March 30, 2025 • 27 mins
In part 1, Matt Milligan, co-founder of Uhubs, discusses the importance of assessing and benchmarking sales team capabilities to drive performance. He shares insights on the significance of combining technology and consulting services for meaningful business transformation. Matt also highlights the value of having mentors and coaches in both professional and personal development, drawing parallels between business and sports. The conversation touches on the challenges of scaling sales teams and the need for a data-driven approach to performance management.
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Episode Transcript
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Matt Best (00:00):
Hello. Welcome to the growth workshop podcast with
(00:02):
myself, Matt Best and JonnyAdams. Today, we're joined by
Matt Milligan from Uhubs andUhubs are a capability platform.
They help you assess andbenchmark and measure on a long
term basis the capabilities ofyour sales organization. So
Matt, thank you so much forjoining us today on the Growth
Workshop Podcast. It's fantasticto have you here. Jonny and I
were talking just this morningabout what interesting questions
(00:24):
we could ask our guests.
Jonny Adams (00:25):
And the question today is, if you could choose
two people to be on yourpersonal board of advisors, who
would they be and why? And thesepeople could be people who have
now passed these could be peoplewho are celebrities. You don't
know who would those two peoplebe for you?
Matt Milligan (00:39):
So I'm gonna go with is a little bit cliche.
I've read quite a few of hisbooks and recently re engaged
with some of his content. Andhe's just got so many, so much
wisdom. Tony Robbins, love theguy's energy, just love like the
back story. I think he's feedinglike 30 million people a year.
He's known as kind of like acoach to the rich and famous and
(01:01):
very big in that kind of selfhelp world, which, if that's
your cup of tea, that's your cupof tea. But if you kind of look
between the fluff, the guy'sjust full of wisdom, and he's so
cool, headed and calm, and heruns 120 businesses now, and he
feeds 30 million people a year.So I think just spending 30
minutes with that guy, you'regonna get a lot of value. So
(01:22):
that would definitely be benumber one. The second one's bit
of a niche one, but I played alot of golf growing up, so I
played a bit of professionalgolf, and one of my mentors
growing up was a guy called Robwatts, who was my golf coach.
And Rob and I still stay intouch today. He's a legendary
guy, but the coolest head out ofanyone I've ever met business
(01:44):
sport. So he coaches the Englandgolf team. He does a lot of
work. He was Darren Clark'scoach. The guy is so good with
psychology and performancepsychology, and I'd benefit
probably more from him. Neveractually told him this until
now, yeah, but just in terms of,you know, things like creating
containers around your emotionsand being able to develop a high
performance mindset resilience.You know, he taught me a lot
(02:07):
from a young age. So gotta getRob in there.
Jonny Adams (02:09):
I love that. I think if people see when we ask
that question, whenever we get aresponse, you know, the first or
second, one of my eyebrows golike that, and depending on the
first I'm like, oh, that's aninteresting one. I reckon you
could have a pretty good nightout with Tony Robbins and Rob.
Matt Best (02:24):
Nice. I think that's when you're talking about golf
coaches. I was thinking about itin the context of the full swing
on on Netflix. Yeah, you look atsome of those. I forget the name
of the player, but one of theplayers was talking about not
having a coach, and the impact,and then just actually the
importance of that. We obviouslytalk a lot about the importance
of coaching, yeah, working withleadership teams and and that
(02:45):
everybody needs to, you know,everybody needs a coach, but how
impactful a coach can be? And Ithink, like so many times,
leaders are saying, well, Idon't need to, you know, I'm not
the very best of that. How couldI possibly be a good coach in
that context? It's just kind ofrecognizing, right? I'm sure Rob
wasn't the greatest of probablynot as good as Dan Clark when he
was coaching him. So that'sokay. It's the other things
(03:06):
outside of it, like you said,like containerizing your your
thoughts and controllingyourself talk when you stood
over a part on the 18th green onthe last day and thinking, this
needs to go in for me to be ableto pay my mortgage.
Matt Milligan (03:18):
Exactly. Yeah, it's huge, and I'm sure we'll
dive a bit deeper into that. Butlike the world of professional
sport, I think there is so muchcrossover between business, and
I think business can learn somuch about performance and high
performance from the world ofsport, but it's also things.
It's not any mindset and thepsychology side of things. It's
things about structure andprocess and routine, you know,
(03:40):
and the importance of your preshop routine and nailing that
down and that like there's somuch that we could go into but,
but I've learned, I reckon I'velearned, hands down more on the
golf course about business andlife than I have in any lecture
theater or event.
Matt Best (03:56):
I'm snipping that and sharing it with my wife.
Jonny Adams (03:59):
Okay, well, let's get into the meat of it. Matt,
so I mean, we've known eachother for a number of years now.
You know SBR? Well, you know alot of the colleagues at SBR,
and I love your background inyour career, and now what you're
doing at Uhubs, it's fantasticfor the audience out there that
are listening to today. If youcould share a little bit about
(04:20):
the story or journey, maybe evenlike the founders story. As you
are a founder yourself, you andyour co founder are building,
and have been building, afantastic piece of technology
that we all advocate for. SBR,so yeah, tell the audience a
little bit about you.
Matt Milligan (04:33):
Yeah, I'll try and keep it brief and not too
much of a backstory. But grew upin a, you know, really loving
home, South African parents. Sokind of first generation
immigrant, if you like, grew upin a very competitive household,
sport mad. My dad was a formerrugby player, yes, but sport
fanatic from a very young age.But was always, always kind of
hustling, always, you know,scheming, selling things from a
(04:55):
young age. So my first job wasat 13, was Caddying at
Sunningdale Golf Club. We get 25quid for 18 holes as a junior.
And then I remember, I think mysecond job was Caddying in the
group behind Ant and Dec in theITV golf day. And I was just
there, like 13 I was like, Thisis amazing. And I get paid for
this, and I love golf. So thatwas great.
Jonny Adams (05:16):
Was there any type of, like, countries of people or
so, was it Americans when theycame over, you'd get the best
tips. Or was it like the Britswere the worst?
Matt Milligan (05:24):
You know, the Brits are the worst, allergic to
tips. But I was obviously youngat the time, and I was jumping
on the train to Sunningdale, soI would I became quite
proficient at bunking the train,and the one day I rocked up, and
course, was packed. Caddy Shackwas empty, and Vince comes up to
me at 8am and he goes, Milligan,it's your lucky day. I go, well,
(05:46):
where's that? Vince? And hegoes, just had a cancelation.
