How to Stand Out in a Shifting Presales Job Market

Todd Janzen: [00:00:00] All right. Welcome to episode 81 of two Pre-Sales and a Pod. We have a very special guest today that we’ll intro in just a little bit, but before I get into that, Adam, how are you?

Adam Freeman: I’m fine, Todd. How are you?

Todd Janzen: I’m doing awesome today. It’s a beautiful, beautiful Thursday here.

Adam Freeman: Yeah. Do you know what I’m gonna start by saying?

We’ve got our summer right now in the uk, right? We’ve had about three days of decent weather. I think it’s gonna turn to rain pretty soon. So anyone listening from kind of UK, Europe will feel me on this. We’ve having our summer right now, so let’s enjoy it.

Todd Janzen: Get out there. It’s your time. All right, let’s get into today’s episode.

Today we are gonna be talking about a very important topic. The state of the job market and how to land your next dream job. I get this question almost daily, Adam, I’m sure you do. We get a ping on, Hey, I’m looking for my next role. What cool companies are out there? What do you know? And I don’t know know about you, Adam, but like, [00:01:00] you know, I got the family, I got the day job.

I’m not really that dialed into some of this stuff, and so you and I are putting our heads together of like. How can we help this community? And it turns out there’s someone out there that is really an expert out there and can really help.

Adam Freeman: Yeah. And it’s not us. It’s the one and only Mr. Yuji. Hii Yui, thank you so much for joining us.

Yuji Higashi: Thanks guys. Really, really happy to be here. Um, you know, I’ve, I’ve been big fans of, of the podcast for a long time and, uh, excited to, to be able to join you all to chat a little bit about the state of the job market and how, how folks can, can ultimately get roles.

Todd Janzen: Awesome. We’re gonna get to some really burning questions here.

I’m so excited for this episode. But before we do uji, kick us off by just, just telling the audience about who you are and how you got here.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah. Yeah. Happy to. So, uh, my background, I started my career just going way back at Deloitte Consulting, realized pretty quick when I was doing that, that I, uh, wanted to get into tech, the tech startup world.

And so I did that. Had a [00:02:00] couple good runs. Uh, first being at a company called Aptio that had a good exit, IPO ultimately. And then I had the opportunity to go into another company called Outreach, where I. Was able to build and lead a pre-sales team from scratch. And, uh, had a good five year run there where I was able to build it into a global, uh, SE team.

Um, and really enjoyed that run. And then, uh, towards the end of that, that experience, I ended up partnering with James Kakis to, to co-found pre-sales collective because what we were just. Seeing out there in the world was that there wasn’t a really a good community or a place to go for presales professionals.

And we had a, a lot of passion for the role. And so we ended up creating the presales collective, which now continues to be a, a pretty large global community for presales. Um, and then as part of that. Building that community. I ended up taking on initiative to build out a, a presales academy, which was part of Presales Collective.

And that was a re-skilling program where we would help people from all kinds of backgrounds get into presales for their [00:03:00] first role. And, and I’m talking to people from, you know, all kinds of backgrounds like. Teachers and real estate agents and mortgage brokers, and that was a real, really fun experience.

We helped a lot of people make some really life-changing career moves, and I think just through that experience and also previously managing teams, I, I realized that I really enjoyed. And got developed a strong passion for helping people develop their careers, and specifically in pre-sales and also tech sales in general.

Um, but really just enjoy helping people take that next step, whether it’s making a big career pivot, getting a promotion or landing that next job. And so that’s what led us to create this new company called Better Career, where that’s our primary focus is really just career coaching and helping people at different stages of their career, specifically within.

SC or sales engineering roles and, but also in account executive roles as well. And to date we’ve helped, you know, hundreds of people now take that next step or get promoted or land the next job. And so it’s been a really rewarding experience and you know, if you ask me. [00:04:00] Five or seven years ago, if I thought I’d ever leave a pre-sales as a practitioner, I, I would probably say no.

But, um, and I never thought I’d be a career coach, but, but here I am and, uh, I’m loving it every day.

Adam Freeman: Feel like we should. That’s awesome. Virtual round of applause there, Todd. I think there’s a few people we know that have been through it, and I know you’ve, you’ve helped some people do some fantastic career steps along the way, so you know, more power to you guys.

Todd Janzen: Yeah. Before we get into the first question, U Eugene, um, you do have a co-founder. She wasn’t able to make it today, but maybe let’s give her a quick plug and shout out.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, Maddie Streek, she’s my co-founder. She is the other half of a better career and she’s incredible, incredible leader and also just very passionate about helping people.

She was somebody that I hired at Presales Academy and she really helped actually build that entire program and into what it was. Um, and so yeah, I wish she could be here, but she’s somebody that I work very closely with day in, day out, and she’s helped a lot of people through it, through their career journeys as well.

So maybe the next one, we’ll, we’ll get her on.

Todd Janzen: Yeah, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting her a few times, and [00:05:00] I just think about like, if I was looking for a role and I was working with you, like she’s got this incredible sense of empathy and just like, and so do you, by the way, I mean, I can’t think of two better people to work with.

Um, but that’s being said, like, let’s, let’s talk about the burning question. Everyone’s that’s on the tip of everyone’s mind, and that is give us a sense of what is the current state of the job market, and particularly when it comes to pre-sales.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, happy to get into it. That’s something that we are very close and stay up, up, up to, up to speed on just because it’s, you know, our, our, our, our daily focus, right, is just helping people navigate the job market.

