You may have heard that we are in the process of building a 130,000 square foot addition to our campus. Having been a part of this company for 17 years, it’s really exciting to see it again reach the point where we are running out of space. My department, which had 22 Sales Engineers when I started, now has 203 (gulp), with more folks already scheduled to start in the coming months!
That doesn’t mean we’re going to stop hiring. We are pretty much always on the lookout for potential Sales Engineers because of our ongoing growth. It’s just that finding individuals with “the right stuff” is pretty challenging. To that end, I’d like to give you a few insights into what we look for in a Sales Engineer.
- Attitude is first for me when interviewing candidates. The quality of our customer experience means everything to us, so we need to have Sales Engineers who truly care about their level of service.
- A strong work ethic is critical to do this job well. We liken it to starting your own business (with a really great infrastructure and tons of support, of course); a Sales Engineer must be willing to go above and beyond to do the right thing and work at what we call “Sweetwater speed” every day. Excellence is expected.
- The right candidate must also be a great team player. Sales Engineers take care of each other’s customers many times every day, and the motto here is to treat every customer as though they are your own.
- I define sales as great communication and problem solving. Our team has a ton of autonomy when working on solutions. Every Sales Engineer must have a healthy dose of common sense and be able to solve problems on their own. I’m not a fan of micro managing and would much rather hire intelligent people, train them extremely well, give them great tools, and support them as best I can. In other words, get out of their way and let smart people work!
- Finally – and very importantly – any candidate must have a serious level of product and application knowledge as well as extensive real world experience.
Maybe you are or you know somebody who would be a good fit? We work very hard, but we have a lot of fun. I have never worked with such a smart, talented, and driven group of people, and I count my blessings every day. Please let any potential candidates know that they can go to Sweetwater.com/careers/openings.php on our website to learn more and to apply.
Rock and Roll!
Jeff Radke
Executive Vice President of Sales
Chief Sales Officer