Sales Leadership Strategies

Jessica Ly: I'm here with Vikram Gupta, who is the senior director of pre-sales for the Americas at Akamai. Hi Vikram. Welcome to the show.

Vikram Gupta: Hi, Jessica, good to be here.

Jessica Ly: Akamai has been around the internet industry for a long time very well respected company with over $3 billion in revenue and 8500 employees. So the whole market has shifted. I know that the network layer is not just the network layer anymore, but more of the application involved. So I wanted to get your take on the market trends you're seeing, and also in your role handling the pre-sales. What are some of the best practices in leadership that you would like to share with us?

Vikram Gupta: Sure, yeah, happy to be here. So Jessica, with the situation that we're in with the global pandemic, we’ a significant rise in internet traffic. So 30%. And that's because people are working from home, they are not going into the offices, schools are closed, and there's a lot going on. And shopping has all, you know, moved online, as malls are closed in, and people still need supplies, people still need their daily household items. We're seeing, obviously, a lot more movies being watched online. There are no more online sports, but still, a lot more media consumption happens online. So more and more traffic, moving to online viewing, you know, as in our homes, we most of us have OTT, into our homes. And you know, and that's, that drives a lot of traffic, a lot of usage for end users. And Akamai is right in the middle of it, right. We're the largest globally distributed edge computing platform. We've been around for over two decades. And we've been making the internet be fast, reliable and secure. So you know, we're at the core of the internet and we bring the content closer to the end-users. So this way, end-users don't have to, you know, traverse to the internet to get to the source to get content. They get it from the closest endpoint to them from the edge. And that has a lot of really positive impacts. One is it makes content be delivered to the end-users faster. It's secure because you can now apply security mechanisms to it. It's highly available, very scalable. And now content owners have deeper insights into where the content is, who's viewing it. And you know, all the trends that go along with it.

Jessica Ly: One of the areas that I find very interesting is the use of bots to create all kinds of problems for their consumers, maybe stealing their identity and just causing websites to go down when you have a lot of bots attacking, too and that's an area that the Akamai has actually been providing new solutions to address the bots.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, so with the pervasive network that we have, we're closer to the end-users. As we talked about, we see all the traffic that comes with it. And bots have been around for years, and they're more of a menace than they ever have been. And they take advantage of situations. So these are the bad guys. Right? So these are your political activists, there's organized crime, there are nation-states involved. And their goal is to somehow manipulate passwords, get access to accounts, sell it in a heap to in the dark web, and then have the bad guys go and exploit. So it's a problem, and especially with, you know, with the situation that we're in the pandemic, you know, they choose to exploit that. So they also exploited using, you know, malware or phishing. So they'll send emails saying, Hey, here's some great information about Corona, but you click on that link, and it takes you to a phishing site.

Jessica Ly: Yeah, and I think that with us being home, you know, I think about the voting situation where a lot of states are saying, let's try to do online voting. And that's an area of concern so that the technology to go in and make it a secure voting environment is so critical nowadays.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, my Akamai goal is to accelerate applications to accelerate APIs and secure them and mobile apps bring content closer to the edge so we can, you know, we help with pretty much everything that happens on the internet.

Jessica Ly: I want to talk about your role in pre-sales. This is where once there's a sales qualified lead. Your team steps in to help maybe look at the environment, be the trusted advisor, suggest solutions and come up with proof of concept. Talk to us about your team and how you're leading that effort and the management tips that you would share.

Vikram Gupta: Yes, I've been in pre-sales for two decades. So that's the role I'm super passionate about. This role I really care about. And it's a very critical role to an organization. Some people call themselves engineers, solution engineers, pre-sales. It’s the same thing. And what a pre-sales engineer does is works with their sales counterparts to help identify opportunities, understand the business problem that the customer is trying to solve, map it to a solution if there is that outcome, I can help solve, and then architect the solution at times were re-engineering the customer version because they have thought about it in one particular way. And we may come up with a much better creative way to solve that problem. So that's, you know, that in a nutshell, is what a sales engineer does. Now, through the selling process, you know, there's a lot of different steps that you go through. So it understands what the customer requirements are, what the business being is, you know, what the impact is, in making sure that we can actually solve that problem. And then working with the customer to identify what the success criteria are going to be, you know, do a demo, do a proof of concept, and then, you know, help solve that business problem for them.

Jessica Ly: Vikram, I know your team is pretty large, and it is making a huge impact because you're actually helping to show the value in your solution that this helps to close deals for the sales team. Talk to us about your 212-degree approach or your philosophy in, you know, making a difference at that pivotal point in the effort.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah. So let me start with me why. So Simon Sinek wrote, The thing about the Golden Circle, and it's really about uncovering your why, and my why is to encourage us to evolve. So that together, we can foster change. And what that means is, hey, let's always be on the lookout to evolving to adapting change and to creating change. And to be open to change, change is the only thing that's constant. And, and that change happens, you know, around us and in different facets of our life. So 212 degrees, it's actually a very interesting thing that stuck with me for a long time. And all it is is here, 211 degrees Fahrenheit, water is really hot. At 212 degrees, it starts to boil, and boiling water creates steam, and steam can power engine steam can power train. So it's that one extra degree that makes all the difference.