And so I would say just generally, um, I’ll start with like broadly across tech, you know, and then we can narrow in on presales. But I think what we’ve seen is that, uh, in 2024 things improved. A decent amount and also going into 2025 as far as new job openings, increased hiring. And so that, that’s been a, a nice relief from the 2022 and 2023 where it was just really mass layoffs, not a lot of hiring, tons of [00:06:00] fiscal tightening.

And so things have started to improve. I will say it’s been very, very steady and it’s also been very, very mixed as far as. The, the areas within tech that have been hiring. Um, and when I say areas, different domains, different companies. There are a lot of companies that are still struggling and still laying off, as we’ve seen even in some, some recent layoffs that have happened with some, some companies.

Um, but then on the other side of the spectrum, there are companies that are well funded, have great product market. Fit and they’re growing and hiring constantly. And so it’s very mixed. And then even with roles, right? So we talk about pre-sales roles, account executive roles, that’s also kind of mixed as far as, um, roles that we see a lot of hiring around.

And, and I think that, um, within pre-sales especially, I. The, the leader market is very tight. Um, and that’s because a lot of companies had gone through, you know, trying to operate more lean. So they’ve cut a lot of middle management. A lot of really strong leaders have been kind of laid off, and so there’s a lot of talent out there looking for new roles.

And then there’s just not a [00:07:00] lot of roles that are available for SE leaders right now, unfortunately. Um. And as you probably have experienced and seen, a lot of those roles that are open typically get filled internally, right? You take your best SC and you promote ’em up to a frontline role. You take your best frontline leader and you promote ’em to that second line role.

So that just creates a, a very imbalanced market, unfortunately, in the SC leader world right now. So it is pretty challenging. We, we haven’t had some leaders, leaders that have gotten very good roles fairly quickly, um, but it just remains very competitive. And then on the other side of the spectrum, like.

First time scs going into those entry level SC roles, there’s a lot less of those than there used to be in 2021. Everybody wanted to hire first time scs. This doesn’t exist anymore. Uh, at, at that level. There’s certainly still hiring for first, first MSEs, but it’s just, it, it’s not something that there’s a ton of hiring around.

So we do work with some career changers make, looking to make that pivot. Um, but not as many as we’d like, just because the market is, is in, in a place where it’s just not, um, I. Not hiring a lot of up, [00:08:00] first time scs, so, so yeah, I mean for the rest of 2000 or 20, 25, you know, I guess if you asked me a few months ago, we would say, yeah, it’s still looking pretty good, umstead steadily growth.

But of course, you know, there’s some macroeconomic things happening and trade policy that have thrown everybody for a bit of a loop. Um, and so, you know, when there’s uncertainty in the markets, that just means that companies may be a little slower and, you know, be in wait and see mode before they do a bunch of aggressive hiring.

And so that’s what we’re probably gonna experience in the next, at least few months until some of that trade stuff maybe gets sorted out and the macro stuff gets smoothed out, which is hopefully the case. And we don’t go into something, you know, more serious, like a recession. But, um, but yeah, I think for now it seems that hiring is continued, continuing to steadily pick up, which is good.

That’s good. Hmm,

Adam Freeman: you, you, Jim, I’m just thinking, um, are you seeing, with this kind of uncertain, are you seeing people kind of double down on some of their maybe top performers? Right? Because I, I know going into, into Covid, that was one of the things that pushed the salaries. If you remember the kind of the [00:09:00] covid years, Todd, when we were trying to hire over that period and salaries were insane, right?

And there were people moving for, for crazy money. Are you seeing people really double down and retain their top talent with this kind of market that’s going on right now?

Yuji Higashi: We have seen, yeah, there are companies that are, that are really investing in, in their top talent. Um, I will say that there’s also the other side of that where there there’s not, you know, there’s, we have pe people that are very experienced and very high performers, great resumes, and they just feel like they’re underpaid and they’re not able to get more from their company.

’cause their, their company isn’t, you know, doing big raises or comp adjustments. And so, you know, they come to us and say, I want to find that next position where I can get. You know, a a, a pay increase. And so we, we do, we help a lot of experience SCS make that move. So it’s, it is a little bit of both. I think it definitely varies based on the, the organization and the company.

Todd Janzen: Yeah. U ui. So, um, we’ve been talking about the pre-sales role and, you know, my background at Salesforce, um, you know, there’s a lot of roles that surround or the kind of lumped into the pre-sales role, but they’re [00:10:00] not traditional SE is better career helping with some of those and kind of what is, what is the breadth of, of careers that better career is helping with.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, great question. So I would say generally the pre-sales umbrella, so sales engineers, solutions engineers, solution consultants, any of those titles, right? Solution architects, even as long as they’re kind of in the pre-sales world and not post-sales. We also do work with some value engineers. Here and there.

I can’t say we work with a ton of them. Um, you know, maybe some demo engineers too. We’ve helped people actually get into demo, demo engineering roles as well. So we do a little bit of that. And then on the account executive side, we work with account executives, not so much BDRs or SDRs, um, but account executives and, and ams, account account managers as well is who we focus on.

Hmm. Fantastic.

Todd Janzen: Are, um, uh, your last statement triggered this. Are you seeing ses, um, being more flexible in what they want to do next? Like, I know some of these companies need to hire a very technical ae, which actually lends itself more to a, a [00:11:00] pre-sales person. Are you seeing some of that shift around or am I making this up?

Yuji Higashi: No. Yeah, absolutely. We’re seeing, we’re seeing a lot of that. So in fact, last week we had two. Former ess or actually who were ess, they wanted to go after external AE roles and they went and got AE roles pretty quickly. In fact, one person got two offers, uh, or AE roles. And so we are high, we are seeing that sales managers, sales leaders are preferring a technical profile or more of SE profile to step into their AE seats.

