Episode 7 Kim Stites | Amazon, Marketo, Google Looker, Cloudinary
7 Kim Stites | Amazon, Marketo, Google Looker, Cloudinary. Kim has been a trailblazer as a sales ops pioneer and as a gay woman in the tech world.
Kim has dealt with discrimination by employers and individuals throughout much of her career as a gay woman. The good news? She’s seen a lot of progress over the years and has been a trailblazer for the gay community in the tech world. Kim has also been a trailblazer for a role that frankly didn’t exist 20 years ago. Kim was doing sales operations before it was cool and when Salesforce was a relatively new company. She has applied those learnings to companies like Amazon, Marketo, Google Looker, and Cloudinary.
Interview transcript:
Kim Stites:
And I was given tasks by, uh, my, my manager at the time like that he wasn't giving to anyone else. They weren't in my wheelhouse. So things that I did, um, but he basically told me that he was giving them to me so that I would fail at them so that he could fire me.
Braydon Anderson:
This is the early years a show about influential early employees of the most successful companies and their stories that have made a lasting impact. I'm Braydon Anderson and on today's show how our guests has helped set up and run sales. Operations teams is some of the most successful startups. Have you ever had to deal with discrimination? Unfortunately, it's something that's prevalent in our society. Has that discrimination ever transferred to your work life? How do you overcome this discrimination? And does it ever get better today? We're joined by Kim Stites. Kim has dealt with discrimination by employers and individuals throughout much of her career as a gay woman. The good news. She's seen a lot of progress over the years and has been a trailblazer for the gay community in the tech world. Kim has also been a trailblazer for a role that frankly didn't exist. 20 years ago, Kim was doing sales operations before it was cool. And when Salesforce was a relatively new company, one day Kim was asked if she could implement Salesforce at a company she was working at despite never implementing Salesforce before she said she could do it.
Kim Stites:
I was working at a company and I was doing like QuickBooks and a kind of random system stuff for them. Uh, I was in college kind of a summer job thing. Um, and they bought Salesforce and they said, Hey Kim, can you implement this? And I said, of course I can. Uh, in my mind I was a genius. And so seemed like a really easy thing to do. And, uh, that I would just pick it up and no problems. Uh, there were a few things that I didn't know, uh, which was anything about Salesforce and, uh, that I only had three hours of consulting time with like Bluewolf where I could call them on the phone and like, have them walk me through things. Um, and this was, you know, 15, 18 years ago, if not more. So, um, Salesforce was vastly different then.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. So this is like mid 2000. Salesforce is pretty new at this point, right? For anybody.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. Yeah. Uh, there wasn't a lot of expertise. Like I think Bluewolf was really the major consulting partner that you could even get anything from. So I, um, and there weren't like a lot of people that knew Salesforce that you could technically hire and those kinds of things. So I, yeah, it wasn't there wasn't a lifeline really. Um, so it, it was a great learning experience. Um, and what I learned from that was I, in my mind was like Salesforce is going to be huge. Um, I just, I really thought they were going to do amazing things. Uh, so I just was excited about it and that's what I wanted to do. I, I changed everything, my degree in college, I changed, um, what I want to do with my life. Um, I was going to be a doctor, uh, and I'm not a doctor.
Kim Stites:
So, so that's what I took off to do was, um, run Salesforce at companies. And, uh, so I eventually left that company. It was a very small company, um, like 10 employees. Um, but it was a great way that I got my feet wet in Salesforce, learned about the tool, um, and determined that that's what I wanted to do with my career. Like that's where I wanted to go. Um, yeah. And then I went to work for a software company and it was my first software company ever. What, the reason why I joined there's I wanted to learn Salesforce more. Um, but I had this amazing, uh, director of sales ops there, um, who really taught me everything about sales, operations, um, in the huge kind of things that, that entails like you do so much more than just run Salesforce, uh, anymore. And, um, I think Salesforce has facilitated sales ops growing in a certain way because it integrates to all the different departments. And now sales ops is tied to pretty much every department in a company. I really look at sales ops as the lifeblood of a company. They are behind the scenes, but they're the thing. They are the people that make everything run and work and do, uh, for a company to survive. But it all started at that first software company way back in the day.
