Amplify sales success with AI-powered account intelligence with Lesia Nikolaieva

[00:00:00] Lesia: But there is a huge difference between data and intelligence and what makes data, and  

intelligence is how it helps you solve your problems. Essentially, we're not there to help people sell more. We are there to help people better solve our clients problems.

[00:00:28] Vamsee: We have a wonderful opportunity to talk with Lesia, today. Lesia, is an industry veteran, and she is currently the AVP of Sales Enablement at GlobalLogic, which is a Hitachi Group company. She has had multiple roles across her two decades of career. She has worked, in business development, in sales, strategy, and now

Leads the sales enablement process for one of the most successful company in technology services industry, GlobalLogic. So with that, Lesia good morning and welcome to the show. Really appreciate your presence here and for making the time to share some of your insights and more importantly, some of your experiences and best practices with us.

Thank you, Lesia, for making time.  

[00:01:15] Lesia: Sure. Hello, Vamsee and my pleasure to be here.  

[00:01:17] Vamsee: Wonderful. So let's actually start with something very basic. Like there is so much confusion in the industry about what is sales intelligence, right? There are some tools which actually do, contact databases and they call themselves, sales intelligence.

On other sides, there are some very complex and very, cutting edge technologies or consulting companies who also say that they are the sales intelligence platform. From your perspective, being an industry veteran who has seen this entire industry evolve in the last two decades, how do you classify or how do you characterize, as, say, the sales intelligence, Lesia?

[00:01:55] Lesia: Of course. First of all, I see a huge difference between data and intelligence, and there are a lot of data providers in the market, and that's a very important space and also very important tools and vendors, and we use that extensively. But there is a huge difference between data and intelligence and what makes data and intelligence

is how it helps you solve your problems. That's where I like to say that my own philosophy and what I encourage my team to follow is that essentially we're not there to help people sell more. We are there to help people better solve our clients problems. That's where the intelligence come to help us because before we start talking to clients, we want to be prepared, we want to anticipate their needs so that when they share their needs with us, we can truly understand that and we can truly hear that.

And then we see results of that when the clients who believe and who trust that their problems are heard and understood by us, they become our partners, not just clients. They become our partners for decades.  

[00:03:00] Vamsee: So basically what you're saying is sales intelligence is all about personalizing the needs of your prospects and customers to the capabilities that you have.

Is that a good characteristic?  

[00:03:12] Lesia: Exactly. Exactly. Or moreover than it's for us to be able to personalize the capabilities that we have to better solve the problems of our clients. So essentially the holy grail is how we can leverage what we've done so far and our experience of solving other types of problems for other companies to solve this particular company's problems.

[00:03:36] Vamsee: I think that's a wonderful definition, Lesia. Now, let's talk about the big white elephant in the room, at least for the last few years, has been AI and Gen AI to be specific, right? Again someone who being a practitioner and a leader, in this industry and, has seen the evolution of multiple tools, multiple, messages and multiple capabilities.

How do you see the evolution of AI is, is enabling the sales function in general, and specifically the sales operations and the sales enablement tools. How is AI impacting that, the sales enablement function, Lesia?  

[00:04:13] Lesia: So what I've seen over the year is AI has been growing its share, in our industry, in our market.

Now, from where I stand, I don't necessarily see AI as replacing certain roles, in sales enablement or in sales analytics or in sales operations. I rather see AI reshaping those roles, reshaping the expectations, of a person in that role and reshaping what kind of value this person is bringing and what a typical day in the life of this person look like?

So if in the past people on my team would have to spend days searching for the data. Now it's not about searching for the data now it's about processing that data analyzing it and more importantly generating insights and solutions and ideas based on that data.  

[00:05:01] Vamsee: So in other words like, you know a lot of the things that you are forced to do but are not adding any value your eliminate a lot of those activities and focus more of the efforts on areas where you are able to provide the value both to your internal teams as well as your prospects and customers.

Is that good way to characterize this?  

[00:05:22] Lesia: Exactly, and that's a much better and more productive spend of people's times. Besides, it also keeps people more motivated. So if you have people in your team and they're growing and they're becoming more competent, you want to keep them in your organization. So you want to let them focus on more value generating activities, as opposed to some routine data search tasks.

