One Up Club

It's 2023, it's no longer acceptable to suffer in silence.

If you're not getting the support you need from your company, manager, team, friends or family, we're here for you. It's not easy winning in the sales profession today, but let's make it easier by answering those tough questions / scenarios that will make your quarter.

This is the resource I WISH I had

Get a sales expert to answer your question by calling Sales Support at +1 (303) 578-8581

Team of Ten

Alignd

“Pipeline is down 40-80% YoY”

So what do you do about it?

If you don’t fix it… you’ll have to cut headcount, reduce techstack, push off growth initiatives or give up your bonus.

OR 

you could re-align your sales & marketing teams to earn buyers

Experimenting to find your competitive advantage in the way you build lists + prioritize accounts, deliver prospect experiences & enable champions to get back that pipeline you lost

We start with an assessment to find the quick wins to fuel the change & workshop solutions together to find the best way to make that 2 year strategy a reality.

Ready to win back pipeline?

Shoot me a DM or visit our website to learn more

We offer:
1 Assessments - Align your team, buyers and shareholders to create consistent growth
2 Workshop series - ABSD & Social selling
3 Multi-year GTM services

We start with a strategy call to see if it's a smart investment (ROI + Risk)

Managing Partner

B2B Power Hour

We help sales and marketing professionals thrive in a world dominated by outdated playbooks and old-school tactics.

Learn new skills & strategies

Each Friday, we go live at 9AM PST / 12pm EST

Co Host

HYPCCCYCL

HYPCCCYCL is an invite-only, professional community where top B2B revenue leaders cross-train their GTM skills with VCs.

Brand Ambassador

KO Advantage Group

Marketing & Partnerships Manager

Community Engagement Manager

Sales Unicorn

I want children to tell their parents they want to be salespeople and for them to be proud!

I see a day when Sales Unicorn makes sales a highly sought after profession by:

1) Educating salespeople to a higher industry standard
2) Providing consistent & above average income to support their growth
3) Partner with great companies for them to work with
4) Nurture their ongoing develop to create highly sought after sales unicorns

That's something I feel is worth fighting for!

Co-Founder + COO

GROE Business Development

At GROE, I lead the business development and growth of service companies with $1M+ revenue.

-Structuring innovative and creative solutions to complex business issues
-Originating, developing, validating, qualifying, and closing sales opportunities
-Conduct analysis to address critical business issues and generate insights about client and industry business performance improvement
-Build a team and provide leadership and support including performance management and coaching.
-Engaging and influencing key stakeholders to ensuring initiatives are implemented
-Responsible for overall account management, account growth, and leadership of cross-functional teams

Chief of Growth | Innovation + Strategy

JCI (Junior Chamber International)

I built relationships with engineers, accountants, lawyers, bankers, IT, financial advisers, architects, and other young professionals (18-40) in Calgary looking to advance their career and have a positive impact on the community.

My specialty was working with each individual to align them with the right resources and help them get the most of what JCI has to offer.

Director of Membership | Community Builder

Prairie Advisory Corp.

At Prairie, I Built long-standing relationships with oil and gas, environmental, industrial, and construction companies across Canada (Mid-market $10M - 100M revenue) which cultivated a strong sales pipeline of Qualified Mergers & Acquisition leads of $10,000,000+ revenue and $1,000,000+ EBITDA

I was leading the business development activities of the team including prospecting activities, preparation of teasers and proposals, building relationships with existing and target clients, and establishing a network of professional colleagues.

Coordinating and executing buy-side and sell-side due diligence process in order to ensure timely completion of financial models, valuations, and integration planning.

Preparing and reviewing detailed financial analysis to illustrate key business drivers and performance indicators;

Assisting in executing all aspects of mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, turnarounds, and financing from inception through due diligence, valuation, negation, closing, and integration. Leading and facilitating post-integration analysis.

📍 It was at Prairie that I first started developing my sales + customer service methodology. 

I was required to make 100+ cold calls a day to earn my salary but it was highly ineffective and mentally draining... I started a combination approach of researching on LinkedIn and approaching with specific proposals (email, warm call, and LinkedIn personalized connection requests) which opened the door to long-lasting relationships.

Companies struggled to build a diverse and loyal customer base which created the opportunity to work with GROE Business Development

Associate | Mid-Market M&A Advisory

HD Energy and Investments

At HD, I worked with and supported portfolio companies, including attending board meetings and monitoring performance to ensure returns and strategic objectives were achieved

📍 We built profitable startups by thorough go-to-market strategy, leveraging a collaborative work style, creative problem-solving ability, and the lean startup methodology.