One of the caddies is sick, soyou've got an adult rate for 36
holes with a buggy. And it wasAmerican guys, so I'm just
there. Oh my god, this isamazing. So all I did was drive
the buggy around for 36 holes ina glorious summer day. And
instead of getting the 25 I'mtrying to remember now, I think
(06:07):
the adult rate was 60. So I got120 cash, and then he gave me
100 quid tip in 50 pound notes.And at 13 years of age, like
this is like the most money I'veever held. And the ticket lady
at Sunningdale, pretty sure sheknew that I used to bunk the
train, but that day, I rocked upto her with a big smile on my
face, and I put down a 50 poundnote. I said, I'll have a first
(06:29):
class seat.
Jonny Adams (06:30):
I love it.
Matt Milligan (06:32):
So that was like the, you know, the introduction,
really, I guess, to sales, andyou're constantly selling your
services. And, you know, you're,you're approaching members and
pitching them, if you can walktheir dog for five pounds. So
you just pick up little things.And then obviously, being in
that environment, you get tolearn. Because most of the
members are, by default,successful, you know, in the
business world, and you're justthere as a sponge for four hours
(06:55):
a day, absorbing all thisinformation about these guys,
talking about deals that they'reclosing and how it works. And I
just became fascinated with thatside of it. So that was the kind
of first, I guess, where mypassion for for business and
sales and deals came about. Ifound it exciting.
Jonny Adams (07:10):
And then, you know, the time that we spent together
and the mutual clients thatwe've got between Uhubs and SBR,
one thing that I love workingwith you and the team loves
working with you is because youhave a consultative background.
So, so you once at EY, if I'mnot mistaken, yeah, what's the
type of role you were doingthere?
Matt Milligan (07:25):
Terrible employee.
Jonny Adams (07:29):
That's why you're your own boss now, right?
Matt Milligan (07:31):
So roundabout way, ended up went at South
Africa, and then came back tothe UK, and my mom was sat me
down, and she was like, you haveto get a proper job by this
point. So that's how I managedto get into EY. Was through a
bit of a connection through thegolf course, one of the partners
at EY and I managed to work myass off and get through the
assessment process to get in.Started off in tax, in the
(07:52):
reading office, and lasted abouta week. Completely hated it, but
managed to network with aconsulting partner, which
sounded more interesting. So Iended up kind of it was really
awkward, but I fired my managerafter a week, I had to go up to
her, and I prepared a littlespeech down. I was like, I'm
changing my internship, and I'mnot going to be in tax anymore.
(08:13):
And she was like, What do youmean? I was like, I've networked
with the partner over there, andhe's going to send me to the BBC
to do a consulting project. Andshe was like, what? So that was
the end of my tax career, lastof the week. And then went into
went into consulting, and, yeah,ended up at an E wise
transformation team. So doingstrategy consulting, spent a lot
of time on go to market. So Ithink one of the early projects
I did was a CRM Salesforceimplementation, a big energy
(08:35):
company. So that was like ninemonths of just brutal 100 hour
weeks with meeting rooms with nonatural light, trying to
migrate, you know, they wererunning off some really old
sebul system onto ontoSalesforce, cloud based system.
So look like really greateducation, I guess. And the UI
network was really valuable. Butthen I got into the startup side
(08:56):
of things, because I still hadthis kind of hunger to build
businesses. And lots of my mateswere building companies. So that
started the idea for somethingcalled the EY Startup network.
So that was just like aninitiative that I set up side of
desk, and I went to one of thepartners I was working with, guy
called Mark Hutchinson, who'snow an investor in you hubs. And
I said, Mark, I got this idea. Ithink there's a huge opportunity
(09:19):
for EY to tap into startups anduse them in the projects that
we're running. And that was kindof like a business idea born, I
guess so. Mark said, All right,I'll protect you. You've got six
months. So that meant I couldget off chargeable work for six
months to try and build thisthing. And yeah, and then we
ended up building an internalventure, if you like. So I've
built the startup network, andthen they actually hired an
(09:41):
external partner to come in fromthe US, a guy called Rich Gould,
is a big mentor of mine. And wegrew. We turned what was the
startup network into somethingmuch bigger, which was e wise,
fast growth platform, and that'stheir service offering for scale
ups in in Europe. So so thatthen gave me this business, and
I seconded to E. By sevenbecause they had to get me off
(10:02):
the books, basically because itwasn't technically chargeable.
So, yeah, that was theconsulting side of things.
Pretty unorthodox journey, Ithink.
Jonny Adams (10:09):
And then what's the bridge between there to now
Uhubs? Like, when did you startUhubs? And maybe even a little
bit about what Uhubs is, justfor those that are not entirely
sure, be great.
Matt Milligan (10:19):
Yeah, happily. So we'll comment to UHubs in a sec.
But I think the journey of howwe got there was many of our
customer base in that fastgrowth environment were VC or
private equity backedbusinesses. We're talking here
sort of 2015, onwards. So wewere starting to enter that kind
of SaaS boom. So we were doing alot of work with B to B software
companies, particularly helpingthem scale into the US and doing
(10:42):
their legal, doing theircorporate finance advisory, and
then doing go to markettransformation as well. And the
biggest challenge for prettymuch every CEO that we were
working with at the time wasI've hired a bunch of
salespeople because my investorshave told me I have to, and only
15, 20% of them are hittingtarget. So I was like, This is
nuts, because I'm watching theinvestors pour their money into
(11:05):
these businesses, hire theseteams when the existing teams,
you know, only a handful of themare hitting target, and so the
capacity model is justcompletely off. And I'm watching
these businesses kind of crashand burn because they're hiring
way too quickly and they have noability to enable, you know,
predictable performance acrossthe team. So I sort of Lent into
(11:27):
that problem. I was like, thisis like a massive problem for
these businesses. And aroundabout that time, I met my co
founder, Ash, who was the firstmarketing director at just eat.
So ash had taken a bit of timeout, done some engine investing,
and have written a book, and Igot ash to do a couple of
speaking slots at UI for thestart of network. And mentor
found, you know, found amentoring and ash took this
(11:48):
problem to ash. And I said, youknow, seeing this crazy problem
in the market with sales teams.And he pitched back to me his
philosophy around his book,which is called the unfair
advantage. And he says, Youknow, I think a really big part
of this is skill development,because you think about the
sales career is notprofessionalized in the way many
other careers are. He says,there's a massive opportunity
for you know us to help salesprofessionals understand their
(12:10):
unfair advantages and how theycan become more competent and
and that led us down this pathof this vision of creating a
business that could help solvethis problem. A few pivots along
the way in terms of how we'vegot there, but the visions
always stayed the same. It'sabout turning potential into
performance. You know, it'sabout helping people realize
their potential. Long way ofsaying but what we do at you
(12:32):
hubs is is exactly that, like wespecialize in helping people
realize their potential, and wedo that through assessing and
benchmarking capabilities ofteams. So helping Chief Revenue
officers, chief sales officers,answer the question, what does
good look like in myorganization? Because
fundamentally that if you can'tanswer that question, then you
(12:54):
cannot hire the right profile.You definitely cannot replicate
or get close to good if youdon't actually understand what
it looks like in the firstplace. So we see that as you
know, the core problem thatneeds to be solved.
