The ElevenLabs sales culture (and why inbound is a risk)

This article summarizes an episode of The Peel’s video series featuring Carles Reina, head of GTM of ElevenLabs.

Carles Reina, head of GTM of ElevenLabs / Photo credit: ElevenLabs

ElevenLabs reached a US$1.1 billion valuation after raising a US$80 million Series B round, becoming a unicorn in the AI audio space.

Carles Reina, the company’s head of go-to-market, recently introduced a new framework to manage sales teams and build a pipeline, pushing leaders to review performance publicly instead of keeping feedback behind closed doors.

It achieves this growth by enforcing a rigid financial baseline. Reina believes publicly addressing poor performance offers a clear advantage. By relying on total transparency, the sales team can focus on hitting massive targets and expanding the business.

The cost of unclear expectations

Trying to manage a sales team without clear metrics is costly. By choosing to set extreme quotas from day one, ElevenLabs can quickly weed out reps who cannot keep up with the company’s pace.

“We ask everyone to bring 20 times their base salary,” Reina explains. “That’s your quota. If I pay you US$100k a year, your quota is US$2 million. If you don’t achieve your quota, then you’re going to be out.”

Relying on this unbreakable rule eliminates confusion. The team stops worrying about subjective reviews and starts focusing on the raw numbers needed to survive.

Navigating missed quotas

The decision to enforce such high standards means dealing with hard conversations when reps fall short. To maintain momentum, leadership had to separate those who simply lacked the right skills from those working on longer, more complex deals.

“There are people that truly don’t fit in the company,” Reina notes. “What they get wrong is, fundamentally, [that] they’re not product experts.”

Because the product demands deep technical knowledge, the company has to swiftly cut ties with those who cannot adapt to the fast-paced environment.

“Those guys, unfortunately, we terminate their contracts. We give them a compensation,” Reina adds.

Rewarding long-term builders
Not every miss results in termination, however. Reina explains that the company kept reps who missed the 80% mark if they were clearly laying the groundwork for massive future wins.

“The other percentage of people who don’t get to that 80% [of their quota] are people who are building long-term pipelines,” he explains. “[For example, one rep] is tackling the difficult, challenging industries. We kept that person, and this person absolutely smashed it this year.”

Rethinking performance reviews

Defining the sales baseline