Unleash Your Inner Sales Scientist: Randi-Sue Deckard's Journey from Scientist to Revenue Growth Leader

Celeste Berke [00:00:00]:

Hello. Hello. This is Celeste. We are on the Sales Edge Podcast. I am with Randi. We've been chatting ahead of time, prerecording 30 minutes, and I'm blown away by the unique story. I can't wait for you to share it with our listeners here. So give us the low down on what who you are, what you're up to, and then we'll get into some questions.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:00:21]:

Well, thank you for having me, Celeste.

Celeste Berke [00:00:23]:

And we didn't we didn't plan the the red for those of you listening on audio. We're both wearing red today.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:00:30]:

Oh, great minds, think alike. So I think what I'd like to share with everyone is, You know, sales is a wonderful place to be, it's not a dirty word. And the other thing that I'd like to share is that We need to give people more chances in sales. And what I mean by that is I'm actually a clinical scientist Turned revenue growth leader. And everyone goes, science, sales? This is how I break it down. So As a scientist, I was trained, number 1, to fail. That's what running experiments do. You iterate to get the right outcome.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:01:10]:

Come. Well, think about sales in your go to market motion. What are you doing? You need to know your numbers, where you need to improve and you are Constantly iterating, whether it's, you know, ACV, you're having a larger contract value or whether it's, you know, getting more inbound or whether it's, You know, conversion rates. Whatever it is, that's what we do. So I was literally trained to fail and experiment, And that's exactly what I do as as a sales sales leader. And for anyone who's thinking, okay. That's all good and well, Randy, but how did you transition? I think it's also important, like I said, giving people a chance as I already said. And I was fortunate enough that as a leader over, you know, a science life sciences group, I had a network who's like, You know, you would be really good at actually selling.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:02:01]:

So I took a chance on myself, stepped down, Set my ego aside and said I need to learn, took an individual contributor role, which meant a lower title and less pay. And in that 1st year, I blew away the number that I was that I was given by two and a half times. And not only that, they asked me, okay, if you can do that on your own at a start up where no one taught you how to do what you just went out and did it. Can you teach a team? And I was like, okay, and so if I can do it, anyone can. And If you are, like, even considering, like, oh, I don't have the skills. You do have the skills. There are lots of transferable skills. And I know myself as a leader, when I'm looking at resumes, Verbal skills.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:02:46]:

And I know myself as a leader, when I'm looking at resumes, I'm not just looking at the piece of paper. I'm looking at the whole person because there's things that can be taught And those are things that you bring to the table, right, whether it's transferable, your attitude. And one of the biggest things in sales is being coachable. Right? So that's one of the the things that I just like to share about myself as scientist to revenue growth leader. And now I'm just a mad scientist Obsessing over the go to market motion.

Celeste Berke [00:03:14]:

Right. Obsessing over that data. So I think you touched on it a little bit that that sales edge. If If this was the only clip someone heard and we were asking, hey, Randy, what do you consider your sales edge aside from scientists to where you are now. How do you sum that up?

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:03:35]:

Well, this is gonna be a little contrarian. A lot of people think that your edge is, What tech tools do you have? If if you don't have tech tools in your bag, how are you gonna do it? It's not about the Tech tools. And it's about you as an individual and the skills that you have. So I'm always investing in myself. Here I am, been doing this for quite a while, but guess who's taking course after course why? It's not just for the material. It's for the cohorts and the other perspectives because I am the game changer in the conversation. If I can obsess about my customer, Learn to really understand what their pain points are. Talk like them.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:04:18]:

Add value. Because remember, no one cares about what you sell. Right? It's only if you're helping someone and someone wants to be seen, valued, heard in the conversation. That is that is the game changer is you. And as soon as you get that growth mindset and really focus on upskilling yourself, you will see Results, and you will go further than you thought you could. Look at me. I'm SVP of sales marketing customer success. I am living proof of this.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:04:46]:

I I just started investing myself. And, honestly, when I went into sales, I had no idea. Miller Heiman, MEDDIC, I was like, I know a lot of acronyms because I've been in health care and life sciences, but I don't know those. Yeah.

Celeste Berke [00:05:01]:

And I and you and I were chatting a little bit earlier. So anybody who's entering sales right now is in such a different place. I mean, obviously, every generation can say this, right, as time goes, but The tech tools have skyrocketed, and you and I chatted about our our when we both entered the market. But I think It's safe to say when we were both in sales and started out, it was the grassroots effort. Like, tech was in this thing. And so you really are doubling down on what do I know about my prospective buyer? What language do they speak? Where can I find them? I I mean, this was back when there were, like, pagers, and there wasn't really I mean, email was just, like, just starting to come out, right, in the, like, to thousands. So we lived through a time when all you had was yourself. Right? You didn't have all this fancy tech to hide behind this tech stack.

