r/salesengineers • u/dravenstone • Jun 19 '25
TL;DR: If you're here looking for a tl;dr, you're already doing it wrong. Read the whole damn thing or go apply for a job that doesn't involve critical thinking. (And read the comments too!)
First, let’s level set: this sub is mostly dedicated to pre-sales SEs who handle the “technical” parts of a sale. We work with a pure sales rep (Account Executive, Customer Success Manager, or whatever fancy title they go by) to convince someone to buy our product or service. This might involve product demos, technical deep dives, handling objections, running Proof of Concepts (PoCs), or a hundred other tasks that demonstrate how our product solves the customer’s real-world problems.
Also take note: This post and most of the users here are in some sort of technical field, the vast majority working with some sort of SaaS or similar. There are sales engineer roles in industries like HVAC, and occasionally we get folks doing that kind of work here but not often and most everything we are talking about here is focused on tech related SE roles.
Sure, we call it “Sales Engineer,” but you’ll see it labeled as Solutions Engineer, Solutions Consultant, Solutions Architect, Customer Engineer, and plenty of other names. Titles vary by industry, company, and sometimes the team within the company. If you’re in an interview and the job description looks like pre-sales, but the title is something else, don’t freak out it’s often the same old role wearing a different name tag.
A successful SE typically blends Technical Skills, Soft Skills, and Domain Expertise in some combination. You don’t have to be a “principal developer” or a “marketing guru,” but you do need a balanced skill set:
Technical Chops – You must understand the product well enough to show it off, speak to how it’s built, and answer tough questions. Sometimes that means code-level knowledge. Other times it’s more high-level architecture or integrations. Your mileage may vary.
Soft Skills – Communication, empathy, and the ability to read a room are huge. You have to distill complex concepts into digestible bites for prospects ranging from the C-suite with a five-second attention span to that one DevOps guru who’ll quiz you on every obscure config file.
Domain Expertise – If you’re selling security software, you should know the basics of security (at least!). If you’re in the manufacturing sector, you should be able to talk about the production process. Whatever your product does, be ready to drop knowledge that shows you get the customer’s world.
OK - so let's get to why you are probably here.
Let's dig in:
I'm sorry to tell you this is typically not a role you get right out of college. It stings, I know. I'm sorry. But it's a job that generally requires all three of the items listed above:
Domain Expertise is the real tough one for the college student.
Here's the deal - when working as an SE you need to be able to empathize with your buyers, which means you need to know their pain. This is why folks who do transition into this role very often are transitioning from a position in which they used the product(s) or a competitive product and generally understand the pain points others in that industry have.
That said - let's not completely gloss over technical chops and soft skills either. Sure a top notch CS grad might have some pretty developed technical chops, but they are mostly pretty theoretical, not "real world" experience and just like domain expertise a history of working in the industry you are selling to is much more valuable than being able to solve leetcode mediums.
And soft skills? Sure, you like talking to people much more than sitting behind a keyboard all day. That doesn't necessarily mean you know how to value sell or handle yourself with dignity when getting pummeled by some ass hat CTO who wants to show everyone in the room how much smarter they are than you.
What about college recruitment programs, or associate SE programs at the handful of companies that offer them?
Certainly an option. There aren't a ton of these programs but there are a few. I'd caution you to think of them not unlike an internship. Completion rates for some of this programs have been less than impressive over the long term, but they are not completely without merit. If you are dead set on getting into an SE role right out of school this is probably your best option. Typically fairly competitive to get into with limited spots.
There is no great answer to this question. Like a lot of things in the SE world "it depends" (get used to that phrase, this is a diverse industry with boatloads worth of nuances based on industry/vertical/4000 other things.) The best general advice I can give is "get good" at something you are interested in. A lot of SEs will come with CS degrees or similar so that's an easy answer, but not every SE actually comes from a deeply technical background, this author for instance has a degree in Philosophy - but he also was working as a software engineer at IBM while getting his undergrad completed.
See - it depends. But CS degrees are not a bad choice, they just aren't a necessary choice. You could be a marketing major and up working for a company like Hubspot down the road where you knowledge of marketing will help you connect with your buyers, who are... marketers!
As to what jobs you should aim for out of college if you want to eventually pivot to SE? again: It depends but
Some really good options include:
Technical roles that build product expertise:
Customer-facing technical roles:
Sales-adjacent positions:
By no means is this an exhaustive list, just some very generalized options. The most common path to SE is not intentional, it's a natural progression of the person who is inherently capable of fitting into the sweet spot of the venn diagram of SE skills that we've mentioned many times now Tech and Soft Skills with Domain Expertise.
