

Warren Zenna · 0:00

If you're going to be running all these organizations, what's the current state? And what impact do you want me to have on that state?

Warren Zenna · 5:28

Get rid of lumps. What are the things that we put the bed sheet over that we didn't really address?

Warren Zenna · 13:48

At the root of every single conflict is really at its core a communication problem.

Warren Zenna · 42:51
Frequently asked

Common questions from this episode

What is the difference between a traditional CRO and a modern CRO?

A traditional CRO runs only the sales function, while a modern CRO (CRO 2.0) oversees the entire revenue operation including sales, marketing, customer success, and often has strategic input on product. The modern CRO doesn't carry a bag or have a personal book of business.

At what company size should you hire a CRO?

Typically at 30 million or above in annualized revenue, when operational complexity requires coordination across multiple revenue functions. Below 15 million, focus is rightly on sales-driven growth, not full revenue orchestration.

What should a new CRO do in their first week?

Conduct pre-onboarding due diligence on key stakeholders, address unresolved conflicts (especially CMO reporting lines), run a transparent town hall to set vision and expectations, and begin structured interviews with every leader in the go-to-market organization.

How do you handle an existing CMO when taking on a CRO role?

Discuss reporting structure changes before accepting the role, involve the CMO in your interview process, assess their alignment with the new vision, and commit to clarity within the first week. If unaligned, have a plan for conversation or transition.

Why do CROs fail in the first 18 months?

Most CRO tenures fail due to misaligned expectations between CEO and CRO on scope, unresolved organizational conflicts, and lack of clear agreements on decision rights and reporting structure before day one.

What is the framework for the first six months as a new CRO?

Months 1-3: deep discovery on people, customers, data, and operational gaps. Months 3-6: build and present a detailed roadmap addressing those gaps, then begin execution on systemic changes.

SEO meta description

Warren Zenna reveals how new CROs should spend their first 6 months: pre-hire alignment, stakeholder conflict resolution, and building a revenue system instead of just running sales.

Target keywords
CRO onboarding chief revenue officer first 6 months Warren Zenna CRO collective sales and marketing alignment revenue operations strategy CRO role definition organizational restructuring go-to-market strategy CRO leadership framework revenue team structure CMO reporting structure
Full transcript