Jonny Adams (13:07):
And it's really, really helpful that you know,
hearing your your founder storyin the background and the
journey that you've been on. I'mnot a founder, right? And I
think that there's a bone withinme that I really want to be one
day, and I don't know whoever Iwill be, but it strikes me as
quite a lonely environment. Andmaybe that's why you've got a co
founder in ash. But I wouldimagine that there are elements
(13:27):
that are really challenging toyou as a founder, being
vulnerable, and vulnerability isa really important part. Could
you describe a really vulnerablemoment that you have had as a
founder over the number ofyears?
Matt Milligan (13:38):
Yeah, totally hands down. The standout example
of this, and it's front of mindbecause I was talking about it
over dinner last night with withmy co founder and our partners,
we got off to a really goodstart with the business early
days. 2022 we got some reallygood traction. We were building
out this amazing vision for, youknow, assess the world's sales
capability, and the VC marketwas still pretty hot back then.
(14:00):
So we were, you know, burningcash. We were, you know, we'd
raised some money prior to that,but we had attracted the
interest of some big, big VCs inhere and the US. So we went on a
fundraising process, whichstarted in September 2022, we
had six months of runway, whichis pretty normal for a startup.
So six months of cash left tosustain the business, if you
(14:20):
like. And we went out to the US.We did a brief sort of tour of
duty over there. We came backwith a term sheet, which is an
offer of investment from a VC.And then we met with heaps more
in Europe. And the market wasstill running hot in the summer
of 2022 so we ended up, withinabout three weeks, we had three
(14:42):
term sheets, which and we werelike, Oh, this is amazing. Like,
great, you know. And these weresignificant offers for us at the
time. So, you know, we'retalking multiple millions here
of investment, two to 3 million.And it was a kind of crazy,
crazy turn of events. So what?Then happened, if you cast your
mind back to q4 2022, was thesoftware mark. Well, the
(15:04):
software markets, the globalmarkets, tanked, the bubble
popped, the bubble burst, andovernight, one of the investors
pulled the term sheet, and theywere like, we're we're not sure
about the market environment.We're holding off valuations of
tumbling. We're out. So we'reokay, fine. So then it was two
of them, and we'd alreadystarted sort of initial due
diligence with both of thoseinvestment firms. And one of
(15:29):
them, we did a tech audit, sothey even got access to our code
base and saw what we had builtso far as a v1 then turned
around to us and said, Ah, we'reout, because one of our
portfolio companies is pivotinginto your space. And we were
like, Ah, well, you'veliterally, we've literally just
opened up the hood and taken youthrough everything that we
built. So yeah, that wasn'tgreat. And then the worst bit
(15:52):
about all of this was that thethird VC then found out through
the market that they were theonly horse in the race, so they
had us over a barrel. Yeah. Andby this point. So the process is
starting, say, August, threeterm sheets in September, and
this basically was capitulatingas around in October, and then
it was like week by week, justeverything got worse and worse.
The news headlines were gettingworse and worse. The valuation
(16:14):
our term sheet kept dropping,and then the investor kept
adding all of these crazy termsthat, like, I've been around the
startup world quite a bit withmy previous world, you know,
role never even heard of some ofthis stuff, right? So it was
like mandatory board seats plusan observer. So then you've got
two people on our board, whichis not standard at that stage.
We basically ended up gettingall the way to November, and we
had gone from like having anamazing business that was
(16:36):
growing and a huge opportunity,but then you've taken three or
four months out of yourbusiness. So growth has gone
like this because with we werefounder led sales, so we're busy
doing DD with investors. We'renot spending the focus on sales
like we should be. So then yourbusiness is going down and
you're running out of money. Sowe ended up in a situation where
(16:56):
we basically had a month'srunway and one awful term sheet
on the table, and despair,really. And coupled with, you
know, ashes, had some familyemergencies at the time, so I
was basically, like, on my own,grappling with the situation and
fate, staring into oblivion.And, yeah, we had like, 15
(17:16):
employees at the time, and I wasthinking, this is, you know,
this is existential. Yeah, thatwas the difficult moment for
sure.
Jonny Adams (17:23):
Yeah, lessons learned, though. Like, what was
that one lesson learned fromthat? I mean, we could make our
assumptions as we're listening,but what's the one thing that
you would do differently movingforward?
Matt Milligan (17:32):
Well, I think the big takeaway is that the
business only dies if you if itsounds stupid to say that
actually, because there arethings out of your control, for
sure, but most of startups diewhen the founder gives up. I do
genuinely believe that, because,like, even as bad as things were
there, I could have easily justjacked it in. Be like, you know
what we're done? Like, let'sjust wrap it up and, you know,
(17:54):
take, take a break and go to thenext one. The mindset, yeah,
just, just bite down on the gumshield and be like, this is just
a problem that has to be solved.What's, what's an essential
solution? So, you know, in thatinstance, I ended up going and
getting the train up toSheffield, going to our previous
lead investor, and organized anin person meeting, and I put, I
printed out the term sheet, allthese awful terms, and I put it
on the table, so a board memberat the time, and I said, we've
(18:17):
been in the market for fourmonths. Huge distraction
fundraising. We've been throughhell with this investment around
this is the best offer we'vegot. Do you want to protect your
investment? And then they wentthrough the thing and they came
back like a day later, calledme, the CEO called me, and he
was like, don't take that deal.We'll give you some money. All
Jonny Adams (18:35):
Well, that journey itself, it'd be good to dig into
right.
maybe some of the successes andthe challenges you've got,
because I'm sure there's a few.
Matt Milligan (18:45):
Have we got enough time for them?
Jonny Adams (18:47):
That laugh just tells me there's a few in there.
My background. And I wasthinking about this this
morning, as I knew we weremeeting you, and I when I was
18, I wasn't too sure what Iwanted to do. I was fortunate
enough to be given theopportunity to become a European
licensed coach. And we weretaught by a international coach
at the time. So I thought, Youknow what, I'm going to be the
(19:08):
next England football coach,right? Absolutely buzzing for
it. And I've got a philosophyaround coaching. You know, the
output of the one nil victory orthe two one loss is not, you
know, there's a byproduct of theinputs that go into the team.
