Head of Sales Operations: a day in the life
Frances Smith, Head of Sales Operations, has been with LexisNexis since January 2020. Frances is responsible for a team of 7 dedicated and knowledgeable individuals who support Go-To-Market on their sales processes.
Frances wakes up…
...usually between 6.30am and 7am with the best intentions to do some exercise or something productive. But when it really comes to it, Frances mostly decides that the weather isn’t nice enough / she has some admin she really ought to do / Mercury is in retrograde so it really isn’t safe and she wisely chooses to have a cup of tea instead.
Frances got her job...
...in January 2020, and by the time she started in April we were all navigating a huge shift in working practices and experiencing the first couple of weeks of lockdown. It was a huge learning experience as Frances was not only getting to grips with a new company, new people and millions of new acronyms but also figuring out how we wanted to work in this remote environment. She am tremendously grateful to my team and manager for their support as we found a way through this together.
Prior to joining LN, Frances was itching for a new challenge after spending a couple of years developing the sales operations function at a start-up. She started her career at a consultancy, but found it frustrating that we were unable to truly partner with clients long-term, and see recommendations change and evolve with their businesses. Frances therefore moved into an internal project management role at a financial services company, where she spent most of her time working on projects for the sales team. As they progressed these projects into BAU Frances began to take on more and more of the day-to-day support and eventually her role turned into that of a sales operations manager (initially without the job title).
A typical day...
...always starts with an inbox review for any emails Frances needs to respond to or incorporate into her day. After that point it really depends on what we have going on. Much of Frances’ day is spent in project meetings with people across GTM, discussing projects or support queries with her team or checking-in with the CRM / data teams on the items they have for GTM on the backlog. The type of meetings range from planning meetings to requirements gathering sessions, or just a check-in to make sure we’re on track and ensure we understand any risks or obstacles.
Most memorable work moment...
...was coming into the office for the first time – not many of Frances’ team were able to come in the first time, but a few did and she had a massive ‘first day at school’ feeling about it so she was hugely nervous. Frances was amazed how quickly the nerves went away and how incredibly friendly and welcoming the team were.
The best parts of Frances’ job are...?
...working with the wide variety of wonderful people at LexisNexis. The team always have interesting discussions that present different viewpoints. Frances’ team is fantastic for this as they have such a deep knowledge of LexisNexis processes and historical issues and are always willing to bring these to bear in a discussion about how we can make things better. Frances also love the variety of her role and getting the chance to understand so many different areas of the business.
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The worst part of her job is...
...not having the time or resources to do everything Frances wants to do to the standard she wants to do it.
One mistake Frances will definitely never make again at work…
...is not running through a presentation in present mode before showing it. When building client presentations we used to add in comments in a text box for notes and feedback. In Frances’ first solo build, she didn’t delete all the comments boxes but just put tables over the top of them which then appeared with animations. This meant that you couldn’t see them when working on the document, but when her senior presented the slides the first things to appear were our slightly too honest comments to each other on the slides and data. The client didn’t mind, but it was a bit embarrassing and now she always have a quick check.
The best career advice Frances has ever been given...
...Analyse your mistakes but it’s rarely worth the effort to spend a lot of time assigning blame. We’re all human and we all make mistakes so time is better spent looking forward and understanding how we avoid making the same ones again. Also, an offer of a cup of tea is always appreciated.
Inspirational quote from Frances:
“If you can stay positive in a negative situation you win.”
-Virat Kohli