Karen Dernavich’s Post

Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) need a Chief of Staff (COS)—even today it is rare to have this role supporting a CRO and Leadership Team.  But the tenure of a CRO is decreasing. In 2020, the tenure was approximately 4-5 years. Today it is between 1.5 to 1.9 years.   Alarmingly this is a short period of time and the question becomes will this trend continue and if so what will this tenure be in the next three to five years?  This is not a sympathy card for CROs rather it is about continuity and building excellence into a revenue organization.   Especially in SaaS, a CRO org consumes more resources than other teams and it is an expensive function.  But CROs need the correct reporting structure and there is no benefit of an org’s CRO to report to COO rather it should report to a CEO.  Additionally, a CRO needs the professional support of a Chief of Staff to make a significant movement to excellence and to create a high performance team.  If the tenure decreases further it will make this role a non-functioning leader–simply if a CRO is in place for a year or less it will be hard to understand what contributions they have made or what they might have put into place was effective. Also, a new CRO is a disruptive experience as a leader will always want to leave their mark and make considerable changes (warranted or not). The reason CRO tenure is decreasing is several fold and probably the biggest issue is unrealistic sales targets; fault is both the org assigning an unattainable sales goal and additionally the CRO agrees to unrealistic sales targets.  There are many places for a CRO to go after their current role as there is much turnover and many organizations need a CRO.  Also, CRO orgs are very difficult places to work and rarely factor in efficiency, business process excellence and incremental improvement.  Sales-Rev orgs are expensive to operate and take the largest share (particularly in a SaaS org) of resources and many have not only not shown efficiency many of not even entered into a phase of scalability in terms of revenue and operating spend. I certainly advocate for a COS to be placed in numerous roles in all organizational types and of course that depends on revenue to support these roles.  Complex organizations and organization motion requires the support of a COS to make for optimized and efficient organizations where individual contributors are engaged. If you'd like more information on this topic, please let me know and please consider watching the linked video. #chiefrevenueofficer #cos #chiefofstaff #revenue #revenueorganization #cro #continuousimprovement #efficiency #tenure

Revenue Operations initiatives often suffer from a “failure to launch” because they lack a consensus, a common purpose, a blueprint, and an incentive to change across their functional team. Learn about our ninety day program where our expert practitioners and network of peers will help you overcome the five obstacles to success and prioritize the smartest short term actions to take to ensure your Revenue Operations initiative achieves “lift off” . days. Over 90% of organizations are deploying Revenue Operations strategies that better align the revenue teams – and the operations, systems, data and processes that support them – along the revenue cycle. 85% of growth leaders are change the way they lead and align revenue teams and the operations that support them. 94% are actively consolidating, simplifying and optimizing their commercial technology stack. Let our expert practitioners help you overcome the five obstacles to launching a successful Revenue Operations strategy and prioritize the smartest ways to achieve “escape velocity” in 90 days.

Revenue Operations initiatives often suffer from a “failure to launch” because they lack a consensus, a common purpose, a blueprint, and an incentive to change across their functional team. Learn about our ninety day program where our expert practitioners and network of peers will help you overcome the five obstacles to success and prioritize the smartest short term actions to take to ensure your Revenue Operations initiative achieves “lift off” . days. Over 90% of organizations are deploying Revenue Operations strategies that better align the revenue teams – and the operations, systems, data and processes that support them – along the revenue cycle. 85% of growth leaders are change the way they lead and align revenue teams and the operations that support them. 94% are actively consolidating, simplifying and optimizing their commercial technology stack. Let our expert practitioners help you overcome the five obstacles to launching a successful Revenue Operations strategy and prioritize the smartest ways to achieve “escape velocity” in 90 days.

Four Qualities Of Successful Chief Revenue Officers In 2024 And Beyond According to LinkedIns 2023 “Jobs on the Rise List”, the title of CRO, sometimes known as Head of Revenue Operations or Revenue Management, is the fastest-growing job title in the United States, and for good reason. CROs must be disruptive, big-picture thinkers who are constantly on the hunt for new ways to generate revenue for their organizations and optimize processes and systems to drive business growth. In 2024, CROs should build their strategies more around data and less on sales instincts, no matter how highly refined these instincts are. As a disruptive managed service provider early stage firm, we are engaging with CRO’s to secure new relationships and build mutually beneficial opportunities. #BeAware https://lnkd.in/eiqVDvzz

The typical Revenue Operations leaders charged with commercial technology consolidation generally lacks the span of control, mandate and influence to get other parts of the organization to cooperate with their efforts. CEOs and the executives that have the ability to deploy capital, take risks, and control incentives across functions often push too much change management burden on more junior operations managers. But only they have the authority and span of control to establish the common purpose required to align the many stakeholders in finance, marketing, product, sales and technology required to pull off a commercial transformation project. Sugato Deb reinforces this point. “For a technology implementation to succeed, it has to deliver value at all three levels of the internal organization and extend the value all the way to the customer,” he emphasizes. “The C-level executives who direct growth strategy, the customer facing employees that execute it, and the operations team that activates them.” This is one of the top five reasons Revenue Operations initiatives suffer from a “failure to launch.” The other headwinds RevOps leaders face is the lack a consensus on priorities, a common purpose, a financially valid blueprint, and an incentive to change across their functional team. Learn about our ninety day program where our expert practitioners and network of peers will help you overcome these five obstacles to success and prioritize the smartest short term actions to take to ensure your Revenue Operations initiative achieves “lift off” in 90 days.

