---
title: "COO or CRO? Where the RevOps Career Actually Ends Up"
episode: 125
podcast: "The LeanScale Podcast"
publisher: "LeanScale"
guest: "Thurman Sneed"
guest_title: "Chief Revenue Officer, Marigold"
date_published: 2026-09-24
date_modified: 2026-09-28
duration: 00:46:59
word_count: 7709
topics: ["revenue-operations", "sales-leadership", "gtm-strategy", "forecasting", "sales-compensation", "ai-in-gtm"]
canonical_url: https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/podcast/thurman-sneed-marigold-coo-or-cro/
source: "LeanScale Knowledge Hub — https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge"
license: "Free to quote and cite with attribution to The LeanScale Podcast."
---

# COO or CRO? Where the RevOps Career Actually Ends Up — Full Transcript

> Episode 125 of The LeanScale Podcast, with Thurman Sneed.
> Published September 24, 2026 · 00:46:59 · 7709 words.
> Machine-transcribed and **not diarized** — speaker attribution is inferred, so verify
> attribution against the audio before quoting a specific person.
> Structured breakdown: https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/podcast/thurman-sneed-marigold-coo-or-cro/

## 00:00 — Cold open + intro

**[0:00]** Many times when you're in the RevOps role, you're thinking about, yes, you're a people, right?

**[0:05]** But when you get into the C-suite, you're thinking about the whole, at least I do,

**[0:08]** I think about the whole company. My guest today is Thurman Sneed, Chief Revenue Officer

**[0:13]** at Marygold. Thurman's path to the revenue seat did not run through sales, it ran through accounting.

**[0:21]** Numbers connect everything for me. If you were an accountant, if someone's listening to this

**[0:26]** stuff in the account that you'd understand what I'm talking about, you want things to balance.

**[0:31]** How do you think about the investment itself in RevOps specifically? RevOps headcount, tools,

**[0:39]** the time away from selling to do enablement. If you haven't invested in RevOps,

**[0:44]** RevOps should be able to pay for themselves. Like a spider bite moment when you went from

**[0:51]** finance to RevOps. It was kind of the, it was kind of scary to be honest with you. I had to call some

**[0:57]** people. It's like this guy's asking me to like effectively change my career. All I know is

**[1:03]** finance. You're going to have to carry a bag before you can be a CRO. Yeah, that's a, that's a great

## 01:16 — The CIO who tapped him on the shoulder

**[1:16]** question. It's a couple of things probably, but for sure he saw some potential in me that I didn't

**[1:23]** see outside of finance. And I think he saw that potential because of how I interacted with him

**[1:29]** when he was actually in a sales role himself prior to getting into a CIO kind of tech position

**[1:37]** and the way that I interacted with cross-functional teams. So being in that finance role,

**[1:43]** I interacted with marketing, with sales, with finance. And he was an observer of that,

**[1:49]** but I, from my perspective, I was just doing my job. And from his perspective, he saw someone who

**[1:56]** had built some relationships and the ability to communicate and understand and listen to the needs

**[2:03]** of others and try to close gaps. So I appreciated him seeing that. Yeah. And I think that's something

**[2:11]** a lot of people in RevOps. Maybe they don't appreciate that that's their superpower, that

**[2:15]** that's really what it takes to do the job well. And I also think it's really interesting. You

**[2:20]** started off in accounting. I feel like having that type of background makes you an absolute weapon

**[2:27]** in the RevOps world too. Yeah, certainly I, I leveraged that accounting background, whether I

**[2:33]** realize it or not every single day, um, numbers connect everything for me. And if you were an

**[2:40]** accountant, if someone's listening to this stuff in the county, you'd understand what I'm talking

**[2:44]** about. You want things to balance. Um, you also want a true return. And so, so many times when I'm

**[2:52]** teaching, you know, my sales team or I'm teaching my RevOps team, I'm always bringing it back to

**[2:59]** the numbers. And I think finance people probably love me because I'm always bringing it back to

**[3:04]** the numbers, whether it's, you know, us needing to drive more revenue or reduce expense. It sometimes

**[3:10]** might be the case. Um, we're always looking at where are we going to hurt the business the least

**[3:14]** or improve the business the most. And it's always coming back to those numbers.

**[3:21]** And to take that a little bit deeper, there's a lot of people end up in RevOps, maybe from a

**[3:26]** systems background, maybe more like engineering type of role. Some come in through sales too,

**[3:33]** so that they've spent some time maybe carrying a bag or doing that. Where do you think in go to

**[3:40]** market and in RevOps that numbers and data driven mindset has really, really helped. What are some

**[3:47]** things that you think you see and some projects that you approach that might be a little different

**[3:52]** than someone else? Uh, I would say designing go to market models or coverage models, right? So,

**[4:00]** so many times, and I've worked with a lot of CROs, I'm not going to mention any names here,

**[4:04]** but a lot of times you have the urge to peanut butter spray it. And, you know, when you really

**[4:11]** can focus on the numbers, you can say, where are we really going to get the return? If we have a

**[4:15]** finite amount of money to spend, let's not necessarily peanut butter spray that money,

**[4:20]** but let's aim it at something very specific that we, that we have the greatest comfort is going to

**[4:26]** get the returns that we need. And, and to be able to defend that investment, because it's always an

**[4:32]** investment from my perspective, to be able to defend that investment to our cross-functional

**[4:38]** teams, not just the finance team, but literally the cross-functional team. So marketing, I need

**[4:44]** you to aim in this direction. Would you mind floating your dollars in that same direction?

