What I Know How to Do

Opening European markets from zero

Six markets opened from zero across four companies: France (Kaisa MD, EUR 0-3M ARR), Spain (Kaisa VP Southern Europe), UK/DACH/Nordics (Kaisa VP International Sales), France again (Tapjoy Sales Director, EUR 0-2M ARR). Not managing inherited pipelines -- first hire, first client, first revenue in each case.

This is the rarest and most commercially valuable experience in European expansion. Most senior commercial leaders have managed European markets. Very few have opened them. The skills are different. See the specific hiring criteria at How to hire VP Sales Europe.

Barcelona startup hub design and execution

I have been based in Barcelona for nearly a decade and have operated across the full lifecycle of what it takes to build a commercial team here: EOR vs SL decisions, first hires, Beckham Law applications for relocating executives, coworking to private office transitions, multilingual outbound design, and the specific rhythm of the local startup community including MWC and 4YFN.

This is operational knowledge, not advisory knowledge. See the Barcelona hub guide at Why Barcelona for your European hub, or the failure patterns at How US startups fail in Europe.

VP Sales Europe hiring

I have been on both sides of the VP Sales Europe hire: as the person being hired and as the person hiring others. The most important insight from both sides: the profile that can open a market from zero is fundamentally different from the profile that can manage existing European revenue. Confusing them is the most expensive hiring mistake in European expansion.

Full framework at How to hire VP Sales Europe.

Enterprise SaaS sales across European markets

Enterprise accounts across the full portfolio: Toyota, Allianz, AXA, Richemont and Schibsted at Kaisa. Decathlon, Mastercard and Foot Locker at Allcolibri. Samsung, Havas, Publicis and WPP at Tapjoy. HP, Diesel and HSBC at GroupM. These deals were sold in different languages, to different buying committees, in different regulatory environments. The commercial skill set transfers; the cultural assumptions do not.

Multi-country team design and management

At Kaisa VP International Sales: 15+ people across UK, DACH, Nordics and Southern Europe. Different employment contracts. Different compensation structures. Different management cadences. Different cultural communication norms. The challenge of managing a team distributed across five countries is not a logistics problem -- it is a commercial architecture problem. Who covers what. How pipelines are consolidated. How forecasting works across markets with different cycle velocities.

For the team-building framework, see Building a multi-country European sales team.

Enterprise accounts