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EP 67Sep 23, 2026· 6 min

Your CRO No Longer Wants a PreSales Department

0:000:00↓ MP3
Why defending the pre/post boundary is the fastest way to look obsolete

Nate's CRO used the word "PreSales" once in a forty-minute quarterly review — to ask why the team is still called that. He and Ava dig into why the pre/post split is an artefact of an older business model, and what to propose before someone proposes it for you.

What Nate and Ava discuss

  • Why SaaS growth from renewals, upsell and cross-sell makes the pre/post boundary an org-chart leftover
  • The ninety-day pilot one of Nate's SE Directors ran after go-live — and Ava's pushback on comp plans and attribution
  • Why the Forward Deployed Engineer wave is an old answer to an old question, and why titles matter less than you think

The move

Put the question on the table yourself: where else in the customer lifecycle does our skill set create the most contribution? Then bring a narrow pilot — one lifecycle moment, ninety days, one number you report back.


🚀 Join the PreSales Leadership Community: serockstars.com/community

🔗 Resources & Links: paths.to/presales

Your hosts

Nate Hargrove

Nate Hargrove
The Seasoned Pragmatist

Ava Vasquez

Ava Vasquez
The Modern Builder

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