The most frequently asked questions I get asked to contribute are around building a framework for Revenue Operations, a playbook from MVP to World Class. It's been an incredible journey collaborating with industry leaders, and I'm beyond grateful for the insights gained. 1️⃣ Creating a Comprehensive Framework: 📊 Developing a successful revenue operations strategy requires a robust framework. Many of you have asked for insights into building a cohesive framework that aligns people, processes, and technology to drive revenue growth. 2️⃣ I plan to utilise a "Good Better Best" model: 🎯 Determining what "good" looks like in revenue operations can be challenging. Together, we've explored benchmarks, KPIs, and best practices to set achievable goals and measurable outcomes. 3️⃣ Guiding the North Star: 🌟 Establishing a clear North Star is crucial for revenue operations success. I've been honoured to help define overarching goals that steer your organization towards long-term growth and sustainability. I'm in the process of creating an in-depth Revenue Operations Framework following the "Good Better Best" methodology. This framework will pave the way from Minimum Viable Product (MVP) to the ultimate "Best" state. It will encompass: 📌 Requirements: Identifying the core prerequisites for a successful revenue operations strategy tailored to your organization's unique needs. 📋 Deliverables: Mapping out the tangible outcomes and milestones that will lead you towards revenue excellence. 🔄 Processes: Streamlining end-to-end processes, from lead generation to customer retention, to maximize efficiency and effectiveness. 🔧 Resources & Tools: Recommending the essential resources and technology stack needed to execute your revenue operations vision. 💡 Guidance: Providing step-by-step guidance and actionable insights to navigate challenges and seize opportunities along the way. I'm dedicated to empowering you and your organization with the knowledge and tools to unlock revenue potential. Stay tuned for the detailed Revenue Operations Framework release, and let's embark on this transformative journey together! 🚀🌟 #RevenueExcellence #StrategyInAction #OperationalExcellence #BusinessGrowth #RevenueOperations #GoodBetterBest

How failing every business and job over the past 6 years has prepared me to become an Operational Business Consultant. Two of my biggest takeaways: “When you don’t listen to the whispers they will become screams.” “Failures are the breadcrumbs to success.” From now on I’ll be sharing insights into Business Automations, Sales Enablement, Systems Efficiencies, Hiring and Recruiting, Team Building, and more❤️🔥 If you think I can help you or someone you know PM me today! #salesenablement #mystory #operationalefficiency #processimprovement #businessautomation #recruitingpartner

The typical Revenue Operations leaders charged with commercial technology consolidation generally lacks the span of control, mandate and influence to get other parts of the organization to cooperate with their efforts. CEOs and the executives that have the ability to deploy capital, take risks, and control incentives across functions often push too much change management burden on more junior operations managers. But only they have the authority and span of control to establish the common purpose required to align the many stakeholders in finance, marketing, product, sales and technology required to pull off a commercial transformation project. Sugato Deb reinforces this point. “For a technology implementation to succeed, it has to deliver value at all three levels of the internal organization and extend the value all the way to the customer,” he emphasizes. “The C-level executives who direct growth strategy, the customer facing employees that execute it, and the operations team that activates them.” This is one of the top five reasons Revenue Operations initiatives suffer from a “failure to launch.” The other headwinds RevOps leaders face is the lack a consensus on priorities, a common purpose, a financially valid blueprint, and an incentive to change across their functional team. Learn about our ninety day program where our expert practitioners and network of peers will help you overcome these five obstacles to success and prioritize the smartest short term actions to take to ensure your Revenue Operations initiative achieves “lift off” in 90 days.

We recently hosted a Revenue Operations forum at our headquarters. The initiative generated an honest and insightful conversation with commercial operations leaders from across industries about their shared experiences, obstacles and best practices. The findings should be of interest to anyone involved in managing, optimizing or transforming the go-to-market model in their business. You can watch the video summary of the key findings from over 50 conversations we’ve had with RevOps leaders in the last months below. If you do, it will be very clear that educating senior leadership and building a consensus on the financial impact of commercial transformation across the C suite are really big obstacles to almost every RevOps leader we met with. It's no coincidence that these were the very same challenges facing the growth equity investors, owners and portfolio company leaders we studied in our research on Revenue Engineering in growth equity funded businesses. So it seems the board level and C-suite executives leading commercial transformation at the top of the organization have the same core challenges as the operations leaders executing those strategies on the front line: They all lack the education, experience, and financial context they need to reliably assess, improve, and maximize a company’s core underlying ability to reliably generate future revenues in a disciplined manner. If you are interested in discussing what these findings mean to you and your business, let me know and we can arrange to get you the full report and discuss this on the phone. https://buff.ly/3QoYNm9

Revenue Operations – the alignment of revenue teams - and the systems, operations and processes that support them - represents an unprecedented opportunity to unlock the vast potential of technology as a growth multiplier to generate more scalable and consistent growth. But it won’t be easy. Most organizations face headwinds as they seek to deploy Revenue Operations strategies because they lack a consensus, a common purpose, a blueprint, and an incentive to change across their functional team. They lack a financially valid business case for prioritizing projects, programs and investments to accelerate growth is not understood or agreed upon. They lack a “top down” blueprint to help configure, connect, and organize the many different technologies in modern commercial tech stack. RevOps managers often lack a top down mandate and incentive to coordinate marketing, sales, customer success, finance, product and operating teams to work together and take risks. This research brief explains the financial impact that revenue operations can have on firm value and financial performance. This can help establish a financially valid basis to build the consensus, a common purpose, agreed upon investment priorities, and an incentives to change that often hold Revenue Operations initiatives back. It also introduces our ninety day program where our expert practitioners and network of peers will help you overcome the five obstacles to success and prioritize the smartest short term actions to take to ensure your Revenue Operations initiative achieves “lift off.” .