Welcome

Sales enablement professionals are at the forefront of driving behavior change across the organization, developing sales talent, breaking down organizational silos, improving culture, driving tangible business impact, and more. For those who have a desire to help others and drive impact, a career in sales enablement can be fulfilling and exciting. In order to truly thrive within any role, it is important to foster ongoing learning and continually seek professional development and growth opportunities. Here are the best tips, tricks, and tools to help you get started and continue to excel in sales enablement.

Why a Career in Sales Enablement?

Your talents are in high demand

As more and more companies have adopted formalized sales enablement functions within recent years, we see a staggering growth in the presence and demand for sales enablement talent. The ever growing field of sales enablement presents an opportunity to develop a career with a purpose, impact change, and align your professional growth with personal values.

Did you know?

The number of people with “sales enablement” in their job title has more than tripled since 2015, and there are more than 9,000 LinkedIn job postings worldwide related to sales enablement today.

sales enablement career
Article

An increased need for individuals with sales enablement skills

As sales enablement’s trajectory continues to accelerate, professionals are able to get in at the ground floor for projects and teams that will pave the way for the organization. Companies are beginning to fully connect the dots between enablement programs and overall organizational growth and success. As sales enablement gains authority, professionals in the field have more opportunities for career growth and advancements.

Now more than ever, individuals with the right skills can be a catalyst for organizational success. As sales enablement establishes itself as an essential business function, individuals with a desire to help companies deliver more value to customers and grow their own careers will find a fulfilling career as a sales enablement professional.

The Skills to Succeed

While there is no specific set of experience or education required to be successful in sales enablement, there are essential skills, values, and behaviors that can increase an individual’s effectiveness in a sales enablement role. Here are a few key attributes that lead to success:

Natural Collaborators

Sales enablement is an inherently collaborative role. Practitioners need to be able to collaborate with teams across the organization to access resources, enlist buy-in, and ultimately help their sales teams. It is essential for sales enablement to be likable, and know how to get a message across to different groups.

Self-Starters

Sales enablement professionals are known to “build the airplane as they fly it”. Often, there are no clear instructions on where to begin, so sales enablement practitioners need to be tenacious about forming a strategy, leveraging resources, and generating outcomes.

motivating salespeople
Article

Sales Empathy

The core of a good sales enablement function is deep understanding of how your sales reps operate and behave. Understanding the motivations, struggles, and lives of your sales teams allows sales enablement to create more effective programs are produce impactful results.

willie chan podcast
Podcast

Charm

Sales enablement practitioners work with a variety of teams, and often have to defend their value or enlist buy-in from executive leaders. It is essential for sales enablement professionals to be confident, convincing and comfortable up on a platform.

professional relationships
Article

Outcome Oriented

The ability to define clear desired outcomes and effective strategies to measure outcomes is essential to demonstrating business value and designing effective sales enablement programs.

Kristen McCrae podcast
Podcast

Certifications

Unlock your potential by becoming a certified sales enablement professional. Learn how you can develop skills in building collaborative relationships, cross-functional collaboration, project management, and more.

How to Land a Sales Enablement Role

The first step to sales enablement success is finding a role which challenges you to explore the field and grow as a professional. Sales enablement professionals come from a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and roles. Use these tools and resources for strategies to stay ahead of the game and distinguish yourself as a top candidate.

The stats on the right from CSO Insights show the variety of titles people had, prior to becoming Sales Enablement professionals.

Helpful Links

Here are some articles and tools with information on finding a job, building your resume, and interviewing:

sales enablement resume
Article
culture fit
Article

Open to Opportunities

Jobs Board

Enablement Manager (Sales)

Monday

monday.com is looking for a hardworking, thoughtful, and driven client-facing enablement professional looking to make a big impact on our Client-Facing Group globally. This individual has a proven track record of success in a Sales

Enablement Strategist

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

At AWS World Wide Field Enablement (WWFE), we are seeking an Enablement Strategist to drive the strategy and development of a unified AWS Sales Methodology. This position will work closely with our global sales leaders,

Revenue Enablement Specialist (Customer Success)

Extensiv

The Revenue Enablement Specialist (Customer Success) role is responsible for product, systems and process enablement of the Customer Success organization within the Go to Market team. The individual will work as a valued business partner

Excelling as a Sales Enablement Leader

Practitioners who excel within their roles are constantly looking for opportunities to improve their skills and their function as a whole. Continually developing skills and fostering ongoing learning are essential to stay on top of your game and be an effective leader. Think about these three essential sales enablement qualities, and how you can work to develop these skills.

Cross-functional collaboration

Cross-functional collaboration is needed to break down-organizational silos, secure buy-in from stakeholders across an organization, and gather expertise from all levels to ensure sales teams are equipped to deliver valuable customer experiences.

Read the Article

Defining Enablement's Responsibilities

In order to set yourself (and your team) up for success, it is essential to clearly define sales enablement’s responsibilities and scope within your organization. Transforming sales enablement from a “fix-it” mentality to a strategic business function can help sales enablement gain authority and demonstrate business impact.

Read the Article

Developing Enablement Core Competencies

Just as core competencies are useful to guide onboarding, training, and coaching for sales teams, developing core competencies for sales enablement roles can help identify where sales enablement professional can improve and how to measure success for the function as a whole.

Listen to Podcast

Guide:

Your First 100 Days as a Sales Enablement Leader

Ask an Expert

Q

How can someone who doesn’t have a background in sales transition to a sales enablement position?

A

“Start by building and improving sales empathy under the theme of time. Ask what tasks they find an inefficient use of their time, observe the process if you can, and discuss how you might help. After your first success, use it as a case study for sales members and before you know it, you’ve established a relationship of relevance with sales, proactively calling you for assistance in other areas.”

–Willie Chan
  Sales Enablement and Support Manager, Renesas Electronics America

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Sales Enablement Leaders

Connect with other members:

Mary Shea

Thought Leader

“I think we are at a critical juncture with sales enablement. We are at a place where this discipline is more critical than ever before, especially for organizations that want to put their sellers on even footing with buyers, and for organizations that want to deliver a world-class buyer-customer experience.”

sharon little headshot

Sharon Little

VP, Global Enablement
Skillsoft

“The ability to work with all types of people, to work across teams and do it in a very effective way, having a warmth and a charm and a graciousness comes in handy for a lot of these folks that are going to be in front of a room at some point, commanding that room, facilitating the conversation, giving a presentation.”

Kristen McCrae

Kristen McCrae McMullan

Senior Director, Revenue Enablement
GitHub

“When it comes to that data-driven mindset, we have to find a way to quantify our impact – especially if one-third of our audience is feeling like they haven’t seen our impact yet. So, my challenge to every sales enablement practitioner is starting to think about what are you working on, how are you prioritizing it, and how are you measuring success.”

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