00:01:49 · Reggie Marable
[00:01:49] S0: No. It's it's... I believe success is a winding road. It's never straight. And my my whole life is built on relationships, taking calculated risk, and failing. So I... When I when I graduated from college, I wanted to play professional football, and I went to a small school. Shout out to Morehouse College, which is one of the greatest schools in the world. And I knew if I didn't try to play professional football, I'd regret it. So I played in the Canadian Football League for a year, quickly realized I was never gonna make it to the NFL, and I was wasting my time. I needed to get a job. Came back to Atlanta and Sprint at the time was hiring college students for entry level customer service roles. So I I started my career in the telecom industry in a call center in customer service. So when you got mad at Sprint, you called in, I was the person that answered the phone. Quickly realized the money in the career progression was in sales. And especially, being a minority, there's no subjectivity in sales. It's either can you produce or can you not? And I love this quote from Jay Z says, men lie, women lie, numbers don't. So I just forged my way through, the telecom industry in sales and when I was a direct direct seller. Then I was a first line, second line, third line leader. Then I ran Sprint's international wholesale business. Then I left there to become a CRO of a mid sized media company. And at the time, gee, I had a big ego, smartest guy in the room, had all the answers, came with my playbook, and it completely failed, got fired after my first year. So I was unemployed for six months. So, and I wanted to get in the technology industry and I've always used the Salesforce product and I had a friend, his name was Ryan Radding. He was a senior leader at Salesforce and he was like, hey man, this is a rocket ship. You should come over here, but no one's going to hire you as a senior leader. You're going have to come in as a first line sales leader if you want to join this company. So I had to swallow my pride and then because I had failed and I had gotten fired, I had to really reinvent myself and think about what real leadership means and it's putting people first, serving leadership. So when I joined Salesforce ten years ago as a first line sales leader, I approached it with humility and my career flourished.
00:03:56 · Reggie Marable, Guillaume Moubeche
So if you would have told me when I graduated from college that I wasn't gonna be a professional football player, and that I'd end up in the technology industry and sales, I wouldn't have believed you. [00:04:08] S1: Nice. I love all these stories. And, you know, when you're at that stage where, you know, like you get fired as a CRO and you have to go back to, you know, like, a frontline sales. Like, goes through your mind at the time? Like, do you feel like it's gonna be a learning experience? Do you feel like it's something brand new? Like, how do you kind of, like, change the mindset?
00:04:08 · Guillaume Moubeche, Reggie Marable
[00:04:08] S1: Nice. I love all these stories. And, you know, when you're at that stage where, you know, like you get fired as a CRO and you have to go back to, you know, like, a frontline sales. Like, goes through your mind at the time? Like, do you feel like it's gonna be a learning experience? Do you feel like it's something brand new? Like, how do you kind of, like, change the mindset? [00:04:30] S0: At the time, it was the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life. Like, I remember sitting in my car crying because I have responsibilities, man. I have a daughter, and I have a son, and my wife doesn't work outside the home. And they look up to me like I'm responsible for them financially. So I was like, man, I got fired. I have no job. Like, I have no, like, belonging. So this quote that I remember from Albert Einstein, like, adversity introduces a man to oneself. So I just figured out what what can I do differently? How do I reinvent myself? How do I position myself so I'm never ever in this situation again? And I started to like deconstruct what I was doing as a leader and why I got failed, like why I got fired. And it was really just my my leadership style, man. You can't be the smartest guy in the room. You don't have all the answers. You have to rely on other people. You gotta put people first. It's not about you. But I will tell you, man, like, it's like the most humbling thing that you'll ever experience when you get fired from a job or you fail at something. So...
00:04:30 · Reggie Marable, Guillaume Moubeche
[00:04:30] S0: At the time, it was the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life. Like, I remember sitting in my car crying because I have responsibilities, man. I have a daughter, and I have a son, and my wife doesn't work outside the home. And they look up to me like I'm responsible for them financially. So I was like, man, I got fired. I have no job. Like, I have no, like, belonging. So this quote that I remember from Albert Einstein, like, adversity introduces a man to oneself. So I just figured out what what can I do differently? How do I reinvent myself? How do I position myself so I'm never ever in this situation again? And I started to like deconstruct what I was doing as a leader and why I got failed, like why I got fired. And it was really just my my leadership style, man. You can't be the smartest guy in the room. You don't have all the answers. You have to rely on other people. You gotta put people first. It's not about you. But I will tell you, man, like, it's like the most humbling thing that you'll ever experience when you get fired from a job or you fail at something. So... [00:05:34] S1: Yeah. I love that. I think this is something European can can learn from because, obviously, like, it's not something we talk too much about, but I think you're a great example of someone, you know, who faced adversity and make, you know, amazing things afterwards. So what what would you say were, like, your main or key learnings at at Salesforce and more specifically at at Slack?
00:05:34 · Guillaume Moubeche, Reggie Marable
[00:05:34] S1: Yeah. I love that. I think this is something European can can learn from because, obviously, like, it's not something we talk too much about, but I think you're a great example of someone, you know, who faced adversity and make, you know, amazing things afterwards. So what what would you say were, like, your main or key learnings at at Salesforce and more specifically at at Slack? [00:05:59] S0: Both amazing companies. So Salesforce, big tech company, Slack, midsize company. So I got a I got a, you know, a feel of both environments. But Salesforce, I got my accelerated MBA on how to run a business. How to be a sales leader, like how to do operational excellence, how to run a business. And then Slack was more, you know, how do you scale? How you scale up? And I was also responsible for helping integrate Slack into Salesforce because Salesforce acquired Slack. So how to like, how to manage like cultures, like merging cultures and managing people and getting people inspired to be part of a bigger company, which is a different motion. But I learned a lot from both places that have really helped me in my current role today at Sierra. But just really understanding how to run a business, you know, operational rigor, operational excellence, you know, inspirational leadership, all those things that made me successful today. I took a lot from Salesforce and Slack. [00:06:58] S1: So in the day to day, like, what's for you like an inspirational leader? Like, what are the the specific things that you can, I don't know, like, start doing to become an Inspire leader? It's a
00:06:58 · Guillaume Moubeche, Reggie Marable
[00:06:58] S1: So in the day to day, like, what's for you like an inspirational leader? Like, what are the the specific things that you can, I don't know, like, start doing to become an Inspire leader? It's a [00:07:12] S0: good question. It's it's gotta come from within. So the first thing is the way I approach leadership, my mentality is, you know, servant leadership. And I I love this quote from doctor Martin Luther King Jr. Life's most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others? So putting people first and then also, always trying to figure out connect to people's why. Like, why do they wake up every day? What's motivating them? What's inspiring them? And then it's my responsibility to create a very safe, transparent environment where people can bring their authentic selves to work. And then if I'm connected to their why and I'm leading from the front, I'm getting my hands dirty and I believe this, I would never ask someone to do something I wouldn't do myself. I've carried a bag. I've been a first line leader, a second line leader. I've done pretty much all the roles to be successful in a go to market operation. So I'm willing to lead from the front. I'm willing to work my ass off, work incredibly hard, set the example, get my hands dirty. And, I think if you do all of those things, people get inspired by you. And I and I always go back to this Brian Tracy quote, be the kind of leader that people would follow you regardless if you had a title or a position. And that's kind of how I think about, like, inspirational leadership.