How challenging is it to progress from a Sales Development Representative (SDR) role to an Account Executive (AE) position at Verkada?

Question

Accepted Answer

If you’re willing to go through 6 months of hell it’s not so bad

Answer

The SDR program is more of a AE sales training program and is extremely challenging. Not many people make it through, but the majority of the reps that do survive become the best MM AEs in the company though.

Answer

The program (usually lasts around 6 months, if you’re not fired before then) is incredibly gruesome. I would say 50% make it through the six months due to incredibly unreasonable standards.  Of that 50%, another 20% get fired due to “culture fit”. They’ll say anything to get you to sign - beware!

Answer

2/2.
You can also go the Marketing Development Representative route. It’s basically an SDR working mostly inbound leads (depending on team). You’ll make ~25k more as an MDR.

MDR timeline is 10 months then you become an AAE, so the route is a bit different but you must go through the AAE program

Answer

There are two different routes you can take (depending on your experience/interview skills)

1. Traditional SDR Route (Associate Account Executive). 4-6 months. Extreme workload. Studying during week, weekends, holidays. Turnover is pretty high, weed out the weak is the mentality. 1/2

Answer

They do not have a traditional SDR role, rather, an Associate Account Executive role wherein you perform most traditional SDR tasks plus additional training, incrementally learning/applying basic AE tasks, and completing periodic tests. At the end of the 6 month (?) term, the idea is that you move in seat as an AE.

Answer

The AAE program lasts about 6 months. It's hard work but if you're not afraid to grind for 6 months then it's totally worth it. Way better than being in an SDR role for 1 year+.  You are doing traditional SDR job functions as well as sitting in on sales and product trainings.  Because you do have trainings and tests to pass outside of your basic job duties you will spend extra hours studying. But again, worth it in my opinion

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Anonymous Q&A

How challenging is it to progress from a Sales Development Representative (SDR) role to an Account Executive (AE) position at Verkada?