Braydon Anderson:
And so in that, at that company is where you learned a lot of just like the foundation of running Salesforce, running sales ops, any other key learnings that you could share from maybe this early experience in your career?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, I mean, you know, and I'll, I'll tell a funny story from this company. Um, maybe one of my favorite stories about messing things up in my career. Uh, yeah. We, every order that we would do, we would enter into this like Excel spreadsheet, um, at this company. And so it was my job to go in and enter all of these, uh, rows into this Excel. It was our poor man's version of a data warehouse, I guess, and back in the day. And, and so I was entering them in and I went to try and change something and I deleted the entire spreadsheet. And literally you're talking like, at this point it was like hundreds of thousands of rows of data.
Braydon Anderson:
Oh my goodness.
Kim Stites:
It was potentially the fastest I've ever gotten sick to my stomach for, uh, I literally like was trying not to cry and trying to think of everything in my power. Like I was hitting undo and all these things, but I had hit some kind of like a hot button thing that had done it and I couldn't get it to like undo. And I was like, I felt terrible. I like, I was trying everything. I eventually, like, I went to, um, my it team and thankfully I had saved a copy before I had started my work that day. That was still on my like hard drive. And they were able to restore that version of this Excel spreadsheet. Um, and I got, so I had to like redo my work, but it was only my work for that day, which was like, I was thinking I was going to have to input hundreds of thousand rows. Um, it was the literally the worst day ever that I can remember of doing this job. Um,
Braydon Anderson:
Just feeling the tension just here as you tell it.
Kim Stites:
It's a, it's terrible, but, uh, you know, valuable lessons learned, uh, I always save now and, um, I always have backups, so I, I will keep back at backups of important files like that. Like, I'll have another set of it. Um, because I was, I just happened to be lucky in that scenario and I was yelling and I, you know, wasn't thinking things through, at that point, I'd never had a spreadsheet of that value for importance and, uh, yeah. Deleting. It's not a good idea. Yeah.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. Geez. Um, so I'm, I'm actually really interested in this, in this side of your story, Kim. So this is in your career so far that you're, this is like the mid two thousands around 2005. Um, and you had made it pretty well known to your employers up to this point that you're a gay woman. Right. Um, I'm really curious what it was like to be a gay woman in the workplace, especially, you know, 20 years ago.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. Um, so it's, it's been interesting. It's been, um, you know, I've, I've experienced a lot of different things. Um, and I would say some really extremely good moments and some extremely bad ones. Um, you know, I, I did have an employer, um, early on in my career that asked me, you know, to not speak about my significant other in the workplace. Um, and I wasn't able to, um, you know, join in certain kinds of conversations. Uh, it's, it's difficult to carry on the conversation about what your home life is like when you can't bring up what your home life is like. So, um, you know, that was one time in particular that, you know, that occurred for me. Um, you know, I also had scenarios where, you know, I was singled out in, in a meeting, you know, and I was given tasks by, uh, my, my manager at the time like that he wasn't giving to anyone else. They weren't in my wheelhouse. So things that I did, um, but he basically told me that he was giving them to me so that I would fail at them so that he could fire me, uh, because he didn't want to have me on his team. Um, so, you know, these are, these are things that, you know, happen. Um, and it's funny because until it actually is like in your face that way, it's your, I don't want to say oblivious to it, but you're not thinking about it constantly. Um, but it was made very apparent to me that in that moment that this was an issue. Um, you know, and so I, I worked all that week. I learned how to write a code I've never written in, in my life so that I could provide these reports that he wanted, that he basically wanted me to fail out. Uh, and I did it and I provided him the reports and he was shocked because he literally has no idea how I did it and then accused me of like, um, basically like stealing code or getting someone else to write it for me, um, which I didn't do. Uh, but then it was funny. I already had been looking for another job. So I basically gave them the reports in my two weeks notice. Oh man, I'm sorry. That's, that's so unfortunate. That's a terrible experience, Kim. I'm sorry. You had to go through that. That's that's rough. Yeah. It's, you know what I think though, you know, some of those things happen, but then, uh, you know, later on in my career, I was actually, um, diagnosed with MS and, you know, a company that had maybe not been as great or as open to me being gay was actually super supportive when I was diagnosed. And they, um, you know, really bent over backwards for me, uh, to allow me time to go to, you know, these specialists that weren't in our state, even like, I went to some specialists out of state and they allow me to take that time. People even volunteered there, like sick leave or their paid time off. They like gave it to me so that I could take time off. Um, so I, you know, sometimes individuals are going to have, you know, their opinions and they're going to feel how they feel about something, but at the same time, there's a lot of good in this world. And a lot of people that do good things and, um, you know, so I, as much as I've had bad things, I I've been blessed, um, by the good in people more than my fair share. I'm sure. And so, um, you know, I'm grateful for those, those things.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. And I'm curious, how has it changed over the years? Right. So this is 15 years ago. Has it gotten better?