**[4:50]** Customer success. I need you to take care of a certain set of customers very, very well,

**[4:56]** because we need success stories from the M and K studies so that we can land the next fish in

**[5:01]** this pond, not the one in the small one in this big ocean that sometimes we try to peanut butter

**[5:06]** spread into. So whenever we are leading a significant change and we're trying to narrow

**[5:13]** down a focus, it's that the numbers being able to resist spreading them too thin.

**[5:22]** Yeah. I've definitely seen some really awful planning processes and in my career, that's one

**[5:27]** of them peanut butter spreading or not having enough coverage and keeping the goal really high,

**[5:32]** not taking account for some of the other numbers like attrition or things that you know are going

**[5:36]** to happen that can really wreck your plan. And I think if you haven't spent a lot of time

**[5:42]** looking at things like that, it can be pretty easy to miss. Yeah. And one of the ones that

**[5:50]** as you asked that question, I'm starting to think about back in the day has to do with product P and

**[5:54]** L's. So you have a sales CRO that may be responsible for trying to make every product leader

**[6:00]** happy. And sometimes that's not the right answer, right? Sometimes we need to say, you know what,

**[6:06]** that specialization to sell that specific product is not the best place to place the money. And so

**[6:12]** those typically have been some very hard decisions, but those are some of the best decisions to be

**[6:17]** made because the diamond in the rough or the gold that's sitting in the ground sometimes is getting

**[6:22]** sacrificed with the investment in something that has passed his life. How do you think about,

## 06:31 — How much should you actually invest in RevOps?

**[6:31]** this is something I've struggled with and I know a lot of other people in RevOps have struggled

**[6:36]** with, but I'm interested based on your finance background, how you might approach this. How do

**[6:42]** you think about the investment itself in RevOps specifically RevOps, headcount tools, the time

**[6:51]** away from selling to do enablement, all of those investments that are made there. What's kind of

**[6:57]** the equation you run in your head to let you know how much you should be investing or what you expect

**[7:02]** the return to be on that investment? That's a great question, Anthony. And my experience,

**[7:08]** I've always had the situation of trying to be as lean as possible. So in terms of giving you

**[7:15]** something that's a magical formula, I haven't necessarily approached it from that way. What

**[7:20]** I've approached it from is from a capability perspective. So many times I've brought revenue

**[7:28]** operations teams with me and I evaluate the situation that I am entering and I decide what

**[7:35]** capability is missing. And if that capability is going to cost whatever that capability costs to an

**[7:42]** extent, but we have to be able to close the gaps is the biggest thing. And so as opposed to saying

**[7:49]** I need a team of 10 or I need a team of five, I first start with I need a skill set that can

**[7:55]** help us do A, B, C, and D. And then I build a team from that perspective. That's changing now

**[8:03]** from the perspective of AI and all the other things that you need to be able to turn on

**[8:10]** and implement and explain again cross-functionally because some of that spin may relate to things

**[8:17]** that used to be spent in marketing before. But now you have RevOps people kind of leading the

**[8:22]** way to connect and close some of those gaps. And so you need to have different types of

**[8:26]** conversations. And again, it's not just a RevOps line item in the P and L anymore, which is exciting,

## 08:36 — The floor: RevOps should pay for itself annually

**[8:36]** actually. I think so too. And I know there's not a magic formula. It probably depends. Are there

**[8:43]** any guardrails you would say like on the spectrum of not having RevOps at all versus like a bloated

**[8:53]** RevOps team, any ROI calculation you think would help you make a decision? Some companies are

**[9:01]** running around with zero RevOps investment. Oh, wow. Yes, I certainly wouldn't recommend that. So

**[9:08]** in my experience, the best way to, I guess, from a numbers perspective is you definitely should not

**[9:14]** be with zero RevOps. And that kind of goes for even small companies. I think the return on having

**[9:23]** someone think about things from a cross-functional manner and recognize the gaps and how you can make

**[9:29]** a sales person. It could be one person. How you can make a sales person or two more efficient,

**[9:35]** more effective. How did it generate more leads? The new terminology of go-to-market engineering.

