How to Map Success in the Growing CSO Role
In response to rapid changes in markets, buyer behavior, and technology, the role of the chief sales officer (CSO) is becoming increasingly complex. Today’s CSOs must balance hitting current revenue goals, aligning with key C-suite executives, and building a future sales vision, all while adapting to changing markets, technology, and buyer dynamics. Given these demands, CSOs must ensure they are equipped with the knowledge, skills, and expertise required to succeed in both the short and long term.
Here, let’s examine six core components that CSOs should focus on in order to succeed as the role continues to evolve.
The Board and CEO’s Leader of Revenue Growth and Market Insight
CSOs are uniquely positioned to provide valuable market insight to the rest of the C-suite. Under growing pressure to take risks and grow market share, CSOs should leverage this expertise. To become leaders of revenue growth and market insight, CSOs should focus on collaborating with the rest of the C-suite to push for the evolution of the organization’s go-to-market strategy, working to link key corporate initiatives, and their associated metrics, to the value drivers of the company as a whole.
Lead the Commercial Strategy and Organization
Many CSOs struggle to align with functional leaders throughout the commercial organization. According to Gartner research, fewer than 25 percent of sales and marketing leaders collaborate on commercial activities, such as target customer profiles, messaging, metrics, lead qualification, customer data and analytics management, and tech management.
Gartner research shows that organizations that prioritize cross-functional key performance indicators and aligned commercial activities are three times more likely to exceed new customer acquisition targets than their peers. The evolving CSO role requires collaboration with all commercial leaders to align vision and commercial priorities. They should also work on coordinating and integrating shared resources, such as technology, operations, data, and enablement, to find efficiencies and build a culture that supports innovation.
Win in the Competitive Talent Landscape
Talent management remains a challenge for many sales leaders, and this has been exacerbated by the myriad of new technologies, skills, and tools brought in to support seller productivity. Many sellers feel overwhelmed by the number of skills and technologies they are expected to adopt in today’s sales organization, which decreases their performance.
CSOs should reevaluate the right structure for seller roles and responsibilities to maximize efficiency and effectiveness. Next, focus on creating an environment and employee value proposition that limits seller drag and motivates sellers to perform.
Finally, CSOs must identify and provide the tools and technologies that will support sellers’ effectiveness, without creating a technological burden that could overwhelm them.
Lead Through Evolving Economic Scenarios
Economic headwinds and external disruptions have shaped the sales organization in recent years. However, two-thirds of CSOs struggle to adapt strategic plans to a sudden change in business context.
To prepare for future shifts, CSOs should focus on establishing clear leading indicators and signals that alert the sales organization to impending disruption and enable rapid adaptation. Successful CSOs will build an external network of trusted executive partners across industries and customer groups to pressure-test ideas and collaborate around decision making and strategy in order to navigate future disruptions more effectively.
Become a Trusted Leader
The CSO’s leadership team has grown in many organizations, with expanded roles for operations, enablement, and revenue technology leaders. The leadership team’s growth provides CSOs with an opportunity to delegate more responsibilities, but it also requires them to become strong leadership coaches and mentors.
To become trusted leaders, CSOs should focus on providing team members with visibility into career paths and opportunities for growth. CSOs can play an important role as mentors to budding sales leaders who want to learn and progress within the organization. In doing so, CSOs can expand their influence and effectiveness while also building a leadership bench for the future.
The Foundation
The CSO must build a foundation of sales excellence that includes a strong understanding of industry trends and worthwhile technology investments. For example, CSOs must identify how key trends and industry changes will affect the sales organization’s strategy and trajectory. CSOs should also provide guidance on metrics for evaluating technology, with a focus on user adoption and ROI, to ensure that technology investments drive productivity.
By combining this knowledge with their unique viewpoint as the CSO, sales leaders can become a true leader in the C-suite as they drive decision making and growth in areas ranging from talent management to change management.
Michael Katz is senior director, research, in the Gartner Sales Practice.