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Read the full transcript · 58 KB · Warren Zenna
WARREN ZENNAThis is the stuff that screws up the job for people. These are the things that don't work. And these things are overlooked because someone's saying, look, you know, we'll figure it out. Don't worry, we'll get there. And that's probably true. I mean, you're never going to get it exactly right. But I disagree with this idea that you'll just sort of work it out.
SPEAKER_02Welcome to Go-To-Market Science. There's an art and there's a science to go to market. And in this podcast, we talk about the science by interviewing CROs, private equity investors, and other sales and marketing experts, as well as talking about what we learn every day in the trenches helping to build go-to-market engines.
RACHAEL BUECKERTMy name is Rachel Buchert. I'm the marketing manager here at Union Square Consulting. And today I'm interviewing Warren Zena, the founder of the CRO Collective. And we're going to be talking about how CROs in their new role should be spending the first six months. Hey, Warren, how's it going?
SPEAKER_07Good, Rachel. Good to see you. And thanks for having me back.
RACHAEL BUECKERTYes, great to have you back on. I'm excited to have this conversation. We've been waiting a little while to have this interview. So looking forward to it.
WARREN ZENNAYeah, this is an interesting topic that you've chosen for a number of reasons.
SPEAKER_08Why do you say that?
WARREN ZENNASo much of the first onboarding part of the CRO role, at least in the context from which I'm speaking about it, right?
WARREN ZENNASo let's make sure that we're talking about the same thing, first of all. So I know that maybe some people are familiar with what I'm up to, but the definition of the CRO is a big part of this conversation.
WARREN ZENNABecause if you're coming in as a CRO, let's call it like the traditional chief revenue officer where you're running sales. It's ostensibly your onboarding process should be no different than the head of sales, which there's probably a lot of information about there, how to do that successfully, because a lot of sales leaders are being onboarded. Probably find, I don't know if you Googled onboard a head of sales on Google, you'd probably find a million hits and from really good stuff on it, but that's not what I'm talking about. So I'm talking about the CRO, let's call it like the CRO 2.0, right? Which is the revenue leader who oversees the entire revenue function, doesn't just run sales.
WARREN ZENNAIn fact, I would say for this conversation, let's assume a couple of things. So we are clear about what we're saying. Doesn't run sales exclusively and also doesn't carry a bag or have any book of business.
WARREN ZENNAThis is someone who's really overseeing the entire go-to-market, as they call it now, or the entire revenue operation, right? Which is the sales organization, the marketing organization, the customer success organization. In fact, maybe even many CROs in the context I'm talking about are also frequently reporting into or have a relationship with product, right? They have an insights funnel with the product and do spend time on partnerships and development of extended up relationships to expand the scope of the business's infrastructure, right?
WARREN ZENNASo let's make sure we're clear about that. So that when people hear my answers, they think, oh, it doesn't make any sense. I was a CRO and I didn't do any of that.
RACHAEL BUECKERTIt's a big thing. Like a lot of companies and a lot of CROs almost see themselves as glorified salespeople. And it's super important, especially for the work that we do, moving CROs in that direction of having this new definition of what a CRO is. I don't even know if I'd say it's a new definition, but rather like the proper definition.
WARREN ZENNAIt's the proper definition. Thank you. You're correct. It is. It's more of a recalibration, right? And if I would say somewhere probably 10 years ago, the CRO roles sort of drifted off course for numerous reasons, which we can have a whole other podcast about that. It's actually would be an interesting conversation as to why that happened.
WARREN ZENNAWithout getting into that whole history, what's happening is now the marketplace has drawn it back, right? For numerous reasons. So now what's happening now is this CRO sort of role is sort of being sort of re-embraced, right? For its usefulness. And it's even more pertinently useful now because of a lot of things that have happened in the conditions of the marketplace and the way businesses are today, which goes into the question you asked, right? It's a lot of factors there. So let's also make a couple other important assumptions about this too. So the framework for this conversation is what does a CRO do in the first six months in the job? But one, that during the job that I just described, that's key.
WARREN ZENNAAnd number two is that they're hired in an organization. I think the, let's frame it this way. So we're going to assume that, and I'm sorry, I'm doing this, but it's important that we do it.
SPEAKER_16Oh, absolutely.
WARREN ZENNAThe CRO we're talking about that's listening to this is sort of in a certain situation where
WARREN ZENNAthey're going, okay, either A, yep, Warren, you're right. I get that. I'm on board and yep.
WARREN ZENNAThe other ones are like, oh shit, I didn't think that. Really? That's the case? Okay. I was thinking about it this way and I'm looking for a job that way. Okay. So for this purpose of this discussion, let's switch your paradigm a bit and we're talking
WARREN ZENNAabout the role that way. Number two is it's not just about you.
WARREN ZENNAObviously, if you're onboarding yourself, what you should do in the first six months on the job, given what I'm saying, it's a lot of things are dependent upon your company.
SPEAKER_18And an onboarding process is a collaborative thing.
WARREN ZENNAIt's not like you're alone onboarding yourself. It's the whole company has to onboard you. If I'm a CRO in this context, let's say CRO 2.0 for the purpose of this conversation, then I have to assume then that there's an agreement that the organization embraces that and that I've been hired that way, which means there are implications that have to be addressed for me to be successful there. So I think the first thing is when a CRO takes the job, there's some assumptions I'm making which that they've done their due diligence and that there's the right opportunity for them, meaning the company's at the right stage for a CRO.
SPEAKER_20Because if it's too early, meaning like if you're under 15 million in revenues, you're probably
WARREN ZENNAnot going to be able to do it. I just said, you're probably going to be running sales. And the main reason is because companies at earlier stages are understandably focused primarily on building up their client base to develop their go-to-market and stuff like that. And that's where it should be. And a CRO should be hired only after a certain level of operational complexity has been realized where a CRO, in the manner that I'm speaking, is necessary to kind of build and coordinate
WARREN ZENNAmore of a system because complexity is present and a system is needed to mature the business.
WARREN ZENNASo that's the one thing. I would say the first thing is maybe before you start onboarding is, you know, make sure you got the job at the right place at the right time. So let's assume they did. And it's a 30 million or above in annualized year revenues. The organization is an agreement with this premise that they hired you to be the leader of all revenue and now you have to onboard yourself, right? So what do you do for the first six months under those circumstances? So if you did your job correctly in taking this job, there should already be some things you've agreed upon before you start your onboarding, which is an agreed upon set of parameters and agreements and understandings of the scope of your role and the implications of that role. And you should know what those are. I would actually have a document that says, okay, so if I'm going to be running all these organizations, what's the current state that I'm being hired into? And what impact do you want me in the CRO world to have on that state? And what are the implications of the impact on that state? So for example, let's say you're bringing me on at the CRO and you already have a CMO because you, like most companies, maybe I don't want to say, I'll say mistakenly promoted a CMO before they thought this stuff through. And now they have a chief marketing officer who is very ensconced in their job, worked really