**[9:40]** It's just a tremendous return. And so I look at it as if I'm spending X amount of dollars,

**[9:48]** I want that team to think about at least paying for themselves. So that's the rule that I would

**[9:53]** give you, right? If you haven't invested in RevOps, RevOps should be able to pay for themselves

**[10:00]** annually, right? Whether that is reducing expenses and unneeded systems and costs, because you might

**[10:07]** have four different platforms that you're paying for because you don't have someone to integrate

**[10:12]** them and then cut that cost out. Or if you have a large sales team that doesn't have any beginning

**[10:18]** of a sales process or consistency, and you know that once you get that consistency, once you have

**[10:24]** territory management, for example, I've gone into some situations where there's no concept of

**[10:31]** this person has a responsibility to drive a number in X space. And it's just a round robin type of

**[10:37]** thing. Go-to-market operations RevOps fixes that. And that ultimately comes back to accountability,

**[10:45]** a management system, being able to run a cadence, being able for a CEO, CRO, etc., to run reports

**[10:53]** that make sense and be able to make the next best decision, having new information that they didn't

**[11:00]** necessarily have before. So it should pay for itself. That's the basic math that I would put on it.

## 11:07 — The power of one percent

**[11:07]** No, I think that makes a ton of sense. And a lot of people get caught up in like, oh, well,

**[11:11]** maybe I can have one more AE or I take that investment and throw it into marketing and

**[11:15]** I think one thing people don't realize is how sensitive, especially if you're making a

**[11:20]** sizable investment in your go-to-market machine salespeople marketing. I mean, a mid-sized team

**[11:26]** is probably costing $20 million in spend. And if you don't have a team dedicated to making sure

**[11:32]** that it's running efficiently on a $20 million plan, if you can increase the conversion rate by

**[11:40]** just one point, that could be a million dollars. Yeah. I'll frame that as the opportunity or also

**[11:48]** as the risk if you don't keep your conversion rates where they are as you scale. That is correct.

**[11:53]** And it's funny you use 1% because in certain situations, I literally talked about the power

**[12:00]** of 1%. And then from a RevOps perspective and being able to focus the renewal team on the power

**[12:07]** of improving GRR or NRR by 1%. What is the equivalent of replacing that in new customers?

**[12:16]** It's large in a lot of cases. So power of 1% is a very simple but principle that RevOps

## 12:25 — Finance to operations: the CRM implementation that changed everything

**[12:25]** implements typically. Walk me back to, I want to go back to this like a spider bite moment

**[12:35]** when you went from finance to RevOps. You're doing that CRM implementation. Walk me through

**[12:41]** how that moment led to all the other opportunities in your career and what you learned along the

**[12:48]** way through that path. Yeah. So first thing, it was kind of scary to be honest with you. I had

**[12:56]** to call some people. It's like this guy's asking me to effectively change my career. All I know

**[13:02]** is finance. At least that's how I was evaluating myself at that particular point in time. And once

**[13:10]** I got over the discomfort and I took the leap, started getting engaged in the project in and of

**[13:16]** itself, some of the feedback came from the consultants that I was working with. They

**[13:22]** actually loved working with me. And they're like, man, we've never worked with someone like you.

**[13:27]** And what they meant by that was clearly I was thinking and operating and more than in a sales

**[13:34]** capacity, right? So not just let's finish this to connect the dots, but no, we're going to go on a

**[13:41]** road show and we're going to talk to people. We're going to ask questions. We're going to make sure

**[13:46]** that we are implementing something that the sales people are going to use and that we're going to

**[13:51]** get the reports downstream that we want to get out of this. And we're not going to talk about reports

**[13:56]** after the fact, things along those lines. And so as this project is going on in every interaction

**[14:02]** that I would have like that, but also when you were running to issues and the process for solving

**[14:09]** the issue. Well, we have an issue. Let's bring everybody into the room, right? As opposed to,

**[14:15]** you know, this group over here yelling and screaming and not knowing what to bring everybody

**[14:20]** into the room. Let's go around the table and let's figure out how we're going to address

**[14:24]** this issue. Again, now I'm seeing what Jose saw in me. It's like, I didn't know that all the things

**[14:32]** that I was doing in other places in finance or whatnot, it actually had a direct impact on this

**[14:38]** project. And so by the time we finished this project mistakes and all finding situations where

**[14:44]** I implemented things that I've wanted to get data back from the sales people, I'm like,

**[14:49]** and as soon as we go live, they're like, we're not doing this type of stuff. 500 man field.

**[14:58]** Even those learnings were fantastic because I had the capability and authority to say,

**[15:03]** take it out. Let's roll it out. We hear them. And you know what? It's, it's cool to be able to put

**[15:08]** yourself, your feet literally in their shoes. And it's easier to do that when you have had a

**[15:15]** relationship with them. So they could come to you to me and say, Thurman, come on, you know,

**[15:19]** this, this is, this is not going to work. Look at how much time this takes and you pay attention.

**[15:25]** And so once that happened, then you realize, Oh, I'm doing, I'm truly doing operations.

**[15:34]** This is not finance. This truly is operations. We did this from a system implementation standpoint.

**[15:40]** We're trying to connect this to the product. We're connecting this to the reporting that

**[15:44]** the CEO is going to see, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I am squarely in operations. And