Kim Stites:
Um, yeah. I mean, I think a few things have changed. Um, I always joke that, um, well I used to, I used to look different. I used to wear my hair really short. Um, and I think my attitude was probably different as well. I was much more like in your face, like I'm, I'm gay look at me kind of thing. And, uh, like I was way out and proud if you will. Um, I think, you know, I have, I have a child now and, uh, as he's grown up and I've matured, uh, I think, you know, I'm, I'm still out, I'm still proud. Um, I'm now married, uh, which was, uh, a great thing that I think happened, um, was the allowance of, of gay people to be married. Like that was a big deal for me. Um, it, because that changed how, you know, things are viewed, um, how I get to claim things on my taxes, how I get to claim my wife on my insurance. Like all of these things, the hoops I would have to drop through to try and claim somebody as my domestic partner, like all of these kinds of things I don't have to do anymore because we're married and it just is. Um, so from that aspect, it's absolutely better. Um, and being in California, uh, working in a company in California, um, you know, it's fairly commonplace anymore. Like I, I used to always be the only one in the office and now I'm not, um, you know, and I think more people feel that it's a safe environment to be open and out and those kinds of things. And so I think people express whatever their truth is, um, more openly these days. And so I think it makes it better for everybody around them because, you know, when you're not the only one, you seem to get less of an issue. So I appreciate it.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. And is it giving you maybe that sense of camaraderie knowing that you're maybe not the only one in the workplace anymore?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, it absolutely has. Um, it's nice not to be the only one. It's nice to have someone else that shares your struggle. Um, and I would say, you know, they've created groups now. Like you can, like, if you're like at Salesforce, they have a group and they do the parades for pride and they do these kinds of things. Um, similarly like Amazon, when I worked for Amazon, um, they had a group for, um, pride as well that you could participate and they participated in the parade and they would do different things. So like those kinds of organizations, um, you know, have really started to support, um, people being out and being, you know, uh, creating that comradery in the workplace for people that are out. And so I think, you know, those were really great initiatives that, um, help get things to a better place.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. That's awesome. That's great. I, you know, it's, it's a hard experience, hopefully it's not hard for you to share, and I'm glad that, you know, you've been able to see positive experiences despite some of the, the individuals that you encountered over the years. So I'm glad to see that there's some progress at least. Um, so yeah. So as you mentioned, you then go to Amazon at this point in your, in your career. Um, tell me about that. What was it like going to work at Amazon, especially, you know, this is again, 15 years ago about, uh, Amazon. I'm sure it was a lot different back then than it is now.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. Like, so I started at Amazon the easiest way to explain it to people. Like the time of all of it was I started at Amazon when they were trading at $90 a share, which if you look at them now they're trading at a vastly higher value. So, um, and I remember when it hit $200 a share when I was there and people went crazy. They're like, they will never go any higher. This is amazing. Like it's unheard of and look at them now. Yeah.
Braydon Anderson:
Well actually, what are they today? Do you know off the top of your head?
Kim Stites:
I actually, I track it on my phone. Uh, I believe it's like $1,400 a share.
Braydon Anderson:
Uh, I'm seeing $2,700 a share right now. I'm looking at the right one, so, wow. That's nuts.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. Um, yeah, so it's, it's vastly different. So that's how long ago I worked for Amazon, uh, before AWS had come out. Uh, they, it didn't exist yet when I was there. So, um, quite a while ago, as you can imagine, um, and they had had Salesforce for like six years and they had never hired anyone that had like Salesforce administration experience to own it and run it. It was just kind of this, like, we use it, but nobody really owns it. So everybody just kinda did whatever they wanted to it. And so it, when I got there, it was the, it still is to this day, the ugliest Salesforce I have ever encountered, uh, you'd be hard pressed to find something worse, but it was
Braydon Anderson:
So, Kim, explain to someone that doesn't know what an ugly Salesforce looks like, what an ugly Salesforce looks like.
