Tufin Career Growth & Development

Tell us about your sales journey thus far.

I joined Tufin as an SDR as my first role after college. I heard about Tufin when a mentor connected me with Nick Skoczen, the manager of the SDRs. After a few conversations with Nick and others during my interview process, I quickly realized Tufin had great people across the organization and would be a great place to start my sales career. As a business development representative, or BDR, I was involved with many different teams and personas within the organization and was exposed to what all of the different sales teams do.

I quickly realized that my path would be different than the traditional path toward becoming an account executive and that I was much more interested in a solutions engineering, or SE, role. When I expressed this to my manager, he immediately encouraged me to get in touch with our director of solutions engineering, Ricky Egge, to learn what this process would need to look like. Over the next year, Ricky and some of the SEs effectively groomed me to ensure my success should I switch teams. When the day came for the promotion, I don’t think anyone was more proud than Nick who got to watch yet another one of his hires do something never done before at Tufin.

What is the sales culture like at Tufin?

There is a strict “no a-holes” policy at Tufin. Hiring with this methodology throughout the years has kept the culture and team thriving at Tufin. Everyone I have come across has been happy to assist when I have questions or need help tackling an issue. Tufin is big on sales performance bonuses to give that little extra motivation to get things done and do more than you thought possible. My best weeks as a business development representative were during little incentives where we could earn some extra cash or a half day on Friday. It always kept you in competition with yourself and striving to be better.

What advice do you have for sales professionals who want to join your team?

Be prepared for things to change. Tufin is a young and growing organization which means that change is a constant and there is no stopping it. Don’t be afraid to go outside your comfort zone — nothing is accomplished from within the known. Ask questions sooner rather than later, don’t wait a week so that your question becomes urgent because you were too proud to ask — there are “no a-holes” at Tufin, and everyone wants you to succeed.

Tell us about your recent promotion or role change.

I recently was given the opportunity to move into an inside sales role from the business development team. I am extremely grateful for this new position and gained a lot of support from different areas of Tufin to prepare me. Through advice from my manager and others who had moved on from the business development team, I felt confident and prepared to take on this next step in my career. I now work with an experienced sales team from whom I have a lot to learn. Being able to have a good relationship with managers and executives at the company made it easy to communicate what I was looking for and for them to give me the transparency into what the business needed. The newly formed strategic account team has been quick to bring me up to speed and help me with learning the new skills I’ll need to be successful in this role. Their willingness to help and use my support with accounts they are working on has given me a lot of confidence to keep moving forward as a sales professional.

What will this new role or skill let you do?

In this new role, I’m being exposed to the entire sales process from start to finish. In my previous role, I really only worked the beginning stages of initiating contact with a company. Now, I can learn the right way to go through the sales motion from seasoned veterans. Working with three proven sales leaders at Tufin, I’m able to learn different styles and strategies when it comes to managing a deal, being exposed to some of the larger and more challenging accounts that our company works with, and understanding the right way to jump the hurdles that come along the way. It’s such a great step in my career to be involved in the day-to-day activities and interactions that need to be done to become successful in a fast-paced sales environment with the support of an experienced team. Getting comfortable with the conversations, product and other work that needs to be done is putting me in an incredible position to hit the ground running when it’s time to manage my own accounts and goals.

How would you describe Tufin’s approach to internal mobility or upskilling? 

Tufin’s culture as a whole has a strong family feel. Even with teams spread across the globe, it’s like a family reunion whenever we all have the opportunity to get together. In terms of internal mobility, I felt as though I had so much support from all different levels of the company, from my manager giving me advice to get my name out there, to old team members guiding me into practices that got them promoted, to the C-suite executive who was willing to sit down with me and discuss what opportunities might be coming up in the near future. From top to bottom, everyone was communicative, honest and helpful. When I first started at Tufin in an entry-level sales role, I watched my more experienced teammates move into all sorts of roles like engineering, marketing, account management, sales operations and more. This further reinforced my belief that if you show interest and demonstrate hard work, it will be recognized, and they will reward you. The relationships with people built here go deeper than a standard work environment, and I feel they truly want to help you succeed.