Marie Claire you are founder of Saleswomen Unite and Co-lead of Women of SaaS – Copenhagen Hub.

What is the purpose of these communities?

• So inherently these communities exist to bring women together to build their network, to empower them, to share experiences and to meet in person. I actually started Saleswomen Unite primarily to meet people. After Covid, I feel like everything stayed online and the need to bring in person, events and people together is important now more than ever. And why is there a need for communities like yours? Yeah, well, I suppose I created Saleswomen Unite with, you know, it was little selfish reasons, I suppose. So what happened in my career was I was actually in a completely different industry before I got into sales. So I was a ballet dancer previously. Seems a bit of a weird career transition. It was but why I did that career move was I had my second child. Covid happened. So what happened? All the theaters were shut down and I was at home trying to stay in shape with a four month old baby running around my legs and it was near on impossible. And you know, at that point I also thought, are theatres even going to open again? At that point we didn’t know. So I had a big career change and it took a lot of processing for me as well. And I actually landed a job in sales. So I became an SDR and I suppose the rest is history from there. But at that point I felt I lacked a network. I went from one industry to another. I didn’t know anyone. I only knew my small startup that I was part of. And luckily at that point I actually had a female CRO and she was a huge inspiration to me. And I knew just from facts on the Internet that actually out of all Salespeople, I think 26% are female. And those stats get even worse when you think about leadership. It’s something like all leadership positions. It’s only 16% of sales leadership positions are female. Right. There’s women in those roles. It’s 16%, that’s nothing. So I was lucky to have one of those 16% being my leader. And she encouraged me. I actually went to her with this proposal of should I build a community? Because I don’t see one here in Copenhagen. I was looking, I was searching online, is there a community for sales women here? And there wasn’t one. So I created it myself and it wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t have both my CRO at that point, but later on, also at Dreamdata, having my colleagues encouraging me to do it and to start rolling with it. That’s very inspiring. Yeah. And so for the audience also who can join and how do you join? Yeah. So anyone that is for Saleswomen Unite anyone that is a saleswoman in Copenhagen, we are meeting primarily in person. We do plan in the future maybe to do some things online. But the backbone of the community is that we do meet in person. We have amazing speakers coming in. So our last event, actually the CEO of Altinget so that was Anne Marie Kindberg. She came in and she gave a really inspiring talk. So we’re doing things like that. And this is community driven as well. So a lot of our community members find inspiring speakers and then bring them in. And their companies also sponsor the events as well. So we are a nonprofit organization. So for Saleswomen Unite if you’re a saleswoman in any industry, actually. So that’s B2B. B2C would love to chat to you. Because it’s also, you know, a way of learning how different industries do sales as well. But for women of SaaS, that’s slightly different. So it’s a global organization and myself and another Co-lead for the Copenhagen chapter, Jasmine Hansen de Gulzman, we have opened this a few months ago. And this is open to all women that work in the software industry. So it could be you’re working in product, finance, marketing, whatever. If you work for a software company and you’re a woman, you are more than welcome. We also love male allies. I mean, we’re having this conversation today, and I love it because you know, we don’t want women, you know, speaking and shouting to women about this. It needs to be that, you know, guys like yourself recognize that there is there is a problem that needs to be solved here and how can we do it? Yeah, right before we went live here I asked, can my colleagues even join? Yes. You’re like, yeah, absolutely. You can encourage them to join. And that’s really good. Because for example, here at Radiant we have role models in our board, female role models. We have role models in male management and seniors and graduates, students, but not in top leadership, for example. So I can actually encourage my colleagues, female colleagues, to join the community and then get inspired by excellent top leaders like Anne Marie Kinberg that came by Saleswomen unite. That’s impressive. Definitely. What do you feel like, what’s your stance? I mean, we wouldn’t be talking today if you didn’t think it was important, but, you know, you are CEO of Radiant. Are there any things that you try to do? Like, why do you feel like this is an important topic to be talking about? Yeah, I feel it’s important topic because especially in sales, I feel it’s. It’s very male dominated. And I think that most companies and entrepreneurs and business leaders, they actually want a representative pool of candidates also in terms of gender. And the facts remain that it’s not balanced at the moment. So I think a lot of people, including myself, aspire to have a more balanced pool of candidates and employees and colleagues, right. So I think it’s very important that we do different actions on the subject. And the reason why I reach out to you is because you were in my LinkedIn feed and I was inspired and I didn’t even know that there were such communities because it is something that we, as a business. I’m a male entrepreneur, okay. I cannot completely understand how it is to be a woman in sales, right. It’s impossible for me to understand. I have allies around me that can help, etc. But I think that you and the communities are a way to create the awareness that we need in order to be educated on the subject. So that we know that, you know, it’s not balanced as it should be at the moment. And we know that we can do something about it. Even if it’s small, we can do something. And that’s why I reach out to you. Yeah, definitely. And I think there’s some small things that organizations can also do to encourage gender diversity. It could be anything from branding to making sure that your job description is attractive for women. It can be so many small things. But I wonder also what you have done personally from your position to help that in your organization. Yeah. So going back a couple of years ago we had, I think was 14, 15% of our organization were women. And my board member Christina asked me, you know, Joakim we need to do something about it. It’s not a representative pool. And I completely agreed. And I also want to do something about it. And we were aware about the bias since I’m a male entrepreneur also in terms of branding, communication stuff like that. And she proposed that we can set a work group. Joakim ask your female colleagues if they want to contribute, make a difference. It was that simple. And I asked them, look, do you want to join with our board and sit down, work group a couple of times evaluate and then create some suggestions that we can implement at the business here at Radiant to make a change for the positive progress and they made eight, I think it was eight excellent actions. And I evaluated them and I was like, yeah, sure, absolutely. Let’s do it. One of them was to improve our recruitment process in terms of job positioning, language so that it appeals to a broader audience, including a more diverse gender based audience, including women. And it helped. It was a small thing. It didn’t cost me anything. That makes a real change. Yeah, it did. And I think we’re now up to. Well, I know for a fact we are up at 25% representative of females right now in our organization, and we strive to do better. So I think it was a great, simple, easy way to make a change. Even though it seems small, it made a big difference. And I think just asking your female representatives in your organization, how can we change this? Is a huge step, t’s the awareness. It’s also you know, as a, as a leader as a CEO, understanding that you’re aware of what’s happening in your own organization and making sure that you’re. You’re rooting for change to happen. I think it can be multiple things as well. So we actually had a discussion last time about mentorship, but actually sponsorship. So changing it from being a mentorship to, you know, if you think inherently how mentorship happens is usually someone that is a leader mentoring someone that’s an individual contributor Actually, we need sponsorships. We need someone being a sponsor of you internally. So your female employees helping each other, sponsoring each other, saying she’s really ace at her job. How can we make her better? How can we progress her career? I think that’s a really nice thing to have as well. And that can happen with your male colleagues as well. We all need male allies as well, especially within these organizations and communities. It’s not that we females want to be preaching to other women. We need to preach to you guys and say, this is what’s happening. How can we make a difference together? I think that’s a big thing as well. 