WARREN ZENNAhard and diligently to get that title.
WARREN ZENNAIs very happy about that Ascension, has a C-suite position, has a seated table, has established some stake in that role for the company and for themselves. And there's going to be a potential issue there related to the CRO now overseeing this
WARREN ZENNAperson. Very common thing. Very, very, very common what I just said.
WARREN ZENNASo within that first like week or two, you should already have an understanding of what you're going to do about that. And the CMO should know about it, right? So if I'm going to bring on a new CRO in this way, I should have the CMO be aware that this is going to happen and what the implications are. And that CMO should probably be involved in the interview process and should be already onboarded and aligned with whatever changes are going to take place. So for example, let's say that the plan is that, yes, Steve, as the new CRO, you are going to oversee marketing. And yes, we do have a CMO and Rachel's the CMO and she's going to have a reaction to that. So we're going to talk to her about it and we're going to figure it out because we have a long-term plan. And that has to be worked out as much as it can be. Now, this is a problem. So part of the onboarding process can very well be, this can be a weird analogy, but you know, when you make the bed and you don't put down fully untuck, like fully tuck in the sheets and then you walk out the door and you can see there's like a little lump.
SPEAKER_25Right.
WARREN ZENNAIt's like you made the bed over the sheets and do I want to like undo the whole bed and fix the sheets or do I just want to leave it like that? And most people just leave it like that. And there's like a lump and that lump doesn't go away. It gets bigger. And that's what I'm talking about. So I would say like, if I would be analogizing, I say, get rid of lumps.
SPEAKER_26Okay.
WARREN ZENNARight. And what are the lumps? What are the things that we put the bed sheet over or the blanket over that we didn't really address?
WARREN ZENNABecause they're going to be hard for me. They're going to affect me. They're going to affect the way that I'm able to do my job. We never really fully addressed the issue of the CMO.
WARREN ZENNAWe talked about it. We had a conversation about it. But as incoming CRO, I don't feel it's resolved. I sort of feel like there's still some tension there. It was glossed over. The tension was sort of not addressed because normal human beings, they don't want to deal with conflict or they don't want to solve things because they don't want to be the bad guy or whatever it is. And these are the stuff I'm telling you, this is the stuff that screws up the job for people. These are the things that don't work. And these things are overlooked because someone's saying, look, you know, we'll figure it out. Don't worry. We'll get there. And that's probably true. I mean, you're never going to get it exactly right. But I disagree with this idea that you'll just sort of work it out because I think that while you're not going to solve it completely, you have to have the right agreements and context and understanding of a future state so that everyone understands. Let's say you and I are going hiking and we get lost and we realize that where we are is sort of a treacherous place and we have choices. We can go this way or that way. And we realize that we have to make a decision where to go. And both have their dangers. One is like rocky and steep and the other one is like water. And I say, Rachel, we're going to go to the rocky area. Better yet, we say we're going to go to the water area. And you don't tell me that you can't swim that well. So you didn't communicate that to me. So if I don't work that out with you, then either way we go, it's going to be unpredictable. It's going to be a bit dangerous, but at least we understand why we chose the water or the rocks and we know what's ahead of us and we know what's on the other side. So the treacherous part, yeah, you can't know, but you know where you're going, you know why you're going there and you know that it's going to be rocky. That's fine. But if I haven't agreed with you to go to the rocky area and you're dragging me along, that's not going to be very good. I need you to cooperate. We need to work together. So I think that this is sort of like what I think the onboarding process has to include is kind of a review of the players. Who is this role impacting? Have we worked this out? Is everybody on board? Is everybody really clear about where we're headed and where we're going and why?
WARREN ZENNAAnd that they understand the implications of it and the impact it's going to have on them and what their role needs to be in the process to make it successful.
WARREN ZENNAAnd if it's not clear, then you got to work out whatever resistance they may have. Like for example, in this case, the CMO may say, I get it. I get the premise and I understand that everybody needs to be aligned and I'm not in disagreement
WARREN ZENNAthat we are misaligned. I'm not comfortable with the idea of like having to report into the CRO when I was already reporting to the CEO. I think that feels like a devotion and it feels like my concern is that I'm not going to have a strong voice in the marketing space now because I'm not going to have the ear of leadership
WARREN ZENNAand it's going to buffer my ability to do my job. It's a fair point. Okay, fine. So then that's got to be addressed. It's got to be talked about. And if it's not, it could be a disaster again. Yeah, so realistically speaking, how much of this should be discussed and worked out before
RACHAEL BUECKERTyou get hired at the job versus in your first week?
WARREN ZENNAI think it should be all worked out before. I think that there should be an agreement that either A, it's worked out, which may be hard, but without question, there has to be an agreement that it will be worked out in this period of time. Not just it'll be worked out, right? That's not enough. Ah, it'll be worked out. Okay, fine. That can happen in 10 years. It's like within the first week, right? We're going to have this process that's going to work this out.
RACHAEL BUECKERTOkay. So like while you're in the interview process, knowing, okay, how's the organization going to be structured? Who's reporting to me? Who am I reporting to? Are they on the same page?
SPEAKER_33Yeah, I want to meet them. I want to interview them. I want to talk with them.
WARREN ZENNAI had this happen to me. I got a job. I was brought in to run this division of a big organization.
WARREN ZENNAIt was a corporate job and basically brought me in to run this big group that had already been in existence and it had a lot of fits and starts. There was a person there who had been there for like four or five years before me who was basically running it because my precedent was this person's boss and left. And so I knew when I came in, the first thing was that this person would probably be wondering why they didn't get the job. And I knew that, right? It's just human logic that this person would probably wanted the job and didn't get it. So the first thing I did was when I was interviewing, I said, I want to speak to that guy. I want to have an interview with him. So I'm like, fine. So I sat down with him and the first thing I said to him was like, why don't you have this job?
WARREN ZENNAIt's a loaded question. Why don't you have this job? So I said, why am I here? I was uncomfortable, but I was intentional. I really wanted to know. I needed to find out because this person was either going to be the key to my success because this person had been around for such a long time or this person would be my biggest problem because he's been around for such a long time, right? And I needed to find that out, even though in this case, he gave me all the right answers. I knew it was going to be a problem.
RACHAEL BUECKERTOh yeah. How did you know? What were some like red flags that you saw?
