Tech Sales is for Hustlers

After a game-changing injury that ended a promising career in the NFL, Will Ossai needed a new outlet for his competitive drive and relentless grit. Enter: professional sales.  From NFL rookie to memoryBlue SDR, and now an Associate Sales Manager at Radware, Will Ossai is the first to tell you how quickly plans change. Shortly into his rookie year with the Colts, Will received a diagnosis that end...

A winning team is built from the top down. And Joe Reeves is precisely the type of leader needed to create a championship squad.  Managing Director of memoryBlue’s Silicon Valley office, Joe has turned his six years with the company into something special. He quickly progressed from SDR to DM, and, ultimately, now steers the ship as the leader of a rapidly growing office. From coaching sports to s...

Omari Morgan has mastered getting outside of his comfort zone – and his commitment to playing the long game with his career is paying off in a big way.  From his start in sales at memoryBlue seven years ago to his position now as a highly successful Channel Account Manager at SecurityScorecard, Omari has cultivated a powerful network from coast-to-coast. Incredibly self-aware and immeasurably well...

Can introverts succeed in sales? Caroline Sullivan’s career is undeniable proof that the answer is an emphatic yes.  The 2021 memoryBlue Phenom Alumni Award winner collects accolades and honors in her role as an Inside Account Executive at Rubrik because she understands an important sales secret: demonstrate that you genuinely care about people, prospects, and colleagues, and the achievements will...

If you’re going to talk the talk, you better walk the walk. Christina Ierullo lives that mantra with an unapologetic style dedicated to elevating her team. Being the Director of Sales Development at Apty never stops Christina from getting her hands dirty and jumping into the sales trenches alongside her team. There’s no better way to earn respect than leading by example. From her running start at...

How can you compete against someone who is constantly improving their abilities? Once Deionte Davis unlocked this cheat code, the professional sales world changed for him. Deionte, now a successful Account Executive at Searchspring, deploys a daily improvement style to max out his gains mentally, physically, and professionally. His personal love of health and fitness helped him adopt a self-improv...

From working in hospitality to managing a team of SDRs, Stephen Labay knows with change, comes an opportunity to learn new things, add to, or refine your current skills, and push yourself to achieve more than last week, last month, last year.  Alum Ruben Rosado saw Stephen’s competitive nature and ability to grow in tough situations and referred him to join memoryBlue as an SDR. Rolling with the p...

Most see being a manager as a fast-track to more responsibility, a higher salary, a lofty title, or a bigger office. Jackson Hawkins has different motivations; he loves the thrill of guiding his employees to reach their maximum potential.  Jackson, now a Managing Director in the memoryBlue Austin office, started his career as an SDR. His journey from SDR, to Delivery Manager, to Managing Director...

It takes more than a compass to blaze a trail like Blake Erwin.    Blake, an accomplished Enterprise Sales Rep at Couchbase, charted a course for the entire memoryBlue team as the first to ever be hired by this longstanding client. Since that time, more than 20 elephants have charged down the path he helped build with the database solutions powerhouse. A relentless goal-setter and hard worker, Bla...

If you’re not prepared to sweat, stay off the field. David Tharp learned that lesson well during his time as a Marine, and then once again in pursuit of a career in sales. Today David handles OEM licensing sales in the Global Business Development department at Splunk. Practically destined for a career in sales, he carries on a family legacy in the profession for a third generation. He eventually p...

If at first, you don’t succeed, keep trying until you do. Sam Burkhalter applies this motto to whatever he pursues, and his consistent progression suggests he is on to something.  Now an Inside Sales Representative at Precisely on a strong path to Account Executive, Sam preaches the power of persistence. You’ll never master anything if you don’t stick with it long enough. Sam overcame cold-calling...

If some is good, more is better. That was the approach Jeremy Mills used with memoryBlue, and you can’t argue with the results. Jeremy, now an accomplished Account Development Representative at Fictiv, pulled off a rare feat by getting hired out twice in two tours with memoryBlue. The first time through, he learned the hard way, including more than a few cold call calamities. But he reassessed his...