We could validate the business opportunity (in Oil and Gas, and Construction sectors), establish an investment case, and structure and negotiate terms for potential investments with limited resources.

My challenge was developing a complete understanding of an emerging company by evaluating its market opportunity, competition, product/service, sales and growth, operations, financial statements and projections, human capital, equity needs, and capital structure.

📍 Maintaining great relationships with my entrepreneurs, our technical team and the different financial institutions was key!

I had a unique experience of managing a separate portfolio that invested in public shares while building our portfolio companies. Annual reports offer a different perspective on market trends, strategic planning and operations than the Startups in our portfolio.

📍 Strategic Planning is a POWERFUL process

The different approaches to strategic planning such as SWOT Analysis, Six Sigma, Balanced Scorecard, Scaling Up (One Page Strategic Plan), PEST, and Blue Ocean created a dynamic hands on experience. Managing the execution is where most companies failed… you can’t take a static approach. You have to constantly pivot, re-evaluate and drive forward!

We created 3 profitable businesses that generated over $1M in revenue and the new relationships opened doors in Mergers & Acquisitions Advisory at Prairie Advisory ☝️

General Manager | Portfolio Management | Go-To-Market Strategy

Exploring (& challenging) the future of sales 🤖 | Social Selling & GTM Strategy | 🎙 Host @ B2B Power Hour

How do you succeed in sales & not kill yourself in the process?

This is the question that consumed me as I was fighting for my life in the hospital...

I had wore my burnout as a badge of honor until it literally almost killed me. But yet, all I could think about is how sales was the only profession that I felt appreciated (& I loved the thrill of the hunt!)

That little question turned into over 5 years of research and evolved into:

What are the most effective ways to build pipeline based on testing in the trenches?

No more theory...
I wanted to know what actually works

I started looking into which sellers at the top had a thriving life outside of work. Family, friends, hobbies & so much more than just the endless hustle…

It didn’t take long to realize top sellers were taking marketing into their own hands to:
1) create content
2) engage on social media
3) host virtual events / podcasts
4) All while earning credibility at scale!

So… it was time to learn copywriting

I joined a copywriting course through Seth Godin's Akimbo & met this dynamic marketer that wanted to learn more about sales (Morgan Smith)

I was teasing him about the misalignment between sales & marketing

Which turned into more than talk... we started running weekly experiments together to validate every process, framework & tool we could find

But now we needed a place to share!

That's where the B2B Power Hour was born

We shared our experiments on social selling, ABSD, cold email, AI, SEP's, Async video, virtual events, gifting & SO MUCH MORE in our shows to help sellers win in this digital environment.

It didn’t take long until we found clear winners

AND those new skills/frameworks/technology were in high demand due to COVID. We were getting 100's DM's a week to train sales teams what we learned

One workshop turned into a series…

Which evolved into multi-year contracts building legacy Co’s modern GTM strategies

That's when Alignd GTM was born!

AND we were working with the companies I dreamed about as a kid!
 
DM me to:
🎙️Get on the podcast (B2B Power Hour)
📅Schedule a strategy session
📢Book me to speak at your SKO
 
Outside of work:
🍻 I’m a competitive home brewer, ask me about it!
🎧 Audiophile that’s exploring the world of broadcasting & content creation
🪵 Hobby woodworker
🤖 Tech Nerd that’s beta testing the world’s cutting edge software & hardware (AI?)

nicholas thickett

Imagine investing $10M+ and 18+ months in your Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system…

…only to see it FAIL to go live.

Or even worse, seeing it go live - without the results you wanted.

All that time, effort, and money wasted. 

You’re probably thinking, “It won’t happen to us. We can do it all in-house.”

Which is EXACTLY what I thought when leading my first ERP implementation.

But after 20+ years of managing ERP implementations, let me tell you one thing - it ain't easy.

In fact, I've never seen an ERP implementation go smoothly.

The reason is simple - too many moving parts. You can't master it overnight.
Even the best IT experts will struggle without outside assistance,
and SALES-DRIVEN outside assistance is the only thing that can be WORSE than none at all.

Thousands of companies have learned this the hard way, which led to:

-Losing key clients
-Firing people
-Bankruptcy

After all, 70% of all ERP implementations fail to:

-Meet business requirements,
-Finish on time, or
-Stay within budget.