And when I was coaching an 11aside team, you had to go
through transitioning the teamthroughout the game. Yeah, talk
about transitions. Now you hadto move from a 442, formation to
(19:29):
a five back, five, etc, three inthe middle and two up front.
Here we go, getting right intothe detail. But I was used to
look at the team and break themdown into components. So that
person would be really skillful,or that person would be a great
person who was great at heading.Is that? How you see, you know,
a sales function, do you breakthem down into different
(19:50):
functions? Or how does that workin your head? You know, UHubs?
Matt Milligan (19:53):
Yeah, totally. So there's a really good book by a
guy called Jim Collins calledGood to Great. So one of. The
key principles of successful orendearing, enduring rather
businesses, is he talks about,you have to figure out how to
get the right people on the busand get them sitting in the
right seats. So, you know, touse a football analogy, we talk
(20:15):
about something similar, but wesay, figure out how you get the
right players on the pitch andget them in the right positions.
And like speaking to CROs everyday, you know, particularly the
ones that are new to role.That's kind of like priority
number one. You know, onceyou've done your your Tam and
ICP definition, it's like, thenwhat the hell have I inherited
here? You know, how do we figureout we how we optimize that
(20:37):
team? So, so, yes, absolutely.And then you think about how you
you break that down so you havean organization that you inherit
often, in particularly privateequity businesses, right? How do
you then understand, Okay, whereis everybody, what levels are we
talking about, and whatcharacteristics, attributes,
(20:58):
capabilities that they possess,once you've got that initial
baseline, the next step we findis then you can start thinking
about role definition, becausethen once you understand what
you're working with, you canstart to think about, okay, in
order for us to get to thenumber that we need to hit in
the next 1224, months, we'regoing to need x percent to come
(21:19):
from new business. We're goingto need x percent to come from
expansion. We're going to needto maintain this NRR to get
there. So then you startthinking about specialism. So
that might be new business salesroles, so you might have an
account executive or even anoutbound so I think a big part
of going on that journey is stepone, like baseline, what you
(21:41):
have? Step two, start thinkingabout that operating model and
that role definition. And thenstep three, once you understand
what good looks like in each ofthose roles and where those
because every organization, Imean, otherwise you wouldn't be
around as an organization haspockets of excellence, has
pockets of brilliance, that wow,there's something really working
there. You know, like this rephas smashed out the park for
(22:03):
eight quarters in a row. Whatthe hell is it? Yeah, these reps
are doing, yeah, that the othersthat the others aren't. And I'll
just carry out that with animportant point, I think, which
is not to say that there's oneprofile for success, and it's
not to say that we're trying tocreate a cookie cutter factory
of undiverse teams. I thinkeveryone has superpowers, and
(22:25):
everyone has unique superpowers.And some sales people are
amazing prospectors, and they'rejust pipeline machines, and
they've always got amazingpipeline coverage. Others are a
little bit more lone wolfy andare, you know, a bit more
Maverick, and they're justreally good closes. So, but what
it's about is, it's aboutidentifying what are those macro
behaviors that are workingacross the board? Because if you
(22:48):
don't directionally understandthat, then, then you're lost,
you know, then, like we'retalking about, you can't go
back, and you can't hire theright capability, and then you
can't run performance managementeffectively, and you definitely
can't invest in the rightenablement and training and
resources that focuses onbuilding capability in the right
areas.
Matt Best (23:04):
Just going to ask, because I think one thing I find
really interesting there, Matt,is you talk about looking at
what you've got right now in theteam. Because some people were
thinking, Well, you might have80% rubbish, 20% good. So is
there an argument actually, fornot building around what's
currently there, but insteadbuilding around what the future
should look like, how does Imean, of course, one informs the
(23:26):
other in different directions.Or what have you seen working
with the businesses that youwork with as the as a sort of
good balance? Or is there nosuch thing, and it just really
depends on where the businessis?
Matt Milligan (23:37):
It's a great question, really good question.
And we haven't even come on totalk about AI yet, because AI
fundamentally rethinks this forevery single organization, is
the viewpoint that I'm forming.But just to park that for a
second, I think something thatis really important is
benchmarking organizations cantend to be very insular. Most of
the ones that we've had thepleasure of working with would
probably admit that in thebeginning. So this is where the
(23:58):
power of being able to actuallybenchmark externally as well as
internally, is really, reallyimportant. And our bigger vision
as a business at you hubs is wewant to create a global standard
for sales capability. We wantpeople to take their Uhubs
profile with them on theircareer journey in a number of
(24:18):
different organizations thatthey work at, and that becomes
the de facto standard for howyou assess the true capabilities
of someone. So that goes to saythat we're building a pretty
sizable benchmarking data set aswe go on this journey of
building the business and beingable to where we start now,
which is focusing very heavilyon private equity backed B to B
businesses. Mostly means that wecan go really deep on the
(24:42):
profiles that are working forother organizations that have
similar deal sizes, similarsales cycle lengths, are selling
to similar industry verticals,and then you can start borrowing
those insights and ideas foryour own organization.
Matt Best (24:55):
I think that's fascinating. And so many
organizations are looking outthere for Okay, well, what are
our competitors? Still not evenwhat our competitors doing. But
what does good look like? Jonny,you and I were talking at a
recent an event recently focusedin a particular area of
financial services, and talkingactually about some of the
things or I was sharing withsome of that group, some of the
learnings that I'd had from atechnology background when it
(25:15):
came to client engagement andmeasuring customer satisfaction,
of which, you know, tech firmshave tended to be quite towards
a sort of front, you know,bleeding edge of that when it
comes to sort of compared toother industries. And, you know,
there's an experienced group ofleaders in this room, and a lot
of light bulbs firing off aroundthe room being like, I hadn't
thought about that, or we don'treally look at that. And I
(25:38):
think, like, that's aninteresting perspective, as well
as taking this, okay, what aresales that like in in a in a
SaaS world, versus what a saleslook like in a consulting world
versus what a sales look like ina, you know, B to C versus B to
B. There's so much of thatcomplexity like so I guess
there's, it's probably not onebenchmark. It's a range of
benchmarks that come togetherthat can inform the direction.
Matt Milligan (26:02):
Totally, yeah, and the lines are getting
massively blurred. I've got achief revenue officer of 100
million ARR software businessthat we're working with at the
moment. His big emphasis rightnow is hiring management
consultants. He's an exconsultant himself. He's an ex
McKinsey guy, but he isrecognized that in the current
environment, they're sellingbigger ticket items. He's found
(26:22):
that the ramp time is shorter ifhe brings in management
consultants and up skills themon the commercial skill set,
rather than trying to takecommercial sales people and
upskill them on the consultingsolution sale skill set, which
is super interesting, I think.