Jessica Ly: Yeah, I like that analogy a lot.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, and it's all about, you know, you could be so close to solving a problem. And it's all about never giving up. And it's about making sure that we're always going that extra mile extra degree, as I call it, to solve a customer's problem to do whatever we need to do to accomplish. So you know, that's really what it's about. And that's the philosophy that's ingrained in the minds of our pre-sales engineers,

Jessica Ly: Maybe you can share with us what ideas your team has come up with, you have come up that you've implemented, that has demonstrate that outcome from 211 to 212 degrees change.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, and we see that every single day, we see that every single day when they're working with their customers. You know, if you think about the problems that optimize solving, you know, it's not the same problem every single day. Internet technologies are evolving, everyday attacks are getting more and more complex, where performance needs are, you know, more stringent every single day. No one knew about this pandemic that was about to hit us, which was about which was going to put everyone in their homes and working from homes, and that created the strain on the internet. And these are the situations that you know, you just can't always prepare for and you have to go in there at times and destroy and work with the customers and try and figure it out and make sure you solve that problem. So optimized platform does that very easily and does that very effectively. And, you know, we see that every single day from our customers, from our pre-sales engineering standpoint, you know, these engineers are at the tip of the spear. They’re the base of our organization in front of our customers. And they have to be smart. They have to be intelligent. They have to be the best technologists that there are. And we call them the trusted advisors. And what that means is, I want our customers to trust them with technology, not just Akamai, but with any technology. I want them to look at our pieces engineers as trusted advisors to help solve their business problems.

Jessica Ly: Vikram, you talked about the one-degree difference from, say, hot water to boiling. I’m wondering if you could share how you've made an impact and sales conversion, for example, what have you done that has shown a change?

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, so we, you know, a method we use is data-driven decision-making. It's, that's our philosophy. And it's harvesting data to understand where we are and then determine where we need to be. So an example of that is proof of concept conversions. And you know, we've over the last year and a half, we've increased by 50%. So that's been a significant improvement because we started to take a look at, hey, what was our proof of concepts all about? Who are we doing it for? What kind of products and in you know, the aging? And, you know, when did we win it? How long did it take for us to not win it, and, and then we just put some best practices around, we put some gating criteria around it. And we wanted to make sure that we did those for really qualified proof of concepts.

Jessica Ly: And you automate any part of that because I know automation is one way to scale.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, it's, these are complex technology. So it's hard to automate proof of concepts. But there are demonstrations that can be given that show you know how this technology works and how it can be used in a customer's environment. But it's really hard to automate proof of concept because that's in a customer's live environment. So we've made that very effective. And our customers can now dig or not now, but they've always been able to take our products and try them out. And then buy, and, you know, we work with them, and we set up success criteria. So they know and anticipate the kind of improvements that they're going to experience. And they, more often than not, you know, exceed that. And that's a huge thing.

Jessica Ly: Wow, Vikram 50%. Improvement is huge. Talk to us about your leadership. How do you manage the team this big, making this big of an impact?

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, I truly believe that a leader has to have three things, right. One is the intellectual ability, emotional awareness, and then operational command. And without that, it's really hard and a leader needs to exhibit those three things. So you know, be smart, be really understanding of where the market is, where the trends are, so you can stay ahead of it. And then emotional awareness to manage your team and to make sure that you're providing equal opportunities, you're hiring a diverse team, and you're giving everyone you know a chance to shine. And then the last thing is operational command is to do to understand data understand the dynamics of a business, right? If you think about the mission for my team has to fascinate our customers so that we can be the creators and catalysts of customer confidence. Right? If I break it down, the word fascinate there was a book I read about fascination by Sally hogshead. And this is all about, you know, fascinate if you think about what that word means it's about to hold somebody under a spell or to really impress the heck out of somebody. And in that is the feeling I want our customers to walk away with when they engage with our team is to be fascinated by them and to be the catalyst and creators of customer confidence. That is, you know, that's a very strong terminology as well because we're trying to make our customers feel confident in themselves about making a decision. That's going to happen to have a significant positive impact on their business. Right? Change is always hard. And we're always. Our goal is to be the sense makers. And there's so much information out there. If you talk to businesses, you know, they NSM Hey, did you run across? Or did you come across good information during your buying cycle? Gartner’s study says 90% of people actually encountered information of really high quality. Now, that's a pretty high number. So how do you differentiate yourself? Right? How do you become, you know, the organization that, that people gravitate towards? Or do people understand? Because when they're looking for a new solution, you know, there are competitors out there, but how do you stand out, and you stand out when your people become the sense makers, when they work with customers, to really help them, you know, help explain to them what they need to be aware of, and what is not important. And that's what we do with our engineers, and we help them deal with their customers.

Jessica Ly: This has been a really insightful conversation about your pre-sales processes and the tips that you are able to share on the leadership. I want to thank you very much, Vikram, for being on the show to talk to us. I know that the security and network space is huge. The application layer is definitely a significant part of your business. And you are helping to close deals. So thanks for sharing the best practices on that.

Vikram Gupta: Yeah, I think more important than that, I think we're helping the internet. Stay fast, reliable and secure. I think that's our core mission. And that's what we're going to continue to do. It was a pleasure talking to you, Jessica.

Jessica Ly: Thank you.