So, before you can reap the rewards of your new ERP, you need someone whose goal is NOT to sell you the most expensive piece of Software, but to ensure your:

-Team meets all the necessary milestones
-Reasonable scope is delivered
-System is implemented properly
-Project doesn’t go over budget
-Team finishes on time

This is where I step in.

As an Independent Advisor, I worked to align client’s IT team, System Integrator & Sponsors. Now I do it as a system integrator.

First, we make sure everyone knows their role, and knows exactly what your ERP implementation process needs to look like to deliver the results you want.

Next, we apply proven ERP implementation methodology that make sure the deliverables & milestones are completed on time & in budget — all that without compromising business requirements.

As a result, when the system goes live, every stakeholder & user is guaranteed to have a user-friendly ERP leaving them satisfied.

Makes sense?
Great.

Want to learn more how stand behind my offer? - email me at slava.pisanka@pagodasystems.ca

Slava Pisanka

Why is it so hard to find a good ERP Consultant?
 
What makes this problem so special for ERP consulting industry?
 
In my opinion a great ERP Consultant stands on 3 pillars:
1.     Domain knowledge. She needs to know her subject area very well – Finance, Supply Chain, Manufacturing, Sales, etc. across multiple industries: Retail, Oil & Gas, Telecom etc.
2.     Consulting experience. A consultant goes through the phases of ERP implementation and learns how to deal with a client and overcome project challenges. Basically, soft skills.
3.     Product knowledge. A consultant needs to have experience configuring and implementing their specialty ERP: SAP, Oracle, Microsoft Dynamics etc. These are technical skills.
 
Mastering all 3 pillars takes years or even decades. 
 
If you find someone who excels in all three, they are golden. 
 
If you get 2.5 still very good and you are lucky.
 
The situation gets worse for system integrators with vertical positioning that also provide business consulting.
 
For example, they specialize in food and beverage, and they help with supply chain planning.
 
ERP implementation services just augment this offering.

In this case the ERP consultant must come from food & beverage industry and have SCM background.

And the employer will train them on the product.

My prediction is that ERP industry will always need great ERP consultants.

And this challenge will not go anywhere in the near future.

The ERP Guy | SAP, Oracle, Microsoft D365, Odoo | 20+ years in ERP implementation

9 things I wish I learned earlier in my ERP career

1. Integration to boundary systems is one of the weakest points of the solution. Pay more attention to it than to standard configuration.

2. OCM is more important than technology. Lack of communication, training, adoption of solution can screw any great product.

3. Scope creep is lurking and just waiting for a chance to bite your tail. Just be ready how to deal with it.

4. 70% of project SMEs will not be backfilled. Be ready that they will not deliver what you ask them to do. Be careful with how you spend their time.

4. Be ready for a poor leadership support. This can bust the whole implementation. Learn how to escalate, educate, persuade.

6. Sometimes the deadline will be dictating what you do. It may require you to work over weekends. The solution can be crappy and even not working properly. But still the leadership may force to go live. Don’t sweat it. You will have plenty of work in a long long hypercare!

7. When giving business requirements SMEs will want to replicate their processes from a legacy system. They don’t care what your ERP can or cannot do. Collaborate with OCM to avoid customizations. They are your best friend.

8. Sometimes SMEs do not know what they want. You need to be their guide both in business and technology.

9. There will be lack/delay/absence in decision making related to important aspects of your solution. Not done in time this can impact your delivery timelines. Learn how to escalate early. Be tenacious.


Did I forget anything?

I spent a month interviewing ERP system integrators and commercial leaders. 

I didn't find one-off stories but discovered repeating patterns of struggle and success. 

These are the main topics:

• Founder-dependent sales engines
 • Outreach that burns money without building trust
 • Leadership bandwidth stretched thin
 • Clients unprepared for transformation
 • Consultants trained as technicians, not business partners
 • AI hype far ahead of operational reality

I compiled these and more into a 3-page report.

If you want it, comment “report.” 

And I’ll send it to you.

Do you think a tiny little field can cause a massive business disruption?

Oh yeah. It sure can. 

This is exactly what happened on a big ERP transformation I was working on.

$5 million lost in sales, $16 million extra inventory across supply chain.

A number of supply chain operations leaders lost their jobs.

More details in the video with Kevin Johnston

taplio

The Battle

nicholas thickett

Slava Pisanka

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