The quality of entries for this year’s (inaugural) Sales Enablement Team of the Year made narrowing down a shortlist difficult, and then making a decision on the winner and runners-up has definitely made our heads spin. But here we are.

The aim of the award is to recognize and showcase stand-out teams who have demonstrated a particular ability to collaborate, build relationships, and above all else, deliver results for their respective companies.

We looked for those that have gone above and beyond during the strange times we've experienced over the past 12 months, whether it's launching a new program, implementing (or building!) cutting-edge enablement tools, or devising innovative training and coaching schemes.

And the winner is…

Sage

  • Werner Schmidt, Vice President, Sales Enablement
  • Kathleen Hakin, Manager, Onboarding & Programs
  • Kelsey Downey, Manager, Communications & Content
  • Anne Geraghty, Director, Learning Content & Design
  • Cindy Campbell, Director Learning Certifications
  • Laura Tortosa, Director, Salesforce Effectiveness and Learning
  • Isabelle Delcuvellerie, Director, Partner Enablement
  • Max Nkomo, Head of Social Selling
  • Sam Robinson, Director, Sales Enablement - United Kingdom & Ireland + Africa
  • Steve Hamilton, Director, Sales Enablement - North America
  • Sandrine Ferreira, Director, Sales Enablement - France

Sage’s global enablement function delivers customer success through digital learning and program design, empowering their colleagues and partners in small and medium segments through onboarding, skills & competencies, communications & content, and technology.

They drive innovation in everything that they do to enrich their effectiveness across customers, colleagues and partners, and take a data-driven approach to making decisions.

Why are Sage our Sales Enablement Team of the year 2020?

Here are some of the milestones they've achieved over the last 12 months.

  • Throughout the summer, continued with the expansion of their customer-centric Selling Through Curiosity program, delivering a running +42 NPS (net promoter score).
  • Made over 500 content updates and navigational improvements to the Sales Portal in FY20, achieving more than 100k views across the year by over 3k unique users – for the second year running.
  • Delivered 144 enhancements in FY20, and recently included the LinkedIn CRM Sync, a powerful integration with Salesforce that will help colleagues to better understand, find, target and engage with prospects and customers across the globe.
  • Expanded their enablement platform, SalesHood, providing the capability and reporting to enable colleagues virtually through high performing learning paths. The technology is also being used by Sage’s product teams and being made available to their partners for better alignment.

Werner Schmidt, Vice President, Sales Enablement, had this to say:

“There’s no denying that 2020 has been a different year to the one we anticipated back in January. The team adapted and overcame these new challenges, and galvanized both their personal and professional lives by working together and supporting each other to continue to deliver, in spite of the adversity. I'm very proud of the team for this as we continued to deliver on the priorities with customer-centric programs to equip customers, colleagues and partners across the globe for success and, through this success, have been given the Partner Enablement responsibility too, expanding on the function. We’re looking forward to an even bigger and better 2021.”

The runners-up

Atlassian

  • Kyle Doerflein, Head of Sales Strategy & Enablement
  • Danny De Los Santos, Curriculum, Strategy & Training Team Manager
  • Danny McCarthy, Sales Enablement Program Manager
  • Blakely Calvert, Sales Enablement Program Manager
  • Caylin Dadeo, Sales Enablement Trainer, Enterprise Development
  • Rachel Davis, Sales Enablement Trainer of Loyalty Advocates
  • Jessica Salinas, Enablement Content Developer at Atlassian
  • Megan Lerner, Cloud Enablement
  • Sascha Fogel, Sales Enablement Manager EMEA & APAC
  • Nick Thulin, Solutions Enablement Manager
  • Paul Harriman, Sales Enablement Program Manager

Dealing with a vast product suite and ever changing landscape, this team has revolutionized the meaning and expectation of enablement at Atlassian.

Going above and beyond driving a tangible impact on revenue, they have shared their expertise internally and externally, participating and many presenting at the Sales Enablement Summit, among other conferences and roundtables.

Kyle Doerflein, Head of Sales Strategy & Enablement, says:

“They are changing the landscape of sales enablement at large.”

DocuSign

  • Jesse Potter, Senior Field Enablement Manager
  • Paul Hamilton, VP of Worldwide Field Enablement
  • Tanya Casey, Senior Field Enablement Director
  • Jeff Leslie, Senior Field Enablement Director
  • Ian Westbrook, Senior Field Effectiveness Director
  • Owen Manning, Senior Field Enablement Director

DocuSign’s field enablement team of 40 oversees enablement for all of its sales (~2300 people) and customer success (~1400 people) representatives around the globe.

An expanding product portfolio has seen the team completely overhaul their selling system and processes, along with leading brand new quarterly “Accelerate” programs which combine product training with dedicated marketing materials and target account lists to provide sellers with a strategic sales play. In Q2 alone, they increased the pipeline for their CLM product by over 120%.

Senior Field Enablement Manager, Jesse Potter, says:

“This team has adapted to all the challenges of the past year without missing a beat. Every sales and success leader in the company has remarked on the marked improvement in not just the quality and quantity of enablement for the field, but also the partnerships we've established to be more aligned with their ultimate priorities and goals.”

YouGov Sport

  • Scott Horowitz, Chief Revenue Officer
  • Tracy Schoenadel, Global Head of New Business Sales
  • Lance Fraenkel, Vice President Head of Sports Data Products
  • Georgie Webb, Vice President - Client Services
  • Scott Horowitz, Chief Revenue Officer
  • Victor Gras, Head of Account Management
  • Jordan Deitch, Sales Coordinator
  • Chris Todd, VP of New Business Sales
  • Christopher Getz, Client Service Manager
  • Alex Cosenza, Analyst
  • Kristen Ilhardt, Global Director of Analytics
  • Justin Pertierra, Senior Research Manager
  • Miranda Kahl, Senior Client Service Analyst
  • Colin Gibbons-Fly, Client Service Analyst
  • Jasmine Long, Client Service Analyst

Since the team came together 2.5 years ago, they have had continued success growing the business 6X in such a short period of time. This has come from listening to clients and innovating to meet those needs with new products for the market that have helped lead to continued sales growth.

Chief Revenue Officer, Scott Horowitz, says:

“The YouGov Sport team truly operates like a family. We all work together for the success of the organization and the team. That means everyone lends a hand in the sales process from prospecting, data and insights collection for pitch decks, and pitching together as a team for optimal results. This team truly is a unique collection of sales, product, and service expertise that is unmatched in the sports insights business and our clients have told us this to be true when comparing us to other insights providers in the space.”

Here’s to 2021

We were blown away by the quality of the entries we received. So thank you to all those who nominated. And thank you for the excellent, inspiring work that you do every day.