WARREN ZENNABecause I could just tell it was a lot of behavior. I just look, I don't know. I just was, I'm sort of good at this sort of thing, but I had a good process for asking him questions. I knew what I was looking for. I knew the kind of answers that were going to be the answers that were going to indicate an attitude that would have been one that satisfied me. And I knew the answers that wouldn't, and I got them. I don't want to go so far as to say the person was being dishonest. That's not fair. I think the person was confused and angry and upset and had issues that whatever. My point of making is that I had to now plan how to deal with it because it was definitely going to be a problem. And I ended up working it out, but it took time, but at least I knew it. So I wasn't going in blind and having false expectations like, oh, you're going to have this great deputy and he's great. He's been around you. That's not true. So that's right. You should do all this stuff. If you're a CRO in the context where you and I are talking about right now, and you're
WARREN ZENNAgoing to be overseeing all these things, you need to be talking to all the people who are going to report to you and that have been there before you and that are going to be
SPEAKER_12displaced because of this role and are going to have, right? This is the implications for everybody are ready to show up.
RACHAEL BUECKERTI was going to say, I know a lot of people listening to this right now might be like, well, a lot of organizations, the CMO or whoever doesn't report to the CRO and they're all equals on the same board.
SPEAKER_40But they never do.
RACHAEL BUECKERTYeah, they almost never do, right?
SPEAKER_40They never do.
RACHAEL BUECKERTSo in a case like that, where it's like, yeah, the CRO is working with marketing and your job is to align marketing, but let's say you're not necessarily over the CMO. Let's say you're still kind of on the same playing field and CMO is still reporting to the CEO. In other words, let's say that the leadership decides that we're not going to have that structure
SPEAKER_42and you're going to be equals.
SPEAKER_43Yeah.
WARREN ZENNAMy more harsh response would be it's a red flag. I'd want to know why. I'd ask why. I'd say, so I understand, but persuade me why that's the right decision.
WARREN ZENNAWhy do you want to do that?
SPEAKER_18And I'd listen, right?
WARREN ZENNAAnd if they said, well, this person has been really great and he or she is really terrific and amazing and it's been really good and our marketing is really excellent and the reporting structure has been really great and I think it'd be really disruptive. I don't think it's necessary sort of thing.
SPEAKER_44Okay.
WARREN ZENNAI'd say then I'd want to speak to the head of sales and I'd want to have a private meeting
WARREN ZENNAwith the head of sales and say, so tell me how marketing is doing for you.
SPEAKER_46Yeah.
WARREN ZENNAAnd I'd say, tell me what your experience is with the way marketing is. This is, this is what I'd be looking for, to be honest with you. I'd be looking for a couple of things. There's the soft stuff, which is just, what's the relationship you have with the marketing organization? Like, is it friendly? Is it congenial? Is it like supportive? Do you think they're amazing? They have your back and like, right? At those things, or is it contentious? We don't get each other. They're idiots and they don't know what they're talking about. And the other thing I'd ask is data. I'd say, so I asked this question. Founders should know the answer to this too, which they won't. But I'd say, what is the measurable contribution that marketing has on a sale, a deal? What percentage or what's the actual numerical measurement that you can attribute to marketing's
WARREN ZENNAcontribution to a deal? And how do you measure that? What's the way that you figure that out? They never know the answer to that question, right? I have very few companies that go, yeah, well, we have this system. And, you know, it's like, wow, it's impressive. That'd be great. I'd take that job in two seconds. They knew the answer to that question, but they don't. And mainly it's because it's very hard to do.
WARREN ZENNAAnd most people don't do it. And they have things called MQLs and all this stuff. And those are fine, but many times they're built in a silo. I know we kind of want to draw the reservation here, but it's an important thing.
WARREN ZENNASo these sort of things I'm doing about when I'm starting my job is I'm asking these questions. I'm trying to find out what I'm getting myself into and what I need to prepare myself for, right? Because we can get into all this stuff like, oh, you need to do diligence and meet everybody
WARREN ZENNAand meet customers. And those things will come. Believe me, they're important. But if this is the stuff, this is the harder stuff to do first, right? So I'd talk to sales and I would say, all right, so I don't want to get into a whole thing, but the nature of the conversation would be something like, walk me through how marketing
WARREN ZENNAsupports you. What's the way in which you can attribute marketing's contribution to what you guys do?
SPEAKER_48Because you're not necessarily looking for like a specific number of attribution because it's so hard. Like nobody knows.
WARREN ZENNAThey could give it to me. That'd be amazing. But they could say, yeah, we know we get a deal. We can attribute 10% of it, right? Okay. Show me the numbers. I'd love to see that.
WARREN ZENNAThat'd be amazing because I don't care if they're right, Rachel. I just want to see like how they're thinking about it.
SPEAKER_50Yeah. The thought process.
WARREN ZENNAThat's it. I want to see like what was the machinery that you used to figure that out? That would show that they thought about it and that they tried to figure it out.
WARREN ZENNAThat to me is great. That's like, okay, good. I like this. It doesn't matter if they're right. They're looking in the right rabbit hole. What's the connective tissue? Exactly. Right. I just want to know. Typically, you'll hear things like either like I said, A, it could be, and I've heard
WARREN ZENNAthis before. I've heard salespeople go, they're great. We love our marketing team. Tina's amazing. She's a genius and she can run this thing great and we get great leads and she does an amazing job and you've seen our marketing and we love it and our salespeople love it. That's great. We have one opinion about this decision, but if they told me, well, you know, she said that, she said, oh, that's not true.
WARREN ZENNAThen I'd be like, all right, this is just something I'm going to inherit this problem. You understand? This dialogue is now my problem, right? Like I'd make that connection.
RACHAEL BUECKERTIt sounds like a lot of the beginning stages of CRO going into their new role, a lot of it is just politics. It's politics.
WARREN ZENNABut when I say politics, yes, I'd say politics is a component of what I'm talking about. It's not everything. What I'm talking about is more organizational dynamics, culture. Operational cop cult system dynamics.
WARREN ZENNAPolitics are a role because you're hearing a lot of things like opinions and anger and fear. Politics are people whom are protecting turf, right? And stepping on people's toes and all that crap we see on television shows. And it's in companies.
WARREN ZENNABut that's expected because it's people. I'm talking about that as one thing, which you're going to get anyway. I'm talking about like what's underneath it. Maybe there's reasons. Maybe it's because the organization is set up where sales has this opinion about marketing,
WARREN ZENNAbut it's not marketing's fault. They probably are really competent, but that's the way that they're being incentivized.
WARREN ZENNAThat's what they're being told to do.
SPEAKER_11If everyone's not aligned toward goals that are based around revenue, then everyone has
RACHAEL BUECKERTtheir own agenda to fill. If marketing is, they're judged on MQLs. And of course, their whole job is going to be getting as many MQLs as possible, either they're closable deals or not.
WARREN ZENNACome hell or high water. That's what they're going to deliver because that's every day. That's the number they got, right? And you see this shit all the time. So what I'm saying is like, I'm looking for these things because I'm using these as a
WARREN ZENNAdue diligence measure for myself to understand, like the sort of do a deep dive on the guts of the organization. And it's part of my onboarding process because now I'm formulating my plan, right? This is going to help me go, okay, all right. You told me your reason why you'd rather keep the CMO in this position.