A sales call for novices can feel like an open mic on improv night. James Manning prefers to enter the show highly prepared for the opening 30 seconds.   James, now a Business Development Representative at ScienceLogic, started his sales career as a self-described “theatrical” SDR. But he quickly learned focus, discipline, and mastering the opening moments of a sales call create repeatable success...

She may have started out cleaning up messes, but now she’s just cleaning up. Ceilidh initiated her career as a janitor in an Austin (TX) gym, but her exceptional work ethic quickly moved her into management and ultimately jumpstarted her career in sales.  Ceilidh thrived in the cold-calling trenches for 2.5-years here at memoryBlue. From SDR to Senior SDR to recruiting, Ceilidh ran the gamut of th...

When Victor Mata spent time working around a forklift, he couldn’t resist the opportunity to learn to operate one himself. It’s the same natural curiosity that allows him to thrive today in the professional sales world.  Victor, now a highly successful Enterprise Business Development Rep for ThreatConnect, unpacks a compelling personal story starting with his deep roots in Venezuela to his winding...

Life turns dramatically on a few pivotal moments. For Libby Galatis, the clock almost struck midnight on the idea of working at memoryBlue when her recruiter came through in the clutch. Libby, now the 5th most tenured employee in the company, was minutes away from accepting another job offer before landing her initial memoryBlue role. She can only be fittingly described as the undisputed Queen of...

From fighting fires to stoking them through dynamic sales competitions, Stefanie Boyer’s road to professional sales education is riveting. Dr. Boyer, Professor of Marketing and head of the sales program at Bryant University, never lost the drive to compete after suffering a career ending injury as an athlete in college. The pivot in life took her on a wild ride including stops as a firefighter, a...

Translating wind-tunnel performance into $30M plane design recommendations at Boeing turns out to be a phenomenal entrée into a professional sales education career. Dr. Ryan Mullins, an award-winning author, Associate Professor in Marketing, and Executive Director of the Sales Innovation Program at Clemson University, traveled a fascinating route from aerospace engineering to his role as a dynamic...

For Dr. Howard Dover, there is no success for his students without unwavering support from leadership. This is precisely how his sales program at the University of Texas at Dallas differentiates itself from other programs.  Dr. Dover, the Director of the Sales Program at the University of Texas at Dallas, founded the sales program at UTD and has carefully cultivated its steady growth over the year...

Faye Hall Jackson formed a core value early in her life: regardless of where you are, you are always CEO of yourself.  It’s a belief her parents instilled in her. Passing that life ownership lesson on to her sales students is a major part of her mission as a Professor in the Department of Management, Sales, and Marketing at Tuskegee University. She helps students understand that you can fail, make...

What are transferable skills? As Dr. Brent Baker illustrates for his students, the same skills that help you become a better sales pro can help you be a better spouse, a better worker, and a better friend. Dr. Baker, Associate Professor at the Florida Gulf Coast University, prepares future pros to sell the most difficult products and technologies. But that's not all. He encourages them to thi...

Dr. William Steiger, an Associate Lecturer at the University of Central Florida since 2009, has learned a lot about the industry watching sales go from a last resort to a competitive program throughout his long and fulfilling career as a sales professor. His competitive sales program selects students with a true passion for sales, regardless if they fit the "typical" sales persona.  As s...

Attending a professional conference and wandering into the right breakout room can change your life. Just ask Dr. Alex Milovic, Assistant Professor of Practice – Marketing and founder of the Center for Professional Selling at Marquette University. While completing his Ph. D. in Marketing, Dr. Milovic attended an event that included a side session on professional sales and it crystalized his own pa...

If you grow up in wine country, making fancy wines might seem like a natural career choice. But Dan Yorkey pivoted off that path early on and he’s never looking back. A native Californian now turned East Coast sales pro, Dan discovered a natural talent for sales born from his early experiences helping customers and working for his parents in an auto parts store. And as you’ll hear in this episode...

Joey Cohen is a testament to memoryBlue's commitment to elevating from within. 7 short years ago, Joey joined memoryBlue as a Sales Development Representative. In those 7 years, Joey has been an integral part of developing sales teams for each of our services and mentoring the next generation of sales talent.  While he's not quite in the same place as he was 7 years ago, some things neve...