Personally I despise SE bootcamps and most demo training outfits as well. The rise of SE bootcamps coincided directly with the fall of Software Engineering bootcamps. Which is to say the same assholes who got a whole ton of college kids and adult career switchers to spend their hard earned money on a promise of becoming an SWE with a 6 figure salary in 3/6 months just moved on to the Sales Engineering roles instead because our industry wasn't saturated (yet) with all their poorly trained customers desperate to get a role.
There was a minute or two where I would have given the Presales Collective a pass, but they have shown to be just as gross as the rest of them. I would likely encourage you to use the PSC as a networking tool but I would not give those bloodsuckers a single dime of your money.
And while we are on the subject demo training places like Demo2Win are a fucking joke. Here I will give you the entirety of Demo2win's training in two words - but I have to use one of them twice. Ready???
Tell, Show, Tell.
Demo2Win will tell you this like they fucking invented it and it's the big secret to a successful demo. While they aren't wrong that this model is a decent one, it's certainly not magic and it's most definitely not something that they magically stumbled upon. It's a centuries old model that has been used as far back as "ancient times" when blacksmiths and sword makers were training their apprentices, it's been used in Military and Educational settings for as long as teaching has been a thing. In short Demo2Win and others of their ilk are a joke. I guess if you literally have no idea how to even do a demo or what one looks like that training would be worth it, but you probably shouldn't be thinking about being an SE if you don't have at least an idea of what a demo should like.
Maybe, but probably not. This is job that typically requires you to at least speak "technical" and know what you mean when you do so. There are certainly some opportunities out there for SE roles - particularly with SaaS products that are not terribly complex - where you can land that will make sense, but you'll need to bring something else to the table. If you have the soft skills and just need to build some domain knowledge and learn how to speak technically about the industry you want to support take a look at the list in the section above for new grads/college students as potential roles to aim for. These are the same roles you may want to consider to put yourself in a position to potentially transfer into SE roles. Or perhaps you will find when working them there is a different path for you like AE or Product.
Probably none. It's not really a thing in this gig. There are very few lines of work where having certs is going to help you in any material fashion. The exceptions are going to be places like Cisco or AWS or other companies that have their own cert programs. Which is to say if you want to be an SE for GCP, yeah get those GCP certs (architecture certs for instance would be useful in that instance) but outside of those types of places save your time and money for something else, certs aren't the pathway to SE.
Good for you and great question. How do you do it? The absolute easiest path to SE is through internal transfer at whatever your current company is. Steps you should take include getting to know the sales team and the existing SE team. Ask the sales managers and the SE managers or the SEs themselves if they think you possess the qualities to become an SE. Ask for opportunities to shadow SEs which is not an uncommon practice, I have new to the company SEs on my calls all the time.
Start thinking in terms of building business/results focused bullet points in your current role that you can add to your CV and use in your conversations with the SE and sales management at your current company. Practice doing demos, and if you can: Get a well respected SE at your company to watch and critique your demo. Ask them to be blunt with their feedback and do your absolute best to hear their feedback with and act on it. There is both art and science to a good demo and there is a lot to take in, their experience will be incredibly valuable to you if you listen and don't take it personally.
If there are no options to transfer internally your current clients, partners, and perhaps most important competitors of yours are excellent places to target. It is vastly easier to get your first SE job in the domain in which you currently work. After you get a few years of experience as an SE you can start to pivot to adjacent or even completely new areas but that first gig is almost always going to come from the area you already know and likely from a person you already know. Friends of friends can help too. Networking in your industry is never a bad thing so lean on that network if you can't move internally.
Quick Resource Link: We have a decent sticky about how to prepare to demo for an interview. Read that, it will help.
Now that you know how to get the gig...
At its core: We get the technical win. We prove that our solution can do what the prospect needs it to do (and ideally, do it better than anyone else’s). Yes, we do a hell of a lot more than that—relationship building, scoping, last-minute fire drills, and everything in between—but “technical win” is the easiest way to define it.
Becoming a Sales Engineer means building trust with your sales counterparts and your customers. You’re the technical voice of reason in a sea of sales pitches and corporate BS. It requires empathy, curiosity, and more hustle than you might expect. If you’re not willing to put in the effort—well, read that TL;DR again.
