As Manager of Sales Development at our Boston office, Siobhan Houllahan spends a lot of time working with people, from one-on-one coaching sessions to teams-wide enablement programs. Keep reading to get to know Siobhan, from her weekend hobbies to her thoughts on Tines’ leadership team.
Can you tell us a little more about yourself and what you like to do in your free time?
My hobbies are very simple - I love being outside in the sunshine with a little sweet treat on the side. I’m an avid cook and baker. Sugar is my love language. I usually try to experiment with new or different recipes on the weekends, when I have some free time.
I love to box - that’s something I’ve been into since I was a kid and have carried on through my adult life. I love mixed martial arts, Muay Thai, and kickboxing. That’s my preferred outlet for releasing stress and staying active.
I’m also a new homeowner, so I’m learning the ins and outs of gardening and home maintenance. I’m an obsessed dog lover, too. In our #pets Slack channel, I'm constantly checking out posts to see everyone's cute animal pics.
What does a typical workday or week look like for you at Tines?
I’m a manager of sales development, so part of my week is having one-on-ones with my direct reports. I want to understand the accounts they’re targeting, the prospects they’re going after, and how we can help them target a bit better.
Outside of people management, other things may come up throughout the week - for example, planning enablement sessions for our team to learn the product and various security topics.
We also have general leadership discussions with our internal leadership team, as well as leaders outside of the team, to understand the current business gaps, goals, and sales team performance. This helps me understand where I can best support my team to align with our GTM goals.
My weeks are very collaborative, spent talking to a ton of different people, looking at data, analytics, and messaging, and using all those components to coach my people into better sales reps.
I’m pretty lucky to be in the office 3 days a week. Before I joined Tines, I was completely remote. Being able to talk through challenges and brainstorm ideas in person is a totally new experience for me.
My favorite thing about managing my team is that everyone has a different personality and working style. We’re really lucky to have people from all different backgrounds. Some of them had non-traditional study or work experience that led them to Tines.
What I love about my direct reports and the SDR org in general is that everybody brings their unique sense of self every day. The variety of opinions, ideas, and approaches for solving problems makes us so well-rounded.
What's the coolest thing you've worked on to date?
A few months ago, we had our SDR leadership offsite, where we identified our focus areas for the fiscal year. One of those was enablement: How do we give our reps continuous learning opportunities so they can always try something new and get exposed to other parts of the business?
One thing I’m really proud of is our upcoming enablement plans for the fiscal year. We asked the team where they needed more support and resources. They were super responsive and gave us a ton of feedback on what they’d like to see.
For each topic, we’ve developed a 4-6 week enablement period with activities, workshops, and certifications to complete. It’s very collaborative - we’re having our team get into groups and work on them together.
Everyone has such a unique background and approach to problem-solving, and we value that level of diversity in our groups and sessions.
I think it’s really important in sales, and life in general, to be a constant learner. Be curious about everything you’re doing. This helps people to get into the habit of asking questions and saying, ‘Why? How does that work? I want to learn more about this.’
One thing our CRO, Terry, always says is, ‘Focus on the flawless fundamentals.’ Before you can soar in your career and master any craft, you need to master those basic building blocks first. In sales, that means understanding the technical pieces and knowing how to incorporate them into your process. I used Terry’s perspective while planning these modules and workshops to make sure we were aligned with the company vision.
The first thing I always do when building out any program or resource is go to the team that will be using it. For my SDRs, I’ve done the role, and I’ve been in their seat. It would be easy for me to say, ‘I know what would be helpful.’ But I don’t actually know - I’m a bit far removed from the role now. So I always go to the people it’s going to impact directly.
I also go to people who have a lot more answers than I do. I reached out to our wonderful enablement manager, Bjorn, in Ireland. He knows a lot more than I do about building out an enablement lesson plan. He helped me make it more concise and digestible.
From there, it goes out to the wider team to ensure I haven’t missed something. My general philosophy when coming up with these plans is that input from multiple people is always better than input from just one person. And that goes back to our spirit of collaboration.