[00:05:46] Vamsee: I think you're absolutely right. I think the best way that you can, any salesperson or anyone in the commercial team can be effective is when they are walking the corridors rather than sitting in their office and doing that research, right? So let's make it a real life, you know, a case study or a use case.

Lesia again, in your evolution, right? I think, where are the areas where you have seen a tremendous value that has been generated for GlobalLogic? With the use of some of the next generation AI Tools. What are the areas where you have seen the impact? What are the areas where you see that has evolved into a challenge?

So is there any light that you can throw on it Lesia?  

[00:06:26] Lesia: Of course. So first of all, use account intelligence and sales intelligence in and around every stage of the sales life cycle. So we actually start using account intelligence before we start selling. In fact, we want to build our business strategy around solutions, not around sales process or selling.

When we build our solution strategy, we actually start with account intelligence. So even when we plan our proactive investment into research and development, we want to do it around our client’s needs, and those are not the client needs that they come to us with. Because we want to anticipate their needs, want to anticipate what their needs will be a year from now. That's where we use account intelligence a lot. Then of course, when we go to market, when we plan our go to market motions, we also use account intelligence to recalibrate our offerings. So once we have the solution, how do we make sure that we convey the value of that solution in a way that will resonate with our clients?

Then when we start getting our first meetings, our first leads was our clients. We didn't want to speak their language. We want to make our solutions relevant to them. We want to show specifically what value can this particular solution bring to them? So basically it's way before and way beyond just the selling cycle.

[00:07:49] Vamsee: Got it. Got it. With all of that, I'm pretty sure that the metrics are not going to go away, right? Somebody is actually always looking at what does that mean? Did we, increase our lead funnel or are we have we accelerated the closure timelines or have you, doubled or tripled the sales volume?

Whatever those metrics are, from your perspective, what are some of those metrics that have had the biggest impact because of the new technologies or the new tools that have come in Lesia?  

[00:08:24] Lesia: First of all, of course, it's time, right? If in the past, a proper account research effort would take up to five days.

Now, all the data is already available. We don't need to spend five days. We can spend one hour and then maybe a couple more hours analyzing the data and generating insights. So whatever was taking five days can now take one day. What it means for us, is that our deal life cycle is much shorter. Our clients don't have to wait for us to come with a solution.

We do it much faster. So obviously our win rates are- our win probability is much, much higher. If we are more agile and quicker in processing the insights.  

[00:09:07] Vamsee: Are there any like one is that definitely the time and, are there from the- from if you look at the ROI of any of these tools, one way to of, course, the time and that value for your internal team is definitely something that is very valuable.

But what does that mean to the conversion rate? Have you seen any dramatic shift in, engagements you've been having with your prospects or the ability to engage with excite them a lot more than what you are able to do before.  

[00:09:39] Lesia: Yeah, and here are the challenges. It's something that is hard to quantify.

obviously see the shift. It's hard to quantify because there is a number of factors that influence that. Now, does account intelligence play a role with that? Absolutely. Yes. Of course, and like I said, where I see the impact, it's not just the impact on a single deal, where I see a much bigger and more important impact is the lifetime of the relationship you built with the client.

[00:10:07] Vamsee: That's a great point. I think sometimes people get carried away thinking that, hey, it did not impact me in this, so that it actually is not as valuable. But what you are saying is you really need to look at it holistically rather than time and point and saying that it is the same as what it was before.

I think that's a great point, Lesia, and I'm pretty sure that, that is a huge takeaway for a lot of the listeners who are probably looking at this and saying that, I implemented this last month and I'm not seeing much of an impact yet. No, so that's awesome. So now, if you want to put yourself into the shoes of someone who's just evaluating tools, for, supercharging their sales process. What would be your guidance on what they should think about some of the challenges when they go through this transformation or transition, or what are some of the things that they need to be aware of, both from the internal expectations perspective and also, external expectations perspective?

Are there anything that you can share there?  

