Summary: Why would anyone leave a highly successful sales career after a decade at Microsoft with all the benefits that come with it? "One day I just realized sometimes you have to step out of the picture to actually see the picture clearly," says Piyush Saggi, the CEO and co-founder of Atlanta-based SalesTing. What Saggi repeatedly encountered was a huge disconnent between sales and marketing. So the Georgia Tech MBA set out to fix it. Saggi shares his insights founding the flourishing startup in the latest edition of Series A-The Podcast, recorded on location at the Atlanta Tech Village with host Jim Brisimitzis. Saggie offers great lessons in moving from the enterprise to a startup, and the problems that come with shifting from selling IT to creating solutions. "The realization was that marketing organizations, sales organizations...they are basically living in two different solar systems, and the lack of data is causing bad decisions or lack of decisions in many cases," he says. Saggi admits it's been difficult and humbling at times, and acknowledging his own shortcomings has been a key in his own development as a CEO. "There are all these skill sets I did not have to build a company," he laughs. Saggi offers tremendous insights for other founders, including the need to build relationships and shore up those shortcomings well before you launch your startup to minimize the learning curve. Saggi also shares his learnings on building a team and hiring employees, including the challenge of actually identifying the best fits. "Everybody has to share the dream and the vision. It's not about the 401 match at this point...And you need people who are really good at execution," he says.