**[15:51]** at that point I had every bit of confidence to stay in operations and desire actually,

**[15:56]** not just confidence, but desire to stay in operations because it was, it was more fun

**[16:01]** helping people hit a quota, um, then, then being on the dark side, so to speak.

**[16:09]** I was going to ask what kept you from maybe going back to finance and then what teed up,

**[16:15]** okay. You land that project, then what teed up like the next roles and going deeper into

**[16:21]** the rev ops role. Yeah. So, and you know, some of these things you just can't make up. Sometimes

**[16:27]** it's about, and you've probably seen me post about this when a door opens five more open for you

**[16:34]** typically. And so, um, that door that Jose opened, it led to another door because we ended

**[16:40]** up getting acquired and I met, you know, general manager and other executives from the acquiring

**[16:45]** company. We had conversations and they only knew me as ops. And so I stepped through that door and

**[16:54]** I became, you know, a, a go to market operations leader for, for net IQ. And that's, I was able

**[17:02]** to stay there because that was the value at that point that I was adding. Um, I'd never even thought

**[17:07]** about going back to finance. Cause I had stepped through a couple of doors already.

**[17:13]** It's tough. There's a few people I, I got kind of pushed into it too, or it just kind of fell in my

**[17:19]** lap. And then I fell in love with the, with the work and what it meant. And I was like, Oh my gosh,

**[17:24]** there's no going back after this. This is way too much fun. Yeah. Yeah. It's a different level of

**[17:30]** fun when closing quarters and you know, trying to try to help the sales team, you know, across T's

**[17:36]** dot eyes and being a person to go back and convince finance that this is a good deal. And the rep

**[17:42]** wreck is good. It just, it's just a different perspective than, than just kind of waiting.

## 17:48 — From RevOps to the C-suite: plant yourself in between everything

**[17:48]** Right. Well, one thing that I think, I think is just fascinating about your career arc

**[17:54]** is that you took rev ops all the way to the C suite in two different roles. Once as a COO,

**[18:05]** now as a CRO. And there are, there are a lot more people coming into rev ops now. I think,

**[18:12]** you know, when, when we got into it, it was maybe like, okay, happenstance and figured out, but now

**[18:18]** there's a lot of people who are intentionally getting into it and it's attracting really,

**[18:22]** really top talent to come into the role. And with that, the top talent has ambitions for,

**[18:28]** okay, ultimately where is this leading? And I think that's always, those two roles have always

**[18:34]** kind of been, been it, but a couple of things. One, what does it take to go from rev ops to a C level

**[18:43]** position? Because I think that's a big jump. And then you have to walk me through both roles and

**[18:50]** where you think heads of rev ops are likely to be heading. Okay. So the first question

**[19:00]** is really plant yourself smack in between everything. Sometimes you can be in a rev ops

**[19:07]** and you can kind of try to be in the background, so to speak, and the systems and things along

**[19:14]** those lines, but when you really move yourself forward and you get to the point where you can

**[19:20]** own the reports and you own the numbers and you can explain how a connects to Z and not only system

**[19:30]** terms, but understanding that marketing is doing this, sales is doing this product is doing this

**[19:37]** type of storytelling. That's how you do it. Right? So when you are a required seat in the meetings,

**[19:46]** right? I, it's difficult to conduct a C suite meeting without inviting the rev ops person.

**[19:53]** If, if you're following what I'm saying. And yeah, especially if you're close with the CRO,

**[20:00]** because as the second, some data questions come up, it's like, wait, where's my, where's my rev ops

**[20:06]** person? That's exactly right. And, and that's, that's how it happened for me. I was able to

**[20:13]** participate not only in executive meetings and off sites where I'm the only person that's not

**[20:19]** part of the executive team that's in the meeting all the way up to the point of being in board

**[20:24]** meetings, doing the same thing. And, and so as you asked me that question, I'm thinking about how

**[20:30]** that happened. I was invited and, and, but I was invited because of the information and the

**[20:37]** understanding of the information and how it all connected to functions and being able to be that

**[20:44]** trusted source that didn't have, you know, a lean towards the marketing or the sales or the product

**[20:51]** organization that I was literally trying to be, um, the fly on the wall or the, the, you know,

**[20:59]** the non-biased party providing information. I want to go back to something cause I think

## 21:05 — How to get invited to the board meeting

**[21:05]** that's actually a critical moment. I felt like it was for me first time getting invited to

**[21:11]** a board meeting. That is when it felt like, okay, I'm, I'm playing in the big leagues now. Um,

**[21:21]** I might be, you know, the, the sixth man or something on the team, but I'm still there.

**[21:26]** I'm on the team and I come in quite a bit for people who are sitting in heads of RevOps roles.

**[21:31]** What does it take to get the invitation? I didn't ask. I can tell you that, but

**[21:38]** look in hindsight, I could have asked in the, you, you, you will recognize that there's a

**[21:45]** point in time where you have trust of the CRO. You have trust likely of the CEO.

