I’ve always assumed that great financial modelers have deep backgrounds in either corporate finance or accounting. That’s not the case for Lyndsey Weber who is the Senior Solutions Consultant at Quantrix. After graduating with a degree in engineering management, Lyndsey spent the next three years of her new career at ExxonMobil. And then the itch that didn’t go away to pivot to a position in PreSales surfaced. The rest of the story is fascinating and illuminating.
Interview Highlights
- The difference between PreSales, sales development reps, and salespeople
- Behind the scenes of a senior solutions consultant
- Leaving the unknown for something totally new
- The links between engineering, project management, English, and PreSales
- The filtering process in identifying the right fit in a new company in a new career
- Sage advice on tailoring resumes to each audience
- Lyndsey’s three buckets
- The interview process and question suggestions
- The role of culture in the selection process
- Decision time – Quantrix
- Reasons why Quantrix was a right fit
- Three unique roles in financial and business modeling – the architect, the analyst, and the storyteller
- A shoutout to PreSales Collective
Five Fascinating Insights
PreSales vs Sales
… PreSales is set out to support the sales process, I think we are there to help sales be successful, and ultimately, of course, to make the sale and help ultimately, the customer to be successful.
One of the unique things to me is PreSales is about helping a potential customer see the value and the potential of our solution. I think sales is more focused on making sure that we build that trust as quickly as possible with a potential customer and helping them understand the general offerings of our solution.
Lyndsey Weber
Key Resume Tip
You should always reframe your resume based on the person or the company that is wanting to hire somebody like you. The example that I’ve given people before is, if I were a journalist, and I had to come up with my next story, and I had a sense of who I was going to interview, it would be a dream come true. If that person came to me and said, ‘By the way, I’ve written up just a few questions that I think you should ask me that I have really interesting answers to.’ As a journalist, I’d be like, ‘This is sweet, this is the exact type of person I want to talk to you because they’ve made my job easy.’
Lyndsey Weber
The Time for Confidence to Kick In
I’ve seen a lot of interesting metrics that try and capture what’s the runtime before a PreSales person or solutions consultant can be fully utilized in the process. And I would say, it seems about the four-month mark is maybe where it started to feel …where there’s not this sense of fear when you log into your computer in the morning thinking I have no idea what I’m going to be seeing or what I’m going to have to do.
I would say about the four-month mark, I had had some chances to start testing out my ability to demonstrate the product, answer some technical questions, and to deal with some objections So I would say four months is about where I had more confidence than doubt.
Lyndsey Weber
A Favorite Aspect Of PreSales
I think part of the benefit of my job and the humbling part too is I’m never the smartest person in the room. And I’m never the expert. I actually love that part of my job because I get to help the experts do their job better. And hopefully, more than that, I’m not just trying to solve a problem, but I’m trying to create new opportunities and show them new possibilities of how they can do more than they’ve been able to do previously with the existing tools that they’ve had.
Lyndsey Weber
The Magic of Quantrix
I love the tool because … you are only limited by your imagination, right? I’ve told people before, especially if you’re coming from spreadsheets like I did at Exxon, with a lot of my projects, the things that you love about spreadsheets, you get to keep in Quantrix. The things you don’t like about spreadsheets, you don’t have to ever think about again in Quantrix.
Lyndsey Weber
Relevant Links
- Lyndsey Weber’s LinkedIn profile
- Pivoting Into PreSales, Where Do I Start?
- Quantrix website
Similar Episodes
While our topic was not on financial modeling per se, we’re still mindful of two highly-popular shows on this topic. If you enjoyed this conversation, consider the following two with Ian and Steve:
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