Hunters and Unicorns: Playbook Universe – Marjorie Janiewicz #003

“I had a pretty good sense of how to build and run teams successfully, but the MongoDB experience helped me see how granular that process can be, how you can recruit, develop, and execute on a day-to-day basis based on the playbook that can really unlock fantastic results. I spent about three years at MongoDB under their leadership and it propels the way I look at running sales organizations and most importantly driving great business outcomes for companies.”  - Marjorie Janiewicz Hunters and Unicorns shares the playbooks from leaders, founders, executives and investors from high growth technology companies.   In this special edition series The 33 CXOs we investigate the greatest success story in the history of software sales. Discover how thirty-three sales execs from one organisation, BladeLogic, became CXOs in the world’s 100 fastest growing technology companies. We uncover the stories and playbooks of the most prolific sales leaders in the industry.  Today we are joined by Marjorie Janiewicz, Chief Revenue Officer at Foursquare. In this interview, we discuss Marjorie’s evolving mission and vision as she leads Foursquare’s global go-to-market strategy as well as her incredible career trajectory working with word-class innovative software companies and how she has risen through the ranks to become the deeply respected enterprise software sales leader that she is today. “The playbook we’ve been talking about in practice is an enterprise playbook. It is designed to extract bigger business value, to justify premium. So as a CRO deploying the playbook to attack very large accounts in financial services, retail, all the way to sales cycles in government public sector, I think the playbook had given me the foundation to understand the steps in the sales process, how I think about how customers are buying, and how I think about mapping our sales motion to it. The playbook gave me the foundation and empowered me to know that I could do this.” Marjorie learnt and mastered the playbook under the tutelage of Dev Ittycheria and Carlos Delatorre during her time at MongoDB. We discuss the incredible impact that MongoDB had on Marjorie’s career and how the ground breaking methodology and principles of change management gave her the blueprint she needed to channel her appetite for disruption into a successful career leading transformational SaaS initiatives. Offering advice and guidance to current and future leaders, Marjorie discusses the key challenges facing tech businesses today and highlights how the ongoing evolution of the playbook has provided business owners with more visibility and tracking capability than ever before. Providing strategies and guidance on how to lean into the methodology during times of change, Marjorie also puts forwards her views on the topic of inclusion and diversity in the tech space and draws our attention the playbook’s capacity for unlocking the talent pool via training and enablement and accelerating the career paths of diverse individuals. “Sales is a profession, like anything, it’s a craft you can master, and I think more than ever, thinking about the economy and the world we live in, it’s just a wonderful place for anyone that has smarts, hunger, and an appetite to excel.” In this vodcast you will discover:  Marjorie’s journey to embracing change – how the playbook provided foundations for Marjorie to become a well-rounded CRO The fundamental mechanics of the playbook and how to adapt the methodology to fit different industries and customer profiles Diversity and inclusion – the playbook’s capacity to unlock the talent pool The effects of the current recession on the software market and what changes we should look out for With over twenty years of international software and SaaS sales experience, Marjorie is a true builder. Her customer first orientation and collaborative approach to scaling has enabled her to bring different organizations together towards one sales motion, deliver value to customers, and drive ongoing improvement. We discuss Marjorie’s journey to embracing change as well as her plans for the future and excitement for the next phase of growth at Foursquare. This wide-ranging discussion is essential listening for those with an interest in sales strategy, as well as anyone with a passion for the technology space.