Celeste Berke [00:06:00]:

And so taking a step back for our modern day sellers, if you strip all of that away, who are you at the core? How are you pouring into yourself so that you can align with your buyer and your customer, but also find that confidence in your own voice. You and I had talked about that, like finding your voice and not being afraid afraid to stand up. You had mentioned, and something I wanna share here when we talked off air, is you have all of these people that have worked for you or work with you who say, Randy, I would do anything to be on your team. What does that stem from?

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:06:37]:

I think it's because I'm a life because I'm a lifelong I call it serial learner. You know, I've I've checked my ego, and I always am so excited to share And not only invest in myself, but invest in my team and helping them succeed. I don't always have the best ideas. Right? So I I just surround myself with people who really want to learn and are coachable. And because I've invested them and seen them soar, like Like I said, it's one of the things I'm most proud of is that literally, you know, I still keep in touch with, you know, you know, the team members that I've had in the past. And, you know, the fact that they say, hey. If you had an open position or if you ask me to come work for you, I would work for you again. And I think it's a testament to leadership.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:07:27]:

And I consider leadership a privilege, which is which is another thing. And if you're not investing in your people, you know, What are you doing? Right? Like, I'm not a hands off leader, and I'm not saying I micromanage, But what I'm saying is I coach to the individual. What do you need to be successful? Everyone learns differently. Mhmm. And everyone needs help in a different state in a different way. But I'm also the person who has seen something in you and believes in you, And I will keep on you till you believe it in yourself.

Celeste Berke [00:08:02]:

Yeah. That's so awesome. And I love how you said, you know, leadership is a privilege. And I was looking at something yesterday, which I think I wrote back a a barf emoji on LinkedIn. It was a sales a sales leader who had posted this really cringey job, and all the sentences start with I. Like, I'm looking for this. If you're not willing to do this, this isn't for you because this is how I run the team, and it screamed, This is a very self I mean, who knows? A very selfish leader, and we're in a day and age when people will jump ship.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:08:39]:

Mhmm.

Celeste Berke [00:08:39]:

And something that Keeps the team and keeps people together really as this culture. And a lot of it's done around the leadership. Yeah. Leaders have to be investing in yourself as leaders. Right? My my father's 78. He has a $10,000,000 business. He constantly is like, Cece, I read this book and I was looking at this and constant that as you said, like, just that just consumer of knowledge and information because then we have this opportunity to not hoard information. And I think part of my issue with leadership growing up is growing up through through the ranks is they always felt threatened.

Celeste Berke [00:09:15]:

Like, maybe someone was gonna take their job or what. Like, who cares? Right? Isn't the point that we're building people up so that they can go on, just like we were talking about parenting, and go out into this world, usurp us in in a role or, you know, go on to do great things. Like, that is growth. And when it comes from a place of that, like, servant leadership but you also have to be a little bit of that parent where you're moving people along because they don't know what they don't know. So I appreciate you sharing about pouring into yourself. You also mentioned that you're writing a book. Tell us a little bit about that new chapter, so to speak.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:09:55]:

Yeah. So I I just want People, you know, my giveback is I want people to know, and it is geared more towards women just because that's My point of view that you can do anything. So I'm the queen of transition, you know, clinical scientists Mhmm. To, you know, this individual contributor. I kinda spent a little bit of area in in, you know, CX and and before I got into Into actual sales and running sales, marketing, customer success. But I want people to realize that everyone has it within them And, you know, anyone can can change at any time. And whether you've had success or failure, Your past does not define your future, and I'm I'm super excited just to share my journey and my story in the hopes That it inspires others to either, you know, take a leap of faith or just Ponder and be curious about what if and and giving them, you know, that space to think about what they want to do in their lives.

Celeste Berke [00:11:07]:

No. That's so wonderful. I'm I'm excited to have heard about the journey. It obviously inspires my own journey. And for Everybody out there, I think we're both in alignment. Like, everybody has a great story to tell. Everybody has that book, whether they write it or not, that is this, like running dialogue that people wanna hear. We are all inspired by others' journeys.

Celeste Berke [00:11:27]:

I'm definitely inspired hearing how You've gone from this, like, mad scientist, right, into your current your current role, and we were connected on LinkedIn. You were referred to me as someone I had to meet, someone I had to chat with because of this unique crossover. And it so aligns with early on in my career. I I wasn't in sales. I was in association management, event meeting management, and someone took a chance on me. I went through 7 interviews and landed a director of sales roll, and I couldn't even tell you what the industry was, any acronyms. Like, I I was flying blind, but somebody took that chance on me just like you took that chance on yourself and said, I'm gonna go for it, because I have this innate skill set, and now sharing with other people that journey and saying, hey, you can do it too. It might be tough.

Celeste Berke [00:12:20]:

You may fail forward, but it's your story to tell and and your journey. So I so appreciate you sharing time with us. Individuals can find you on LinkedIn. You're putting out some amazing content, and I love that we were connected by Riley. He's the master connector on LinkedIn.

Randi-Sue Deckard [00:12:37]:

He is. He is the e evangelist of of LinkedIn. We gotta give Riley a shout out for sure.