Pete Crosby is Chair of the Manchester Revenue Collective, founding member of the London Revenue Collective, and non-exec at Kluster, a revenue analytics platform.

Previously Pete led revenue growth at Ometria and Triptease – 2 successful B2B SaaS scaleups – and he drove commercial operations at Viadeo from Series A to IPO.

In a candid discussion, we explored:

DIVERSITY

• “Leaders should lead – even when it’s difficult to do so”
• Diversity is one of the tough challenges business leaders are failing to tackle
• Putting a black square on your linkedin profile does not demonstrate you’re dealing with diversity challenges!
• The “Unbiased Playbook” is a comprehensive diversity hiring playbook recently launched by the Revenue Collective
• The playbook suggests, for example, that you need to “pump prime it early on” to encourage people of diverse backgrounds to come and work for your business

CEO FAILINGS WITH SALES LEADERSHIP HIRING DECISIONS

• Founders and CEOs are advised by VCs and “well-meaning but stupid books” that you should hire someone to lead revenue for 18 months then get rid of them
• When sales are not happening – as company leaders and investors expect – they focus on the symptom not the cause
• The underlying problem is typically product or positioning – firing your sales leader will not resolve this
• Few CEOs understand the differences between the tactical leadership you get with a VP Sales and the strategic leadership you get with a CRO – and when and why you should hire either profile

For more information on the Revenue Collective check out https://www.revenuecollective.com