[00:11:16] Lesia: Of course. So first of all, it's always the relevance. For us, what was actually the final decision making factor is the relevance of the data that the platform has to our industry, because there are a lot of broad data platforms that will give you millions of records, tens of millions of records, all over the industries, but if that's not relevant to our business and what we do, it doesn't add much value.

So we were looking for something that would, focus on the industry, on the specific industry segment that we are at. That would, that's what given us not necessarily the scale or the quantity, but more importantly, the quality of the data and the relevance of the data, because when you come to your sellers and to your clients, with the relevant data, immediately, it gets attention.

Now, of course, the next challenge is the adoption. So how do you- increase the adoption? It's again, so first of all, relevance again. If the data is relevant, it's not going to be such a big challenge, but also it's about transforming people's behavior and work habits, and that's a little bit more complicated.

So how do you make your teams work with you towards achieving this more sustainable results through intelligence? What worked for us, that's where, what worked for us was making the success story within the organization. basically selecting a few early adopters and creating this early success together with them, and then creating a success story around it and sharing it within the organization.

Now, if something becomes a success, people start sharing it within the organization and they want to try it and work with you on that.  

[00:12:56] Vamsee: Yeah. I think you talked about a very important point, which is about the people behavior. At the end of the day, sales is nothing but people selling to other people, right?

With any tool or any new framework or a methodology, there are certain things that you have to unlearn and some things that you have to learn or like to upskill yourself or reskill yourself. How was that journey, with this transformation Lesia? Was it difficult or was it like, as simple as somebody kind of getting a mobile phone and, and adopting a new process. Where do you characterize that, process was?

[00:13:33] Lesia: That actually was quite easy, and I think if the value is there and if the need is there, then the process will follow. So if the people see value in that, if the people see how it can impact their results, their quotas, they will learn it. So it's more around centering the adoption around value that the people can receive.

[00:13:53] Vamsee: So as a leader, what was those few things that you, you had to showcase to gain that trust from your team, Lesia?  

[00:14:01] Lesia: I was, I wanted to say, it's about showing how you can build more trusted and sustainable relationship with your clients by being equipped with the data. So it's really about the results. In our organization, it's not that much about processes.

It's not that much about tools. It's about how we can impact our clients, in a more efficient way, in a more sustainable way, and how we can make their lives better. So it was more about the value and the results.

[00:14:30] Vamsee: Got it. Got it and the one other challenge that we keep hearing is there are just too many tools.

And every tool has its own value, but, but I only have so much time, I I don't want to learn so many things, I want something to be told what to do, or I want one place where everything comes together. How did you handle those kind of challenges, Lesia? Is that even a real challenge, or is it something that people just worry about it unnecessarily, without having a real impact on their lives?

[00:15:01] Lesia: It can become a challenge if you don't think about it proactively. Now what we do here in my organization is we try to take a holistic look at our tool set. So we're not considering each tool separately, independently from the other tool set that we are using. We would like to look at our entire infrastructure and understand.

Make sure that we are not overusing, we are not duplicating some tools functionality. For us, it was an easy decision because we had a clear vision of what place each tool play, it takes in our tool ecosystem. Once you have this holistic picture, you can easily convey that message. You can easily show that message that yeah, although it may seem that we have five different tools, but each of these tools in our case was addressing different stage of the sales funnel, sales pipeline. So you use this stage at- use this tool at the awareness building stage, and you use this tool at the need and identification station, you use this tool at the solutioning phase, and then it becomes clear for the people. What is the value of each tool?  

[00:16:06] Vamsee: Got it. Got it. So you have to lead it by, you need to clearly define what's the value of each state, or the life cycle of your sales process.

I, I think that's a wonderful, guidance there. So Lesia, one last, a couple of things on, AI, right? I think, of course, I wish it is as easy of a journey as, someone who's as matured as a GlobalLogic organization is, but a lot of companies don't have the basic, processes or rigor of, standardizing- standardized tools or the frameworks, right?

They always try to say that, okay, if I don't have this standardized, I cannot get to the end result, right? So what would be your suggestions to someone who probably are thinking that I don't have proper process, so therefore I cannot adopt next generation tools or some new frameworks? Is that, a right way to think about it?

