Simon Edmunds leads international sales development at BeyondTrust, the cybersecurity company specialising in privileged access and identity security. He manages 28 SDRs and BDRs across hubs in Manchester, Frankfurt, Dubai, and Singapore, covering every market outside the United States.

In this episode, Simon and Mike cover what separates the BDRs who progress into AE roles from those who plateau, why the hierarchy myth is one of the most damaging beliefs in B2B GTM, how to hire for will over skill at the top of the funnel, and what a well-designed BDR compensation plan actually looks like. They also get into AI use in the SDR workflow, partner BDRs, and why Simon's Monday morning metric is a Claude project pulling intent signals, not a CRM dashboard.

In this Episode:

• SDR versus BDR: the structural difference and why it matters
• Partner BDRs: using intent data to build brand inside strategic partner organisations
• Hiring for will over skill, and how coachability is tested without asking about it directly
• The 70/15/15 compensation framework and the short/medium/long logic behind it
• Incentives at scale: how to regionalise motivation across four continents
• Career progression: why your number opens the door but your brand with the AEs around you gets you through it
• AI in the SDR stack: ZoomInfo, Sixth Sense, Outreach, Gong, and Claude in practice
• Rapid Fire: Outreach, the hierarchy myth, a Claude intent project, The Multiplier Effect, Problem Prospecting, and Maury Haber

About Simon Edmunds

Simon Edmunds is Senior Manager, International Markets at BeyondTrust, leading a 28-person sales development function across four global hubs. He began his career in graduate recruitment before moving into sales development leadership and has spent over a decade building and coaching the next generation of B2B sales talent in the cybersecurity sector.

Links:

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@TheOutsideSeat
Spotify Channel: https://open.spotify.com/show/033ujY7VMYJiHa40HlycUb?si=dcc0e644f79f4f77
Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-outside-seat-podcast/id1896892470
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theoutsideseat
Simon's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-edmunds/

The Outside Seat is a B2B revenue leadership podcast hosted by Mike Tumalty. New episodes every week.

Episode 11 is supported by Flourish, an early-career B2B sales recruitment and training business. If you are hiring sales talent, look at what they do:
https://info.helloflourish.com/hire-a-sales-exec/

InsideNow: GTM diagnostics and commercial due diligence for B2B SaaS. insidenow.io