Manchester employee engagement platform tech startup, Your FLOCK aims to scale their Monthly Recurring Revenue (MMR) to springboard them into their next funding round. GAIN LINE facilitated an Optimisation Sprint with them that focused on ways to improve their sales performance.
This is the story of what happened when we sprinted.
Your FLOCK was born out of an academic thesis on team dynamics and company culture by co-founder Michal Wisniewski, who studied at Manchester University.
Co-founder Dan Sodergren, a specialist in digital transformation, invested in the fledgling business and amplified its presence in a growing marketplace.
Using machine learning, personal assessment and many other techniques, the business is able to strengthen core values and reduce churn for organisations.
With COVID and the subsequent explosion of home and remote working, the demand for a SaaS company that could build a sense of belonging grew hugely.
This interest attracted investment and space for the co-founders to stand back and take a look at what was needed for Your FLOCK to take the next step.
Why do an Optimisation Sprint?
Having identified a need to optimise their sales process, Your FLOCK chose to engage GAIN LINE to deliver an Optimisation Sprint. Dan Sodergren explained:
We knew there was nothing wrong with the product, because we’d been so product led up to that point – but we need to focus more on the market.
We’d spoken to other advisors but none had taken a granular approach to help us truly visualise the process.
GAIN LINE came along at the right time and instantly understood the challenge of sharpening our focus over the next few months to be more growth driven.“
Pre-sprint
Before delivering the Optimisation Sprint, GAIN LINE’s team asked Your FLOCK staff to complete individual interviews to help inform the process.
The results helped GAIN LINE design a series of sessions to sharpen and transform Your FLOCK’s approach.
Sprint Workshops
Via workshopping methodologies including ‘working together alone’ principles and ‘How Might We’ questioning, GAIN LINE enabled Your FLOCK team members to:
- Identify their main obstacles which included: a lack of structure within Your FLOCK’s sales process, a prolonged sales cycle from initial lead to closed deal and a low conversion rate after a product demo;
- Formulate questions to challenge their own established ways of thinking;
- Draw conclusions on what to do to systematically address and remove the blocks to achieving their stated goal.
By ensuring everyone’s voice was valued, they were able to put together a picture that reflected the collective desires and drivers of Your FLOCK.
GAIN LINE technical director, Kevin Williams, highlighted how this works, saying:
Nobody’s input is discounted or drowned during an Optimisation Sprint, as views can be given anonymously and democratically where required.
Priorities are collated and voted on, while conversations are kept on track and tightly timed to keep things moving towards a shared goal without distraction.
Your FLOCK bought into the process from the start, which meant we were able to draw out more from them in order to create the best outcomes post sprint.“
Sprint Outcomes
As a result of the Optimisation Sprint sessions, GAIN LINE delivered a series of recommendations which include:
- Ensuring there was a focus on the right people to target for their marketing campaigns;
- Defining a more structured and considered sales process that produced more accurate and actionable data points on sales intelligence;
- A method to score sales leads so that their efforts were most focused on those opportunities closest to the door.
These outcomes are associated to action plans for each participant to take away and execute. There are timely check-ins with GAIN LINE to show progress and we look forward to sharing the successes of the Your Flock team in due course.
What you’ve done is absolutely brilliant. The process is literally the best thing we’ve done this year and I completely see the power of it. I wish we had done this years ago.
It’s a cliche but sometimes you really can’t see the wood for the trees – if we could all help ourselves we wouldn’t need doctors or coaches.
Objectivity is so important – I like to be challenged and learn different ways of thinking. GAIN LINE helped us define how our immediate goals might be achievable and gave us a playbook – now it’s up to Your FLOCK to execute.“
DAN SODERGREN, YOUR FLOCK
