The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
00:56:03 · Max Freeman
[00:56:03] S0: I think a few things. One, a lot of exposure. When I joined Ramp, my boss was effectively Eric. I'm seeing him in sales conversations. I'm seeing him talking to investors. I'm seeing an operating out of his email inbox. Like, it felt like I earned 50 MBAs in a nine month period of time. That was an insane acceleration. And then two, also exposure to investors that have seen and done this before. Like, I'm super grateful that I get to call Dave Schneider a friend and a mentor. I've learned a lot from him. And then two, Colin, my boss, is exceptional. Like, he's taken companies public. He's sold businesses, and so I think just being in the room has allowed me to absorb a lot of this knowledge, and two, it's forced me to figure it the fuck out. Like, I'm not naive to the fact that I have to earn this every day. If I don't perform, I could lose my job at any moment. If I'm not buttoned up in executive conversations with Eric, whether it's external with a customer or internal with a hot board topic, why would I still have this position? And so, like, I I think it's a a combination and a sum of all parts of the founders have given me a lot of exposure. They hold me intensely accountable, and I have, like, a healthy amount of stress and paranoia that if I don't keep delivering and I don't keep growing, the music could stop.
00:57:22 · Harry Stebbings, Max Freeman
[00:57:22] S1: Yeah. Dave Schneider said one of the greatest lines ever to me on a podcast. He came to London. Love this guy. He says VCs are like seagulls. They like to fly, you know, a 100 feet ahead of you, look down on you, and then just take a big crap all [00:57:36] S0: over you. [00:57:39] S1: And I just say that honestly, I can't remember anything else he said. But that that one line really stuck with me. He had [00:57:46] S0: he had the best one line around... I forget what the topic. It was something around, like, how do you how do you measure performance? And, like, how do you how do you stack rank? And he's like, Max, there's three categories of performance in sales. One, you are god. Two, I don't know yet. Or three, you're fucking fired. [00:58:04] S1: It's so true. You know what? It also taught me that when you listen to what I just said, which is like, oh, the seagull shitting on you. [00:58:11] S0: And [00:58:11] S1: Yeah. It's better to be a purple cow sometimes, which is like, you know, the Seth Godin being different is sometimes being better. Dude, we're gonna do a quick fire because otherwise I could talk to you all day and you've got a quota to hit. Yes. What one sales tool could you not live without? [00:58:26] S0: I don't know if I could say this publicly, but I'm going to. Inspect. Inspect is Ramp's internal coding agent in harness. It feels as though I have an engineer and a sales engineer in my pocket at any given moment. [00:58:41] S1: Have you guys just built all your own tools?
00:58:41 · Harry Stebbings, Max Freeman
[00:58:41] S1: Have you guys just built all your own tools? [00:58:43] S0: Harry, this... When I come to London, I'll I'll show you this. It is insane what our sellers can accomplish with inspect, like creating bespoke custom demos, performing any analysis on, you know, current customers ramp configuration. It's epic. [00:58:59] S1: Who's to credit for that? Is that as the CTO who's built the internal tooling? [00:59:04] S0: Yeah. I I give dual credit to Eric and Kareem. It's just culturally in our DNA to push forward and go build. [00:59:13] S1: Okay. You have a job offer that you know will not be rejected. You can give it to anyone in sales in the world to join the Ramp Sales team. Who is it? [00:59:24] S0: ICR leader or anyone. [00:59:25] S1: Anyone. I liked Becca Lindquist a lot from Clay. [00:59:29] S0: So I was literally gonna say, Becca or someone that's under... Like, I'm a big believer in finding someone that's just about to hit an insane trajectory. Again, my whole thesis on mispriced assets. There's a guy, Charlie Demuth, who's an enterprise frontline leader at ProFound, who's a... He's an animal that I've been... Every every six months, I I try and bring him in. Hopefully, Mark, doesn't listen to this because he's the SVP of sales at ProFound. [01:00:00] S1: What's your biggest advice to a new rep on their first day?