Kim Stites:
So you only can create so many custom fields on an object in Salesforce. So when they wanted a new field, they would delete,
Braydon Anderson:
Oh man. And all the associated data goes with it. Oh man. Yeah. Okay. That's pretty ugly.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. And then imagine, you know, millions of records of data, like, so you're talking about a massive data set inside of Salesforce that is just dirty because this is how it's being managed.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. I imagine it's, this has gotta be the biggest dataset you've ever worked with. Oh yeah.
Kim Stites:
Hands down the largest dataset I've ever seen in a Salesforce. Um, I, and I've worked, uh, with other, uh, companies like on a consulting basis and things like that that had large data sets, but I've never seen anything like Amazon's dataset since. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's ridiculous.
Braydon Anderson:
And I'm even kind of curious because people recognize Amazon as a B2C company, not as a B2B, which Salesforce is traditional use for a more B2B type company. So how was Amazon even using Salesforce?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, so it was on the B2B side. Um, so what we were doing, we were in charge of like, if a company wanted to sell on Amazon. So if you own Nike and you want to sell on Amazon, your, your, your goods, um, you would come through our Salesforce and we would log you as Nike as an account. And we would have an opportunity where we would track, you know, um, what, uh, what type of things you're going to sell, like, cause they have different categories as you can imagine. And so, um, and they only allow so many in a given category. So just because you want to sell on Amazon doesn't mean you'll be allowed to, so a lot of the categories gated, meaning you have to get approved to sell on them. And, um, so that's majoritively how we were using it was to track those that wanted to sell on Amazon. Um, also those who wanted to advertise, so product ads, so companies that wanted to say, Hey, come buy my product, particularly, um, as well as, um, you know, fulfillment. So again, this is way back in the day, Amazon shipping stuff for other companies was really new. Um, and it was part of their, my like sales team's job was to get these companies to sign up, to have Amazon ship their stuff. Um, and so this is really when that was starting. And that, that was a big push that Amazon was making, was getting companies to send their goods to Amazon, to put into Amazon warehouses to then be shipped, um, where like now, like it's fairly commonplace. Most all companies will subscribe to that.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. I typically won't buy something unless I know it's getting shipped from Amazon. Yeah. Amazon prime. It's amazing. Yeah, exactly. Um, I'm curious, what's maybe one of your biggest learnings that you took away from working at Amazon? Um,
Kim Stites:
Well also we, my next stop in my career really was because of Amazon. Um, we purchased Marketo um, while I was at Amazon. Um, and I implemented it for the first time and had the same feeling about Marketo that I had had about Salesforce all those years ago. Um, but what I learned was that they were still relatively small. Like I was actually on the, the fast or the side. Yeah. I was on the early side of, of Marketo at that time. And, um, I, again, I just thought Marketo would be huge and I really liked the product. I liked what it did. Um, I liked the team there. Um, and I just, so, you know, that was something that I definitely took away from Amazon was then my move, but, uh, away from Amazon. But the, the other thing that I learned, um, is just starting with a good foundation is huge. Um, you know, and this is, this is true of, of all companies that I've worked for. You know, if you set up your systems and processes in a good foundation, it will support you to grow to whatever size you wind up being, whether it's Amazon size or, you know, Marketo, or, you know, small, if you never make it past a certain size, it, if you have good systems and foundations for those systems, um, you can facilitate whatever growth or changes that you need to make. And the thing that I learned at Amazon, um, was just that, uh, that you can, um, you know, be of that size and have built something and let it kind of grow organically the way that they did until it's, you know, kind of a big, hairy beast, if you will. Um, but what I also took from that is you can make mistakes and correct them. Um, you know, Amazon made a mistake in that sense, um, you know, letting it grow organically and becoming the big, hairy beast that it was, um, you know, they didn't, um, do it the right way. Like that was a mistake. And, but that mistake was correctable. Um, and as long as you learn from that mistake, and then you grow from it, you know, that's the importance of your career? I mean, I think for me, um, that's held true. That's, that's how I've learned systems. That's how I've learned tools is, you know, making mistakes. But those lessons that I learned when I make a mistake, I carry with me forever. And so I think it's important that people understand that it's okay to make mistakes, um, but just learn and grow from them and then carry it with you, you know, so that you don't make them again. That's always my goal. It's not do it again.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. That's the key point. It's okay to have the mistake as long as you're learning from it and, and using that to, to move on from. So that's good. Um, so you, you alluded to this Kim that, um, Amazon is what introduced you to Marketo the product and the company, and you decide to then go work at Marketo. So did you go straight from Amazon to Marketo to, to work there?