Or is this, the tool sets can help you to leap one generation and get to where you want to be much faster?  

[00:17:10] Lesia: I actually think that, you can build processes around the tool and it's not a wrong or bad way of doing things. I would say moreover, sometimes it's much harder to fit a tool into a well built and well-structured process.

Sometimes it's much easier to start with a tool. What I like to say is that you never know what you don't know. You don't know how your process may look like before- until you try. So sometimes it might be even an easier spot to start. If you have greenfield, start with a tool, build your processes around it.

[00:17:40] Vamsee: I think that's a great point right there. One other thing that, people always have huge expectations on what AI or Gen AI can do, right? I think, having seen this evolution in the last few years, what's your perspective on where we are going Lesia? What are some of the untouched areas of the sales process that you think that is going to be like either accelerated or destroyed because the AI tools?

[00:18:12] Lesia: So I only see- I don't see what can be potentially destroyed. I see a lot of areas that can be improved.  

[00:18:20] Vamsee: Okay.  

[00:18:20] Lesia: To me, and can't emphasize it more, I think it's about actually creating value. In my ideal world in the future, I don't think the sales is going to be seen as somebody trying to sell you something.

It's about somebody's trying to help you get where you want to be. There are a lot of challenges on the way to becoming that kind of partner or solution kind of solver for your client without the data, and that's where AI can play the role. So how can you really become the problem solver for your client, not somebody who's trying to sell something to you?

[00:18:57] Vamsee: One last thing on, of course, the potential pitfalls, Lesia. What is one thing that if you were to do it again from scratch, what is the few things that you will not do or you will do better than what you have done?  

[00:19:13] Lesia: So I think there are, and I wouldn't say we had issue with that, but I think those are the two areas that are important to take into account and that are, that were important to us.

So one is, I already mentioned that, it's relevance. And the other one is trust. So when it comes to relevance, it's also about, it's about the source. So with AI it's what you put in that impacts what you get out. So to make it relevant, you need to make sure that the source that you are using is actually relevant to your business.

Now, the second is much more probably sensitive and important, which is trust. That's where I see augmentation of human intervention and AI is what's making the difference. I think the more AI grows and develops, the more trust is going to become an issue and that's where I see people will be playing a much more important role acting as custodians, validators, of AI generated insights.

[00:20:12] Vamsee: So that actually brings up a very good point Lesia , which is, have you started looking for a different persona or a different skills in the people that you hire than before? If so, what are those one or two specific skills that you tend to look for more and more nowadays?  

[00:20:33] Lesia: We definitely want to see people more as thinkers rather than data searchers, because like I said, data is everywhere.

It's available on your fingertips. So simply finding a person who can search for data is no longer adding value. Now, what we are looking for in the people is the problem solving mindset. So it's not about how people can search for the data for us. It's about what people can do with that data.  

[00:21:00] Vamsee: Got it. Got it.

So, we are coming towards the end of, the time slot here Lesia. What's your prediction on where we will be in the next three years or five years? If you were to take, if you have the crystal ball, and have the ability to look into the future, what are you looking at it, right now?

[00:21:22] Lesia: I think where I see this all heading is us moving from being aided by AI and by data to us being driven by AI and by data. So if for now it's still us initiating or originating the requests, I expect to see the data being more available to us proactively. Sourced to us, submitted to us, without even us having to, do or make any action to search for it. I think that's an exciting future.  

[00:21:59] Vamsee: Yeah, it is definitely a very exciting future, Lesia. We really appreciate you taking time, to share your experiences and more importantly, your guidance, and also, sharing your, advice to the, the people and the companies that are exploring, what is the value and why they should do it and how they should do it.

It, it has been very valuable for us, and, again, having worked with you for the past couple of years, we have learned a lot from you. Thank you very much for sharing this and, really appreciate your time today Lesia.  

[00:22:32] Lesia: My pleasure, Vamsee. Always glad to talk and discuss the future.

[00:22:39] Vamsee: Awesome. Thank you so much.

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