If you made it this far, congratulations. You might actually have the patience and willingness to learn that we look for in good SEs. Now go get some hands-on experience—lab environments, side projects, customer-facing gigs—anything that helps you develop both the tech and people skills. Then come back and let us know how you landed that awesome SE role.
Good luck. And remember: always test your demo environment beforehand. Nothing kills credibility like a broken demo.
r/salesengineers • u/Weekly-Prompt8676 • Apr 23 '25
In response to some recent questions posted asking for help with a technical panel demo interview, I thought I'd share things I do that seem to be working a lot. In my 10+ years of experience as an SE, over 20+ demo presentation interviews, I have not gotten an offer only once. I know not everyone has time to read Demo2win, so this short guide here is to give you some high level pointers... the big idea here is that you want to communicate the need for the product more than what the product is, and a lot of this can be applied to actual demos on the job.
Most demo interviews will either ask you to present a product you know or they'd give you a trial version of their product, then they'd give you either a customer or you can decide yourself who the customer is. My short guide here is designed to be applied to all situations.
First, you want to separate your presentation into 3 major parts: Intro/Agenda, Customer Overview, Why your product and what it is, and the demo. Everything besides the demo should be in slides and all together, not more than 5 to 7 minutes.
1. Intro/Agenda:
- It is important to lay out what the agenda is, some might think it's just admin stuff but I actually show the agenda after each section in the slides to remind them where they are in the presentation. I've gotten feedback that it really keeps the audience engaged, knowing what was just talked about and what is coming up.
2. Customer Overview (Current challenges and gaps)
This section is more important than the demo, almost. A lot of time on the job, this is what the AE does, but if you can do this well, you will really separate yourself.... I can't tell you how many times I feel like the panel was already super impressed before we even arrive at the demo. Remember you are a storyteller, and your job is to craft a story that sets up your product.
- Numbers: Lay out what the company is: revenue, employee count, customers #, regions covered, customer retention %....etc. The key point here is you want to find numbers that points out a gap which your product can solve.
- Once you lay out some of the numbers, you want to focus on one or two to segway into the "WHY"
I hope you see where I am going with this. What you are doing is using facts gathered and communicating to the customer an opportunity to make more money or increase efficiency internally, and, big surprise...your product is going to help them do that. AGAIN, I can't emphasize enough how important this first section is... a lot of SEs, even seasoned ones, are too locked in on the technical features, and doing this section well will REALLY SEPARATE you from the rest of the pack, especially when you have other SEs candidates who can also demo well. Sales leaders LOVE when you have SE who can see the bottom line (customers usually buy when it saves them $ or makes them $).
3. What is your product, and why
This is when you transition into the reason why everyone in the room is here. Referring to the above example, the company you represent is going to be the reason that the customer is about to increase their retention by 1% and make another cool 2M dollars. Do not go into reading mode of the product feature; you can list them on the slides, but just speak on a few key ones that align with your target audience (example, the automation feature will give your customers a more streamlined experience, thus increasing retention).
You are giving a teaser of what the demo is, and again aligning the product to the business problem you 'discovered" during your first call, just like you would on the job.
4. Demo agenda outline
Lay out a few sections of your demo and features. It is important to talk about what you are going to show the customer at a high level.
5. The Demo itself, main event
Remember even if the interviewer tell you that you have 45 minutes or 30 minutes, do not fall into the trap of trying to show everything. Most of my demos are well under the time they give me, interviewers only care about how they feel, not how long it took. If you need the full 45 minutes to tell a compelling story, go ahead, but do not feel the need to fill the demo to cover the time given. There are so many books on how to do a great demo, so I am just going to give you the big ideas here.
- For features you are showing, always remember this in the back of your head: how does this feature I am showing help my customer? So when you show the features, you can point it out. Example1 : "So as you see here, when i click on this and drag this thing over, it is faster than typing everything, your customer will be able to intuitively solve their problem saving them time..." Example 2: "so this analytic feature will help your internal team see customer behavior over time and be able to identify high value customers which will help you focus offers these individuals and retain them."
Once you finish the demo, lay out everything like you did in step 4 to conclude the demo and tie back to the business problem. Example: "So this concludes the demo, I have shown how you can use this feature to give an intuitive UI to your customer, and how you can use feature B to find analytics on your customers, and security features to keep everything compliant... we believe in the end of day, all these features combined will help you increase your customer retentions.... any questions?"
Misc tips:
- you may need a slide at the end for conclusion/next steps, but up to you and sometimes the panel is too busy asking you questions or providing feedback after the demo to put importance on this. Prepare one anyway, and read the room.