Kim Stites:
No, I, you know, I talk a lot about, you know, decisions and being more mature and growing, but, uh, in this instance I left a very good job at Amazon, and I moved from Seattle, Washington to the Bay area. So I went from someplace lower price to higher price cost of living. And, uh, didn't have a job. Uh, I moved here. I, yeah, I moved on the hope of getting one. Um, wow. It was a goal. It was what I was determined to do was work for Marketo. And so I came to the Bay area, uh, which isn't a bad idea if you are in sales operations and run Salesforce in Marketo, they're both based there. And, uh, it, in a sense is a Mecca for what I do. Um, and so it, it wasn't a terrible idea. Like there was some security in that, like, I would be able to find a job, but yeah,
Braydon Anderson:
But you went hoping to have a job at Marketo and there wasn't a job, but you left anyway, is that I'm understanding that correct?
Kim Stites:
Yeah. There was no job. Uh, and I got here and I applied and there was still no job. I moved, I, and I didn't get a position at Marketo for an entire year. Um, I did consulting work. I worked for a couple different companies helping them, uh, during that time, like I was working, um, but always just, you know, trying to get an in at Marketo, which is where I really wanted to be.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. So you eventually do get a job there, thankfully I'm doing, were you doing the sales, operations role? Was there any nuances to this role? What were you doing there?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, so originally I was hired just to be a Salesforce administrator. I was in the, I was on it really? Um, yeah, it was, it was kind of interesting. And when I got there, I was like, they kind of had a need for someone in the sales ops, marketing ops role as a leader in that group. And so fortunately I was able to kind of transition, uh, to, they had a combined group. It was both sales and marketing ops. Um, so I was able to transition to running the sales and marketing ops teams, um, at Marketo. And so we were responsible for running Marketo at Marketo, which was an insane idea, but one of the coolest experiences of my career to date, for sure.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. And I want to, I love that, like you were the person at Marketo, that was running Marketo. Um, I was at a company once it's a survey company, a research company, and I had to create surveys occasionally to send to our customers. And it was by far the most intimidating part of my job, like sending a survey to researchers, like from a company that is the software for service, like that was so intense. It has to be perfect. You make one error, you're going to hear about it forever. Right. And so was that intimidating for you to run Marketo at Marketo and all the marketing activities and all of the emails that we're sending out? What was that like? Yeah, I mean, it's,
Kim Stites:
It's, it's intimidating. I would say the thing that was the most intimidating was actually the group of marketers that I was working with. Um, they were the most amazing marketing minds like that I've had the pleasure to work with in like such a condensed group. Like occasionally you'll meet like one great marketer. It was like everybody, there was just amazing. Um, and if you look, they're just their ideas, like they were truly like thought leaders and I think in all, they were ahead of their time. Um, and they're still making great marketing initiatives to this day at the different companies that they've gone to. Like, they're still amazing marketers, like, um, you know, for example, like Maria, uh, for Galena, she ran marketing at Aptis. Now she's at another company in Chicago and she literally is, I think considered one of like the top 10 best marketers in the world. Yeah. And so it's, um, but everyone was like that, like everybody, just the, the ideas that they would come up with or the, you know, the email campaigns that they would think of or the way that they would write the text for those emails, like events that they would put on, like anybody has ever been to a Marketo party. Like they were just amazing ideas. Like they would think of these things. And so it made my job actually easier because really all I'm doing is taking everything that they're saying and putting it into a tool. So it's not as though I'm really responsible for any of it. Um, you know, but it's intimidating because you want it to be the best, right. People look to you. Um, you know, and we had amazing lead scoring algorithms that people would write. Like it was just insane. Um, and if you, if you look at, you know, just the pedigree of the people that came out of Marketo and where they're at now and what they're doing now, like these are amazing individuals like top to bottom. Um, it, it was really a company of, I would say high overachievers and people who were ahead of their time and what they do. Um, I, I, every day am just happy that I got to have that experience just because of, I learned so much and I took in so much and I got to work with such amazing people. Um, you know, it, it was an outstanding experience for me. Um, and one that I appreciate very much.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. Well, Marketo they've been fascinating to watch. So now they're owned by Adobe. They, right before that they were owned by Vista Equity, two powerhouses right there in and of itself. But you were there far before that. Um, I'm curious, what, what was it like in the early days? Like they were pretty small when you joined there.