WARREN ZENNAAnd I spoke to the head of sales and here's what I uncovered. And I'm going to say that I think that your assertion is not the best decision. I think that we should change it because right now marketing and sales have a much different perception of reality than each other.
WARREN ZENNAAnd so there's something to be said for that, that this reporting structure, it might make you feel emotionally comfortable, but it's not good for the business.
RACHAEL BUECKERTAnd having the CMO reporting under one aligned CRO means that everyone's going towards the same goal. And now your CMO, their biggest worry doesn't have to be MQLs. Their biggest worry can be, you know, how are we collaborating with sales to make sure the
SPEAKER_11leads we're giving them are actually closing? And then the whole business benefits from that, right?
WARREN ZENNAYep. And other things, right? I mean, I think marketing's job is to do two things. One is to create brand consideration through the communication of value in the marketplace and differentiation and a better option for alternatives. And then the other one is to educate and inform people whom are prospective buyers so that
SPEAKER_61they become easier to talk to.
RACHAEL BUECKERTAbsolutely. As a marketer myself, I think brand is so important and obviously educational content is so important. That's the bulk of what we do at USC for our marketing. But for me, you know, that all ties back to revenue as well, because if people have heard of our content and they've heard of our brand, you know, on LinkedIn or our podcast or wherever, that makes it so much easier for our salespeople to A, get meetings with them and B, close them once they're on the call, because there's already a level of trust and authority built there.
WARREN ZENNA100%. Exactly. And these are the sort of things that within that first week or two of my onboarding process, I'd probably be figuring it out if I haven't already, right?
WARREN ZENNAI should already come in knowing this stuff, frankly. I'd say this is pre-onboarding, honestly.
WARREN ZENNAYou've done all this work and just giving some examples, you probably do the same thing with like your customer success organization or your ops organization, all these things. So you'd be digging in the weeds here to find out, again, to go back to that original analogy, like what lumps are still on the bed that haven't been addressed so we can maybe rip the sheets off and remake the bed again, because we might have to. And then now I'm going to formulate my onboarding plan, right?
WARREN ZENNANow I've got clarity. I'm like, okay, so I've got the situation where sales and marketing are X, and I've got this thing where I've convinced the CEO to take my counsel as this incoming CRO to have the CMO report into me, which means now it's my job to make that work because no one's happy about it, right? Like I've, I've got them to bet on me. They're going to invest a lot of money in me and they want to give me the authority to
WARREN ZENNAsucceed. So they're going to concede and say, okay, Warren, fine, do it. I don't agree with it, but I'm going to trust you on this. So now my job is to make that work to prove that I was correct in my assertion, which means now I have to do the work to do that. Right. And I have to also make sure that I've done a good job of making my boss aware of the things that need to happen for that to work.
WARREN ZENNAAnd that one of the things that may need to happen is that some people may need to be replaced.
SPEAKER_55Yeah. That's the hard conversation.
WARREN ZENNABecause if we're all agreeing with this vision and we all think it makes sense and we want that to happen to be a $250 million company that we all aspire to be, then we need to have
WARREN ZENNAan organization that works like this, which means we have people who are aligned with working like this and are willing to do what's necessary to work like this. Right. And if we have someone in a critical role like this, who's not on board with this, we either A, need to get them on board or we need to get rid of them. I know it's harsh, but that's the way it is.
SPEAKER_67Absolutely.
WARREN ZENNARight. And so I need to set these things up and I need to let my boss know like, okay, what that means is that means I need to have a series of conversations with the CMO. And over time, I'd be saying this if I was like trying to sell myself onto the job, I'd
WARREN ZENNAsay, look, I'm, I know what I'm talking about. I know how to do this. It's bumpy. But if you're CMO from having met him or her, I feel that there's definitely an opportunity for this person to come on board and to be able to get this and figure it out. But it'll be, I'll do the things I need to do to make sure that they see the value in this. And I have a whole thing I can talk to you about that too. There's a way to do it, but I don't want to get into it right now.
WARREN ZENNAI'd be working on that, right? So I think if I would characterize or categorize this section of my onboarding, it's the people.
SPEAKER_68Because at the end of the day, that's the most important thing is the people.
WARREN ZENNAIf you don't have everybody cooperating with you, then you don't really, it doesn't matter what you're good at. AI and CRM systems are not going to run your business.
WARREN ZENNAIt's going to be people. And so I need to know that I got all the people in place whom have the competencies and the right motivation and the right context and attitude that is going to get us to where we need to go. And I need to find out where those, what the gaps are. And so I can help close them. Is it, I need to persuade them. Is they need to be won over? Is it that they need to be educated? Do they need to be trained? Whatever it is, you do a cost benefit analysis of what that's going to cost versus just getting
WARREN ZENNAsomebody else. And you make your decision and you do it.
WARREN ZENNAThen one of the first things I would do is I would also have a meeting with all the people in the go-to-market team and I would run this meeting and I'd make it like a welcome. This is who I am. This is why I'm here. This is sort of like why I was brought on. This is what it is that we're trying to accomplish. This is why they chose me. This is what I'm capable of. This is what we could do together. This is what it's going to require. This is why it's exciting. This is what's great about it, right? This is how it's going to benefit all of you, but this is how it's going to be maybe rocky for some of you, but it's going to be ultimately you're all going to be better at what you do and all that good stuff and lay it out and spend as much time as possible. I don't care if it takes four hours, answer every single question that anybody has.
SPEAKER_11And this is within probably the first week, right?
WARREN ZENNAEasy. I would get everybody together and I'd say, we're on this call for as long as you need. I'll answer any question. Like I'm, there's no, I want to set the context of honesty, transparency, right? Vision, leadership, everything. So that they're like, okay, I kicked the tires on this guy and he's all to prove himself, but I like this conversation.
WARREN ZENNAI feel good about this and I'm, I'm ready to give him a, my cooperation. Because having a CRO come in is a huge part of a CRO and their new role is restructuring the organization.
RACHAEL BUECKERTBecause, you know, if, if you're being hired as a CRO, either it's the company's first CRO they've ever had or their past CRO didn't work out and now they need something fresh. It's because something, the organization isn't working and that can be scary for a lot of people.
WARREN ZENNAShouldn't be, this is the thing you're dealing with, dealing with all these people who are like, is this mean for me? Am I going to lose my job? You know, people, they go huddle. I mean, I'm thinking back to days when we were in the office, but, you know, they get, they go huddle in the corner and like, so what do you think of this guy? And, you know, I don't know, is he telling the truth? And I don't know, it sounds like we're going to lose our jobs. You know, it's how I understand. I'm not, you know, mocking it. I'm thinking, I understand that people have jobs for many reasons. And the main reason they have is because they're trying to feed their families and, you know, have a living and keep their security.