Uh, we are seeing more and more of that. And, and, you know, just going back to like the leader market, we’re seeing a lot of SE leaders who. Um, our, you know, because they’re having a hard time getting leader roles, management roles, they’re actually going back into either se uh, individual contributor roles or they’re going after AE roles or AM roles because they have a really strong skill set for that, um, that type of a role.

And so we are seeing a bit of that as well. Um, so it is, it’s only been a [00:12:00] trend, uh, that that seems to be picking up.

Adam Freeman: I, I spoke to a US based, um, enablement leader actually a couple of weeks ago, and they made a really, really interesting point, and I wrote it down for us to bring onto this podcast because they said to me, Adam, if I could get all of my a and customer facing people to have the skillset of a pre-sales person, my pipeline would be, would be better and I wouldn’t have as many problems, which I thought was a really interesting observation.

It. It leads me to the next question, which is, we would often ask on this podcast, what are people looking for? What are the skills people want? I’m gonna ask you this a different way. Why are people not getting hired, do you think right now? What are they missing out on?

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, I think, um, I. I mean, there’s a, the market’s certainly been challenging, right?

And I think that just makes it much harder to stand out if you’re going after it the way you used to go after the job market. And I think a lot of the people that come to us just haven’t had to search for a job in a long time. Maybe because they, they’ve been in a job for the last seven [00:13:00] years and that they haven’t updated their resume in seven years.

But then also some people have just gotten their last three jobs through their network, right? They had somebody pull them from one job to another, and they never had to really. Seriously navigate a job market. And so that’s, I think the, the trickiest part for a lot of people right now is that they just haven’t been shown how to effectively market themselves.

And we work with a lot of really, um, or we have a lot of really experienced scs that come to us and who are really, really good at what they do, or AEs even, what really good at what they do, what they just don’t know how to necessarily market themselves in the best way. And that. You know, that’s such a core part of not only just getting a job, I think, but carrying yourself through your career.

And so a lot of what we do is actually help them with that. Um, so I think that the, you know, the, the crux of it is like we can’t rely too much on just a resume anymore because every time a job is posted, it gets flooded with resumes and there’s a lot of good resumes in there. So how do you stand out? Um, so even if you have a, like, really, like what I say all the time is you could be the most qualified, best fit for this role, and you may never even get a.

Conversation [00:14:00] because you’re too far down in the pile of applications to never get seen. And so the key is to really, you know, be visible, find ways to stand out. Um, and we have a, we can get into a little bit like about the process that we take people through and provide some advice for anybody listening on how to go about it.

But those are the main reasons. I think the other big thing that, that people sometimes challenge or challenged with is just having like a really strong. What we call a value narrative, which is really just that the, the talking about the unique set of skills, experiences, and accomplishments an individual has, which everybody has a unique set of that, and how do they package that up into a really compelling value narrative.

That will, will, that will come across clear, concise, and compelling to somebody that would be willing to hire them and pay them, you know, two, 200 grand or 250 grand or whatever it is, right? For that role. And so you people need to just shift their mindset to like, how, how do I, how can I bring, how can my skills bring value to this organization, to this team, to this se role that is cons that I’m being considered for?

And then once they people nail that narrative, it’s kind of like [00:15:00] night and day as far as how they approach that. That interview or that job market, uh, with, with their level of confidence and how they talk about themselves. And so that’s a big part of what I think what a lot of people are missing, um, when they think about, you know, going after the next role or, or approaching the job market.

Todd Janzen: Yeah. We’re, we’re getting into kind of exactly what I wanted to talk about today. So like, let’s just keep pulling on this thread.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah.

Todd Janzen: Um, you know, I, you know, I’m speaking from experience, so I went through a job transition within the last year. Adam, you did the same. There’s a lot of emotions that go with that, right?

Like there’s a lot of your identity that can be tied up with your former employer. There’s a lot of psychological aspects of this whole thing, right? And you, like you mentioned confidence. And I think we all know like that confidence has to be there if you’re gonna land that next job, right? And so, yeah, you know, we can talk about some of the mechanics and I’m sure we will about like resumes and what, what needs to be there, but it, it feels to me like a big part of your job and Maddie’s job.

Is to like, is [00:16:00] to, to boost people’s confidence and bring them along, like talk to us about that a little bit.

Yuji Higashi: That’s a great, great, great point. Confidence is such a, such a important part of it, um, because you have to, you’re right, the confident candidate gets hired and you, you gotta show up to interviews and conversations in that way.

And it’s, and it’s very hard to do that, especially if you’ve been on, on a, on a, through a layoff and, and you’ve had some rejection and you’ve gotten to maybe the final round of an interview process and got rejected. Like, we’ve had people go through that and it is hard. Uh, I totally get it. It’s very hard.

We see it all the time, and so a lot of what we do is just try to. Through our, through our process is just try to hype people up sometimes and give them that confidence. I think part of what we do is give them the, the, the roadmap, give them the tooling, give them the coaching so that they. Know what they’re doing now is the right things, right?

They’re saying the right things. We’re giving them validation of that. I think that gives them confidence. But honestly, sometimes we just get on calls with people before they go into a big presentation interview and just, just hype them up so that they’re feeling like they can take on the world at that point, because that’s very important, you [00:17:00] know?