Kim Stites:
Yeah, so we weren't public yet. Um, and you know, we were doing every deal we could to get to a place where we could go public. Um, I think the thing that everybody always talked about was going public, like going public was a big deal for Marketo. Um, there was always talk of acquisitions, um, back in the day, uh, that never came to fruition. Um, and so we were able to actually go public, um, which was an amazing experience to have, um, you know, a lot of people talk about, if you get to go public with a company, it's kind of like a once in a lifetime style kind of thing. And so, um, having had that, it's, it's been amazing to kind of experience that whole thing. Um, but Marketo was fun. It was, it had a lot of, you know, fun get togethers and we would really enjoy, you know, like they would host Marketo summits or when we would have big events and we would get to, you know, go participate in those, it was, uh, a lot of camaraderie and a lot of like good times to be had with the different groups of people that you were working with. It was, it really was a great company, um, that was super focused on going public.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. And were there pros and cons to that? Like what was it like before going public? What was it like after going public?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, I think, you know, part of the reason that they, everybody was working so hard and overachieving was, you know, we really did have this strong company level idea of going public. Um, I would say that the difficult time came after going public. Um, when you base, you know, so much of your company's effort and kind of the goals around getting to the metrics needed to go public, um, and then you go public that day is amazing, but then there's a bit of a letdown, uh, when you March so hard for a long period of time to get to the peak, and then you get to the peak. If you don't create another peak, it's a little bit like, where do I go now? What do I do? Um, yeah. And it's a little bit of a lost feeling I would say. And so for me personally, that's why I left was because of that. Um, I needed to, um, I was chasing that high, I guess, like I was chasing the dream of doing it again and there wasn't a whole lot of, you know, goals that I had left at Marketo because if the sole goal was to go public, and then you do it, then, you know, you don't really have the next goal and there's not something that's comparable, um, you know, releasing great board metrics this quarter. Isn't exactly like endearing to like drive excited.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah, totally. That's such a good perspective. And I think it's something that's often overlooked is just this concept that let's go public. Let's go public. In fact, I had a CEO once it was like going public is easy, being public is extremely difficult and, and I think it helps level set and help you understand what the, what the core goals of the actually should be. So, um, so you leave Marketo you actually go and join a company called Looker. Tell me about Looker. Um, did you have kind of that same feeling there as well?
Kim Stites:
Yeah, I, again, when I feel that I feel it and I was sure Looker was going to be huge. Um, and in all honesty, I thought Looker would go public again. I, I just had that feeling. They were on that kind of trajectory to, to go public. Um, and it was an amazing company. The good thing I would say about Looker though, was that was not Looker soul goal or purpose. And in fact, they would occasionally talk about it because everybody always is like, are we going to go public? Like, when are we going public? Like, that was always a thing we weren't solely focused on it. It wasn't like the most important thing that we were trying to do. It was not to go public, you know, going public at Looker was talked about, I think in the back of your mind, you weren't hoping for it.
Kim Stites:
Um, and you knew that you were on the trajectory for it, but everybody at an executive level always kind of marched to the same tune of like, we just want to be a great company that changes data analytics, um, you know, business intelligence for the world, um, and makes companies get the data in the right people's hands to make good company decisions. Um, and Looker was great at that. Like, they're great data analytics company, frankly. Like I loved having Looker and being able to use Looker when I was at Looker. Um, and so, you know, it's, it really is an amazing tool. Um, and so you were just excited to work there and, and do the right things, um, at the right company. Like it, it kind of all just fit and worked. Um, unfortunately like they were acquired by Google, which is an insane.