WARREN ZENNABelieve me, I get it. We've all been in that situation. And so I'd be mindful of that. On one hand, I'm, I'm empathetic and I'm aware that people are here because they have their own personal reasons for being here. And that I'm hopeful that the vision that I have will help it activate those, for them, those things that they want. But I'm also aware of the fact that I can't let everyone's personal things get in the way of what we're trying to accomplish as a business either, right? We have customers to serve, right? And it's balance.
WARREN ZENNAAnd the right people will respect that. They'll respect someone who sort of understands those two balances and that they're, that's the way it goes. And so I would call that like the sort of town hall context setting discussion with everybody. So you're sort of setting a tone for, and it should include things like not just what we're doing and answering questions, but also lay a framework of like, okay, so this is what the next month or two is going to look like, right? This is what things we're going to do. And here's some of the things we're going to do so that people will have things to ask questions about. What does that mean for me? Because I do that right now.
RACHAEL BUECKERTI have a question about that. So when you're laying this out, here are the things we're going to be tackling over the next couple months. If this is your first week or so in your position, how do you get to that point where you know which projects to be tackling within the next couple months?
WARREN ZENNAI mean, some of the things are somewhat, I don't want to say boilerplate, but some of them are self-evident. Like one thing is I'd say one of the first thing, again, this gets into the answer to the question more broadly is I need to learn about this place. So I'm going to be talking to everybody individually.
WARREN ZENNASo we're going to meet. I've already done my diligence on the product because I wouldn't have taken this job. I didn't do that already. You know, I've looked at your demos. I used the product. I played around with it. I know what you do. I know the space. I need to learn more, obviously. But if I come in as like an industry expert, like I sold your competitor's product for 10 years, then I probably know it better than most people in the room do, right? Which means there can be some immediate credibility. Oh my God, you work at Acme. Oh my God, they're our number one account.
WARREN ZENNAYou must know everything. Or it could be like, you know, I come from a different industry, but I'm really good at this. So I need to learn more. Whatever it is, just be honest about it. And one thing I'd have to do is that. And the other one is I want to meet customers, right? So I need to work with a customer organization. I want three groups of customers I want to meet with.
WARREN ZENNAAnd those are like our top customers, like the customers that we really count on because of the make some of the bulk of our business. And I already know who those are because I've obviously done due diligence. That's like, you know, five brands who I know are like our key customers. And then the other one is like people who we just recently brought on. I want to find out like why they chose to work with us. And then customers who we had but lost. I want to know like why they broke up with us. Like what happened? Like why didn't they renew or why did they leave? And then I want to talk to some people whom considered us but never hired us.
RACHAEL BUECKERTEven if your people don't have that information, then that's a whole other conversation to have on your reporting structure.
WARREN ZENNAYeah, exactly. They should be able to tell me, yeah, here's those buckets, right? We've got a company at like 20 or 30 million brands should have that.
WARREN ZENNAThey should know. I should be able to look at their pipeline and be able to see who falls into those categories. And I want to meet them and I want to talk to them. And I'd be doing that. There's like sort of like a road show. I don't care where they are. If maybe the company is located in Chicago, I'd fly out there and I'd meet them, you know, because I think it's important to talk to people. And then the other thing I'd be doing is I'd be looking over all the data.
WARREN ZENNALike I just said, like this is the whole thing I'd be doing. Like the first three months of the job is like almost just a total analytical to exactly what you guys do and what I do, right? Essentially, I'd be either hiring a Union Square Consulting or a CRO collective company. And I'd probably have that baked into the way I onboard it is I want a third party who's really good at this because I need someone to do this work because I'm not going to be able to do it alone.
WARREN ZENNAYou don't have the talent internally to do it. If you did, you'd be doing it already.
SPEAKER_11And someone who can look at things objectively.
WARREN ZENNAExactly. All the reasons you and I both know this has to happen. I definitely want to bring in somebody like that. I would say like I want to bring in USC or CRO collective or someone like this who specializes in this sort of thing because I want to learn as much as I can about the maturity of our operation. And I want to know what we don't know. I want to know like systemically like why things are happening. I want to understand our numbers. I want to understand our systems, our processes, and the tech that we're using. And I want to know like all about the way that we funnel people through our business and all the breakdowns and the leaks, all the things that you know. I'd do that and I'd be overseeing that and the intent would be that after agreed upon period of time, I'd have a report that is very clear that I'd present to the higher ups in the company. And I would say, look, this is what's going on.
WARREN ZENNAThis is why we're doing X. This is what's happening. And then part two is, and here's what we have to do about it. And then that would be my plan.
WARREN ZENNAIt would be like how to fix these things, the leaks, the process issues, and stuff like that. And they'd be a series of process things and technology things, you know, stuff you have to do. So the first three months about you're doing all the discovery work and then maybe like month three to four or three to six, you're planning the roadmap for.
SPEAKER_80Start to implementation.
WARREN ZENNAYeah. That's your job really as a CRO. Your job is to build a revenue factory, right? That builds a predictable model for the company. Once that's up and running, then your job is to run it and lead it and grow it.
RACHAEL BUECKERTYeah. I'm guessing this isn't any different from either you're at a $20 million company or $50 million or $100 plus million company.
WARREN ZENNAEssentially, it's the same. As you can appreciate, there's obviously complexities involved with large organizations. There's more people to talk to, right? There's more politics, right? And we haven't even discussed the other possibility in this scenario, which is that there's a third-party investor, like a PE firm or a VC company. That's a whole other thing, right? Because they're going to be involved in all this. And these companies, these PE firms and VC companies are smart and they have systems and they have processes and they've managed companies before and they manage portfolios of companies.
WARREN ZENNAAnd they're going to have their own perspective on this. So if you've done your job properly, but going back about 10 minutes to our conversation, the PE firm or the VC would have been involved in your hire and they'd be on board with this because they would want this too, right? The CEO and the VC should be in agreement that this is the right solution for them and that they need somebody like this. And so they should be an ally in this happening. As a CRO, you have to ask yourself, like, what's the role that that PE firm is going to play in helping me do this, right? What's my responsibility to them? Well, obviously, I'm going to be reporting to them and I'm going to be presenting to them and I'm going to have a seat at the table with them, obviously.
WARREN ZENNAWhat's the day-to-day, you know, are they my ally? Are they an enemy? Are they looking at me skeptically and seeing if I fail? Are they there to back me up? I don't know. I have to find out. Like, you know, maybe there's a consultant that they have in their VC group that says, who the fuck's this guy? That's my job, man. That's why you got me here. And you sort of have to know how to deal with that. That's not easy because they gave the company money.