**[21:54]** And as, if that is your desire to continue to move up, usually they will grant you

**[22:02]** the ability to attend a meeting or two, even if you're not on the agenda, if you're in a

**[22:08]** background, usually that answer would be a yes. So don't be, I would, my advice would be,

**[22:13]** don't be shy to ask. And if the answer is initially no, ask, well, when, what do I need to do,

**[22:22]** in order to be able to sit in, because you want to, you know, evaluate and listen and see how they

**[22:28]** ask questions and, and present it as, I want to be able to hear that so that when there's action

**[22:34]** items, I could hear it directly and I can help you the next time type of thing. So, so another way

**[22:40]** of doing that is debriefing the board meeting with the CRO. What were the toughest questions

**[22:47]** that were asked? Was there anything that you feel like we could have done better to prep you?

**[22:52]** Right? What are the things that we can anticipate being the questions the next

**[22:57]** time that we go to the board meeting, all types of things like that is the way you get invited.

**[23:03]** I think it's really good advice. And I, I know it might sound trivial, but getting that invitation

**[23:13]** is massive for your career. So like, if you can reverse engineer that somehow,

**[23:19]** I think it's really important to try to do that. Absolutely. I completely agree with you, Anthony.

## 23:26 — Volunteering for interim CRO — and being made COO

**[23:26]** So from there, walk me through what it takes to graduate to the next level

**[23:32]** and get the C in front of your title and really be at the table. Full transparency. It felt like

**[23:40]** that was eluding me and I could not figure out how, how am I going to make this a reality if it is to

**[23:49]** be my reality. And so as, as individuals, if we're transparent, sometimes we might think it's not

**[23:55]** going to happen. And then if you pause long enough and you build relationships with the right people,

**[24:01]** you keep doing what you know you're doing is right. Another person will tap you on the shoulder. And

**[24:08]** so in this particular case, change was occurring and I raised my hand. So the advice there is to

**[24:18]** look for when change is occurring and to raise your hand. I think I can do that. I have provided

**[24:28]** this value to tremendous number of CROs to CEOs. At some point you have to get past it and say,

**[24:37]** I'm going to cross the threshold and raise my hand and volunteer. And that's what happened.

**[24:40]** So I actually volunteered to be interim CRO at first. And I did that for a couple of months.

**[24:48]** And so as the transition was occurring, I'm like, well, I think I could do that. I know I didn't

**[24:55]** get picked for this yet, but what can I do? And the CEO then said, you know what, Thurman,

**[25:02]** I want to make you COO. And I'm like, I'll gladly take it. And that became an experience in and of

**[25:09]** itself because I stepped into something that I did not. I never had direct responsibility for

**[25:16]** managing, but it was identical to when Jose years ago tapped me on the shoulder to go from finance

**[25:21]** and lead a CRM implementation. It was the same thing. So I had experienced stepping into something

**[25:28]** that I did not know before. And learning it and picking it up was effectively identical.

**[25:36]** You meet people, you understand, you listen really, really hard to the challenges that they have.

**[25:42]** And then you observe what are the gaps and which ones of these gaps are the biggest and will have

**[25:49]** the greatest impact if we can help close them. And it was RevOps partially all over again,

**[25:55]** but RevOps with a specific business focus. Our job is to improve XYZ numbers. How are we going to

**[26:03]** improve XYZ numbers and who do we need to get on the same page in order to do that?

**[26:12]** In my case, we had not integrated our services organization, but I've integrated systems and

**[26:19]** sales teams repeatedly. This was really no different, just a different context, just a

**[26:25]** little bit of different context, different set of people. And it even helped with the sales piece

**[26:30]** because salespeople sold the services. Well, how much do we talk to the salespeople that sell the

**[26:36]** services? So I even was able to bridge that because it was a pass over type of thing as opposed to

**[26:44]** passing two or a handoff, a true handoff. And so we improved the entire go-to-market process

**[26:51]** with me being COOO because once again, you're bridging and closing the gaps that maybe others

**[26:57]** didn't necessarily see. I think that's a really practical way of thinking about this too. One,

**[27:07]** get uncomfortable being put into positions where you don't know everything and you have to start

**[27:12]** from scratch, but also lean on some transferable skills that you have and see how you can make it

## 27:18 — Why the seat opens when the org goes through turmoil

**[27:18]** work. The other thing, I think a lot of people think of it as like, oh, if I check these boxes,

**[27:24]** then I will get into this role. But a lot of times it requires the organization going through change.

**[27:31]** Yes. A lot of times it takes the organization going through some turmoil to open up those

**[27:36]** opportunities where people are willing to take a chance. My favorite time this happened in my

**[27:42]** career goes all the way back. I worked in restaurants in high school and in college.

**[27:48]** I was 19. I had been working at the same restaurant for three years at this point. I had a busboy

**[27:54]** host. I was a server at this point, loved it, doing a great job. One of the bartenders got fired,

**[28:02]** then the next bartender quit, and then the restaurant had no bartenders.

**[28:08]** And all the money's made where all the money's made. It is where all the money is made.

**[28:14]** And the general manager came over and was like, hey, by chance, would you be interested in being

**[28:21]** a bartender having never had a drink before? I'm 19 years old. Yeah. I was like, yeah, why not?

**[28:28]** Let's do it. And I get in the role and I'm like, okay, learning the recipes. We had a

**[28:36]** little flip book of all the drinks that we made and everything that goes into it.