Braydon Anderson:
Yeah. Well, and I'm curious, cause you you've mentioned this, um, that you're really good at finding these, you know, you can call it a unicorn, which is a company that's valued at a billion dollars. Right. Um, how do you do that? Give us, give us your words of wisdom here so we can go find these unicorns.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. It's I would say at the end of the day, it's a feeling, you know, um, even though Salesforce was fairly big and going crazy growing like mad at the time, I knew Salesforce would be big. Um, and Salesforce was big. I knew Marketo would be huge. Marketo went public and did big things. And so, you know, and then Looker, I knew Looker would be huge as well. And how I get to that place where I believe that of them is a few things. Um, one of which though, I don't know which is the driving force for why I've been able to find them is I get a feeling like this is going to be huge. I get that feeling sometimes just because I use the tool and I'm like, Oh, I could see why people would buy this and love this. And you know, and so that's the only tangible thought that I have to, some of it, the other part of it is, um, you know, being in sales operations and being that lifeblood. When I work at a company, I know all of the metrics. And if I'm using the tool that the company offers, I know whether or not it's a good tool or it's, uh, easily adopt adopted, you know, like if it's, um, used within the company generally is a good sign that it's a highly, easily used tool. Like if a company is using its own tool regularly and people are all in it and they give everybody a license kind of thing, um, that's usually a great sign to me that they have a tool that's can be used by anybody it's, you know, going to be good. So, you know, that's one thing that I look at, I look at their numbers, you know, what are their retention rates, you know, do their customers come back. Um, so when I'm looking at companies, like if I'm going to leave a company and I'm looking to go to the next one, um, you know, I'm looking at their product, I'm looking at, um, you know, their retention numbers. Like I asked in my interviews, you know, what are your retention rates? What is your turn? You know, if people have negative churn and they've had it for, you know, 10 quarters, they're going to tell you that because they know that they're doing great things. So if you ask them, they'll tell you,
Braydon Anderson:
Well, and you've mentioned that where you're at now, Cloudinary, you you've also had this feeling. And so I'm curious in your eyes, what is Cloudinary done right early on?
Kim Stites:
Yeah. So I think the biggest, there's a few things to that. I, I shouldn't say there's a biggest thing. Um, but in my personal opinion, it's the biggest thing is that they're trying to be a great company. And what I mean by being a great company is being good to their customers, being good to their employees, like being a good company is like being good in the world, uh, in a sense in my book. And so when you're a good company, who's good to your customers, who's good to your employees. Um, you know, people want to work hard for you and customers keep coming back to you because they like your service. They like how they're treated. And so I think that's, you know, first and foremost, the thing that Cloudera has done well is be really good to their employees and really good to their customers. Um, they are really good companies. In fact, I mean, I've worked for some amazing companies that we've already talked about. Cloudinary is the best, one of all of those in how they treat their employees. And I can go so far as to say how they are with their customers there. They really are just a good like company filled with really good people. Um, can you give an example of maybe something they do they go and beyond for their customers or for their absolutely. Uh, so this pandemic, for example, they have sent chocolates to us. They have sent flowers to us. They sent us movie night baskets with like a coupon to rent a movie off of whatever provider we wanted. Uh, and it had like goodies and popcorn and everything in it. Um, you know, employee appreciation, they sent a card, um, to everybody with like a handwritten note, um, you know, saying how much they appreciate you and why, and, um, you know, stuff like that. It's, it's pretty much, you know, across the board, things that they'll do for you. Um, in that regard, like, you know, I have a son who wanted to go to high school in Vegas, um, and they let me move to Vegas. Like, um, you know, they just do things for people. Um, there was a person on the team that wanted to take his position to part time because he wanted to write a book and they let this person do that. Um, like they have offered people like shortened work schedules, um, during this pandemic because they know people are home with their kids and need. Um, but they're still paying you more than your shortened work schedule. Um, like they, they really have done above and beyond things and that's for us employees. Um, I know also that we, um, have done great things for customers that maybe are going through struggles during this pandemic and, um, being flexible with them to help them get through these things and not, you know, lose their service or things like that. Um, you know, they, they really do try to help companies, you know, do what they need to do. Um, so, you know, from that perspective, they really just are good company in that sense. And, and that's, I think, um, you know, why we have such a great customer base and why we've been able to grow the way we have and, um, you know, why we'll continue to grow. And, uh, we've continued to grow throughout this pandemic, which is that's awesome. Most companies haven't had the ability to say that, um, you know, so there's a lot of, um, good things to them in that sense. And so I, and the product is amazing. Um, it's, it's the best out there in the market for what it does. Um, and you know, I think it will continue to do great things. And, uh, I think that will be the unicorn of all unicorns in my string of unicorn. So
Braydon Anderson:
I love that. Uh, Kim, I think what I'd love to hear from you is maybe what's one piece of advice that you would give to someone that's currently in the early years of a startup.