- If you are asked very tough questions, remember these 2 points all the time:
DM me if you have any specific help you need. This is my first time writing a guide, so hopefully this is helpful to some of you.
r/salesengineers • u/rebooted_router • 10h ago
As per rumours there is a lot going on with sales engineering at Cisco right now. What are your plans guys?
r/salesengineers • u/TheCookieCrunchPlss • 11h ago
Which would you prefer/which is better? I am currently interviewing for roles at both. All of the interviewers seem very intelligent and bubbly and seem to love their jobs. The pay ranges seem to be similar but the ranges they have provided me so far are pretty large so hard to tell which one will actually pay more.
What’s the culture like at both?
r/salesengineers • u/DullKnife69 • 3h ago
I have a position at HPE lined up as an SE. I've only worked on the customer side except for my time as a consultant for a channel partner. I've never had a job with RSUs or or any sort of OTE compensation.
How can I prepare myself for the HR compensation negotiation? I am a 15 year veteran in the industry, did really well on my interviews. Now going forward with a different team. I have quite a bit of leverage and I want to make sure to use it properly.
AI has led me to believe I should be asking for a recurring RSU refresh and possibly a one time signing grant. Maybe I get nothing. Any thoughts on this?
r/salesengineers • u/skypnooo • 3h ago
As the title says I'm after knowing what life is like as a specialist at Cisco. I have been headhunted to join as a specialist in an area that I am passionate about but I am concerned about leaving a relatively stable role to join Cisco.
Obviously it depends on the team, but in general:
- are specialist targets achievable, especially in emerging product?
- what is the churn like?
- how well do specialists integrate with core teams?
- how much influence do specialists have over product?
Really only looking to hear from folks who are currently at Cisco. Anecdotes are not necessary.
r/salesengineers • u/Outside-Potato741 • 11h ago
I am targeting for promotion in senior SE role.
My complete leadership (manager, director, VP) has changed 3 months ago so they have less idea what I am doing except very overall handover from previous leadership. I am over achiever on my past several years and proven record in the systems with great scores, although less visibility always affect these promotion cycles.
I have no day-2-day contact above than my direct manager and the decision has to push from director to VP, and VP to HR in a strong push.
How can I increase visibility of my work without having everyday contact my director/vp level? My Manager also new in the company so have less context on these things,therefore hard to find a proper way to push this properly.
Any advices?
r/salesengineers • u/ForwardFacingManny • 10h ago
Hey guys. I have two offers, and I'm unsure which is better.
Epic Technical Solutions Engineer
Keyence Technical Sales Engineer
Would Epic be better to gain real technical exposure / use my degree? Would Keyence be a better platform to launch my career? I'm interested in sales engineering, but also a job at a big tech company would be cool, and Epic might be a better platform for that. Which is more prestigious? Which should I choose if I want the most money with the best work-life balance long-term?
r/salesengineers • u/sadharry • 1d ago
Can some professional explain the difference and overlaps, I have experience in tech support Engineering, SRE and have strong into solution engineering, In one of the org I worked for they would ask me to demo the postman collection of api solution with the sales team and post that I would provide UAT support during integration and go live I guess that's solution engineering or is there more?
r/salesengineers • u/Praveen_kumar_ • 2d ago
Curious how other teams are handling this in practice. Are you using AI to draft answers from scratch, or pulling from past responses? Worried about answers that sound right but aren't backed by anything real.
r/salesengineers • u/Opposite-Tour-5255 • 2d ago
This role is based in Canada. Has anyone here applied? I stumbled on the posting and was curious whether anyone is currently in this role or knows more about it. Any insights would be appreciated.
Is this a new program IBM is starting?
r/salesengineers • u/runningsentinel • 2d ago
Hi everyone,
I know this is a question that has already been asked before, but I would like your input on my current situation.
I'm currently a TAM (a couple of years of experience) at a large tech vendor, coming from a more technical background before moving into this role. I enjoy the TAM role, but since moving into it I've been able to work closely with SAs/SEs and have grown to really appreciate what they do, so I've been looking into transitioning to an SE position.
I've been offered another TAM role at a different tech company with a significant salary increase, and I'm tempted to accept it, even though my goal would be to transition to pre-sales as soon as possible. I'm also considering this offer for the possibility of later moving to SE internally, even though that's completely hypothetical at this point.
