Enablement has entrenched itself as an essential function, with 76% of leaders crediting their investment in sales enablement as a contributing factor to improvements in sales performance.
Although those who choose enablement overwhelmingly see its positive impact on key outcomes, there are still those who hesitate.
In the eyes of many leaders, enablement is a cost center, not a revenue driver. However, that perspective is slowly changing: In mid-2023, Forrester foreshadowed the shift from “sales enablement” to “revenue enablement.” In its view, the change was key to indicating the function’s true value as a silo-breaker and go-to-market-aligner.
But how does the shift in naming conventions relate to the struggle to prove enablement’s value to those not already bought in?
It all comes down to perception and positioning — and how effectively enablers harness them to build connective tissue between themselves and leaders at the highest level.
The strategies below describe how to harness perception and positioning to build strong, trusting relationships between enablers and leaders, all the way up to the C-suite.
Embracing New Industry Trends to Power Perception
As enablement practitioners’ titles change and role descriptions ever-so-subtly adjust to suit, the industry itself is not shifting too significantly. Instead, it is simply rebranding itself, and doing so in a way that makes sense to hesitant decision-makers.
“When talking to the C-suite, the moment you say ‘revenue enablement,’ suddenly they want to know what that is. Telling them that it’s where the industry is moving to has been very interesting. They have all said: ‘We want that,’” said Jacob Botha, senior regional vice president at Salesforce.
It’s an emblematic shift that reveals the path forward when it comes to communicating enablement’s value. Proving value does not require practitioners to change the way enablement works or adjust its purview. Instead, it requires practitioners to curate their perception in a way that resonates, builds interest, and sparks dialogue between enablers and executives.
Adjusting from “sales” to “revenue” is a prime example. It may seem like a minor adjustment, but the implications are considerable. Rather than simply equipping sellers, the new phrasing implies that enablement is inherently outcome-based and, more than that, responsible for powering go-to-market teams across the board.
Most practitioners will likely agree that enablement has always influenced these areas — the C-suite just has not been fully aware of it. That’s the first step: Break through the barrier of outdated assumptions to highlight enablement’s overarching value beyond the sales organization.
“Enablement isn’t just about enabling the sales team. It’s so much broader. So, that small tweak from ‘sales’ to ‘revenue’ really gets the C-suite instantly interested in what you’re doing,” said Simon Gilks, vice president of revenue operations and enablement at Enhesa.
Adjusting Positioning to the Language of Leaders
Depending on organizational structure, enablement can sit beneath any number of business areas. As such, there is no consistent language that enablers should learn — instead, they must first identify the language spoken by the leader they report to.
“The entire C-suite has different priorities. Yes, there’s a business priority, but everyone has something that’s close to their heart. It’s about slicing and dicing — there’s no one-size-fits-all strategy. It’s about personalizing and tailoring your message to the person you’re talking to,” said Afusat Mustapha, sales enablement leader.
After capturing those key priorities, enablement practitioners should consider how to position the work they do and the impact they achieve in a way that aligns with the relevant leader’s interests. Knowing how to share the value of enablement can be just as — if not more — essential to the conversation than the data itself.
Consider this example: An enablement leader reporting to the head of revenue operations has recently rolled out a new onboarding strategy and is already seeing impact. Those who completed the new onboarding have significantly higher six-month retention rates than those who completed the previous onboarding program.
When the leader goes to share this value, the head of revenue operations is unlikely to be interested in the retention rate itself. Instead, they will be more interested in the reduced recruiting and onboarding spend sparked by increased seller retention. At their core, the metrics — increased retention rates and reduced recruiting costs — are essentially the same. But to that head of revenue operations, one is significantly more compelling than the other.
Beyond puzzling out the C-suite’s key priorities and the positioning required to speak to them, enablement practitioners also need to adopt a future-forward perspective. Every leader, regardless of function, speaks the language of vision and goals, which means enablers need to, too.
“When speaking to the C-suite, it’s always good to be very future-oriented. If you think about what the future could hold, that’s how you can really grab their attention and get their buy-in,” said Eglys Martinez, director of international sales enablement at Ticketmaster.
The language of leadership differs from function to function and organization to organization. To account for that variance, craft a position rooted in future outcomes and relevant priorities. Those who do so will be better prepared to land the value conversation with the C-suite.
Creating Avenues to Continually Prove Business Value
While perception and positioning are key to securing buy-in, no argument for the value of enablement will be truly compelling without a foundation of tangible metrics supporting it.
Before opening a line of communication with the C-suite, ensure that the enablement initiatives in place align with and move the needle on the high-priority business outcomes or most essential KPIs that leaders are plugged into.
“Keep monitoring the business to see the direction it is taking and aligning our initiatives and ways of working to reflect those new goals of the business,” said Mustapha.
Ultimately, securing C-suite support is about harnessing impact and metrics in a targeted, strategic manner. To do so, borrow the industry’s shifting identity and adopt function-specific language to drive home the value that enablement brings to the organization and those who lead it.
Learn more in this panel session from Sales Enablement PRO, London 2023.