Matt Best (26:36):
Matt, let's take a pause right there, and to
everyone listening, join us forpart two as we continue this
conversation.
Hello. Welcome to the growth workshop podcast with
(00:02):
myself, Matt Best and JonnyAdams. Today, we're joined by
Matt Milligan from Uhubs andUhubs are a capability platform.
They help you assess andbenchmark and measure on a long
term basis the capabilities ofyour sales organization. So
Matt, thank you so much forjoining us today on the Growth
Workshop Podcast. It's fantasticto have you here. Jonny and I
were talking just this morningabout what interesting questions
(00:24):
we could ask our guests.
Jonny Adams (00:25):
And the question today is, if you could choose
two people to be on yourpersonal board of advisors, who
would they be and why? And thesepeople could be people who have
now passed these could be peoplewho are celebrities. You don't
know who would those two peoplebe for you?
Matt Milligan (00:39):
So I'm gonna go with is a little bit cliche.
I've read quite a few of hisbooks and recently re engaged
with some of his content. Andhe's just got so many, so much
wisdom. Tony Robbins, love theguy's energy, just love like the
back story. I think he's feedinglike 30 million people a year.
He's known as kind of like acoach to the rich and famous and
(01:01):
very big in that kind of selfhelp world, which, if that's
your cup of tea, that's your cupof tea. But if you kind of look
between the fluff, the guy'sjust full of wisdom, and he's so
cool, headed and calm, and heruns 120 businesses now, and he
feeds 30 million people a year.So I think just spending 30
minutes with that guy, you'regonna get a lot of value. So
(01:22):
that would definitely be benumber one. The second one's bit
of a niche one, but I played alot of golf growing up, so I
played a bit of professionalgolf, and one of my mentors
growing up was a guy called Robwatts, who was my golf coach.
And Rob and I still stay intouch today. He's a legendary
guy, but the coolest head out ofanyone I've ever met business
(01:44):
sport. So he coaches the Englandgolf team. He does a lot of
work. He was Darren Clark'scoach. The guy is so good with
psychology and performancepsychology, and I'd benefit
probably more from him. Neveractually told him this until
now, yeah, but just in terms of,you know, things like creating
containers around your emotionsand being able to develop a high
performance mindset resilience.You know, he taught me a lot
(02:07):
from a young age. So gotta getRob in there.
Jonny Adams (02:09):
I love that. I think if people see when we ask
that question, whenever we get aresponse, you know, the first or
second, one of my eyebrows golike that, and depending on the
first I'm like, oh, that's aninteresting one. I reckon you
could have a pretty good nightout with Tony Robbins and Rob.
Matt Best (02:24):
Nice. I think that's when you're talking about golf
coaches. I was thinking about itin the context of the full swing
on on Netflix. Yeah, you look atsome of those. I forget the name
of the player, but one of theplayers was talking about not
having a coach, and the impact,and then just actually the
importance of that. We obviouslytalk a lot about the importance
of coaching, yeah, working withleadership teams and and that
(02:45):
everybody needs to, you know,everybody needs a coach, but how
impactful a coach can be? And Ithink, like so many times,
leaders are saying, well, Idon't need to, you know, I'm not
the very best of that. How couldI possibly be a good coach in
that context? It's just kind ofrecognizing, right? I'm sure Rob
wasn't the greatest of probablynot as good as Dan Clark when he
was coaching him. So that'sokay. It's the other things
(03:06):
outside of it, like you said,like containerizing your your
thoughts and controllingyourself talk when you stood
over a part on the 18th green onthe last day and thinking, this
needs to go in for me to be ableto pay my mortgage.
Matt Milligan (03:18):
Exactly. Yeah, it's huge, and I'm sure we'll
dive a bit deeper into that. Butlike the world of professional
sport, I think there is so muchcrossover between business, and
I think business can learn somuch about performance and high
performance from the world ofsport, but it's also things.
It's not any mindset and thepsychology side of things. It's
things about structure andprocess and routine, you know,
(03:40):
and the importance of your preshop routine and nailing that
down and that like there's somuch that we could go into but,
but I've learned, I reckon I'velearned, hands down more on the
golf course about business andlife than I have in any lecture
theater or event.
Matt Best (03:56):
I'm snipping that and sharing it with my wife.
Jonny Adams (03:59):
Okay, well, let's get into the meat of it. Matt,
so I mean, we've known eachother for a number of years now.
You know SBR? Well, you know alot of the colleagues at SBR,
and I love your background inyour career, and now what you're
doing at Uhubs, it's fantasticfor the audience out there that
are listening to today. If youcould share a little bit about
(04:20):
the story or journey, maybe evenlike the founders story. As you
are a founder yourself, you andyour co founder are building,
and have been building, afantastic piece of technology
that we all advocate for. SBR,so yeah, tell the audience a
little bit about you.
Matt Milligan (04:33):
Yeah, I'll try and keep it brief and not too
much of a backstory. But grew upin a, you know, really loving
home, South African parents. Sokind of first generation
immigrant, if you like, grew upin a very competitive household,
sport mad. My dad was a formerrugby player, yes, but sport
fanatic from a very young age.But was always, always kind of
hustling, always, you know,scheming, selling things from a
(04:55):
young age. So my first job wasat 13, was Caddying at
Sunningdale Golf Club. We get 25quid for 18 holes as a junior.
And then I remember, I think mysecond job was Caddying in the
group behind Ant and Dec in theITV golf day. And I was just
there, like 13 I was like, Thisis amazing. And I get paid for
this, and I love golf. So thatwas great.
Jonny Adams (05:16):
Was there any type of, like, countries of people or
so, was it Americans when theycame over, you'd get the best
tips. Or was it like the Britswere the worst?
Matt Milligan (05:24):
You know, the Brits are the worst, allergic to
tips. But I was obviously youngat the time, and I was jumping
on the train to Sunningdale, soI would I became quite
proficient at bunking the train,and the one day I rocked up, and
course, was packed. Caddy Shackwas empty, and Vince comes up to
me at 8am and he goes, Milligan,it's your lucky day. I go, well,
(05:46):
where's that? Vince? And hegoes, just had a cancelation.
One of the caddies is sick, soyou've got an adult rate for 36
holes with a buggy. And it wasAmerican guys, so I'm just
there. Oh my god, this isamazing. So all I did was drive
the buggy around for 36 holes ina glorious summer day. And
instead of getting the 25 I'mtrying to remember now, I think
(06:07):
the adult rate was 60. So I got120 cash, and then he gave me
100 quid tip in 50 pound notes.And at 13 years of age, like
this is like the most money I'veever held. And the ticket lady
at Sunningdale, pretty sure sheknew that I used to bunk the
train, but that day, I rocked upto her with a big smile on my
face, and I put down a 50 poundnote. I said, I'll have a first
(06:29):
class seat.