**[28:40]** And that ended up being one of the funnest jobs I've ever had, and I loved it.

**[28:43]** Yes, you have to do your part. You have to do a good job. You have to show up and you have to

**[28:47]** perform in your role. But you also have to wait for some bad stuff to happen for those things

**[28:54]** to open up. Yeah. I love your analogy because it simplifies it, right? And that's one of the

**[29:02]** things that I try to do a lot too is have probably had some tag lines along the way,

**[29:09]** making the complex simple. But that example, it really is the same. Some people might not

**[29:14]** realize that the example that you just gave is the same as the example that I gave, but it really is.

**[29:21]** It's sometimes just the confidence, right? The confidence to raise your hand and say,

**[29:26]** I'm going to take a stab at being uncomfortable, as you said, for a period of time. And then the

**[29:31]** next thing you know, you're comfortable. And then you're comfortable enough to where you're ready to

**[29:37]** be uncomfortable again and raise your hand again. That's right. That's right. Yeah. In the C-suite

## 29:44 — What changes in the C-suite

**[29:44]** positions, what do you think is a little different or not obvious compared to someone sitting in a

**[29:53]** head of RevOps role right now? You feel a greater obligation to the whole, or at least I do.

**[30:04]** You start to understand that businesses are operating for the benefit of not only the

**[30:09]** customers, but for an employee base, right? So many times when you're in the RevOps role,

**[30:15]** you're thinking about, yes, you're a people, right? But when you get into the C-suite,

**[30:20]** you're thinking about the whole, at least I do, I think about the whole company, right? And how are

**[30:24]** we going to provide career opportunities, not just for folks in sales and in RevOps, but career

**[30:33]** opportunities for across the board, right? I like for people maybe because of my own background and

**[30:39]** the fact that I moved from finance to ops and now in sales, I like to give other people that

**[30:44]** opportunity to float, to move around and to, to understand a little bit that happens to their left,

**[30:51]** a little bit that happens to their right, because the more an organization is able to develop that,

**[30:56]** the stronger you're going to be. So for me, that's, that's the big thing. And you're in a seat and you

**[31:02]** can influence that to an even, even greater degree. Yeah, there's definitely a gravity to it that you

## 31:12 — COO or CRO? The answer that changed

**[31:12]** can feel. Now between the two roles, bringing it back, lots of heads of RevOps have their eyes on

**[31:20]** either one. Should I try to wait for that COO position to open up? Should I try to wait for

**[31:26]** that CRO position to open up? What do you think the RevOps path is ultimately leading to?

**[31:36]** I would not have, I'm going to answer this in a way that I would not have answered this 10 years ago.

**[31:44]** I'm going to say the CRO seat.

**[31:48]** 10 years ago, I would have said COO. What changed? Partially AI. And the reason I bring up the AI

**[32:00]** is who is really embracing it or who can embrace it in a go to market space the fastest, the RevOps

**[32:09]** folks. But as they're embracing it, and what they're trying to achieve with it, they know all

**[32:16]** they're trying to do is make the sales team more productive by giving them more at bats at the end

**[32:21]** of the day. More and more at bats, more quality at bats. And ultimately, that's going to just lead to

**[32:31]** more revenue, more bookings for the organization. It also can lead to, depending upon how things

**[32:37]** are being leveraged, less churn. So when you're thinking about all these things and you're putting

**[32:42]** them together, well, isn't that what the CRO's goals are? Ultimately, to drive more bookings that

**[32:50]** lead to more revenue, to protect churn. The only piece that you then need to get to is do you have

**[32:57]** the personality that you're okay talking to a customer about numbers? Because it's all numbers,

**[33:01]** right? So the same numbers that you're trying to drive as a CRO for your business are the same

**[33:06]** numbers that someone in the company that you're serving is trying to drive for their company at

**[33:14]** the end of the day. So the more you can tell those stories, and if you're a storyteller,

**[33:19]** I would say CRO is a path. I think it feels like a natural path. A lot of the CRO job is the

**[33:30]** operations of revenue. And I think you're really teed up well to do that, especially if you can

## 33:35 — Do you have to carry a bag first?

**[33:35]** pair yourself again with a good head of RevOps. How do you feel if you haven't had a stint in sales

**[33:44]** or carrying a quota yourself or closing deals? I think there's still this idea that a CRO should

**[33:52]** have some type of rainmaking ability as well. Is that a gap to fill or is that not as relevant

**[34:00]** when you get to that level? So that's why my answer changed. So 10, 15 years ago, I felt like

**[34:06]** and people were telling me, Thurman, you're going to have to carry a bag before you can be a CRO.

**[34:12]** And so I believe that. And I, in my mind, gave that dream up. But actually, 10 years later,

**[34:21]** 15 years later, I just don't see that as being true. It's about realistically, if you are a good

**[34:29]** RevOps person, you're carrying a bag in reality because you're right there at the hip with a CRO.

**[34:35]** And you're right there trying to help that CRO hit his or her number. You're carrying a bag.