And I, I just had a leader, um, SC leader who was laid off, uh, I think, uh, in February. And he, he, he, uh. Signed on to work with us right away. And honestly, he had great resume, great, uh, credentials. He was great. Right? I don’t think he, he would’ve really had that hard of a time getting a role. Um, but he just said, look, I just want somebody there to like.

You know, help me through this. ’cause I know it’s an emotional rollercoaster and I wanna make sure that I just have somebody that I can stay grounded with and, and bounce things off of and ask questions of. And I said, yeah, it’s a lot of what we do too, is just, you know, be there for people. Um, because it can be a lonely, uh, journey, right?

If. If you’re on it alone and you know, you’re trying to get into a role so you can get back to, you know, uh, uh, feeling like you have that, that that’s something to work on. And also be, also be there to support your family and things like that. So, so yeah, that’s a lot of what we do. So I’m glad you brought that up.

Is, is just help people with, with their confidence.

Todd Janzen: I’m glad you used the word lonely ’cause that that’s what was coming to mind. It’s like, it can be a super lonely journey and there’s all kinds of big [00:18:00] emotions in this process. There’s fear, there’s, you know, rejection as you said. Um, so maybe let’s get into the process a little bit more on kind of like, and, and again, don’t, not asking for any trade secrets here, but like, kind of how do you work with people?

Yuji Higashi: No, I’m happy to share it all as much as I can in the amount of time that we have. But, um, you know, the way we work with people is a few ways. The, the, uh, the primary one right now, just given the state of the job market is we help people navigate the job market. So we have a, a whole end-to-end coaching program where we guide them through every step of that process.

And I’ll get into more of the details on that in a second here. But there are other two, two quick ways that we help. Uh, folks that we work with, one is what we call career advancement. So we, we do work with people that are in role and they just wanna get to that next level. They want to get a promotion or they want to move into management, and they want help navigating that, that those steps in that process.

We also work with like first time managers that. They just got their first frontline role and they wanna make sure they, they nail it. And so I’m coaching a few folks on exactly [00:19:00] that. So we do some of that as well. Um, and then we also partner with employers to actually help fill roles. We have a big, pretty big bench of candidates we work with.

We also understand the SE role very well. And for you guys who have hired scs, right? It’s a very. Nuanced role. And, and it takes some understanding of, of, of it to, to really find the right talent. And so we, we do help some employers with that as well. Um, but yeah, going back to the job search, which is the, the main focus, and that’s where we work with the most people on is, is the job search.

And so, um, we have a whole kind of process that we take people through. Um, which includes which, which starts with the narrative, right? That’s kinda what I mentioned earlier, like that’s the foundation for a successful job search is really understanding what value you can bring to the role and to a potential employer.

Um, and then we go through and look at all of what we call the career assets, which are the resume, which is very important, uh, but also the LinkedIn profile, which I think some people sleep on because they just haven’t really had to really optimize that in a while. And [00:20:00] arguably that’s more important than

Seen by so many more people and if you have a good LinkedIn profile, you can even get some inbound from recruiters reaching out to you. And we’ve had a few people that have gotten jobs from that. The quality of those, those inbounds is, is, you know, can range, but having some people coming to you is a lot easier than having you to go out and and find roles yourself.

So that’s part of it. The other big thing is what we focus on is what we call proof assets. And these are, these are just different types of collateral or assets or like presentations or micro demos or things that we, we have people create depending on. Where we think they’ll have objections based on their background and experience, and we have them create these, these assets, these proof assets, to proactively overcome those objections so that if, you know, if I’m going after a role that’s expecting me to demo a certain type of software, and somebody’s gonna say, well, I don’t know if you have that experience.

That’s my hesitation, whether they tell you that or not. We’re gonna try to get ahead of that by having you do a micro demo based on [00:21:00] that specific thing so that you can send it to them and say, Hey, by the way, this is something I’ve done that, you know, I think will help you understand what I’m capable of when it comes to doing this role effectively.

That’s one example. There’s a lot of things that we have in our toolkit. I think that that really help proactively overcome objections. Not only does it do that, but also helps you stand out because a lot of candidates aren’t doing that. The average candidate is relying on their resume and maybe their LinkedIn profile to get noticed and visible.

So we take a lot of extra steps to just make sure that, you know, you’re gonna make yourself visible as possible for those roles that you’re really interested in, and that’s gonna get you noticed and invited to do interviews. Um, I. We also look at upskilling for sess in particular. Uh, you know, the market generally is looking for certain technical skills, and so we, we look at what PE skills people have and what skills we can quickly bolster up on their resume.

We don’t have people go do a six month bootcamp on how to code, right? That’s. Crazy. We, we just say, Hey, here’s a free course you can brush up on APIs. Do that for, uh, three [00:22:00] hours on the weekend and be able to talk about it intelligently so that you can start to look like a more well-rounded se. Um, and that’s kinda like getting them set up to go to market.

And then once that they’re ready to go to market, so to speak, then they go out and we get. You know, help them get the interviews. They get the interviews, and then we really guide them through the interview process. We’ve seen, you know, hundreds and hundreds of interview processes for SCS these days. We

know what they look like, and, and we generally know what, what, what people, uh, what, um, at every stage of the process, what, what they’ll be asked, right.

And what questions they need to prepare for, what stories they need to have ready from their experience. And so we help them prep some of those stories so they. You know, they have those ready to go. They don’t have to think on the spot. They can be confident in delivering a strong story every time. Um, and then the last step of the process is once they get the job offer, we help them understand what it is and the ins and outs of it, and then help them negotiate it if there’s, if we feel like it’s not necessarily where it should be relative to what we’ve seen with other scs or AE job offers.