SPEAKER_45They can say, well, no, you're going to work with Sam. And that sometimes happens.
SPEAKER_55Yeah. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like a lot of CROs in this position can almost always expect some kind of resistance from somewhere at some point in this first six months because you're restructuring things.
RACHAEL BUECKERTYou're probably going to be recommending some people get hired or fired or what have you. Our go-to-market efficiency pyramid, we always recommend people starting at the bottom with fundamentals and going right to the basics of what's your ICP? Are certain things being tracked and monitored in your CRM? Is everyone on board with this at every stage? That kind of thing. So if you have to go back and start making these really basic changes that have a huge domino effect on the entire sales process of organization, you're going to run up against some friction there with somebody at some point.
SPEAKER_28Yep. You are. You are. And you have to expect that.
WARREN ZENNAYou have to anticipate it. I think that a good CRO will have a really, I'll call it, evolved relationship with conflict.
SPEAKER_63That's interesting. I like that phrase.
WARREN ZENNABecause most of our life, conflict is painful, it's uncomfortable, all the things that it comes up with. We're not built for interpersonal conflict.
WARREN ZENNAWe don't do with it well. You have to learn how to do that. You weren't born knowing how to negotiate with somebody or deal with their shit.
WARREN ZENNAAnd if you want to be in any complex relationship, you need to develop skills to know yourself and how you are in conflict and how you deal with people and what your shit is, right? You need to learn how I react to stuff and learn how to manage it better so you're less emotional and you're more clear and you have empathy and all the things that go into it.
WARREN ZENNAAnd then once you do that, you have to understand that no one else did.
WARREN ZENNASo you might be one of the only people that has that skill and now you're in a room full of people that don't. And so it made one side of the equation easier, but now you have to deal with people that don't have that. And you've got to be good at leading people to inspire them to understand how to do that. But more importantly is you have to see these conflicts as not like, oh, shit, I can't believe what happened today. It's looking more like, okay, this is what's going to happen today. If I take a match and I rub it against the flint, it's going to turn to a flame. That wasn't an accident. That was an intention. The way those two things are designed to work together. It's the same thing. If I'm dealing with things, then there's going to be friction as a outcome of change.
WARREN ZENNAIt's a good thing. It means change is happening and I'm equipped to deal with it because this is what we are looking to do. Not this is what we're trying to avoid. There's a much different way of looking at things that way. This is something that you work with a lot, right, in the CRO collective, like helping to train new CROs how to handle these conversations and to do this conflict resolution stuff.
RACHAEL BUECKERTSo what are some of your big tips and best practices for approaching these conversations, you know, with both like CEOs as well as the people that are reporting to you?
WARREN ZENNAYeah, I do it a lot. Big part of my job. At the root of every single conflict or every issue we have, I believe this, I'd say, I'll make it like almost like a statement. But I'd say I think like every problem, and I mean every problem, is really at its core a communication problem.
SPEAKER_87Yeah, I agree completely.
WARREN ZENNASo if you look at the world that way, and then the way that I usually work with my clients is I first ask them to first remove their relationship to the situation emotionally and look at first their side of it. And ask, like, what is the reaction you're having about this, say, about yourself right now, your leadership?
WARREN ZENNAAre you mad? Are you frustrated? Are you angry? Are you pissed? Are you embarrassed? Are you ashamed? Right? All the things that happen when things happen. And there's nothing wrong with any of those things, but it's just more being self-aware.
WARREN ZENNAI realize that when people criticize me in this role, I take it personally, and I feel ashamed, and that I am ineffective.
Right?
WARREN ZENNAWelcome to the club, right? But what do you do about that? Because then now you're not effective. So the first thing all my clients do is get them to develop better skills around their own, managing their own way that they interact. Now, the people I'm dealing with most of the time are people whom have had high-powered jobs and managed a lot of people already, so they're not new at this, right?
WARREN ZENNAAnd they've got some good chops already, and they sort of know it, but they're seeing that they still have some leftover stuff they haven't really dealt with, complicated situations.
WARREN ZENNAThat's the first thing. Second thing is interpretation, right? And so when my clients are talking to me about situations, I can tell when they are not talking about facts or things that can be measured. They're talking about opinions and assessments that they've made about things. And there's a difference, right? So I first want to get them to understand what the other side is thinking. So let's say, for example, I worked with this company once.
WARREN ZENNAI was hired by this company, and it was run by these two guys. They were both these dynamic kind of jock types. And one was this really sort of like almost blatantly arrogant and almost like corrupt person with someone whom on the face of it looked like he was just not someone you'd ever trust. Really competent, but like kind of like, you know, you'd probably call him like a scumbag. And his partner was this really affable, like good-looking salesman type guy who, you know, you kind of like liked.
WARREN ZENNAAnd over about six months, it was really amazing. It was a really cool lesson for me. This was a long time ago. I found out that the guy who was like the scumbag was actually a really good guy. He was just more honest. I just knew exactly where he stood. Like he said the truth. He told what he thought. His objective was to make a lot of money. And he cut deals. And he didn't have any kind of opinions about it. And after working with him a while, I kind of like saw some wisdom in the way that he operated. Like it didn't come across great, but it was in fact really effective. And he was really good at what he did, but he just wasn't like necessarily likable. And it turned out the other guy who was really affable. So it was full of shit. He was completely not honest about anything like ever. He was all facade. It was really fascinating. And what I learned from that was I need to understand people better. And I'm pretty good at knowing people. I'm really good at this. But this was like, wow, it was amazing. I really started to realize like I had an opinion about this person's maybe I want to say greed. The motivation for this guy was money. And I had an opinion about that. And what difference does it make with my opinion is about it?
WARREN ZENNASo what? Somebody wants to make a lot of money. There's actually nothing wrong with that at all. You know, like it's perfectly fine if somebody wants to make a lot of money.
SPEAKER_92Most people do.
WARREN ZENNASo what I mean is that like I had to really understand that like my issue was less about them and really more about me, right? So that's what I'm saying. So I sort of had to teach my clients a lot of times like just in a situation to be able to very quickly assess that. Like what's going on in this person? What's motivating this person? Like why is this person having this conflict with you? What do they want? What do they think? Not what you think, right? But what they do. Because if you can understand what the other side's thinking, then now you can probably solve it. And you can remove your relationship to this like it's personal, like there's a lot at stake. It's just like a thing. It's like a problem. It's like a puzzle. You have to solve it. You want to cook this tonight and I want to cook this tonight and we need to use the same