**[34:41]** It just might not have been that your incentive plan had a quota, right? And that your payment

**[34:48]** came from every cell that took place. But every single time I realized that every single time that

**[34:54]** I am making sure that the T's were crossed and the I's were dotted for that sales leader,

**[35:01]** I was carrying a quota. Anyway, right. And then I became to the point where I did because I managed

**[35:08]** deal desk and things along those lines. Sometimes I had to talk to the customer. Sometimes I was the

**[35:14]** one coaching the rep on this is what you need to say. So depending upon how how wide your revenue

**[35:22]** operations experience goes, in reality, you kind of carried ahead a quote.

**[35:28]** I've never heard it framed that way. I love that though. When I was an operator running RevOps,

**[35:35]** I always had an OTE and my variable was on the global number. So did we hit our bookings number

**[35:43]** and I had, you know, commission tied to everybody. Do you think that's an important component to

**[35:53]** have? Do you think it's important to tie some compensation and make your head of RevOps feel

**[35:58]** like, hey, I have some real skin in the game if we perform well. I do. I do. I think that's a

**[36:03]** perfect alignment and that alignment, especially if it's done effectively alignment is what allows

**[36:10]** the RevOps to be that glue because you're continuously trying to work out the kinks,

**[36:17]** close the gaps, help the other functions understand what's working, what's not working.

**[36:24]** Can we, if we went here, can we get more bookings and if we stay where we are,

**[36:30]** type of thing. So yeah, so I do. I do think that if you can add that into the incentive program and

**[36:36]** it not just be a bonus like every other person in the company, I do think that that is much

**[36:41]** stronger aligned. And since we're on it, I just want to see anything else that you think would

## 36:48 — Run the pipeline and forecast calls

**[36:48]** be important. If, if a head of RevOps is listening to this and they're like, Hey, I want to be a CRO

**[36:52]** one day. What you mentioned the breadth of what you're involved in, what are some things you think

**[36:59]** they should maybe actively go seek to do in their role that would help prepare them for the CRO

**[37:06]** position? So something I did, and again, this another one of those things you, you don't appreciate

**[37:14]** until you, you leave that particular environment and you, you find somewhere that doesn't do it

**[37:20]** quite that way. So one of the things that we grew up doing, or I grew up doing and RevOps right

**[37:27]** immediately after that transition with Jose is we used to run the cadence calls. That was just the

**[37:33]** way that I did it. I don't know why I picked that way. Maybe that was because I was coming from

**[37:38]** finance and finance relationships with sales was good to where we could run the calls. I was the

**[37:43]** one building the reports and things along those lines, but then I ran into a group. I left there

**[37:49]** and I went to a group and the CRO was like, what are you doing, Dharma? He's like, I run my calls.

**[37:56]** And I'm like, wow. I didn't know that that's the way it worked at other places,

**[38:01]** but that's not how it works here. I'm going to run the calls. So, so, but then we developed,

**[38:08]** then he, he embraced it and he realized, oh, this is much better with ops running the calls.

**[38:14]** And what I'm talking about the calls, I mean, the pipeline calls, the forecast calls,

**[38:20]** ops ran the cadence literally, right? And so the CRO, I was there in his stead, right? So

**[38:30]** they looked at me in this particular situation. Like I was him. I was, he realized, oh, you're

**[38:37]** asking the questions that I would ask. You're badgering them or you're complimenting them or

**[38:42]** whatever the case exactly as I would, again, didn't know that that's what I was doing until I ran into

**[38:48]** a place that didn't do it the way that I started off doing, right? But then the value of that was,

**[38:56]** was very clear because that person has probably called me four or five times to go

**[39:00]** ref ops for him again after that, after that, that meeting. And so if you're not running those calls,

**[39:07]** that's the advice of one of the first and easiest things you could do

**[39:11]** is to get to the trust of your CRO to where you're running the calls.

**[39:17]** And everything that that individual would be asking, you're asking, and you're expecting

**[39:24]** the responses to come to you just like they would to the boss.

**[39:30]** Yeah, it's like dress rehearsal for the role. Yeah, it's a dress rehearsal for the role.

**[39:34]** I like that a lot. Do some forecasting calls, get put in those sacred rhythms of the company,

**[39:41]** practice leading, get inside the exact room and be the data person and the person who can

**[39:48]** start to tell a story around it, get that invite to the board meeting.

**[39:52]** Yes. Probably the three things to help get you prepped for CRO mode.

**[39:58]** That's right. And all of that comes with storytelling ability. If you're not able to tell

**[40:05]** a story, the story is going to be difficult. You don't just want to be in a room. You want to be

**[40:11]** a storyteller. You want to be able to connect what the information is saying and be able to

**[40:16]** educate people on that information, turn the data into information.

**[40:22]** If somebody feels like they're not a great storyteller,

**[40:25]** any direction you'd point them to or how to work on that or think about what storytelling is?

**[40:32]** I would practice and this goes with a lot of things, but I would literally

**[40:40]** practice with your own team. I would practice with the CRO. And sometimes storytelling starts

**[40:48]** off with telling a story that is non-business related. It's telling your story. So kind of

**[40:54]** like we've been doing here today, Anthony, can you tell your own story? How did you get to where

**[40:59]** you are already? Reflect on where the Lord has blessed you, right? And be able to recognize where

**[41:05]** you were, look back, celebrate where you were, but do that in the form of saying a story.