So, so yeah, I mean that’s at the high [00:23:00] level. There’s a lot of in between. But, um, what we found is just having a very comprehensive. A process is important now because, uh, we used to just do like a resume review here or there, but we don’t do that because we feel like the way we can make the biggest impact and really help somebody get the outcome that they really want is having that end-to-end process.

And then we also have seen that in a very challenging, or. Tight competitive market, you kind of have to be really exceptional. Every interaction with the employer, right? If you miss a step or you say something wrong or you do, you know, you might get de queued ’cause the next candidate is really good and they’re probably doing all those things.

And so it just, the comprehensiveness of the program just really allows us to make sure that. Uh, candidates are missing steps and they have kind of thought through all the extra things they can do to impress throughout the process. So there was a lot there I went through real fast, but hopefully, uh, it gives you a sense of what we, what we’re doing.

So good.

Todd Janzen: I, I just like what a competitive advantage to work with you and your team. Um, I was also thinking there’s so many parallels to the sales [00:24:00] process today, right? Like, yeah. You can have a great intro, great first demo. And lose the deal later on in the cycle. So you gotta, you gotta nail every step along the way.

And so, exactly. Wow. Um, not to, not to go too deep on this, but you mentioned LinkedIn, and I know people have this like, love hate relationship with LinkedIn, right? If you’re looking for a job, the last thing you wanna see is

like, so and so just recently promoted and it’s just like, it’s like the pit of despair and then, you know, you’re kind of like, is this thing even helping me?

Like, give us, give us a quick. Thought on, on LinkedIn and kind of how you guys utilize it.

Yuji Higashi: I mean, LinkedIn, LinkedIn is a power, uh, very powerful tool. And, and so, you know, we encourage folks to find their jobs on there. That’s like an obvious one, but, but networking, right? It’s, it’s the one place where you can go and connect with so many people with, from, at any company, with any background and, um, and just have.

You know, virtual informal conversations or virtual, what we [00:25:00] call virtual coffee chats with people and those connections, uh, can turn into referrals sometimes, or interviews or maybe that another introduction that can turn into something. I mean, Maddie and I talk about all the time, an example of where we.

First met was actually on some, a random, a pre-sales collective connections where we used to connect people just randomly, uh, for networking purposes. And we met on that. It was for the very first time, way back when. And so, um, so you never know what’s gonna come of like these random conversations you have, but.

But you know, if you think, if you didn’t have LinkedIn, how would you go and do that? You’d have to go to in-person events, right? Is what we used to do back before, you know, LinkedIn existed and which is great. We still encourage people to do that. ’cause you, it’s, you know, that’s a great way to connect with a lot of people and, and you can give more meaningful connections, deeper connections in person.

So big fan of, of doing that. Um, but I think LinkedIn is just such a powerful networking tool. And so I guess one of the things we help people think about is how do you, who do you target, right? Because there’s what about 400 million people on LinkedIn or something like that? Hmm. So what we say is like, you know, [00:26:00] find people in the, in the role that you’re looking for, in the companies that you’re looking for, and find somebody that has the same background as you.

Right? Maybe they, they previously were A BDR, and now they’re an sc. Like, that person is probably more likely to wanna connect with you and help you in your journey because they’ve been through that. Or maybe they were a teacher before and now they’re an ae. Right. That’s, that’s a much smaller subset of

people to target, and that’s also a, a, a group of people that, again, are most likely to help you because they, they’ve been through that and they feel like they can give you some support and they, they know the struggles of that journey.

And so those are the people to connect with and learn. I. Um, that will potentially help you. And, and we’ve just had a lot of success with people doing that as far as connecting with those types of people. So that’s one thing I think to, to mention your comment about, like yeah, it’s tough when you see a lot of people celebrating their journey and things like that.

And I think what we just try to do is help people think about it, is like, look, that’s gonna be you. Right? And just use as motivation as much as you can because what we’ve, and what we tell people all the time is it can be grueling. You know, there’s some people that we’ve seen. [00:27:00] At it for 12 months plus, you know, and it, it, it’s very hard.

But eventually it, you get there and eventually, you know, like, I’ll give you one example. We had a guy who just got, uh, an amazing outcome. He, I talked to him in summer, he got laid off and, um, this was like, I think in September. And he was an sc got laid off and he was really having a hard time and he was trying on his own for a long time.

But eventually he, he came back to us in January. And said, yeah, I just, I just, I need the help. You know, if nothing’s working, I’m not making progress in the job search. And then we work, we kinda gave him the playbook, updated his resume, got him, you know, kind of a lot of it was the confidence. ’cause his confidence has kind of been beaten down over the, the nine months that he was looking.

And so we just got him marketable and helped him through the process. He ended up getting three job offers and that’s not, you know, like something happens a lot. So, you know, just for expectations purposes. Right. But it was pretty exceptional outcome. And it just, it just shows that, like, if you. Stick with it.

And you keep trying to find ways to improve and, and, [00:28:00] and better your approach, you’re gonna get there. Right? And, and that’s kind of the message that we have to tell people constantly because, you know, sometimes people get to a point where they feel like it’s just, man, I, I, I can’t do anymore. Right? Um, and so it’s tough, but.

You just keep going and eventually you’ll get there. Uh, and, and that’s what we try to help people with. Well,

Adam Freeman: what great outcome on both sides, right? That must give you such validation that you know, you yeah, the right things in the right way and great outcomes happen, but also great for that guy, right?