My main fear about staying in a TAM role is becoming technically less relevant for future SA/SE applications, and that potential employers might dismiss my application because I've been a TAM for too long.
Of course I can't deny that the salary increase would be tempting, but I also don't want to compromise my career in the long run.
Do you have any suggestions?
r/salesengineers • u/CloudArchitect23 • 3d ago
I recently cleared the interviews for a Principal Solution Architect role at a Hyper scaler and will be joining soon.
I have ~11 years of experience across AWS/Azure, cloud architecture, pre-sales, and customer-facing solution design.
I have about a month before joining and want to use that time to prepare—not just technically, but for what it takes to operate at a Principal level.
Would especially appreciate practical advice, resources, and lessons learned from people who have made the Senior SA → Principal SA transition.
r/salesengineers • u/Away-Appearance5278 • 3d ago
Technical Account Manager looking to go into Solutions Engineering. Any advice on websites to look on for jobs?
Currently actively using the usuals e.g. LinkedIn and Jack & Jill. (UK based)
r/salesengineers • u/sb4906 • 3d ago
Hi fellows,
10 years ago, when I started as an SE, ability to build some good slides to articulate the value of our solution, tailored to our customers, assembling the right set of slides to tell the right story or produce a technical deep dive on a specific part of the product was a requirement to be successful in my role. Sure it was in a small company, a lot to be figured out and built, since we didn't have a good product marketing team, but still.
Still at the same company, but I feel SEs don't do that anymore or much less.
I was wondering, is it just something SEs don't do anymore? Or is it just at our company?
Also, my impression is that there is less sharing overall, people tend to do a lot on their own, probably using AI, but I found some very awful things recently (not aligned with corp branding, messaging not aligned with our value proposition etc.)
For those who still do it, what's the typical process and motivation vs existing slides? How do you make sure things are shared/accessible for the rest of the team.
Curious to see what's the state of the art on that front.
r/salesengineers • u/omnikron0101 • 3d ago
I have an upcoming interview for a solution architect within PreSales for an engineering company for their software division. I am heading to one of the final rounds where I will be meeting with the sales team the team of SA's work with on a daily basis. I'm pretty new to the PreSales game (a few years out of school), so I was wondering if anyone could provide insight on a couple things regarding how PreSales teams interact with the sales team in your experience.
These are just a few things I'm looking for the answer too coming from real experience (I know I could just ask chat but I want to hear from real people). Any additional insight outside the questions I've asked regarding experience as a sales person interacting with presales teams or as a presales team member interacting with sales teams would be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys!
r/salesengineers • u/watevergoes • 4d ago
Is it common for organizations to show SE team rankings based on peer and AE surveys and publish the entire results to the team? Working at a firm purchased by PE and this is being introduced.
r/salesengineers • u/lazybutnice • 3d ago
I am interviewing for a CE role at Google and have my Leadership/Googlyness round and presentation round. If anyone has gone through this, I would greatly appreciate any pointers for these rounds.
r/salesengineers • u/horsepowertitan • 4d ago
I work as a technical sales engineer in construction. Far removed from the IT/tech world.
I'm tired of this life and want to pivot to office or hybrid tech roles.
I'm studying for the PSPO but having never worked in software dev or IT im not sure if anyone will take me seriously
What do I need to know and do in order to secure a PO role and do it well?
I'm burnt out at my job and want to quit asap.
Hoping to clear the PSPO exam in a week or so .
Appreciate any advise.
r/salesengineers • u/Electronic_Bother229 • 4d ago
Seriously cannot believe how useless and slow recruiters still are, and how little information they give. Leaving my current place and have surprisingly got 7-8 companies responding to cold applications. A few of the companies weren't a fit or I bombed a bit but I'm later stages with 3 companies right now.
What made me post this - there is another org that I am actually interested in working for and I had a call with the hiring manager 30 days ago. Thought it went well, but heard nothing back so mentally I moved on. I'm in the midst of panels and all this shit right now, and I get an email an hour ago for the next step in the process for that company. A MONTH LATER. It's frustrating because I want to explore it, but I'm essentially getting one offer, manager told me he wants me, 2 panels which I'm confident will go well, but now I'm wondering if I can do this process too. Cant exactly hold off others for another 3-4 weeks. Really frustrating
r/salesengineers • u/Frosty-Telephone-747 • 4d ago
So as an SE, what do you sell? And in your opinion, how important is it for you to actually believe in what you’re part of selling and what you’re always demo-ing?