Jonny Adams (06:30):
I love it.
Matt Milligan (06:32):
So that was like the, you know, the introduction,
really, I guess, to sales, andyou're constantly selling your
services. And, you know, you're,you're approaching members and
pitching them, if you can walktheir dog for five pounds. So
you just pick up little things.And then obviously, being in
that environment, you get tolearn. Because most of the
members are, by default,successful, you know, in the
business world, and you're justthere as a sponge for four hours
(06:55):
a day, absorbing all thisinformation about these guys,
talking about deals that they'reclosing and how it works. And I
just became fascinated with thatside of it. So that was the kind
of first, I guess, where mypassion for for business and
sales and deals came about. Ifound it exciting.
Jonny Adams (07:10):
And then, you know, the time that we spent together
and the mutual clients thatwe've got between Uhubs and SBR,
one thing that I love workingwith you and the team loves
working with you is because youhave a consultative background.
So, so you once at EY, if I'mnot mistaken, yeah, what's the
type of role you were doingthere?
Matt Milligan (07:25):
Terrible employee.
Jonny Adams (07:29):
That's why you're your own boss now, right?
Matt Milligan (07:31):
So roundabout way, ended up went at South
Africa, and then came back tothe UK, and my mom was sat me
down, and she was like, you haveto get a proper job by this
point. So that's how I managedto get into EY. Was through a
bit of a connection through thegolf course, one of the partners
at EY and I managed to work myass off and get through the
assessment process to get in.Started off in tax, in the
(07:52):
reading office, and lasted abouta week. Completely hated it, but
managed to network with aconsulting partner, which
sounded more interesting. So Iended up kind of it was really
awkward, but I fired my managerafter a week, I had to go up to
her, and I prepared a littlespeech down. I was like, I'm
changing my internship, and I'mnot going to be in tax anymore.
(08:13):
And she was like, What do youmean? I was like, I've networked
with the partner over there, andhe's going to send me to the BBC
to do a consulting project. Andshe was like, what? So that was
the end of my tax career, lastof the week. And then went into
went into consulting, and, yeah,ended up at an E wise
transformation team. So doingstrategy consulting, spent a lot
of time on go to market. So Ithink one of the early projects
I did was a CRM Salesforceimplementation, a big energy
(08:35):
company. So that was like ninemonths of just brutal 100 hour
weeks with meeting rooms with nonatural light, trying to
migrate, you know, they wererunning off some really old
sebul system onto ontoSalesforce, cloud based system.
So look like really greateducation, I guess. And the UI
network was really valuable. Butthen I got into the startup side
(08:56):
of things, because I still hadthis kind of hunger to build
businesses. And lots of my mateswere building companies. So that
started the idea for somethingcalled the EY Startup network.
So that was just like aninitiative that I set up side of
desk, and I went to one of thepartners I was working with, guy
called Mark Hutchinson, who'snow an investor in you hubs. And
I said, Mark, I got this idea. Ithink there's a huge opportunity
(09:19):
for EY to tap into startups anduse them in the projects that
we're running. And that was kindof like a business idea born, I
guess so. Mark said, All right,I'll protect you. You've got six
months. So that meant I couldget off chargeable work for six
months to try and build thisthing. And yeah, and then we
ended up building an internalventure, if you like. So I've
built the startup network, andthen they actually hired an
(09:41):
external partner to come in fromthe US, a guy called Rich Gould,
is a big mentor of mine. And wegrew. We turned what was the
startup network into somethingmuch bigger, which was e wise,
fast growth platform, and that'stheir service offering for scale
ups in in Europe. So so thatthen gave me this business, and
I seconded to E. By sevenbecause they had to get me off
(10:02):
the books, basically because itwasn't technically chargeable.
So, yeah, that was theconsulting side of things.
Pretty unorthodox journey, Ithink.
Jonny Adams (10:09):
And then what's the bridge between there to now
Uhubs? Like, when did you startUhubs? And maybe even a little
bit about what Uhubs is, justfor those that are not entirely
sure, be great.
Matt Milligan (10:19):
Yeah, happily. So we'll comment to UHubs in a sec.
But I think the journey of howwe got there was many of our
customer base in that fastgrowth environment were VC or
private equity backedbusinesses. We're talking here
sort of 2015, onwards. So wewere starting to enter that kind
of SaaS boom. So we were doing alot of work with B to B software
companies, particularly helpingthem scale into the US and doing
(10:42):
their legal, doing theircorporate finance advisory, and
then doing go to markettransformation as well. And the
biggest challenge for prettymuch every CEO that we were
working with at the time wasI've hired a bunch of
salespeople because my investorshave told me I have to, and only
15, 20% of them are hittingtarget. So I was like, This is
nuts, because I'm watching theinvestors pour their money into
(11:05):
these businesses, hire theseteams when the existing teams,
you know, only a handful of themare hitting target, and so the
capacity model is justcompletely off. And I'm watching
these businesses kind of crashand burn because they're hiring
way too quickly and they have noability to enable, you know,
predictable performance acrossthe team. So I sort of Lent into
(11:27):
that problem. I was like, thisis like a massive problem for
these businesses. And aroundabout that time, I met my co
founder, Ash, who was the firstmarketing director at just eat.
So ash had taken a bit of timeout, done some engine investing,
and have written a book, and Igot ash to do a couple of
speaking slots at UI for thestart of network. And mentor
found, you know, found amentoring and ash took this
(11:48):
problem to ash. And I said, youknow, seeing this crazy problem
in the market with sales teams.And he pitched back to me his
philosophy around his book,which is called the unfair
advantage. And he says, Youknow, I think a really big part
of this is skill development,because you think about the
sales career is notprofessionalized in the way many
other careers are. He says,there's a massive opportunity
for you know us to help salesprofessionals understand their
(12:10):
unfair advantages and how theycan become more competent and
and that led us down this pathof this vision of creating a
business that could help solvethis problem. A few pivots along
the way in terms of how we'vegot there, but the visions
always stayed the same. It'sabout turning potential into
performance. You know, it'sabout helping people realize
their potential. Long way ofsaying but what we do at you
(12:32):
hubs is is exactly that, like wespecialize in helping people
realize their potential, and wedo that through assessing and
benchmarking capabilities ofteams. So helping Chief Revenue
officers, chief sales officers,answer the question, what does
good look like in myorganization? Because
fundamentally that if you can'tanswer that question, then you
(12:54):
cannot hire the right profile.You definitely cannot replicate
or get close to good if youdon't actually understand what
it looks like in the firstplace. So we see that as you
know, the core problem thatneeds to be solved.