Who’s, yeah, spent those nine months, like real hard yards. So, and you know, fair weather, never made fair sailor and all the rest of it. So, you know, I, I’m sure he is a better essay for going through. Through that journey. Right. But one of the things I was gonna ask you just moving on a little bit was we’ve spoken a lot about the candidate and kind of helping the candidate and them go through the process.

Do you also help on the employee side? ’cause we have a lot of leaders. Listen, you know, Todd and I know a lot of leaders who kind of, you know, want to come on this and talk about things, but they’re, some of the leaders I know are really struggling to find the right talent as well. Right?

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, it’s interesting.

Yeah, because there are leaders that [00:29:00] have like a very niche or specific set of skill sets or profile that they’re looking for, and there’s just not a lot, a lot of that out there. And I mean, that’s. Common with a lot of a SC roles, but then some are even more specific. And so, yeah, I mean that’s something that we do help with as far as, uh, understanding what, what they’re looking for and helping provide candidates either from like our bench or going and sourcing candidates as well.

So we do some recruitment as well. Um, and then we also help people, employers kind of advise them on. How they should set up their interview process and their hiring process for ESS in particular, because we’ve seen so many processes now that, um, we kind of have a sense in talking to a lot of managers too, as to like, what is effective, what’s working.

And, and one thing that I’ll say too is that even though it’s a pretty, you know, um. It’s definitely a, a, a, a a buyer’s market or an employer’s market, right? Because there’s a lot of candidates out there. I think employers still need to recognize and hopefully have an appreciation for that. Like they need to have a good process that doesn’t turn [00:30:00] candidates away.

Um, and they need to be very take, you know, good to candidates as far as just communicative and making sure that they’re not providing bad experiences to candidates even in this market. I mean, but, but a lot of people do that just ’cause they feel like they can. And what happens is what we’ve seen many times is they get bad Glassdoor reviews, right?

Or they get black or bad reviews on other sites. And we’ve had really, really strong SE candidates who have just backed out of. Processes because they, they didn’t get a good feeling from the process ’cause there wasn’t good communication and things like that, or the Glassdoor reviews were bad. So, you know, I think a lot of employers, we try to advise them on like just how to, how to really attract great talent, right?

And part of, if you want really great top tier talent, those people have options. Those people can kind of be selective of, of who they will work for. And so if you want those, that, that, that level of talent, you know, you have to really have a good process and. And ensure that your candidates are having a good experience.

So we help on that side as well. Um, as far as just, you know, that’s all, we don’t, you know, have any like [00:31:00] formal consultancy around that. It’s more of just advising people on giving them some tips on how to improve their process, specifically around scs. Yeah.

Todd Janzen: Yeah. Wow. Um, I, I’m just thinking to myself, like, even if you interviewed five years ago or you hired five years ago, like the game has changed a lot in that timeframe.

I mean, would you generally agree with that? I.

Yuji Higashi: Absolutely. Things have changed so much. You know, even with ai, with ai, of course everything’s changing, but just like with everything else, it’s changed how companies are hiring. It’s changed how candidates are approaching the market. You know, a lot of AI built resumes, right?

Which, um, which is good, right? You, you should leverage AI as part of everything you do, including your job search and writing a resume. But, you know, I think there’s also some learning that has to be done for candidates where you can’t just. You know, take an AI resume and start sending it off. ’cause the human can still see through that, you know, that it’s reviewing the resume.

So there’s some things to think about there. But yeah, I mean, it’s definitely changed a lot.

Todd Janzen: Yeah. In the

Yuji Higashi: last several

Todd Janzen: years. [00:32:00] So we, we’ve talked a lot about the process, kind of current state. Um, you guys have had some phenomenal results. You’ve been, you’ve been sprinkling in some of these success stories, which I hope is just pumping people up, especially if you’re looking for a job right now, like.

I hope that’s given you hope. Um, but, but talk to us about some of the results that you guys have seen. ’cause I think it’s pretty incredible what you shared with Adam and I earlier. Mm-hmm.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, yeah. No, absolutely. So, you know, today we’ve helped about 150 plus SCS and AEs. Land into new roles. Um, and we work, it’s, you know, we don’t work with a ton at a time.

We work with only a handful at a time because it’s a very high touch, one-on-one program. Um, and on average we’ve helped people increase their, their income when they go get into that new role by 47,000 for ES and about 39,000 for AEs. And some have been much larger than that. We’ve had. Many that are, you know, folks that have taken on new roles where they’re getting $90,000 more in OTE or a hundred thousand dollars more in ETE.

Wow. [00:33:00] Now, a lot of these folks were fairly underpaid starting out when we, when we started working with them. But like that’s a pretty life changing. Amount of income to go from that to, you know, a hundred K more in, in a couple months or a few months. So, um, you know, I mentioned the, the, the gentleman who we worked with recently who got the three offers, that was a pretty exceptional story.

We worked with another AE who was able to get her first software sales role as an ae. She hadn’t done it before and she ended up getting two offers and ended up increasing her income, I think like 30 K as well on her base. Um, and that was, uh, that was in 45 days. That was a pretty quick one too. Right. I will say that.

You know, on average, I think that the, when we work with folks, it takes about anywhere between, depending on their background and the type of role, anywhere between like 70 and 90 days. So 44 is very fast, but we have had some folks that have gotten, gotten there pretty quickly. And then, um, you know, we had another SC that I was working with directly.

He accepted an offer, uh, last Friday, and he was able to. Uh, increase his income by 50 4K, and that was after a layoff. So he got laid [00:34:00] off, was going through a few months of really challenging job search and rejection, and

then. It all worked out, you know, was talking about earlier it all worked out. He got a great role.