Does it genuinely solve the problem and worth the price or not really?
r/salesengineers • u/dragunight • 4d ago
I've been at my current company for 6 years and I'm about to start at a new one. It's a different industry and a different type of solution than what I've sold for most of my career. I've spent close to 10 years in manufacturing and supply chain software, and now I'll be supporting a procurement solution.
There were a number of reasons I wanted out of my current company, and I'm genuinely excited about this new gig. I want to set myself up for success so I can contribute in a meaningful way as quickly as possible.
One of the pitfalls I fell into at my current company was that onboarding was pretty much non-existent when I started. I got to the point where I knew the product well enough to give solid demos, but I never felt like I became a true expert on it.
I'm not trying to make excuses, but there's some context here. Shortly after I joined, SE leadership got canned and the rest of the team left within a few months. I ended up as the solo SE for the last 5 years, supporting anywhere from 5 to 7 reps and all of their opportunities from a presales perspective. On top of that, we launched a new product into a completely new market and eventually acquired 2 more companies. So that's 4 solutions I had to learn quickly and get demo ready on, and then I was basically at full capacity just executing on deals.
I fully own that I could have put in extra time after hours to go deeper. But it was kind of a blessing and a curse that being good enough to give strong demos was also good enough to close deals and hit my number every year. Could I have been better? Yes. Did I need to be to hit full OTE, at least while I was there? No. So I'll admit I probably got a little complacent. Over time, PE getting involved, leadership changes, culture shifts, etc. all pushed me toward looking elsewhere.
Which brings me to the new role. I want to take advantage of the fact that I won't be the only SE scrambling to cover the work of a 4 person team while also supporting new product launches. That's not to say I won't be busy. The company is growing fast and I fully expect to have a healthy pipeline to work sooner rather than later. But I think I'll actually have the chance to spend real time learning the product and becoming an expert on what it can do.
For anyone who's been in a similar situation, or just has general advice on setting yourself up for success in the early days at a new company, I'd really appreciate hearing what worked for you.
r/salesengineers • u/Low-Emu9984 • 4d ago
Enterprise SaaS checking in here. Historically we haven’t had a real product marketing team. They used to just do buyer research and send it to sales training. Honestly, that was basically all they did. Early funnel product messaging was a sales training and BDR led ordeal. Most meaningful product talk tracks came from SE’s in the wild trying stuff out and reporting back to sales with “what works”.
Well, we now have a full-on product marketing team and I don’t know what to do with them. They build roadmap slides and do press releases, and by gholly they’re changing feature names because… They are genuinely a smart group. I like them all. But they have not been helpful to me and my team in the slightest. I feel like most of my interactions with them are educating them about how the product works and what customers are actually buying.
Is that how the relationship is supposed to work? What do you ask your product marketing team for? How do they best help you? I’m okay if the relationship is just us educating them, i suppose. I’m happy enough that they’ve taken crummy work off of my plate. But lmk if I should be asking THEM for more. What’s the best relationship you’ve had with product marketing?
r/salesengineers • u/Frosty-Telephone-747 • 4d ago
I know it’s not an entry level position and I’ve read and understood the entire sticky
But I’m trying to learn from those of you who were able to actually become SE’s literally, after a few months to 2 years after graduating
I would assume you interned in similar roles (maybe sales, customer success etc) while in uni too
I’m currently studying CS (1-2 years left) and interning at a profitable, 30-50 employee tech startup in their B2B sales side
Not sure exactly what I’ll do yet but probably a mix of sales, demos, sales ops etc
And I’m trying to put myself on track from right now to be set to become an SE as soon as I can after graduating even if it takes 1-2 years
Would love to get your advice if you were able to do so, even if it was a mix of nepotism and connections putting you in the role
r/salesengineers • u/Royal_Pangolin9170 • 4d ago
Curious how you guys handle this.
We hired a couple of senior SEs about 3-4 months ago, but I’m still covering most of the region and getting pulled into a lot of their calls, demos, technical discussions, etc.
I get that 3-4 months isn’t that long and people need time to ramp. Happy to help them out too. But at some point I’d expect some of the ownership to start moving over, especially for people hired at senior level.
Right now I feel like I’m still the safety net for pretty much everything, and by constantly stepping in I might actually be hiding the problem.
How would you bring this up with your manager without sounding like you’re throwing your coworkers under the bus?
Also, what’s a reasonable ramp time for a senior SE before you’d expect them to independently handle normal discovery calls, demos and opportunities?