Jonny Adams (13:07):
And it's really, really helpful that you know,
hearing your your founder storyin the background and the
journey that you've been on. I'mnot a founder, right? And I
think that there's a bone withinme that I really want to be one
day, and I don't know whoever Iwill be, but it strikes me as
quite a lonely environment. Andmaybe that's why you've got a co
founder in ash. But I wouldimagine that there are elements
(13:27):
that are really challenging toyou as a founder, being
vulnerable, and vulnerability isa really important part. Could
you describe a really vulnerablemoment that you have had as a
founder over the number ofyears?
Matt Milligan (13:38):
Yeah, totally hands down. The standout example
of this, and it's front of mindbecause I was talking about it
over dinner last night with withmy co founder and our partners,
we got off to a really goodstart with the business early
days. 2022 we got some reallygood traction. We were building
out this amazing vision for, youknow, assess the world's sales
capability, and the VC marketwas still pretty hot back then.
(14:00):
So we were, you know, burningcash. We were, you know, we'd
raised some money prior to that,but we had attracted the
interest of some big, big VCs inhere and the US. So we went on a
fundraising process, whichstarted in September 2022, we
had six months of runway, whichis pretty normal for a startup.
So six months of cash left tosustain the business, if you
(14:20):
like. And we went out to the US.We did a brief sort of tour of
duty over there. We came backwith a term sheet, which is an
offer of investment from a VC.And then we met with heaps more
in Europe. And the market wasstill running hot in the summer
of 2022 so we ended up, withinabout three weeks, we had three
(14:42):
term sheets, which and we werelike, Oh, this is amazing. Like,
great, you know. And these weresignificant offers for us at the
time. So, you know, we'retalking multiple millions here
of investment, two to 3 million.And it was a kind of crazy,
crazy turn of events. So what?Then happened, if you cast your
mind back to q4 2022, was thesoftware mark. Well, the
(15:04):
software markets, the globalmarkets, tanked, the bubble
popped, the bubble burst, andovernight, one of the investors
pulled the term sheet, and theywere like, we're we're not sure
about the market environment.We're holding off valuations of
tumbling. We're out. So we'reokay, fine. So then it was two
of them, and we'd alreadystarted sort of initial due
diligence with both of thoseinvestment firms. And one of
(15:29):
them, we did a tech audit, sothey even got access to our code
base and saw what we had builtso far as a v1 then turned
around to us and said, Ah, we'reout, because one of our
portfolio companies is pivotinginto your space. And we were
like, Ah, well, you'veliterally, we've literally just
opened up the hood and taken youthrough everything that we
built. So yeah, that wasn'tgreat. And then the worst bit
(15:52):
about all of this was that thethird VC then found out through
the market that they were theonly horse in the race, so they
had us over a barrel. Yeah. Andby this point. So the process is
starting, say, August, threeterm sheets in September, and
this basically was capitulatingas around in October, and then
it was like week by week, justeverything got worse and worse.
The news headlines were gettingworse and worse. The valuation
(16:14):
our term sheet kept dropping,and then the investor kept
adding all of these crazy termsthat, like, I've been around the
startup world quite a bit withmy previous world, you know,
role never even heard of some ofthis stuff, right? So it was
like mandatory board seats plusan observer. So then you've got
two people on our board, whichis not standard at that stage.
We basically ended up gettingall the way to November, and we
had gone from like having anamazing business that was
(16:36):
growing and a huge opportunity,but then you've taken three or
four months out of yourbusiness. So growth has gone
like this because with we werefounder led sales, so we're busy
doing DD with investors. We'renot spending the focus on sales
like we should be. So then yourbusiness is going down and
you're running out of money. Sowe ended up in a situation where
(16:56):
we basically had a month'srunway and one awful term sheet
on the table, and despair,really. And coupled with, you
know, ashes, had some familyemergencies at the time, so I
was basically, like, on my own,grappling with the situation and
fate, staring into oblivion.And, yeah, we had like, 15
(17:16):
employees at the time, and I wasthinking, this is, you know,
this is existential. Yeah, thatwas the difficult moment for
sure.
Jonny Adams (17:23):
Yeah, lessons learned, though. Like, what was
that one lesson learned fromthat? I mean, we could make our
assumptions as we're listening,but what's the one thing that
you would do differently movingforward?
Matt Milligan (17:32):
Well, I think the big takeaway is that the
business only dies if you if itsounds stupid to say that
actually, because there arethings out of your control, for
sure, but most of startups diewhen the founder gives up. I do
genuinely believe that, because,like, even as bad as things were
there, I could have easily justjacked it in. Be like, you know
what we're done? Like, let'sjust wrap it up and, you know,
(17:54):
take, take a break and go to thenext one. The mindset, yeah,
just, just bite down on the gumshield and be like, this is just
a problem that has to be solved.What's, what's an essential
solution? So, you know, in thatinstance, I ended up going and
getting the train up toSheffield, going to our previous
lead investor, and organized anin person meeting, and I put, I
printed out the term sheet, allthese awful terms, and I put it
on the table, so a board memberat the time, and I said, we've
(18:17):
been in the market for fourmonths. Huge distraction
fundraising. We've been throughhell with this investment around
this is the best offer we'vegot. Do you want to protect your
investment? And then they wentthrough the thing and they came
back like a day later, calledme, the CEO called me, and he
was like, don't take that deal.We'll give you some money. All
Jonny Adams (18:35):
Well, that journey itself, it'd be good to dig into
right.
maybe some of the successes andthe challenges you've got,
because I'm sure there's a few.
Matt Milligan (18:45):
Have we got enough time for them?
Jonny Adams (18:47):
That laugh just tells me there's a few in there.
My background. And I wasthinking about this this
morning, as I knew we weremeeting you, and I when I was
18, I wasn't too sure what Iwanted to do. I was fortunate
enough to be given theopportunity to become a European
licensed coach. And we weretaught by a international coach
at the time. So I thought, Youknow what, I'm going to be the
(19:08):
next England football coach,right? Absolutely buzzing for
it. And I've got a philosophyaround coaching. You know, the
output of the one nil victory orthe two one loss is not, you
know, there's a byproduct of theinputs that go into the team.
And when I was coaching an 11aside team, you had to go
through transitioning the teamthroughout the game. Yeah, talk
about transitions. Now you hadto move from a 442, formation to
(19:29):
a five back, five, etc, three inthe middle and two up front.
