Aligning Sales Development to Bigger Picture Business Goals with Ryann Morrow, Senior Director, Sales Development at Cybrary

Aligning Sales Development to Bigger Picture Business Goals with Ryann Morrow, Senior Director, Sales Development at Cybrary

Ryann Morrow, Cybrary

In this episode, Rachael is joined by Ryann Morrow, Senior Director, Sales Development at Cybrary, a cyber security professional development platform that provides IT and security professionals with the knowledge and skills to achieve their career goals. Ryann joined Cybrary in 2019 and in 2020, Cybrary won an OpsStars Award for Highest ROI Program of the Year for driving a 133% increase in pipeline in just one quarter after a major project to automate their go-to-market processes.

In this episode, Ryann shares how she took her sales development team from survival mode to a thriving organization, by aligning with big picture business goals.

Key Highlights:

3:58 – 8:28 – Starting in Survival Mode – With a consumer and B2B product, Cybrary could see 20,000 leads per day! When Ryann first joined the team, every lead would get put in a queue that she would then manually assign out based on very little information, which she describes as survival mode. She didn’t have the data to know what was working and what wasn’t which was impacting her ability to provide value as a leader and help move the business forward.
8:29 – 10:08 – Revolutionizing the Process – They built out key automations to get the right leads to the right reps quickly (with LeanData). This change allowed Ryann to see what was working and what wasn’t and they could quickly pivot their strategy and make more informed decisions.
10:09 – 13:56 – Aligning to the Business – To build the strategy, before any technology was implemented, they went through an exercise to outline their needs and rank them against not only the sales org’s needs, but also the greater business goals which helped to prioritize.
13:57 – 19:36 – Succeeding in Leadership – Ryann’s drive in this ultimately came out of her understanding that she couldn’t execute as a leader without getting her arms around the business first. Her team has evolved and is set up for success which allows them to focus on the customers and prospects they speak to. As a leader she looks for people who have a growth mindset, positive attitude and encourages everyone to try new things and fail forward.

Who Would Ryann Like to Take For Lunch in the Ops World?

Chris Voss, World’s #1 Negotiation Coach, Bestselling Author “Never Split The Difference” – CEO at The Black Swan Group

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“You’re never going to be able to get to the next level of your business if you can’t truly understand the full needs of not only your customers but what your business needs to thrive”

Ryann Morrow, Senior Director, Sales Development at Cybrary

“I really challenge any sales org leader to really understand what your actual problems are and where they rank – against not only the needs of the sales org, but against the greater business. And that’s not something we’d ever really done before. So peeling back those layers was really exciting to me, very overwhelming, but I also understood there was light at the tunnel once we had outlined our priorities.”

Ryann Morrow, Senior Director, Sales Development at Cybrary