That’s one of the best things about my team - everyone works together.
What advice would you give to someone just starting out at Tines?
Don’t be afraid to ask questions, even if someone is more senior than you.
Our CEO, Eoin Hinchy, joined our team for a week this year. He was on the front lines, making cold calls, sending emails to prospects - literally living the day in and day out of what our team does. He came to us and said, ‘I want to be the least disruptive and the most helpful I can possibly be.’
My team is usually the first interaction that most people have with Tines and our product. Eoin never wants to be so far removed from what we’re doing that he doesn’t understand the challenges we’re facing. He wants to be aware of them, and help us figure out how to simplify our goals and discover new approaches to solving problems. A week out of his busy schedule was incredibly impactful for our team.
I’ve worked in startups, I’ve been in the business development world for about five years, and I’ve never seen that. Eoin is a highly technical, incredibly intelligent person. He was on the security practitioner side for many years - so for him to do a sales development role for a week and truly want to help us really embodies our company’s values: humility, soundness, and an eagerness to help people.
One thing Eoin said during that week was, ‘I hope you never lose your curiosity.’ He was so happy that people were reaching out to him, asking for help. Any person on my team could message Eoin on Slack right now, and he’d respond.
I think, as you come into a new role, it’s tempting to want to act like you have all the answers. Or feel like you have to fluff up your skills, showcase your knowledge. But I do think you have something to learn from everyone, regardless of seniority. You can learn really valuable things from people who are way less tenured than you.
My advice would be to put the pride aside and ask the questions, because people want to help. A lot of times, there’s a quick or simple answer sitting right there for you, if you just ask. It’s a matter of either asking a question and getting an answer in five minutes, or spending an hour trying to do it yourself and still not figuring it out.
One of our values is simplicity, so make it simple - ask the question. That will also help you build relationships by expressing your vulnerability and humility.
What's your favorite thing about the Tines platform? Any tips?
My favorite thing about Tines is how easy it is to use. It’s extremely flexible, regardless of your technical aptitude. I think that’s why it’s been so easy for organizations to adopt Tines.
In tech, “ease of use” and “easy adoption” are total buzzwords. But our co-founders were two people who had these real issues in their day-to-day, and they saw tools that were not flexible or easy to use.
Having a tool that simplifies some of the manual work and streamlines those processes gives people real, tangible time back in their day. Time is money, of course. But having Tines, or automation in general, also means you don’t have to wake up at 5 AM and go to the office to put out a fire.
My advice for builders in Tines is to just get in there and play around. One thing we say at Tines is, ‘If you can draw it on a whiteboard, you can build it in Tines.’
I think that’s one of the coolest things you can do: play around and see what you can build. It’s essentially limitless. The automations are very customizable to your needs, your environment, and your organization.
Tines brings the fun back to building automations. Normally, you’d be scripting and building things out in Python. For most people, that’s not very fun. But being able to drag and drop and connect your different workflows is really cool. So play around with it, and have fun.
Anything else to add?
My favorite question to be asked by candidates interviewing with Tines is, 'What do you love about the culture?' It’s easy to say, ‘The culture is great!’ But really and truly, I have never felt more supported in a role.
And that comes from our top layer of leadership. They are some of the most humble, kind, and thoughtful people, and that threads throughout the rest of the organization. There’s a baseline layer of respect between teams and a willingness to help.
I genuinely believe, product aside, that the reason this rocketship is growing so fast is because we have some of the best people. I get to come to work every day with people that I genuinely enjoy spending time with. They’re so thoughtful and smart, and always have innovative ideas. I’m challenged during the day, but I’m also inspired by the people I work with.
That’s a nod to our recruiting team - they’ve done a stellar job of making this a phenomenal place to work. I think that’s the power behind the engine of what makes this company run so efficiently.
Tines is hiring! Find out more about our open roles in the US and Ireland.