By Rob Käll, CEO & Co-founder Cien.ai The Wisdom of Munger Most business people are familiar with Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway. And many of you may also revere his business partner and sidekick Charlie Munger, who passed away in 2023 at the age of 99 years and 11 months. Munger wrote an excellent book […]

By Joanna Ridgway, SVP Global Sales, Cien.ai What Happens After A PE Deal is Closed? The leadership team at Cien.ai have been buyers, sellers, or sponsors of hundreds of M&A deals. So we know the drill and what can go wrong. The first 100 days post close is often a time of renewed energy. For the buyer it is exciting to have new products and team members, and for the seller it is opportune to be part of something with greater reach. The honeymoon can end quickly. While the Due Diligence process is intended to uncover any issues with the

[ 2 -3 min read ] Dallas, TX, March 25th, 2021 – AI-for-sales company Cien.ai expands its advisory board and introduces a new API to fix dirty CRM data. Cien Inc., a fast-growing provider of AI-driven sales performance solutions, today announced the addition of Jim McGuire to its board of advisors. Mr. McGuire is a […]

[ 2 -3 min read ] Dallas, TX, December 15th, 2020 – AI-for-sales company Cien.ai expands its advisory board, and introduces new AI-Driven Assessment for B2B sales teams.   Cien Inc., a fast-growing provider of AI-driven sales performance solutions, today announced the addition of Kelly Breslin Wright to its board of advisors. AI-for-sales company Cien.ai […]

[ 2 -3 min read ] Without A Clear And Adaptive Sales Strategy, Customer Acquisition Efforts Fail We have heard paraphrased versions of this again and again. Despite this, sales leaders frequently find themselves managing in situations of strategic ambiguity. As the pace of change continues to accelerate, sales leaders are quickly learning management agility […]

Whether you’re a numbers person or not, here are 21 stats that every technology sales leader should know.   Sales Quotas & Win Rates 1. Only 60% of companies say that quotas are set as a collaborative effort between the CEO with input from senior management. (CFO Alliance) 2. 64% of sales organizations reported correct […]

Why do we accept 60% quota attainment? It seems every day I see another news story read or an article discussing the fact that somewhere between 40% and 50% of B2B sales reps in the US fail to attain their quota numbers. Why is that? There is a plethora of tools and applications available to […]

Think back to the last board meeting you attended that addressed sales. The directors likely looked at the sales numbers, compared them to plan, and probably noticed some room for improvement.   But for board members of early-stage or high-growth companies, a higher-intensity focus on sales is necessary since these organizations may not have the […]

A few days ago, I had a conversation with a member of our Board.  As a Director who sits on several high tech start up boards, she has attended more than her share of Board reviews. Her comments could be summarized in saying that Sales Leaders who are not making their numbers all say the […]

Dallas, TX, November 20th, 2019 – Cien Inc., a leading provider of AI-powered sales performance solutions, today announced the launch of its new Hidden Revenue Assessment.   Cien’s Hidden Revenue Assessment applies over 100+ AI models to a company’s CRM data to reveal the factors that are preventing their teams from achieving their sales quotas. […]

Few sales leaders would say they’re satisfied with their win rate. In fact, according to research, the average win rate per sales rep is just 47%. The question is, is your low win rate due to poor lead and opportunity qualification, below par closing skills, or a lack of product knowledge? Searching for the root […]

Quota attainment went from 63% in 2012 to 53.8% in 2018 – that’s nearly a 15% drop. Today, we constantly hear that “sales are harder than ever before”. The question is – is this just a perception or reality? To understand how much sales have changed and how managers can improve their teams’s sales performance, […]