01:00:00 · Harry Stebbings, Max Freeman
[01:00:00] S1: What's your biggest advice to a new rep on their first day? [01:00:05] S0: You need to you need to go all in. You need to be obsessed. Because if you're not obsessed, you're going to be average. And the additive thing I'd I'd say too is be a problem solver. Don't be a problem finder. Anybody could be a problem finder at a startup. There's a thousand things on fire every waking moment. Very few can be a problem solver. As a new seller, you bring a fresh perspective. You could see there could be something structurally wrong with our process. There's something that you were doing at your previous company that might be applied to help move the business forward. That is how you're going to accelerate your career and do well. And then get, I guess with obsession, like take fucking onboarding seriously. Pass your certifications, break into accounts, start creating a lot of your own pipeline, all the basic stuff that you'd be surprised some people neglected. [01:00:56] S1: I'm always like, listen, accept blame, and deflect credit. Like, the worst thing for me is, oh, no. No. But that wasn't my fault. That was Max's fault.
01:00:56 · Harry Stebbings, Max Freeman
[01:00:56] S1: I'm always like, listen, accept blame, and deflect credit. Like, the worst thing for me is, oh, no. No. But that wasn't my fault. That was Max's fault. [01:01:04] S0: Yep. There... There's nothing worse than going to your leader and saying, hey. Do you have any feedback for me? That's an atrocious exercise for everybody involved. Come to the table with a point of view, Hey, I noticed this in my last two deals. Here's how I'm thinking about course correcting. I'd love to get your take. I'd love to get your advice. Am I viewing this the right way? Have you seen this play out with other sellers? That's just the mindset that you need to bring to be incredibly effective in your role as a new seller. [01:01:31] S1: I agree with you. It's a really good point because whenever... But they always do it to me, and I'm always like, oh, fuck. I guess I should have been better at giving you performance reviews. [01:01:39] S0: I I know. [01:01:39] S1: Do know what I mean? And it makes me feel shit. You're kind of asking a horizontal question that's not like, hey. I feel like I need help with the closing process. [01:01:47] S0: Yes. Same with leaders. Same with leaders. Hey. Do you have any feedback for me? Hey. I noticed this problem. Here's how I'm gonna go solve it. Here's the cross functional resource that I'm gonna need to bring in. If I get blocked, like, come help come help me.
01:01:47 · Max Freeman, Harry Stebbings
[01:01:47] S0: Yes. Same with leaders. Same with leaders. Hey. Do you have any feedback for me? Hey. I noticed this problem. Here's how I'm gonna go solve it. Here's the cross functional resource that I'm gonna need to bring in. If I get blocked, like, come help come help me. [01:02:02] S1: Do you know what fucks me off more, man, Ling? Intro request is in a similar vein, horizontal. I'd love an intro to someone at Ram. I know. Someone at Ram. I can I can do Keith Raboy, the board member? I can do Eric Glyman. I can do Max, the rock star sales leader, but I don't have also a freaking clue why. So I know. That would be helpful too. And on top of that, you know, I get about 50 intro requests a day. Maybe if you could do a copy and paste, that might be helpful too. Yep. The horizontal shit nature of intro requests I know. Astounds me. [01:02:32] S0: You and me both. If you're gonna ask for an intro, there needs to be substance, and you need to make it so easy that they're just forwarding it to the person with the appropriate context. Otherwise, you shouldn't expect a response. [01:02:45] S1: Max, I'm totally aware of the ask here, but I'd love to meet Colin. I'd love to specifically speak to him about his experience at X. I've added a message below that you can copy and paste. Yep. By the way, I totally understand if this is not possible. Huge hugs, and let me know when you're in London. Yes. Final one for you. What's the kindest thing that anyone's ever done for you? [01:03:06] S0: I have to give my wife credit. She was my girlfriend at the time.