In this concise 7‑minute interview, Professor Pete Alexander talks with Mike Muhlfelder, Vice President of North America Sales at Jitterbit. Mike outlines his 30‑year sales background and his current responsibility for selling Jitterbit’s integration platform as a service (iPaaS) to mid‑enterprise and enterprise customers. He explains why integration is a need‑to‑have solution, emphasizing the importance of unified data for a 360‑degree view of customers, employees, and supply chains. When asked what chapter of a business book companies should read first, he likens it to a roadmap that maps out essential knowledge before moving forward. His core leadership advice stresses authenticity, empathy, and being involved in the operational details without micromanaging, linking trust to both employee engagement and sales success. Mike recommends three fellow executives—Josh Allen (Drift), Michelle Benford (HubSpot), and Tom Martin (Glance Networks)—as valuable podcast guests. He shares his early work experiences cutting lawns, delivering newspapers, and rising quickly in a grocery‑store chain, highlighting entrepreneurial drive. Finally, he directs listeners to connect with him on LinkedIn, noting the unique spelling of his last name.
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This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast, where executives share their insights. It is 6 questions in 7 minutes because successful business leaders are busy and rarely have more time to spare. So let's get to it. Question number 1, in a few sentences, please tell me who you are and what you do.
My name is Mike Molfelder. I'm the Vice President of North America Sales for Jitterbit. I have responsibility for a team of salespeople across North America selling our integration solution to a variety of businesses from mid-enterprise to enterprise. I've been in this space on and off for about 14 years and in sales for over 30 years, which is remarkable for me to say because I'm just a kid.
Mike, it's great to have you on the show. Question number 2: What's the best thing about working in your industry?
Best thing is that we are a need-to-have solution. So I've sold nice-to-have and I've sold need-to-have. Jitterbit is an integration platform as a service, so we connect connect disparate systems, whether it's a technology or an API, and we move and transform data so that our customers can best understand how to operate their business and be able to have a 360-degree view of their customer, or a 360-degree view of their employees or their supply chain, and then be able to take action and operate the business accordingly. And in this day and age, and even more so now, The ability to understand that information and have a high degree of confirmation of who your employees are, what they're buying, or what they need of your customers and what they're buying is really, really critical to success now. Mm-hmm.
It certainly sounds like that. It sounds like knowledge is king, basically.
Yes.
Yeah. Question number 3. I have a book. With all the answers for business. What chapter would you think most companies should read?
The first chapter, because the first chapter in that book is gonna, is gonna map out for you where you need to go and what you need to, what you need to know. If you skip to the last chapter, you'll miss all, you'll miss all the good parts. And if you try to hit the middle, you're same thing, you, you may miss the important stuff. So if I, if I look at the, read the first chapter it's going to tell me the things that are important to me and then I can advance from there.
It's kind of like being like the roadmap or the navigation of what you need, where you need to go.
Exactly.
Love it. Question number 4: other than the generic work harder, have a great attitude, and care for customers, what advice or insight would you give to other business leaders?
More so now than ever, be authentic. Be empathetic and be involved. And I mean be involved in the right into— not to be a micromanager, be involved in the bits and bytes, if you will, of each of your organizations that you're responsible for. Know how your people operate, know the processes, know what their customers demand, and just know what they need so that you can offer advice and help make them better. Give them a better work environment, give them a better work life. I think that that's critical today, and to, you know, to communicate openly the things that you, you learn and understand from those interactions.
And I think being authentic and open communication, if I'm understanding you correctly, that, that also allows your, your team, your employees, that they're going to be more committed to the work and more loyal with that Would you agree?
Absolutely, absolutely. People want to, they want to work for and work with people that they trust, and in order to have that, that authenticity is critical to it. And it's same thing from a sales standpoint. We've been talking in my sales organization for well over a year about this. You know, if you want to, if you're gonna buy from somebody, trust is a big part of it, but And that trust comes from authenticity. If you don't believe someone's being straight with you about whatever the product is, they're not going to buy from you.
That's right. That's right.
And you got to show that you care. Now, in this current era, now more than ever to be, you know, to show that caring and that empathy.
Mm-hmm. Very insightful. Thank you for that. Question number 5, what other executives like yourself would you like to acknowledge as a leader and invite to be on my podcast?
I know some great folks. I could give you a list as long as your arm, but there are 3 that are top of mind. Actually, here in Boston where I am, I would say Josh Allen, who's at Drift, who I saw do a tremendous presentation on career pathing a bunch of years ago. He's just a super insightful and great guy. Michelle Benford at HubSpot. We worked together at another company, and from the first meeting we ever had together, I knew that she was just He's just an incredibly smart and very gifted sales leader. And then Tom Martin, who's the CEO of Glance Networks, who's been just a tremendous friend and mentor for me, and he's built a great business.
Wonderful. Those are 3 great referrals. I appreciate that. I'll reach out to them. And question number 6, please tell me about your first job.
So my first job, and we chatted about this a bit, my first job was cutting lawns. And then delivering newspapers, actually both at the same time. And I will actually oftentimes ask this in a sales interview of folks. Now, we've aged out of that. You don't have, you know, people in their 20s and 30s that were cutting lawns and delivering newspapers. But what I'm looking for is some type of an entrepreneurial, self-driven job that they had as teenagers or even preteen. I learned delivering newspapers things like how to ask for money, and that if I worked really, really hard and went the extra mile, I got better tips. So, you know, same thing with cutting lawns. And then my first paying real job was in a grocery store. I maybe misrepresented my age to get my working papers because I wanted a real job. And that same dedication and commitment to the job, I was the youngest department manager in the grocery store chain, the small 6-store chain, because of the job, the work that I did. So that was my reward. And I continued to work from there.
Yeah, it's your reward and a reward of the company for hiring you to be able to— the grocery chain to hire you to see you, you know, rise over the ranks so quickly. So congratulations on it.
Thanks. We both got lucky.
So Mike, thanks so much for being on the show. How can people find you? Well, how could people find you?
The easiest way to find me is on LinkedIn. The hardest part is spelling my, my last name, which is M-U-H-L-F-E-L-D-E-R, but to the best of my knowledge, I'm the only Mike Muhlfelder in the world and the only one on LinkedIn, so that's all it takes.
All right, well, this is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast. For more insights and ideas, please go to LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook, or iTunes and search for the Winning at Business and Life podcast. Thanks for listening.