Kim Stites:
Yeah. So I think, you know, I mentioned it a bit before, so I'll just touch on it again, which is, you know, build a good foundation for your systems and your processes. Um, that's first and foremost, but second is pace yourself. Um, you know, I've worked for a number of different startups with, you know, different cultures and different, you know, managers and all sorts of things. And, you know, it's very easy to get sucked in because you have to wear many hats when you're at a startup and you're in the early years because they don't hire every position available, but you would normally have at a large company. And so, you know, you don't have as much resource in the way of people, um, at, you know, small startups. And so pacing yourself for me really means like when you get home at night, have a hobby, have whatever it is that you need to do to kind of unwind. Um, but you have to do that. You know, we, it's, it's very hard to get caught up and you go to work and you come home and you work some more and, and then you get burnt out and you wonder why? Like, am I done with this job already? Um, and it's really because, you know, we, we work ourselves too much, um, and it's good to set boundaries and to pace yourself, um, the work won't go away, I can guarantee it. Um, I've yet to be anywhere where I had nothing to do. So, um, you know, it's, it's good to pace yourself. Um, you know, and I, I'm a big believer in hard work, um, and that it will pay off if you continue to push yourself. Um, but I also believe in, in balance and, you know, so finding that balance in your life and not getting overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things to do at a startup, because that will always be the case. And you kind of have to find that balance and, and work hard and play hard. So,
Braydon Anderson:
So Kim, in all of your experience, like, I'm sure you've had some great learnings just from, how do you find the right team members and building a team, any light that you can shed there?
Kim Stites:
Yeah. So, um, you know, it's funny, I have a, a team completely built right now at Cloudinary that I built from the, from scratch essentially. Um, and which is the first time I've built an entire team from scratch. Uh, and so it's been an amazing experience. And the thing that I've learned over the years about, you know, who to hire and things like that. Um, the most important thing to me is, you know, being a self starter and being willing to kind of adapt and learn, um, you know, in a startup environment, things are going to change. Like I can promise it always does. And, um, you know, so being able to be adaptable is important because, you know, you, I might tell you something as the most important project today and tomorrow, it might not be important at all. Um, and it sucks and I feel that pain because I've dealt with it myself, but, um, you know, you have to adapt to those things and understand how a company is transitioning, um, when those things occur. And so, you know, hiring somebody who is willing to be adaptable. Um, and the other thing I would say, um, is having a team that is willing to learn new things, um, and to make mistakes as we talked about earlier, um, you know, my team today, um, is trying new tools. They're trying to push themselves to learn new things. And you know, that in essence is how you grow into sales ops. Um, because there's not a course you can take, um, you could go to college for as long as you want, and you won't come out ready to run and own all the tools and run sales ops, like it, a lot of what you do is what you learn on job. Uh, and so, you know, having a team that's willing to learn, willing to take risks a bit, right, to try new things and to know that they could fail or make a mistake, um, you know, is important. And I've been fortunate in my career to hire and have a number of these individuals on my team. And, um, you know, my team at Cloudinary is, uh, awesome and I love them. So they happen to hear this. Hopefully they, they know I love them. So
Braydon Anderson:
That's Kim Stites, the woman that has run sales ops at some of the most successful companies. Thanks for listening to today's show, subscribe on Apple podcasts or Spotify. I'm Braydon Anderson and this is The Early Years.