Determination, hard work, and a willingness to dig my heels in: all three have shaped the trajectory of my career. Long before my beginnings as an SDR for a St. Louis startup, I was hustling around a rural town fully believing I was made for more.
With a graduating class of 53 people, it’s safe to say I’m from a small town. Right smack-dab in the middle of hundreds of miles of cornfields. A town of 3000 residents might not make you think “opportunities,” but let me explain. I learned from a young age to take advantage of any opportunity that came along. Every weekday I worked after school at the local diner, making pizzas and bussing tables, and then headed back to school to finish extracurriculars. Time management was a skill that quickly became non-negotiable. From freshman year, I wasn’t afraid to raise my hand and volunteer for leadership roles. I sat as President of many of these clubs by Senior year running the National Honor Society, Art Club, Student Council, and Rembrandt Society for the State of Illinois. When that was all finished, I’d put on my favorite tennies and run out the rest of my energy for the day. Fun Fact: A full lap around town was 2 miles! Probably more than you care to know about your Systems Configuration Manager, but stay with me. I graduated high school with a 3.98 GPA and ranked #5 in my class.
Beyond the Classroom
After high school though I knew I wanted something more. What did “more” look like? I wasn’t quite sure. But, I was offered a scholarship based on my high school academics, so I packed my bags. That’s how I found myself in the St. Louis area. From college, to a few various jobs I excelled at and moved up quickly in, I knew I hadn’t quite found my place yet but felt like I was well on my way there. Then came my first job as an SDR at St. Louis company, TopOPPS. It was my first time cold calling, crafting email campaigns, or being held accountable for a monthly KPI. I was hungry and ready. Did I know anything about Salesforce, Outreach.io or power dialers? Absolutely not. The best part is I was selling software that highlighted pipeline visibility and next-level forecasting…to salespeople. I had to learn FAST, which made it feel like a game for me. It was strategy, data, science, fast-paced, and gamification all rolled into one. Needless to say, I was hooked.
From there, I moved to Gremlin Social as the Head of Sales Development. I was a one man SDR team and it was my job to build the top-funnel sales process and establish KPIs. I worked with the AEs to break down barriers and fine-tune the feedback loop. It wasn't just about what they needed from me or I needed from them to be more efficient, it was about how we could work together to figure out who our true ICP was, or what pains of theirs we specifically solved. After hiring 2 SDRs to work under me, I got a true taste of what my career in Systems Config could look like. For the first time I was working ON sales, instead of IN sales day to day. I monitored performance and fine-tuned their messaging. I owned the tech stack and provided the insights for everything our company needed. Then a woman named Amy Kohl, who I had worked with previously at TopOPPs, joined the team at Gremlin as Fractional Demand Gen support. We crushed it together. We put a more robust outbound strategy into place to keep the SDRs fed, further refined our ICP, and worked to keep all systems running and working together.
Along Came AK Ops
I bet you can guess what comes next. Fast forward to January 2020 when I took the leap to join Amy at AK Ops—I haven’t looked back. From my graduating class of 53 people to serving over 53 client companies in my time here, from leadership roles within my high school to helping lead sales teams and guide key business decisions, learning to find the opportunities in a small town fine-tuned my creative thinking and ability to capitalize on any opportunity big or small. So thank you to my small town, the class of 53, the lessons I’ve learned along the way, and the clients who have trusted me. I’m so grateful and looking forward to all the teams and systems I’ll continue to impact.