Not only did to get a good normal, but he got, he increase his income from his previous role. So in the end, you know, the layoff was a, a blip in the, in the career journey, but actually that ended up increasing the, increasing his income overall. So, so yeah, those are just some examples. Um, you know, hopefully we can create, create more in the coming months and years, but, um, but we enjoyed doing it.

You know, people are really excited when they get that offer and even though they. Go through that really painful journey sometimes, but at the end it’s, it’s, it’s worth it to be able to celebrate with them once they get across the line.

Todd Janzen: Wow. I, um, tho those stats are mind blowing. I mean, Adam, I I was looking at your face when you were saying those numbers.

Yeah. I mean, if I’m looking for a job right now and I’m listening to this, like this is, this is gonna pump me up. I mean, you know, like, like we mentioned earlier, so much of this is just like staying positive and confident and, you know, getting that narrative down. So,

Adam Freeman: um, it’s [00:35:00] super important, isn’t it, to recognize.

The wide variety of reasons people move. Huge, isn’t it? A lot of people think, you know, ESS move outta necessity ’cause you spend so long honing your abilities around a product or a company. And Todd and I have seen our roles. We were there a long time. Right. And we were lucky to be at companies that were growing and evolving and we evolved with it.

Yeah. But a lot of people become very static and I think it’s equally as hard when you’re out of work of making that realization of, I need to make a jump. I need to reinvent myself, I need to go again. That must give you as much of a challenge as someone who’s maybe out of work. And you know, do you see people coming to you for help when they’re just wanting, they’re currently in a role, they’re not unhappy, but they kind of want that next move.

Is that also someone you see? I.

Yuji Higashi: I think that’s actually probably the bulk of who we work with are people that are in role and they just are at a point in their career or in, in that company where they, they’re ready to make a move for, for either more comp or

maybe there’s just a new challenge, they’re feeling stagnant or maybe they don’t like their manager or, you know, there’s all kinds of [00:36:00] reasons for it.

Um, or maybe they, they see the writing on the wall ’cause the company’s going through an acquisition or something. Mm-hmm. And so, yeah, we have a lot of people that are enrolled that are just looking for that next. Better opportunity the next step in their career. And I, I’d say that’s probably maybe 60% of the people we work with.

Wow. Um, are people that are, that are not necessarily between jobs maybe, maybe more actually. But yeah, it’s, it’s the bulk of who we work with and super interesting.

Adam Freeman: Super interesting.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah.

Todd Janzen: Um, all right, we’re, we’re getting short on time here, so I wanted to get to some tips. So yeah, for the listeners out there, usually kind of what are your, what are your top tips for, for them right now that, you know, for folks looking for a job or maybe thinking about that transition?

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, yeah. Maybe just a few quick ones. I will say that really quickly. We have a newsletter that it’s free people can sign up for. We, we provide a lot of these tips in detail as well. Um, so we can go to our site@bettercareer.org if you want to, uh, just subscribe to newsletter. Um, but the main ones are just like, you know, thinking about not relying on the strategies that worked before in years past, like just your resume, like we mentioned earlier, [00:37:00] finding really creative ways to stand out.

So what does that mean as an sc it could mean create a micro demo. You know, create some sort of other asset, like a 30, 60, 90 plan that kind of shows how you’re gonna approach this role when you get into it proactively. You know, things like that. That’s, there’s things that are gonna stand out to managers because, you know, you guys manage folks, I manage folks, and you know, anybody that’s proactive and a self-starter and somebody that’s gonna.

Drive their own self-development and that’s the person I wanna hire. And so the more that that candidates can do that proactively, uh, the more they’re gonna stand out and, and be able to, to get into interviews and progress in interviews. The other big one is just like what we see a lot of is just practicing interviewing.

You know, you think about practicing your demo, you’re not gonna go in front of a prospect and do demo without a lot of a ton of practice, right? And same thing with interviewing. You shouldn’t necessarily go in front of that interviewer without. Doing some practice. And so we encourage you to do mock interviews with somebody, right?

A friend, a colleague, a a family member. Um, ideally somebody that understands the role, but, but it doesn’t have to be that person. But just practice your narrative, practice your stories to [00:38:00] make sure that it’s coming across confidently. It’s resonating. Uh, we even actually, actually have, have a AI that we built.

Um, we haven’t built the technology. It, it sits on a platform, but we, we built it such that we built. All the different personas of SC interview process or a interview process, a recruiter, SC manager, VP of sales, and eight other different personas. But you can actually do simulator role plays with that AI coach to get feedback and just again, practice your narrative.

Even our most experienced SC candidates or a candidates have used that and said it’s really helped them just refine how they talk about themselves and their narrative. So that, that, the point there is, is, is practice, practice, practice. Um, and then maybe the last two quick things are just like, at the end of the day, you know, it’s a rollercoaster focus on what you can control.

You know, what you can control is just how you show up, how you practice, the work you put in. And, and don’t worry about the stuff that is really outside your control. And hiring a is subjective. You can be the best candidate and still not get the role. And, and that’s, that’s okay. Just, you know, learn from it and, and continue to push forward.

And then lastly, [00:39:00] and you know, you, you all talk about this too and, and, um, it’s something we talk about all, all the time, but just network, you have to. Intentionally network throughout your career, it’s gonna pay dividends for you. And sometimes you have to do it with intention because we forget to go outside of our little inner circle in our job sometimes.