WARREN ZENNAtools to cook and we want to cook at the same time. I can get mad. You don't want to eat the same thing I want to eat. But instead of saying, well, just figure out how we can both make it work. It doesn't have to become an argument. We just get different pots or something like that or change the timing. But it's a different way of solving problems. So that's a lot of it is just sort of getting people to kind of evaluate. That's if I can get them to do that, then we can get into nuances like, okay, is this a data issue? Is this a training issue?
WARREN ZENNAIs this a disagreement on a strategy for how you're going to speak to somebody? Is it a demo problem? Then we can get into weeds and really get tactical. But once all that stuff is removed, it's easier to talk about that stuff. If it's not, then they're conflated.
WARREN ZENNAYou can't have the same conversation at the same time because I'm talking about two different things. I don't know if you've ever been in a long-term committed relationship, but I'm sure you know what this is like, right?
SPEAKER_94Yeah.
WARREN ZENNAIt's like two personalities talking to each other instead of two people trying to solve a problem together.
SPEAKER_11Yeah. It's just a clash of the egos.
WARREN ZENNAExactly. And so I do a lot of this. So a lot of it too is also upfront agreements. So what happens with my clients many times is they didn't talk about something before, right? So it's like they're angry about something that they never communicated. Well, you knew this, you took this job and you knew this was going to be an issue and you saw the structure, the way it was set up and you were able to make a logical decision that this was going to be a conflict, but you chose to ignore it because you didn't want to be a problem or you wanted to get the job. And so now here you are, now you're stuck with the problem. And so to complain about it now, it's not cool because you agreed to it. So now you made your bed, so to speak, right? So let's deal with that. You chose not to address this because whatever, you wanted a job, you wanted the title. This is a very big reason why a lot of people I work with have problems because they sort of overlook things and they don't want to do the due diligence on it because they don't want to sound like a problem. And so what I tell them is, well, okay. I mean, if you go into a job interview and you say things like, well, you know, I only eat vegetables and I want the entire cafeteria to have no meat. Okay. Well, you are a problem. But if it's something where it's like, you're saying, look, I really would like the CMO to
WARREN ZENNAreport it to me. And the reason is systemically it works better. You're not a problem. You have a theory about something.
WARREN ZENNAThere's a difference. And if they think that that's a problem, then it's probably not the right job for you anyway. Yeah.
SPEAKER_48And that, like you were mentioning relationships too, and there's a lot of similarities and
RACHAEL BUECKERTparallels between this because you get into a relationship and you see these red flags or incompatibilities, but you're like, oh, but I really want this to work. I really like this person. I just, I want this relationship. Those same issues.
SPEAKER_95I want the job.
RACHAEL BUECKERTYeah. I want the job. The same issues in the beginning, they're going to just, they're not going to stop being issues later on.
WARREN ZENNAYep. That's because we have other reasons why we want things, right? We want titles, we want money. And some of these things are really legitimate. Like I need a job, like my, I need to pay my mortgage or whatever. And I completely respect that. So, and this is a, I have this conversation a lot.
WARREN ZENNASo I'll see my clients look, I'm like, look, I understand you've been out of a job for a while. You've got an opportunity to make a lot of money. And I see every reason why it is that you should do what you can to get this job, make that money. But you and I need to discuss and make a list of all the concessions you're making to take this job so that later on you don't resent the job because you don't want to be a victim.
WARREN ZENNAYou want to accept that you made concessions and that you made them for the right reasons because it was the honorable thing to do and that those concessions are not going to be comfortable. And complaining about them is like, you're just victimizing yourself. It's like, just, okay, we know that this wasn't going to be a good thing.
SPEAKER_94Yeah. Don't be shocked now.
WARREN ZENNAIt's a whole different way of framing your brain, right? When you operate that way.
WARREN ZENNAAnd I see a lot of times my clients come to me and they're like really complaining and they go on and on. I can't believe there's things I hear. I'm like, oh, they should happen. Some of it's really bad.
WARREN ZENNAOther times it's like, how much of this did you already know? You knew all this, didn't you? Did you ask X, Y, Z question? No. Okay. Well, why not? Sorry. I'm not going to sit here and play a fiddle. I really believe that myself, everybody needs to take a hundred percent responsibility for every single thing happens. And if you take that responsibility, then you're going to be better at what you do and you're going to get yourself into better situations. Then we can get into the tactics, right? Then we can talk about what's the right go-to-market strategy for your business and how do you build a pipeline? And those things are, you know, we can go hire your company to solve those problems, but you need to solve the problems I'm talking about in order for the room to be made for
WARREN ZENNAthose other things to solve or else they don't, they just become like sort of band-aids on a problem that's really gone away.
SPEAKER_48Yeah. I think there's a Harvard Business Review. I heard about the average tenure of a CRO, something like 18 months. Yeah. It's like something like that.
WARREN ZENNA16 to 18 months is right now. I mean, that might change, but that's the way it's been for a while.
SPEAKER_56How much of that do you think is due to... It has to do with everything we're talking about. It has to do with, I think the fact that the main one, I would say if I were like the
WARREN ZENNAmain symptom for that reason is because job was set up to fail from the start because the CEO and the CRO didn't have the same vision and understanding of what the job is. And what happens is they start out with this really like kind of loose agreement where they make concessions with each other. And then the CRO is trying to do one thing that he wants to do and the CEO wants to do another thing.
WARREN ZENNAAnd then it just, it drifts apart by the time they end up, it's off kilter. And just the nature of the CRO role is there's so much potential for those kinds of disconnects
RACHAEL BUECKERTand miscommunication because to be successful in that role, you really need to have a wide jurisdiction over a lot of things. You need to be able to oversee all the different revenue teams. You need to be able to make decisions and have that authority to create real impact in the entire revenue organization, do all your restructuring, have a say in strategy and like big changes. And if you're not seeing eye to eye on what that role is and what that role covers, you're never going to be able to do that role effectively the way that it was meant to be done.
WARREN ZENNAAgreed. A hundred percent. So I'm sorry, I realized we're like, it's at three o'clock. I have a call I got to make.
RACHAEL BUECKERTOh yeah. Oh yeah.
WARREN ZENNAWe could talk for seven hours, you and I. This is awesome. It was really, really great. And I really, really appreciate it. So yeah.
RACHAEL BUECKERTThank you so much, Warren.
WARREN ZENNAAnd let's do another one. Let's have another, another one of these calls. Cause I think they're really good and there's so much we can get into. Absolutely. Rachel, thank you so much.
SPEAKER_55Thank you, Warren. Have a great rest of your day.
SPEAKER_45Me too.
SPEAKER_55See ya. Bye.
SPEAKER_02Thanks for listening to the show. If this resonated and, or you'd like help with anything we talked about in the show, please reach out to us. You can find us at unionsquareconsulting.com and the info will be in our show notes.

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