And Joakim, you have seen hundreds of sales organizations. What is your experience with the development of gender diversity in sales? And have you done anything yourself to balance the scale? 

• Tough question. Yes. I started my sales career in Finance, right – 2012. Moved into Deloitte, professional services. Looking back 10, 12 years ago, I think it’s progressed for the better, especially in terms of culture. I find it to be sales organization especially within these industries that I work in, to be very male dominated. Luckily I feel that the culture is less male dominated. Still male dominated, but less male dominated. And from a personal experience, I find it to be okay now to address and talk about the subject openly with my colleagues, with you, with my network, it’s not a taboo. And I experienced it to be more of a subject that I felt that I couldn’t actually address the subject ten years ago. Interesting. Yeah. I didn’t feel that it was okay for me because I was not an expert in the subject. I’ve experienced multiple times that, you know, Joakim, you are to hire this amount of X or Y gender. And then I had to execute it. And I felt like I weren’t in a position to question that or to understand why it was like that, why. Those things were in place. Exactly, exactly. Because it felt like, no, it’s not something you can talk about. And I see that sales organization, our clients, they openly address the subject. Ive experienced many times, especially the last two, three years, that they ask questions about, okay, Joakim the team of consultants that we are going to get from Radiant, what percentage of those teams are females. And I’ve even experienced someone that had it as a requirement as well. I’m not saying it’s good or bad. I’m not going to go into that subject. But it’s progressed. Right. For the better, in my opinion. And this makes it easier for us to create awareness about the subject. If it’s okay. Yes. If it’s okay to talk about. I feel it’s completely okay for me to talk about with my colleagues, female colleagues. We have it open as a goal in terms of X amount, percentage of women. We showcase it in our strategy, our current organization. And I feel like it’s easier now to make a change for the better when addressing it so people can be educated. And speaking about being educated, I’m also a business leader. Okay. I want to set the best team. I want to provide the best results for my clients, right. I want to achieve the best results. Right. That’s what I strive to do. And when I read a study from Gong.io, for example. I know you use Gong.io. Yeah, we do. They made a study. 30,000 sales calls were evaluated and they concluded that women are 11% more likely to close win a deal than their counterparts, right. That’s interesting okay, very interesting. I read a study at Harvard Business Review I think was a survey from Exactly. And they also mentioned that females are more likely to close their quota than their male counterparts. Those are facts that we need to get out there so that, you know we have both employees that want. Female employees that wants to move into sales that can be motivated from such numbers, but also business leaders that they can see from facts that it’s a good thing to balance the scale. Definitely seeing both sides of it so attractive for, you know, women to see, well, other women closing and hitting their goal and, you know, being in a really nice financial position and yeah, for business leaders to see that as well as seeing, oh, well, I need to encourage more women to apply for these roles. I need to also promote and make sure that. That women feel comfortable in sales and how to make it more attractive for women to be in sales as well. I think that’s super interesting. And I think awareness is the starting point of that. And I think the more we talk about it, share those numbers, if that’s through social media, if that’s through your brand, whatever you want it to be through your job description, I would recommend, even if you do have females and they’ve been closing and just share that, like, share it on social media, I think it’s a fantastic thing to do, definitely

So to sum up, there is a need for ‘women in sales’ communities to develop and improve the sales profession. And we all have a responsibility to create a diverse work environment?

• Definitely. I think it’s inherently important. Now we’re in 2025. We need to make sure that women have an even seat at the table, not only for women, but for your organization. Women bring different skill sets, different energy than the male counterpart does. If you have a diverse team, it only benefits your organization. Youll have better results. You’ll have a more motivated team, and, you know, you’ll be attracting talent as well. Yeah, yeah, I completely agree. And I think it’s very important to have such communities like saleswomen unite because it will help the individuals, it will create an impact of change, and you also bring the opportunities for business leaders to encourage their colleagues and employees to join such communities. So we absolutely, absolutely do have a responsibility to balance the scale. I still think there are, you know, a lot of way to go especially within sales. I’m just being honest right Definitely. But let’s progress in the right direction and let’s create awareness and education about it. That’s step one. So more people can make a change for the positive. Definitely. And I think sponsoring and being part of these communities can help not only your organization, but your female employees as well, to grow their network. And sorry to put a cheesy kind of quote out there, but I really believe your network is your net worth, and it will just help them to progress in their careers and to grow their professional network as well. And I think that’s inherently important, especially for those that are new into sales as well.