At Inventure we’re hyper-focused on helping our portfolio founders with talent and expansion topics. On the talent side, typically this means that Inventure’s Head of Talent, Ryan Savage, draws from his experience as the first Head of Talent at Wolt and Yousician to put together the leadership and recruiting strategy that sets up a company to scale. 

We invest at an early stage and we know that the right C-level hires are crucial for the success of an organization– but it’s not a holistic view of how talent helps companies succeed in the early stages where every single hire and every single sale counts.  

This brings us to the big problem we hear over and over in our portfolio: in the Nordics it’s difficult to hire a solid BRD, SDR, or whatever you want to call your entry level sales reps hired to kick open doors. 

A big element here is a lack of training. Sales is a difficult role in itself, and if you’re a junior level employee thrown into a fast moving company with a rapidly changing product, it’s all too easy to wash out. This lack of training isn’t good for the employee, it isn’t good for the company, and it slows down growth. 

As a proactive VC firm, we should aim to solve real problems for our founders. Enter Inventure’s Sales Academy. 

The first realization is that we’re not sales pros. But we’ve partnered with the best B2B sales organization in the world, Oracle Netsuite, to boost the next generation of sales professionals. Though Inventure Sales Academy our goal is to give real tools to the women and men who wake up in the morning ready to hit the field and open up new opportunities. We want people who feel like they’re currently stuck in the wrong job to succeed in the world of B2B SaaS sales, and we want to give our portfolio a great talent pool to recruit from. 

Top-to-bottom talent

We’re now inviting future sales pros to apply to our 3 week pre-training program kicking off in January.  At the end of the program, participants who graduate will get a certificate and the job training skills to land any job – hopefully with one of our portfolio companies or partners they’ve gotten to know through the program.

The program is structured in three modules:

The theory
Hosted with our partner Oracle Netsuite, we’re diving deep into the world of a junior tech sales professional. We’ll be talking about the basic toolkit and strategies participants need to be successful in this position. Oracle Netsuite is a B2B sales machine, and we’ll be guided through the program with a true pro: Andy Malliff, Senior Director, EMEA Business Development. During this module, participants will also participate in a couple of assignments to test their skills. 

The practice
Each of our portfolio startups participating in the program will hold a session going through the product, culture, sales process, and Ideal Customer Profile. This is an opportunity to get to know the companies participants might interview for, while getting a real look into different sales cultures and products.

The training
We will give participants tools on how to nail the recruitment process and land the job. Sales Academy participants will participate in an interview training session and also have the opportunity to practice interviews monitored by talent professionals. 

If you are interested in starting your career in sales, or switching towards sales, this is the program for you. Apply now, participate in the program and get in front of the pack.

→ Inventure Sales Academy homepage

Andrea Di Pietrantonio
Head of Portfolio Operations
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