What success rate does the speaker attribute to hiring the "number one" AE into leadership?

Jason M. LemkinCEO, SaaStr · Co-Founder of SaaStr AI, SaaStr Fund, Adobe Sign

The Hidden Pitfalls of Hiring Top Sales Reps

16 Jul 2023 · 1 min

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Jason M. Lemkin argues that hiring the "number one" account executive (AE) from another company to be a VP of Sales is usually a bad move. He claims such top performers almost never succeed as leaders (he states "0.00%... actually, 1%" success), and that the only reliable exception is when that rep joins extremely early and operates almost like a founder, giving them time to learn and recover from early mistakes.

Questions this video answers

He claims essentially 0.00%, then amends to "actually, 1%."

Chapters

They will hire the number one AE at a company, the number one sales rep. They'll go find a Brex or a talk desk or Algolia, and they'll hunt around and they'll find out that Lauren was the number one AE or the number one AE in the west. Okay? And they will wine and dine her and take her out to the fanciest restaurants and meet the team. And they'll say, wow, you did 2 million last year and the next rep did 700,000. I want you to be my VP of Sales. They're ambitious, and if they want the next step, they'll take that job. How many reps do you think the number one AE ever hired? Zero. Zero. Do you think the number one rep even knows how to train anybody? Do you think she know where to find anybody good? I find that number 1 rep 0.00% of the time is successful. Actually, 1%. The only time she's successful is when they join way early, which makes no sense, because they have time. They have time to make a lot of mistakes. They have time for the first four sales reps to fail because they join almost as a founder. Once they've joined almost as a founder, they can make their a lot like the founders. They can make their own errors. And they have a year to make up for the fact they never were a director, they never were a lead.