**[41:12]** Then take those practice stories and turn them into telling a story with numbers.

**[41:17]** That's great. And I think, like you mentioned, if you can tie all those things together,

## 41:21 — Where RevOps is going: go-to-market engineers

**[41:21]** then you start to get really, really prepared for the role. Where do you think RevOps is going?

**[41:28]** So you've seen the arc of this really well. And I think you have a really solid foundation

**[41:34]** of first principles. What's the foundation of RevOps? But how do you think this is evolving?

**[41:42]** I know a lot's already changed, especially in maybe the last two years. But where do you think

**[41:48]** it's going? I like the new terminology, go to market engineers. Have you heard that? Have you

**[41:54]** seen that? Yeah, we've adopted it. We've adopted it as a title internally too. I really like that.

**[42:00]** I haven't changed any title in or anything like that. But what that terminology insinuates

**[42:08]** is where I think it's headed. It is definitely leaving where just the people behind the scenes

**[42:14]** working the systems, right? It is more the forward. Where grow to market operations or engineers or

**[42:23]** RevOps is actually, I think, going to start leading the way more so. Hey, all of these

**[42:32]** capabilities are out there. Which one of these capabilities help our business shape and take

**[42:39]** advantage of who we are the best? And that could have an impact on product marketing. That could

**[42:44]** have an impact on demand gen marketing. That could have an impact on product. We just don't see it

**[42:49]** yet. But you're starting to see little bit by little bit more and more of that. So stay educated,

**[42:57]** reach out there. But just again, back to that storytelling, understand what we're actually

**[43:02]** trying to tell the story we're trying to tell. You're always wanting to inform your product team

**[43:08]** of what they could build in the future. That's the engineer engineering, right? What is the market

**[43:13]** really telling us that they really want? Do they really need x, y, and z type of thing. And so I

**[43:18]** think that RevOps is more so than any other function, best position to be able to take advantage of that.

**[43:26]** I completely agree. And I think a lot of teams I'm seeing lean on their RevOps team to take them

**[43:31]** through the AI transition. Even what I find just interesting. Like if you would have a couple years

**[43:39]** ago said, okay, take a company and let's look at just the structure and hierarchy of a company.

**[43:44]** We're going to just come up with this new thing, AI, and everybody's going to start just like pouring

**[43:49]** into it and say, who do you think in the company is going to lead the overall company strategy of

**[43:54]** how you're going to use AI? I think a lot of people would have started to look at engineering

**[43:59]** or product or somewhere more technical. And I just find it so interesting that yes, they're using AI

**[44:07]** within their own department, but for the more holistic strategy, a lot of RevOps teams are

**[44:14]** owning that and leading that. And it's feeling like the moment you probably felt when you're

**[44:20]** tapped on the shoulder to do a CRM implementation. And it's like, we're the ones who are kind of used

**[44:25]** to not knowing things. Everything's changing all the time. Jack of all trades type of people. So

**[44:30]** like, yeah, we'll go do that. We'll go do that. Right. No fear.

**[44:36]** Yeah. Your head of RevOps has been me. So I don't know. I find it surprising, but I also think it's

**[44:44]** an exciting moment for anyone who's sitting in the role right now too. It is. It absolutely is.

**[44:48]** Because there's so much out there. Someone has to also scale it down and say, these are the ones to

**[44:54]** pick for us right now. Because there's a lot out there too. But yes, everybody wants to adopt

**[45:02]** something. But if you adopt, I like to say directionally correct. RevOps is the place

## 45:11 — Wrap

**[45:11]** to get directionally correct. Thurman, this has been awesome. Thank you so much for walking

**[45:16]** through everything. I am really impressed by your story, but it feels so RevOps to me. Nobody went

**[45:23]** to school for it. Nobody thought about it as their career. And then you kind of find your way into it

**[45:29]** and then develop through it. But the people who get it that are in it and love it really understand

**[45:34]** what's special about it. And I think you've just exhibited that through your career this whole time.

**[45:39]** And I also really like the lesson on raise your hand when there's opportunities. Do a good job

**[45:46]** in your role, but you may need to exhibit some patience and wait for those opportunities to open

**[45:52]** up. It's not all going to be on your time. You're going to have to wait for those. And when they do,

**[45:57]** seize the moment and raise your hand and get in there. And I think the conversation we had around

**[46:03]** the ultimate role that RevOps is leading to, is it leading to COO? Is it leading to CRO?

**[46:09]** I really like your framing of this and your opinion and also how that has evolved.

**[46:15]** Say a decade ago, you would have thought, hey, maybe yes, this ultimately will lead to a COO

**[46:18]** position. But now the demands of what the business needs and what you're learning in the RevOps role

**[46:24]** and the time you have to practice the real role of what a chief revenue officer does.

**[46:30]** Letting that be the ultimate end game is really important. So I'm really excited for people to

**[46:35]** listen to this. I'm excited for anyone who's in a RevOps role in particular. And I appreciate you

**[46:41]** sharing everything today and can't wait to see what you do next at Mary Golden and next.

**[46:47]** Thank you, Anthony. I appreciate the invite and hopefully this is useful to a few people.

**[46:54]** I'm sure it will be.