And the last. A time that you wanna network is when you need it, when you’re unemployed or you get laid off. Right. Networking proactively is key. And there’s a lot of stories we have where that’s really paid off for people. I know we’re short on time, so I won’t get ’em to ’em here, but just network, network, network, you know, demo Fest that consensus puts on is one of my favorite, uh, SE co

So definitely, you know, folks are in, um, SF or New York ever check that, those events out. But, but yeah, those are probably the, the main tips that I would have with the, with the time that we have here.

Todd Janzen: I appreciate the demo fest. Shout out. ’cause we do have virtual demo fest, which everyone should be able to attend.

Pick a few sessions, show up better your career, you know, love it. Get, get, get educated. So quick plug for that. I appreciate you mentioning it, uji. Um, [00:40:00] as we bring things to the close, Adam, what are, what are some of the key takeaways that, that you’re walking away with?

Adam Freeman: Yeah, I’m listening to this and I’m thinking.

There’s probably times as a leader when I could have done with this kind of support for sure. Um, and there’s probably times where even when I was going through my consensus, right, just having someone there to talk to would’ve been, would’ve been wonderful. I mean, I had Todd and we were chatting, but you know, I.

He’s only so good. Right. And there’s, but you, you need that kind of, I’m only joking, you’re great. Um, but you need that kind of professional support. And I think where my head’s at for this closing thing isn’t actually some of the practical things you said. It is probably the inspirational side of it. I think, you know, we’re all three of us have sat here in jobs we love.

Companies we love. And I think there’s so many people either at companies where they don’t feel connected in roles where they don’t feel either valued or inspired, but they’re very, very good and they’re very good employers and it’s just not quite working out. Others, people out of work and like you say, usually are just really relentlessly trying [00:41:00] so, so hard to, you know, provide for their families and, and be the best that they can be.

And it’s so hard to show up in those scenarios and have a lot of empathy for that. And I think probably my key takeaway here is just. The hope that you’ve given on all sides of the fence for leaders, that they will find the right candidate for those job hunters, that your dream job is out there and if not, something great is also out there, but just equipping yourself and being, I suppose, that state of readiness.

I think that’s taking what you’re saying, that that constant state of you just never know when your date is gonna come and just keep him with it and keep him talking and. Confident and just that belief that it is all gonna work out. I think

from everything you’ve said, ju I think you’ll give so many people such hope and inspiration.

I just thank you so much for sharing all of the insights you’ve shared.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, no, thank you. I appreciate it.

Todd Janzen: Yeah, I’m gonna, I’m gonna plus one on the hope it’s gonna happen folks. Yeah. It is going to happen. Right. And you just, you have to believe and, uh, uj, I just love what you and Maddie are doing. ’cause I think, you know, you’re, you’re [00:42:00] helping so many people.

The other takeaway is, um, I. You have to think beyond the initial first step. Yeah. Someone discovering you on LinkedIn, someone accepting your resume, you getting the first call, like you gotta think through every step of the way and be good at at, at nailing every one of those. So it’s a big takeaway for me.

Also, the game has changed. Accept it, dig in. Use AI to help research. Right, of course, work with you guys. It’s fantastic. Um. Wow. WW I’m just, yeah, I, and, and look triple down on hope and, and I’m kind of speaking to a lot of my former employees that were really impacted this last couple months. Um, you gotta believe it’s gonna happen and you’re gonna land on somewhere.

Awesome. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Alright, UJI, we got two last questions for you before we close this thing out. First one is, what is your favorite bit of tech right now?

Yuji Higashi: There’s, there’s a lot, [00:43:00] but I have to go with this. Um, it’s called Max ai. It’s like this Chrome extension that allows me to use Chachi, dp, and Claude and Gemini and all these different AI models all across the browser.

So I can use it to reply to my emails, my LinkedIn messages. I can use it to help with my. LinkedIn comments and, and everything else. And also, you know, summarize articles and it just, it’s just been a, a really big kind of assistant or help helper to me. So that’s been a huge one for me that I, that I, I’m hold a lot of people about.

I’m a big fan.

Todd Janzen: I’m writing that one down. That sounds very useful. Alright, last question and having a little bit of fun with this. What is your, your favorite pizza topping?

Yuji Higashi: Oh man, I’m gonna have to go with Ha Hawaiian. So Pineapple and Canadian. Controversial. That’s my, uh, yeah, traditionalist here. So like some fruit on the pizza makes it healthier?

I think so.

Adam Freeman: Oh, we just alienated some of the audiences. Alienated right now. Some, yeah. I know. I’m, I’m on Team Hawaiian, [00:44:00] right? I like a Hawaiian, but yeah, I can feel some people. I’m going, oh man, I like, this guy knows what he’s talking about with recruiting. I’d lost some credibility. I’m with him.

Todd Janzen: It, it’s funny, like.

You know, in our house, the kids will ask for it and my wife will be like, no. Like, no one likes that here. And then like you have a slice and you’re like, that’s really good.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah. Oh yeah.

Todd Janzen: Really love it. Yeah. Awesome. Well, Yuji, I so appreciate you taking time out today to just help our community. I mean, that’s what this episode was really about.

And if nothing else, I hope this is instilling some confidence in our listeners that are out there looking or even listeners that have, you know, been maybe been in a job that they don’t love and they know they could be earning more. Like maybe this is the motivation you needed. So uji, just thank you so much for coming on today.

Yuji Higashi: Yeah, thank you both for having me. I really appreciate it And thank you all too for the work that you all do for the presales community. Really appreciate it. 

Adam Freeman: Take care everyone. Yeah.