So I’ve been in sales for a while. I’ve worked with several SEs as a salesperson, a mentor, or a coach for a few years now. And we love to joke around and talk crap about salespeople. I mentioned this before but on my first week on the job, I traveled to a quarterly training for both SEs and Sales. We had a common training session (marketing slides) and when that session was over and we were about to split up, my manager (SE manager) stood up and said “SEs stay here, those who have a lobotomy go to the other room.”

That’s how I was introduced to sales. It was a joke, and everyone laughed, but since then I knew I could make fun of salespeople because they do things that drive us crazy.

On the other hand, since I’ve been in sales there are things that SEs do that also drive me personally nuts. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen things that have made me so angry, I can see why AEs don’t want to bring SEs into meetings. Here are 12 things SEs do that drive salespeople crazy.

1- Not following up on time – I know sometimes this drives SEs crazy about their AEs.

• The customer asks a question via email, or in a meeting and it is decided that the SE takes ownership, then the SE is the one responsible for getting the answer. The salesperson does not want to have to remind the SE to respond.
• I understand sometimes it takes time for the SE to find the answers, but if there is radio silence for too long, the AE gets antsy and the customer starts thinking that they are not an important customer.

2- High-jacking a call

• The purpose of the call is to help the customer. It’s not for anyone from the sales team to do a monolog.
• When an SE jumps on a call, they need to know what the purpose of the call is. This is usually done by setting an agenda. I know one thing that AEs do that drives SEs crazy is invite an SE without an agenda, so an SE should clarify the purpose of the call before getting on it.
• But if the agenda is set by the AE or by the customer, and the SE does question, then the SE agrees to the agenda of the call.
• But what happened to me last week is that for a 30-minute call, the agenda is set, and the SE jumps in before anyone can speak and says, before we jump into this call, I want to present X because you mentioned why. and goes on talking for 10 minutes, ignoring the AE’s messages, and then the AE has to figure something out to interrupt the SE.
• now I understand that the SE may have some concerns. The customer is expecting too much, or the customer is not understanding how we work technically, etc. High-jacking the call only pisses off the customer (which it did) and puts the entire team in an awkward position.

3- Shooting yourself in the foot

• don’t say negative things about your product. Never lie, but don’t start talking about the weaknesses of your product, or how complicated a procedure is.
• This is especially true when talking about features that the customer is not even interested in. This brings in doubt.
• No product is perfect. Not yours, nor the competitors. Don’t lie, but don’t sell your product short. You see everything that is wrong with your product. You also see the total weaknesses that all your customers see.
• For example, customer A sees the product as slow to load but otherwise, it’s great. Customer B sees that the product, when used the way it like, has some bugs. And so on. Each customer is seeing 1 issue, you are seeing the total issues, so that makes some SEs feel that their product is not as good as they want it to be, and therefore list all these problems to the next potential customers.
• This is not a service for your customers. The customers have a problem they want to solve, and your product is not perfect. Exactly like cars. Cars are not perfect, but people still buy them, and then when they break. we send the cars to mechanics. That’s why each company has a support team. Things break.
• If your product is so bad that you cannot sell it in good conscience, then find another company.

4- Opening the kimono

• This is something I used to do. The customer would be ready to buy but he or she mentions something about a future need.
• I’d say something, actually I heard from our PM that we will have something that will do what you want today and in the future.
• Now the customer is thinking, should I wait? The answer is always NO!
• Plans change. Although the PM said that we will have this all-encompassing product, business needs may change. Things get de-prioritized.
• so if the customer chooses to wait, they might be waiting for a long time.
• That means not only did you negatively affect your AE, but you also hurt your customer

5- Being too pushy, is the AE job.

• I was talking to an AE friend of mine, and yes, I do have AE friends. He told me about his SE who would go up to the customer that they have been working with for a while and said “So you going to buy or what?”
• Now why does that drive the AE crazy?
• For one, the customer needs someone to trust, and when the SE starts being pushy, then the technical resource is no longer trustworthy.

6- Doing things without informing the AE → inviting someone to a call, things going badly in a POC and the AE not being told, even if I’m handling it

• We talked about high-jacking a call with customers, the SE did that without informing me.
• He also had invited a specialist without telling me.
• and had a presentation ready.
• Don’t do that.
• but also not keeping the AE up to date. For example, while working on a POC and things are going badly, many SEs think that they can handle it.
• It might be the case, but the information that things are going badly can go up the chain with customers, and the AE needs to be able to manage that.

7- Interrupting customers

• I don’t think I need to talk much about this, many people do the same, even AEs. But when SEs do it, it drives AEs nuts.

8- Not listening to feedback.

• If an SE makes these mistakes, then someone needs to provide feedback.
• On the rare occasion that an AE wants to provide feedback, they are expecting the SE to listen. And if they don’t it’s annoying.

9- Not updating your calendar.

• SEs complain about being double or triple-booked by AEs. They also complain about not having time to work on demo preps, other anything else that takes place behind the scenes.
• On the other hand, the SEs not updating the calendar, means that every time an AE wants to book time with a customer, they need to go check with the SE. Or if they don’t, then the SE will come back saying “I’m booked doing this” so update your calendar.

10- zoning out when it’s not their turn.

• Most professionals don’t do this, but I’ve known SEs who zone out when they are not involved in the conversation.