Here we go, getting right intothe detail. But I was used to
look at the team and break themdown into components. So that
person would be really skillful,or that person would be a great
person who was great at heading.Is that? How you see, you know,
a sales function, do you breakthem down into different
(19:50):
functions? Or how does that workin your head? You know, UHubs?
Matt Milligan (19:53):
Yeah, totally. So there's a really good book by a
guy called Jim Collins calledGood to Great. So one of. The
key principles of successful orendearing, enduring rather
businesses, is he talks about,you have to figure out how to
get the right people on the busand get them sitting in the
right seats. So, you know, touse a football analogy, we talk
(20:15):
about something similar, but wesay, figure out how you get the
right players on the pitch andget them in the right positions.
And like speaking to CROs everyday, you know, particularly the
ones that are new to role.That's kind of like priority
number one. You know, onceyou've done your your Tam and
ICP definition, it's like, thenwhat the hell have I inherited
here? You know, how do we figureout we how we optimize that
(20:37):
team? So, so, yes, absolutely.And then you think about how you
you break that down so you havean organization that you inherit
often, in particularly privateequity businesses, right? How do
you then understand, Okay, whereis everybody, what levels are we
talking about, and whatcharacteristics, attributes,
(20:58):
capabilities that they possess,once you've got that initial
baseline, the next step we findis then you can start thinking
about role definition, becausethen once you understand what
you're working with, you canstart to think about, okay, in
order for us to get to thenumber that we need to hit in
the next 1224, months, we'regoing to need x percent to come
(21:19):
from new business. We're goingto need x percent to come from
expansion. We're going to needto maintain this NRR to get
there. So then you startthinking about specialism. So
that might be new business salesroles, so you might have an
account executive or even anoutbound so I think a big part
of going on that journey is stepone, like baseline, what you
(21:41):
have? Step two, start thinkingabout that operating model and
that role definition. And thenstep three, once you understand
what good looks like in each ofthose roles and where those
because every organization, Imean, otherwise you wouldn't be
around as an organization haspockets of excellence, has
pockets of brilliance, that wow,there's something really working
there. You know, like this rephas smashed out the park for
(22:03):
eight quarters in a row. Whatthe hell is it? Yeah, these reps
are doing, yeah, that the othersthat the others aren't. And I'll
just carry out that with animportant point, I think, which
is not to say that there's oneprofile for success, and it's
not to say that we're trying tocreate a cookie cutter factory
of undiverse teams. I thinkeveryone has superpowers, and
(22:25):
everyone has unique superpowers.And some sales people are
amazing prospectors, and they'rejust pipeline machines, and
they've always got amazingpipeline coverage. Others are a
little bit more lone wolfy andare, you know, a bit more
Maverick, and they're justreally good closes. So, but what
it's about is, it's aboutidentifying what are those macro
behaviors that are workingacross the board? Because if you
(22:48):
don't directionally understandthat, then, then you're lost,
you know, then, like we'retalking about, you can't go
back, and you can't hire theright capability, and then you
can't run performance managementeffectively, and you definitely
can't invest in the rightenablement and training and
resources that focuses onbuilding capability in the right
areas.
Matt Best (23:04):
Just going to ask, because I think one thing I find
really interesting there, Matt,is you talk about looking at
what you've got right now in theteam. Because some people were
thinking, Well, you might have80% rubbish, 20% good. So is
there an argument actually, fornot building around what's
currently there, but insteadbuilding around what the future
should look like, how does Imean, of course, one informs the
(23:26):
other in different directions.Or what have you seen working
with the businesses that youwork with as the as a sort of
good balance? Or is there nosuch thing, and it just really
depends on where the businessis?
Matt Milligan (23:37):
It's a great question, really good question.
And we haven't even come on totalk about AI yet, because AI
fundamentally rethinks this forevery single organization, is
the viewpoint that I'm forming.But just to park that for a
second, I think something thatis really important is
benchmarking organizations cantend to be very insular. Most of
the ones that we've had thepleasure of working with would
probably admit that in thebeginning. So this is where the
(23:58):
power of being able to actuallybenchmark externally as well as
internally, is really, reallyimportant. And our bigger vision
as a business at you hubs is wewant to create a global standard
for sales capability. We wantpeople to take their Uhubs
profile with them on theircareer journey in a number of
(24:18):
different organizations thatthey work at, and that becomes
the de facto standard for howyou assess the true capabilities
of someone. So that goes to saythat we're building a pretty
sizable benchmarking data set aswe go on this journey of
building the business and beingable to where we start now,
which is focusing very heavilyon private equity backed B to B
businesses. Mostly means that wecan go really deep on the
(24:42):
profiles that are working forother organizations that have
similar deal sizes, similarsales cycle lengths, are selling
to similar industry verticals,and then you can start borrowing
those insights and ideas foryour own organization.
Matt Best (24:55):
I think that's fascinating. And so many
organizations are looking outthere for Okay, well, what are
our competitors? Still not evenwhat our competitors doing. But
what does good look like? Jonny,you and I were talking at a
recent an event recently focusedin a particular area of
financial services, and talkingactually about some of the
things or I was sharing withsome of that group, some of the
learnings that I'd had from atechnology background when it
(25:15):
came to client engagement andmeasuring customer satisfaction,
of which, you know, tech firmshave tended to be quite towards
a sort of front, you know,bleeding edge of that when it
comes to sort of compared toother industries. And, you know,
there's an experienced group ofleaders in this room, and a lot
of light bulbs firing off aroundthe room being like, I hadn't
thought about that, or we don'treally look at that. And I
(25:38):
think, like, that's aninteresting perspective, as well
as taking this, okay, what aresales that like in in a in a
SaaS world, versus what a saleslook like in a consulting world
versus what a sales look like ina, you know, B to C versus B to
B. There's so much of thatcomplexity like so I guess
there's, it's probably not onebenchmark. It's a range of
benchmarks that come togetherthat can inform the direction.
Matt Milligan (26:02):
Totally, yeah, and the lines are getting
massively blurred. I've got achief revenue officer of 100
million ARR software businessthat we're working with at the
moment. His big emphasis rightnow is hiring management
consultants. He's an exconsultant himself. He's an ex
McKinsey guy, but he isrecognized that in the current
environment, they're sellingbigger ticket items. He's found
(26:22):
that the ramp time is shorter ifhe brings in management
consultants and up skills themon the commercial skill set,
rather than trying to takecommercial sales people and
upskill them on the consultingsolution sale skill set, which
is super interesting, I think.
Matt Best (26:36):
Matt, let's take a pause right there, and to
everyone listening, join us forpart two as we continue this
conversation.
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